Caw… caw… caw…
The raucous cries of crows jolted the young woman awake.
She lay face-down in the wild grass beneath a tree. With a sharp intake of breath, she forced herself up, her body aching and heavy as if it were screaming in protest. But as she sat up, the sight before her froze her heart.
“Where… where am I?”
She shook her throbbing head, trying to clear the fog, and forced her eyes open wide.
Pitch-black darkness swallowed her surroundings. The place was utterly desolate—no streetlamps, no signs of the park that should have been there. Under the faint, pale moonlight, the shadows of gnarled branches clawed at the ground like skeletal fingers.
The only sounds piercing the silence were the howling wind and the intermittent, bone-chilling caws of crows, echoing one after another.
Caw… caw…
The oppressive atmosphere sent a shiver down her spine. She curled her body inward, hugging herself as she rubbed her arms vigorously, trying to soothe the goosebumps erupting across her skin.
Something’s wrong. Everything is wrong.
This was not Flower Sea Park, where she had fallen asleep the night before. And the ground beneath her was certainly not the expensive camping gear she had spent over a thousand yuan on.
The tent above her was gone. The nightlight beside her had vanished. Even the air mattress she’d been sleeping on had disappeared without a trace.
I was just camping in the city’s Flower Sea Park, she thought. How could the world change so drastically while I slept? How did a public park turn into a desolate wilderness?
A wave of groundless terror washed over her. She fought to keep her composure, trying to rationalize the situation. Calm down, Yu Fanfan. This has to be a prank. Someone must have dragged me here while I was asleep.
Or maybe I’m a sleepwalker?
It couldn’t be… I didn’t just get transported to another world, did I?
She forced a dry, bitter laugh, trying to rally her spirits. You’re fine, Yu Fanfan. Don’t be afraid. No matter what happens, through thick or thin, you have to stay calm!
The only answer she received was from the branches above. The crows flapped their wings, their bright, beady eyes fixed on her as they cawed in unison.
Caw… caw… caw…
The silent night, the desolate wilderness, this exact scene…
Yu Fanfan’s hair stood on end. Her mind raced, uncontrollably conjuring images from horror movies—the kind where crows always heralded the arrival of something monstrous.
She shrank back, terrified that a creature would emerge from the darkness to test her nerves. Swallowing hard, she curled herself into a tight ball and began to recite the Twenty-Four Core Socialist Values, a desperate mantra to ward off the unknown:
“Prosperity, Democracy, Civility, Harmony, Freedom, Equality, Justice, Rule of Law, Patriotism, Dedication, Integrity, Friendliness…”
Whether the mantra worked or she had simply calmed herself through sheer force of will, no monsters leaped from the shadows. As she grew accustomed to the bone-chilling caws of the crows, Yu Fanfan’s panic gradually subsided.
“Once it’s light,” she muttered, “I’m going to find out which bastard played this prank on me. They’d better hope I don’t catch them, or else…”
Yu Fanfan ground her teeth in frustration. Just as she had finally let her guard down, a rustling sound erupted from the darkness.
The mental fortitude she’d just built crumbled in an instant. Her adrenaline spiked, her spine stiffened, and she practically jumped out of her skin.
In the pitch-black night, she peeked left and right like a terrified little mouse, her face a mask of wary desperation. “Who’s there? Who’s there?”
Swish, swish. Rustle, rustle.
She strained to see, her eyes scanning every movement in the shadows.
About a hundred meters ahead, bathed in the pale moonlight, the bushes were swaying—not from the wind, but from something moving through them, closing in on her.
Her heart hammered against her ribs, threatening to leap out of her throat.
The unknown is the most terrifying, they always said. Your imagination will kill you. All the monstrous images she had just suppressed flooded back into her mind. A cold sweat broke out across her back as she stared, wide-eyed, at the shifting bushes.
Closer. Closer. Closer!
Now!
Before Yu Fanfan could even brace herself, the “monster” causing the commotion in the bushes burst into view.
She let out a long sigh of relief. “Phew! It’s not a demon or a ghost! Dammit, that scared the life out of me…”
She clutched her chest, trying to calm her racing heart. I am never doing this again, she vowed. Never.
But before she could even finish her thought, her gaze swept back to the creature. Its eyes glowed with a malevolent green light, locked onto her. The relief died in her throat, replaced by a fresh wave of terror.
“Holy shit, it’s a wolf!”
And not just any wolf—it was a massive beast with glowing eyes, charging straight at her.
Yu Fanfan, who had only ever seen wolves in a zoo, didn’t stop to wonder how one could be here. She turned and bolted, her mind racing as she tried to recall every scrap of information she knew about wolf behavior.
She needed to find something solid to put her back against—something that would protect her rear—before she could even think about a fight to the death with this abnormally large wolf.
Don’t be afraid. It’s just a lone wolf, not a pack. You can do this, Yu Fanfan. You can do this!
As she sprinted, Yu Fanfan scanned her surroundings, searching for any cover that could offer her a sliver of protection. At the same time, she desperately kept an eye out for a weapon, any weapon, that might save her life.
But the heavens seemed determined to mock her. Just as she spotted a massive tree with a wide trunk—perfect for guarding her back—a flash of hope crossed her face. She lunged toward it, but in the pitch-blackness and her blind haste, her toe caught a protruding rock.
Thwack!
She stumbled, her feet tangling, and slammed hard onto her back.
