The fish was smaller than the one he had caught yesterday, thin and bony, but Luo Yanxue did not complain.
Food was food.
He cleaned it by the river, using a sharp stone to scrape the scales, then rinsed it in the cold water. His fingers were numb, but his movements were steady. There was a quiet rhythm to the work, almost calming.
After lighting another small fire, he roasted the fish and ate slowly, chewing carefully to make every bite last longer.
As he finished, he noticed the warmth in the ring again.
Not just warmth.
A faint pulse.
Like a heartbeat that did not belong to him.
He stared at the ring on his finger, brows knitting together. "Weird…"
He had no knowledge of artifacts, no concept of hidden realms or sealed worlds. In his mind, this was simply an ancient piece of jewelry—perhaps something valuable, perhaps cursed, perhaps just strange.
Still, curiosity stirred.
He closed his eyes for a moment, focusing on the sensation. The warmth seemed to spread, faintly, into his palm.
Then—
His vision darkened.
Not black.
Grey.
Endless grey.
When he opened his eyes again, the river, the forest, and the sky were gone.
He stood on cracked, barren land under a colorless sky. No sun. No clouds. No wind. The air was still, heavy with silence.
His heart skipped a beat.
"What… is this place?"
His voice echoed faintly, swallowed by the emptiness.
The ground stretched as far as he could see, lifeless and dry, like a world that had never known rain. Yet in the very center of this desolation, a small patch of soil was darker than the rest, faintly moist.
And from it, a tiny green sprout had emerged.
So small.
So fragile.
Yet it was the only sign of life in this boundless void.
Luo Yanxue stood frozen, mind racing.
A dream?
A hallucination from hunger?
Or something far stranger?
He knelt and touched the soil. It was real. Cool. Slightly damp.
Before he could think further, the world wavered.
Light twisted.
And in the next instant, he was back by the river, the crackling fire before him, the forest unchanged.
Only the ring on his finger felt warmer than ever.
His breathing was uneven.
"…So I'm not in a normal world anymore," he whispered.
He did not know what that grey land was.
He did not know what the ring truly contained.
But deep inside, a quiet certainty took root:
His second life would never be ordinary.