That human-faced mouth was full of sharp fangs. With one bite, it tore off a large chunk of bloody flesh. The monster swallowed the flesh whole, then continued to bite at William Clark's leg.

William Clark could only endure the biting like a lamb waiting to be slaughtered. Each bite made William Clark scream even more miserably, but in the face of the monster, such wails were meaningless. In just a few bites, the flesh on William Clark's thigh was almost completely torn away. The monster let out a hissing sound and bit down on his thigh bone again, continuing to tear and pull backward, trying to drag William Clark out of the hollow.

"Die, die die die die..."

Suddenly, William Clark roared furiously. In the midst of extreme terror, a kind of rage erupted—an utterly irrational rage.

He gave up curling up and smashed the stone in his hand hard at the monster's head. Whether by coincidence or not, the sharp edge of the stone struck directly at the monster's eyeball.

William Clark's first sensation was that it hit something like rubber, but the monster's eyeball was not actually rubber, and this blow really pierced its eye.

The monster immediately tried to retreat, but for some reason, it still clamped down hard on William Clark's thigh bone. William Clark's arm happened to be wedged against a steel bar. Although the monster was much stronger than William Clark, in this posture of pulling its head back, it couldn't use its full strength. As a result, its head couldn't retract completely, while William Clark gripped the steel bar with one hand and, with the other, frantically smashed the stone at the monster's forehead and eye.

Once, twice, ten times, a hundred times...

William Clark himself didn't know how many times he struck. His lower body was already completely numb, and the arm he used to smash the monster's head felt dislocated, his five fingers swollen like little radishes. Yet he didn't stop for a moment, just kept crazily pounding the monster's head. Finally, after who knows how long, the monster loosened its jaws, trying to pull back, its mouth still making noises.

At this point, William Clark didn't know if he had lost his mind or what, but he suddenly reached out, thrusting his fingers into the monster's ruptured eyeball, digging and tearing with all his might. At the same time, he recklessly lifted his upper body and bit down on the monster's other eyeball.

The monster's roar grew louder, but its retreat slowed. Gradually, the monster stopped moving, stuck at the entrance of the hollow, while William Clark, like a monster himself, kept howling and biting at the monster's head, frantically jabbing his fingers deep into its eyes.

During this process, William Clark vaguely saw some white light particles emerging from the monster's body. Most of the particles dissipated in the air, but a small portion landed on William Clark's skin and in his mouth.

No one knew how much time passed. William Clark's voice had become so hoarse he couldn't make a sound, and his movements grew stiff and weak. At this moment, William Clark once again sensed the opportunity to traverse. It's hard to describe exactly—he just knew in his heart that he could cross over again. Without hesitation, he immediately initiated the traversal.

The next second, William Clark was back in that vegetative state—his body without any sensation, unable to move, unable to express himself, surrounded only by darkness and faint sounds, and the excruciating pain of his ruined body transformed into boundless exhaustion and weakness.

In less than an instant, William Clark finally blissfully lost consciousness.

(End of this chapter)

Chapter Five: Has the Soul Grown Stronger?

William Clark woke up.

Ever since becoming a vegetative patient, he actually no longer had the function of sleep.

In this vegetative state, he couldn't feel anything, only endless darkness. Fortunately, he could still hear sounds from the outside world, or he might have already been driven mad by this situation.

William Clark was very grateful that he could still traverse back. It was simply unbelievable.

You have to understand, the addict's body he crossed into had already died for sure. Now, he should be something like a soul in the afterlife.

(But I was a soul traveler to begin with—my body is lying in the hospital, so even if the body I crossed into died, it's not unacceptable for my soul to traverse back. What I need to consider now is: if I traverse to another world again, will I appear directly in the afterlife as a soul, or will I possess another living person's body?)

After waking up, William Clark gradually began to ponder the world he had traversed to.

That other world was the future, the year 2028, and there seemed to be some kind of major illness there.

In the afterlife, he had brief exchanges with a white police officer and a black homeless man. From what they said, the supernatural events he encountered in the slum apartment were not unique—similar things were happening everywhere. Monsters, ghosts, curses, and the like were rampant, to the point that both the government and the public were fully aware.

And the afterlife—was it really the afterlife?