“Ah!”
The pain was excruciating. It felt like her nose had been broken. Spitting out the sand and dirt that had filled her mouth, Yu Fanfan ignored the ache in her body and scrambled to get back on her feet.
But it was too late. Wolves ran faster than humans.
Desperate and hearing the wolf’s ragged breath closing in, Yu Fanfan refused to just lie there and wait for death. Her hands scrambled wildly across the ground, and in the final moments, her fingers closed around a dead branch, about the thickness of two thumbs.
She seized it without a second thought. As the foul wind of the wolf’s attack swept toward her, she mustered all her strength into her half-risen body and swung the branch backward, blindly, with all her might.
“Aaaaaah!” she screamed, fighting for her life.
Her name was Yu Fanfan. She had just turned twenty-five. She had spent her entire life devoted to her studies, then to her research on agricultural issues, spending her days in the Seedling and Fertilizer Land Laboratory. She’d never even had a boyfriend. Was she really going to die like this? In such a humiliating, gruesome way? Her body would probably be torn to shreds.
In this desperate moment, Yu Fanfan was consumed by regret. She regretted her own past rebellion and disobedience. She could already imagine the grief of her parents—those who had a harsh way of speaking but soft hearts, who had repeatedly urged her to return home and take over the family’s traditional Chinese medicine clinic. How heartbroken would they be to find her reduced to a mangled heap of flesh?
No, I refuse to die!
A fierce resolve surged within Yu Fanfan. She swung the branch with newfound strength, her strikes whistling through the air. Behind her, the wolf whimpered in pain.
Seizing the moment, she scrambled to her feet, her eyes locked on the massive creature now charging at her, its roar a menacing challenge. She ignored its bared fangs and the drool dripping from its maw. Instead, she launched herself forward in a desperate attack.
“You beast! I’ll kill you! I’ll kill you!” she screamed, raining blows down on its midsection. They said wolves had iron legs but soft bellies—she aimed for the waist.
Woof, woof, woof-woof-woof…
The wolf-dog was a solitary predator, more powerful than any Wolf King, ruling a vast territory of its own.
It had sensed an intruder tonight and rushed from far away to investigate. When it found the intruder was a two-legged beast, it hadn’t even decided whether to chase it away or kill it. Yet, the creature had started fleeing in a panicked frenzy, as if seized by a fit.
Being a wolf-dog, it lived among the mountain’s wild beasts every day. Its mother had always spoken of “two-legged beasts” as strange creatures, and the wolf-dog had grown curious about them.
When it saw the creature fleeing in such a panic, it had instinctively followed, hoping to witness a little commotion.
Turns out, it was a terrible mistake.
This two-legged beast is utterly vicious! It wasn’t even half as strong or majestic as the wolf-dog, yet it was wielding a measly stick and had nearly broken its back!
“Woof! Woof! Woof-woof-woof!” This is outrageous!
Yu Fanfan, still locked in her fighting frenzy, suddenly snapped back to reality at the sound of the continuous barking. Her movements faltered, a sense of wrongness washing over her.
Wait, don’t wolves howl? Is this… not a wolf?
The moment she lowered her defenses, the “vicious dog” decided it had had enough. Driven by a need to avenge its injured back, it lunged forward to teach the two-legged beast a lesson.
As the massive black shadow charged again, Yu Fanfan’s instincts took over. Without thinking, she thrust her foot upward in a powerful kick.
Woof—OWW!
A shrill yelp tore through the air. Yu Fanfan watched as the charging black shape, struck by her kick, was sent hurtling backward through the air. It flew a tremendous distance before crashing with a dull thud against a jagged rock, finally halting its backward flight.
“Woof-woof-woof—AWOOO!”
The wolf-dog let out another shrill, pained yelp. Its massive body shuddered, and it tried to scramble back to its feet for another round. But after a shaky stumble, it collapsed back to the ground, defeated. Was it… injured?
Yu Fanfan looked at the miserable creature in the distance, then down at her own foot.
“That’s not right,” she muttered. “That kind of power… it’s not normal. Am I really this strong?”
She raised her hands, turning them over in the pale moonlight. Her eyes widened as she stared at the sight before her.
“I… I… This isn’t my body!”
She had used these hands for twenty-five years. There was no way she could be mistaken about her own hands!
Oh my god! This isn’t a prank? Did I really just go camping and somehow transmigrate into a new body?!
How else could she explain all the bizarre things happening around her?
The strange surroundings.
The strange dog.
The strange body.
“No, no, no,” she stammered, “I need to calm down. I need to think this through…”
Ignoring the whimpering dog, Yu Fanfan slapped her throbbing, dizzy head in frustration. She began to spin in circles, her mind racing as she desperately tried to recall what had happened before she fell asleep.
She remembered…
Oh, right!
Her research had achieved a major breakthrough recently. After a celebratory banquet, her supervisor had granted her a whole week off.
Her hometown was thousands of miles away from the city where she worked. Though transportation was convenient—the high-speed rail took less than half a day to reach the city nearest her hometown, and the transfer to her county took only two hours—her father could also drive up to the city to get her. It was an easy trip, and she had been longing to go back.
However, with the global pandemic raging, she had to give up this precious holiday for the sake of safety and in compliance with national policies. Though the situation was not severe in her country, she was forced to miss the rare chance for a reunion.
She could only video call her parents, promising them that she would definitely return home for the Lunar New Year.