Dark Continent.
This was Ging's explanation for the resurrection he had just witnessed, the phenomenon of a different soul seizing a body before his eyes.
It was a world beyond the world, a place someone like him dreamed of reaching.
The ultimate destination of every ambition.
There, everything that did not exist here could be found.
Any other possibility had been ruled out the instant he watched this man come back to life.
He yearned for the Dark Continent, for every unknown thing it held.
Naturally, he also wanted to understand the person in front of him, whose soul most likely hailed from that place.
This world was vast. Other "lake-island" worlds like the one they stood on probably existed elsewhere.
Yes, the presently known world, what most ordinary people called "the world," was merely a lake dotted with islands at its center.
Beyond that lake lay a continent, the true world.
Compared with it, the present human world was insignificant.
Within this lake, humanity's realm sat a little too far from the real one.
It sounded like the distance between an island and the shore, yet on a planetary scale that short gap was already impossibly remote for humankind, utterly out of reach.
And beyond humanity's endless seas lay a territory shrouded in the unknown.
Its name: Dark Continent.
Humans had set foot there before, and things from that land had drifted across the ocean.
According to the ruins he had excavated, humanity's ancestors might even have been exiled from there.
He wanted to go, yet peculiar circumstances prevented him for the moment.
But he was making preparations, and the man in front of him might become one of them.
Even if every guess proved wrong, turning the unknown into the known would still be a gain.
Ging looked at him, beaming confidently. "Tell me whatever you feel you can, lies included. I won't mind."
But you will also teach me a lesson with that mind-reading trick of yours called observation, Kevin thought.
He nodded silently and began to sort his thoughts.
Deception was off the table. The only choice was what to reveal.
The man opposite had already stated the best option.
Whatever he did might give something away, but doing nothing was worse.
"Fine. This body isn't originally mine. My last memory is dying in a traffic accident.
A truck ran me over head-on. There was no way I survived that."
Ging had somehow ended up sitting cross-legged in front of Kevin, one elbow on a knee, chin in hand.
Traffic accident. Truck. He filed the key words away for analysis.
"Words and language seem to awaken this body's memories the moment you speak. The rest comes in fragments, like an amnesiac needing triggers to recall."
"Mm." Ging nodded. It sounded logical.
Then, abruptly, "Where were you from originally?"
"Originally? I… suppose another world. I'm not sure."
Kevin's reply came out stiff.
Ging studied him. "I get it. Let's leave it there. Trust hasn't been built yet."
He stood and brushed himself off. He already had the information he wanted.
Whether he could later verify Kevin's truth was irrelevant. Many things cannot be judged by true or false alone.
Reaching a conclusion too early would only cloud future judgment.
This was enough. The rest could come step by step.
He lifted the rugged laptop from the table and handed it to Kevin. "You must have plenty you want to know. Can you use a computer?"
Kevin nodded and took it.
Ging settled into a nearby chair, pulled a magazine from his pack, and started reading.
Without looking up, he said, "Ask if something's unclear. Call it payment."
Kevin did not refuse. He urgently needed to learn about this world.
He opened the machine.
The thick notebook looked almost like a satellite rig. The layout differed little from what he was used to, only the script was unfamiliar.
He quickly figured it out and began searching for answers.
First, a map. The world held five continents, and no one had yet reached its edge, let alone circled it.
The more he learned, the more different the two worlds seemed.
Yet the current era felt oddly similar to the one he remembered.
1994.
Even the technology mirrored his own.
"Why did you kill me? I mean, this body's original owner?" Kevin asked suddenly.
Without raising his eyes, Ging replied, "Because you were a poacher. This area was a special-species reserve set up by my partners and me."
So the original "I" had been a criminal.
Kevin's face paled. "Then I'm a criminal? This identity belongs to a wanted man?"
The outburst made Ging look up. He regarded Kevin thoughtfully.
"Not exactly. You were a poacher, but a clever one. Well hidden.
You preferred paying others to do the dirty work. On paper you're a renowned pharmacist."
"Oh… good." Kevin exhaled. That was a relief.
He could not stomach arriving in the body of a hunted criminal. That would only worsen an already grim situation.
"So where am I now?"
"In the Kukan'yu Kingdom's nature reserve, Bisukan Forest Park. We're on the border. The reserve spans multiple climate zones and several countries."
Kukan'yu Kingdom. He had seen the name on his ID and online, one of the V5.
The V5 were this world's equivalent of the UN Security Council.
An uncanny parallel.
And he was deep inside a reserve. Getting out alone would be impossible.
Still, he trusted his own abilities.
Just then,
Ging pulled a phone-like device from his pocket.
Kevin noted its brick-like bulk, smaller than a brick phone yet unmistakably nineties.
Ging glanced at the screen, then at Kevin.
"Your partners are here. Feel like meeting them?"
"What partners? Poachers?"
Ging nodded.
Kevin almost refused, but Ging cut in. "Seeing them might jog your memory. Either way, it helps.
And don't worry about safety. Trust me."
Since Ging put it that way, and Kevin wanted to understand those fragmented, violent memories—
"All right. But fair warning, I don't really fight. Maybe scrapping with punks, that's it."
Then he saw a pistol tossed his way.