Otherworld, Primordial Continent, Southern Wilderness Mountain Range.
"Xuan, hold on, we can escape soon."
In a daze, Jiang Xuan heard a girl's voice beside his ear. He struggled to open his eyes and saw the towering ancient trees and sprawling old vines of a primitive forest.
Jiang Xuan found himself lying on the back of a girl who was running quickly, making him, already feeling dizzy, very uncomfortable with the jolts.
At the same time, a continuous stabbing pain came from his chest, and it was obviously bleeding. He must have been seriously injured, which made the dizzy Jiang Xuan close his eyes.
After an unknown amount of time, the panting girl finally stopped running and placed him under a large tree.
"Xuan, open your eyes and look at me, don't scare your sister."
The girl's call sounded beside his ear, and Jiang Xuan struggled to open his eyes again, seeing a girl wearing beast hide clothing, looking panicked.
Where is this? Who are you?
Jiang Xuan wanted to ask, but he found himself too weak to speak.
"Wait here for me, I'll find herbs to stop your bleeding."
The girl hurriedly ran away, leaving the immobile Jiang Xuan lying on the ground, staring at the unfamiliar world and smelling the strange mix of grass and blood.
What's going on?
Jiang Xuan remembered clearly that he was just working late into the night, fell asleep, and somehow ended up here. Is this a dream?
Suddenly, he felt a dizzying whirl and a flood of information was poured into his mind.
After a while, he finally regained composure and digested the information.
Firstly, he had crossed dimensions, arriving in a highly dangerous primordial world.
The original body was a twelve-year-old boy named "Xuan," a member of a primitive small tribe, and the girl was his sister, Chi Shao, older by one year.
Primitive people named casually, taking whatever came to mind.
"Xuan" represented dark-red in the tribe, symbolizing string, as the character resembled woven string.
Chi Shao, on the other hand, is just the name of a herb, without other meanings.
Additionally, their tribe was just defeated by a hostile tribe, and their parents sacrificed themselves to help Chi Shao and Xuan escape.
In the fight, Xuan was stabbed by the enemy's Mao and Chi Shao carried him while escaping.
Halfway through, Xuan succumbed to his injuries and died, coincidentally at the same time Jiang Xuan crossed over and inherited everything.
The mysterious power of crossing over temporarily saved his life, but if the bleeding couldn't be stopped or the wound got seriously infected, he would still die.
In this dire situation, Jiang Xuan was powerless to complain, and now the most important thing was how to save his own life.
"Rustle rustle rustle..."
At this moment, Jiang Xuan suddenly heard a continuous sound. He turned his head, his face stiffened, and a look of terror appeared in his eyes.
He saw a giant centipede over half a meter in length, seemingly attracted by the scent of blood, quickly crawling toward him.
The centipede was entirely red, larger than any centipede he had ever seen before, with a body like iron armor, cold eyes, sharp mandibles, and hook-like many legs, which sent chills down his spine.
It's over, it's over. Could he die right after crossing over?
Jiang Xuan watched the hideous centipede crawl closer, its venomous jaws opening and closing constantly. As soon as it got close, it would sting Jiang Xuan and inject venom, at which point Jiang Xuan would surely die!
"No...no..."
Jiang Xuan felt his blood almost freeze as he uttered weak sounds, unable to stop the centipede from getting closer.
Just when Jiang Xuan was about to despair, suddenly, a short spear flew with a "swish," piercing into the centipede's back, pinning it firmly to the ground.
By this point, the enormous centipede was less than thirty centimeters from Jiang Xuan; had the spear been a bit slower, he would have been doomed.
"Xuan, are you alright?"
Chi Shao hurriedly ran over, holding a handful of herbs in her hand.
She walked to the centipede impaled by the short spear, ignored its writhing body, and accurately stepped on the centipede's head, pulling out a sharp stone knife from her waist and slicing off the centipede's head in one motion.
"Whew..."
Jiang Xuan let out a long sigh, temporarily saving his life, though he was really scared to death earlier.
The centipede's body continued to twitch slightly but could no longer sting.
Gratefully, Jiang Xuan looked at Chi Shao, thankful that this sister saved his life.
"Let me apply some medicine on you first."
Chi Shao put the herbs into her mouth, chewing them quickly.
After thoroughly chewing the herbal remedy, she undid Jiang Xuan's beast hide clothing and applied the chewed herbs to his wound.
Strangely enough, as soon as the herbs were applied, Jiang Xuan felt a cool sensation on his wound, and the bleeding noticeably began to slow down.
Chi Shao then opened the beast hide bag hanging from her waist, took out a white spider web resembling cotton cloth, and covered the wound along with the herbs, then helped him put on his beast hide clothing.
