As the panic reached its peak, reason finally clawed its way back.
Wang Chen sucked in a sharp, uneven breath, forcing the air deep into his lungs as if it might anchor his spiraling thoughts. His heart was still pounding violently, each beat echoing in his ears like a war drum, but he clenched his teeth and held on.
"Now… the situation might not be as bad as I think it is…"
The words sounded weak even to him, but repeating them helped. Slowly, painfully, his breathing steadied. A long, exhausted sigh escaped his lips once he finally regained a semblance of control.
Yet no matter how hard he tried, the vision from moments ago refused to fade.
Again and again, it replayed in his mind.
Just a short while earlier, it was as if his consciousness had been torn away from reality and cast into an entirely different world—one so vast that even his cultivated mind struggled to comprehend it.
He had seen a man.
No—something wearing the shape of a man.
