Lost Continent

Episode 2

But no. She was fine. Just as she had judged at first, she hadn’t suffered any other unexpected injuries. She secretly let out a sigh of relief, and then, without realizing it, fell asleep.

When Yang Fan woke up, she didn’t know if she had just passed out. She could already see the inside of the stone cave clearly.

He wasn’t there. When she didn’t see him, Yang Fan’s first thought was to run away.

She slowly sat up. In the dim light of the stone cave, she couldn’t see what she looked like now, but she had no clothes, and she didn’t know where her shoes had gone.

Yang Fan began to consider the possibility of escaping without clothes.

She propped up her weak legs and walked to the cave entrance. The stone cave was about as big as a classroom in her university. Aside from the raised platform and grass mat that took up a third of the cave, there was nothing else.

She couldn’t remember clearly, but it seemed animals never kept food in their nests. Their nests were only for raising their young.

Yang Fan suddenly stiffened. She thought she had found the reason the monster had suddenly done that to her. Maybe that was also why he had brought her back.

She had gone to the supermarket to buy sanitary pads because her period was going to start in a couple of days.

Yang Fan tried to look at this as rationally as possible. If it weren’t for this, maybe the monster would have treated her as food the moment he saw her, instead of as a female in heat?

The thought flashed through her mind, and then she decided she should still leave as soon as possible. Although she vaguely felt that after leaving, unable to protect herself and not knowing where she was, she would be in even more danger.

She crawled out of the cave entrance, but she misjudged the distance. She had been carried in on his shoulder and stuffed in, so she thought the entrance was very close to the ground. But when she went out headfirst, she realized the entrance was at least a meter above the ground.

She fell out. Seeing herself completely naked in the sunlight felt awful. She instinctively curled up to cover herself. She once again saw the strange scenery around her. This was clearly the highest slope nearby, and she could see most of the surrounding landscape.

The slope she was on was covered with huge rocks, and in the distance was a forest. She knew that was the forest she had come from.

She squatted on the ground with her back against the huge rock. Her mind was a mess. She should stand up and run, but which direction should she run? If she needed help, was there anyone here who could help her?

She couldn’t run back into the forest. It was even more dangerous there. And judging by the distance, it would probably take her a day to reach the edge of the forest. She had traveled and climbed mountains before, so she knew places that looked close could take an unimaginable amount of time to reach.

The longer time went on, the more afraid she became. She thought that no matter where the monster had gone, he could very well come back the next second.

She gathered her courage, stood up, went around the rock, and fled from behind it. At first she only dared to crouch low and jog, but she kept telling herself there was no one here, so she began to straighten up and run with big strides. No matter how much the rocks on the ground hurt her feet, she ignored it.

She guessed the soles of her feet must be cut. Every step sent a sharp pain. But “run” was the only thing she could think about now.

She didn’t stop until she was tired from running. She gasped a couple of breaths and kept running. Her lungs stung from breathing so hard, and her legs were as heavy as stone, but she didn’t dare stop.

The sun kept shining overhead. She occasionally looked up at the sun and guessed that she might still be on Earth? Maybe if she went a little farther, she would see signs of people. Maybe that monster was just an ordinary monster, and as long as she found a town, she wouldn’t be afraid anymore.

The sunlight wasn’t strong, like the sun in winter. But she didn’t feel cold, and there was no wind. She felt the current weather was more like summer, the season when it was least likely to be cold.

She didn’t know how long she had been running, but her rest periods were getting longer and longer, and she could run less and less. Finally she stopped and looked back, and found she couldn’t see the monster’s stone cave anymore. Did that mean she had run far enough?

She found the shaded side of a rock and squatted down. She couldn’t sit on the ground. Although she was in a lot of pain and very tired, she could only force herself to squat and rest.

Slowly, she knelt down and sat on her own feet, leaning against the rock warmed by the sun, trying to rest as much as possible. She closed her eyes and felt so tired she was about to fall asleep.

Then she was grabbed around the waist and lifted up.

She let out a short cry of surprise, then quickly choked the sound back in her throat.

It was him. He had found her.

Would he be angry? Would he hurt her?

She looked at him in panic, but he didn’t seem to have any reaction. Wasn’t he angry that she had run away?

He lifted her onto his shoulder and started running back. After what had just happened, Yang Fan once again became an obedient prey. She didn’t make a sound and didn’t resist.

The distance she had run with all her strength took him only a very short time to cover back to the cave entrance—maybe less than five minutes. This time he didn’t stuff her into the cave. Instead, he carried her around to the other side, where dry firewood was set up and huge chunks of meat were roasting over the fire.

He put her on the ground, picked up the roasted meat, tore off half, and handed it to her.

Yang Fan took it. That half chunk of meat was as big as a watermelon, at least five or six jin, enough to stuff two of her to death. The meat was still sizzling and dripping oil, and it was very hot. The moment she took it, she knew her palms would definitely blister, but she didn’t dare not take it.

He was still roasting the other half. Then he looked up at her, walked over, and took the meat from her hands. He tore off a small piece, handed it to her, and watched her eat.

Yang Fan stuffed the meat into her mouth and chewed mechanically. The meat fibers were very tough and thick, much harder to chew than the driest meat she had ever eaten. She couldn’t bite through it at all, so she just held it half in her mouth and chewed.

He took the meat out of her mouth and ate it himself. Yang Fan watched him in horror. Sure enough, after chewing a few times, he grabbed her, leaned in, and fed the chewed meat into her mouth.

Yang Fan forced herself to swallow it. She knew some animals took care of their young that couldn’t eat meat yet by feeding them like this. She regretted that just now, even if she couldn’t bite it off, she should have forced herself to swallow it, even if she choked to death.

He didn’t give her meat anymore. Instead, he took another bite and looked like he planned to keep feeding her this way.

Yang Fan reached out to ask him for meat. Whether he could understand or not, she said, “I’ll eat it myself.” She didn’t dare actually snatch the meat from his hand, so she just reached out to signal to him.

He shook his head. That kind of body language, so similar to a human’s, made Yang Fan pause for a moment.

He fed her a little less than half of it, and the whole time he kept reaching out to feel her stomach. When she started to feel full, he just happened to stop. Then he ate all the rest of the meat.