"It's not safe here. Sister will take you to find a safer place."
After tending to Jiang Xuan's wound, Chi Shao placed the beheaded giant centipede into the beast hide bag, then hoisted Jiang Xuan onto her back and resumed their run.
Along the way, Jiang Xuan saw many creatures and plants that made his skin crawl.
For instance, spiders as large as washbasins, scorpions the size of watermelons, mantises that could cut through tree branches as thick as an arm, and so on...
Even the plants were not to be trifled with.
Jiang Xuan witnessed firsthand as a bird approached a brilliantly colored flower, only for the barbed petals to snap shut, turning the bird into fertilizer.
If he were watching a documentary, Jiang Xuan would surely find these creatures and plants fascinating, but being in the midst of it all, he felt only fear.
The Primitive Forest of this world was extremely dangerous. A slight mishap might cost you your life.
Chi Shao's endurance was beyond Jiang Xuan's imagination.
She carried him for three to four hours, avoiding various dangers along the way, yet her pace never slowed, and her breathing remained steady.
Not until dusk did Chi Shao find a cave, finally allowing herself a sigh of relief.
The cave was not deep, and there was plenty of dry wood inside, with some ashes and charcoal on the ground, clearly indicating someone had once made a fire here.
There was also a pile of dry grass on the ground. Chi Shao first turned over the dry grass and meticulously checked it for hidden venomous creatures before spreading it out and laying Jiang Xuan on top.
"It's getting dark; I'll start a fire first."
Chi Shao found a hard stick and a softer piece of wood with a groove from the pile of dry wood.
Using the Stone Knife, she sharpened one end of the stick, placed it in the groove of the wood, and began to rub rapidly.
Jiang Xuan, who had watched several survival programs in his past life, knew this was called the fire-plow method, creating fire by friction, generating heat to spark a flame and light a fire.
As Chi Shao rubbed, she explained to Jiang Xuan: "When I used to go hunting with the Hunting Team, if we couldn't return by nightfall, we would stay here. There are several places like this."
"Scrape, scrape, scrape..."
Under Chi Shao's friction, many fine wood shavings formed in the groove of the wood, and the end of the stick became charred.
A wisp of smoke rose up. Chi Shao set aside the stick, cupped the piece of wood in her hands, and blew gently into it.
A spark quickly ignited the fine wood shavings, forming a kindling.
Chi Shao grabbed a handful of dry moss, kneaded it into a large ball, then used the Stone Knife to transfer the spark into the dry moss, blowing gently.
The moss emitted a thick smoke before suddenly bursting into flames.
With keen eyes and quick hands, Chi Shao placed the burning moss on the ground, adding small dry branches on top. Once they caught fire, she added larger dry branches.
Very soon, a fire was roaring, illuminating the cave.
Chi Shao went outside the cave, found a fresh branch, and shaved off the forks and bark with the Stone Knife. Returning inside, she took the half-meter-long centipede from the beast hide bag, skewered it whole with the branch, and placed it by the fire to roast.
The centipede was poisonous when alive, but once roasted, it became non-toxic and edible.
The centipede's shell crackled with "pop, pop, pop" sounds, and under the intense heat, its meat soon emitted a savory aroma.
After the giant centipede was thoroughly roasted, Chi Shao peeled off the shell, tore off pieces of centipede meat, and held them to Jiang Xuan's mouth: "Eat up. The more you eat, the faster your wound will heal."
Jiang Xuan, already famished from being injured and not having eaten all day, ignored whether it was centipede or something else as the aroma hit him, and opened his mouth to eat.
Swallowing half a centipede, Jiang Xuan felt as if he'd come back to life.
"You... eat too..." Jiang Xuan said with difficulty, speaking the tribal language.
Chi Shao nodded with a smile and ate the remaining centipede meat herself. She needed to maintain her strength to better protect Jiang Xuan.
After finishing the centipede meat, Chi Shao gave Jiang Xuan some water, changed his dressing, and gathered many thick dry branches to block the entrance of the cave, in case any wild beasts intruded in the middle of the night.
Once everything was done, Chi Shao sat by the fire, with Jiang Xuan lying on the pile of dry grass, the wood crackling and popping as it burned.
Busy as they were, they hadn't had time to think much.
Now that they were idle, emotions surged all at once.
Staring at the flickering flames, Chi Shao murmured softly, "The tribe is gone, what are we going to do from now on..."
Jiang Xuan struggled to speak: "If... if it comes to it, we... we will rebuild a tribe."
Chi Shao smiled faintly but said nothing.
In this perilous Primitive Forest, establishing a tribe with just the two of them would not be easy, not at all.