Krafft's Notes on Anomalies

It is said to be noon, but it actually feels a little later than noon.

Kraft and Lucius took turns to rest against the relatively clean board, and waited several times until the sleeping people woke up.

Like a huge inaudible alarm clock ringing, within a few minutes the residents of the sleeping area were awakened uniformly, more uniformly than waking up in a high school dormitory in another world.

There were sounds of activity in the previously silent room. Different feet stepped on the wooden boards, unknown metal and wooden utensils collided, and the noisy conversations were mixed with a few unintelligible swear words.

Human consciousness was returned from dreams in large quantities and thrown back into reality, starting a day that they had missed for less than half.

Then there was the harsh and harsh sound of the inferior door shaft turning. One after another, people pushed the door open and came out, holding what looked like food in their hands and walking towards the port while eating.

Craft intercepted one of the middle-aged men holding moldy dried fish.

"Hello, if you don't mind, can I hire you for a while?"

"Of course!" He agreed as quickly as possible, glaring back at the person next to him who looked over, "It only takes four copper coins, and I might help you with the work for half a day."

Perhaps it was difficult to find work after noon, so he accepted Kraft's employment at a very low price.

The yellowed and black teeth bit down hard on the crispy dried fish, and the fibrous fish meat and bones were bitten into pieces, making a tooth-piercing sound. He chewed a few bites in his mouth and swallowed with difficulty.

"So what are you going to do?"

Kraft was shocked by this way of eating, which was like swallowing glass, and sympathized with his mouth and esophagus, "Don't worry, you can eat first. I want to ask something first, how long ago did you start to notice that you wake up more and more frequently?" late?"

"Now that I think about it, it started like this about a month ago. I didn't feel much at first, but I didn't expect it to become like this. These days are getting harder and harder."

Although he didn’t know why anyone cared about this, the middle-aged man still answered the question while eating, the crumbs flying with saliva, not noticing that his new employer moved half a step to avoid his front.

Kraft stood by and watched him finish the fish in his hand and swallow the last bite. His Adam's apple rolled hard, and he felt that he could write a case report on the scarring of the esophagus caused by a special diet.

"We came here because we were curious about this matter. Now we suspect that there is something wrong with the water you usually drink. Can you take us over to have a look?"

"Okay, although my family usually goes to fetch water, I still know the way." The middle-aged man pressed his chest, which seemed to be caused by pain, "Then let's go."

He led Kraft and Lucius along the twisting and winding narrow alleys, and along the way he kept meeting people who had just gone out to look for work.

The opposite direction requires them to frequently squeeze through sideways, or one party retreats to the back road to get out of the way.

Generally speaking, they were traveling in the same direction as they came from. They departed from the previously investigated route and passed near the red algae well. They then walked forward for about ten minutes before reaching their destination.

It was a normal-looking well, surrounded by the most regular stones Craft had ever seen here.

There was an open space around, and people who came to fetch water formed several long lines. There is no winch, so the progress of lowering the roped barrel and pulling it up again is quite slow. It is not easy to give them time to check.

Kraft didn't like the environment where people were crowded together, especially when this group of people didn't bathe so frequently. Being together made the already stale air even more turbid.

His nose, which had just adapted to the local air, was filled with the smell of sweat, body odor and some unexplainable smell, which made him quickly give up the idea of ​​lining up in person.

"Here are eleven copper coins, five are your reward." Kraft found most of the scattered copper coins in the purse and handed them to the middle-aged man, "Go buy a cleaner bucket for the rest. Line up for me to get a bucket of water.”

It's shameful to be a lazy dog, but it's really comfortable.

Kraft and Lucius found a shady place to stand and watch others lining up. The small wellhead allows at most three people to fetch water with buckets at the same time. There are still three lines at the wellhead, but the queues disperse into a pool at the back and it is impossible to tell which one is which.

The middle-aged man successfully bought a bucket after negotiating with a few people at the end of the queue. He jumped left and right in the queue with blurred boundaries without leaving a trace, choosing the nearest direction to move over.

In the crowd, Kraft soon lost track of his position and began to feel sleepy out of boredom, supporting his head with his hands.

The sun was high in the sky, and it was already the time when he usually took a nap after lunch. His biological clock urged him to find a comfortable surface, put his face on it and enjoy the rare relaxation time every day.

In order to reserve time for the investigation today, I set off from the college very early, first to Elm Street and then to the Yantide District. I didn't even eat at noon, and I had no appetite to eat.

When you suddenly feel free, fatigue creeps in, making you feel like you can fall asleep even while standing.

Through the slightly squinted eyes through the red lenses, the unreal picture became increasingly blurry, the crowd swayed in front of his eyes, and their outlines blurred.

Diffuse double images, red filters, and human-shaped color blocks move slowly, just like the red paint on the slope blending and spreading. Not only is it not bright, but the tone gradually turns darker.

Red usually makes people feel alert and stimulating, but this kind of red made him feel even more gloomy, thinking of the thick venous blood flowing and coagulating on the wall of the transparent container, no longer alive in the living body.

He felt like he was falling. It was the weightlessness he felt in his sleep. It was lighter and softer. Half asleep and half awake, he left the complicated and chaotic reality, fell deeper, and hid in a place where there were no surgeries, no complications, and no investigations.

Hearing also becomes dull, noisy human voices weaken in the ears, and the constant consciousness no longer pays attention to what they say. The language area of ​​the brain enters a low-power state and is unwilling to translate the vibrations in the air into effective information.

The dull sound of water splashing when the bucket fell into the well, the wooden objects hitting the stone wall, and the loud coughing were all simple sounds that could barely be distinguished.

Instinct lazily adjusts oneself to a state of half-dream and half-awake, ignoring the nerve impulses coming from the senses, allowing oneself to be separated from the world.

Kraft felt that he was in the same place, but also seemed to be no longer in the same place. In the erratic state, he heard a particularly clear sound of falling water ringing in his ears, and the feeling of weightlessness ended abruptly.

The hazy state was not broken, but fixed. The sound became more delicate and gentle, like turning from gravel to ground flour, and it was harder to distinguish the content.

Awareness spreads softly and enjoys a moment of peace.

The only drawback is that there is still a strange smell lingering at the tip of the nose. It is not the smell of sweat, not rotten smell, nor the smell of herbs in the bird's mouth, unlike what is collected by the sense of smell.

It seemed to get heavier, the softer, more comfortable part of the voice getting closer. From the invisible to the tangible, it clung to the clothes on his back, caressing his consciousness.

All the senses are pleased by it, sending out "soft" and "comfortable" signals, and the sense of smell is also involved, recognizing its strange but soft and pleasant smell.

Like a girl's hand, like silk gauze, it gets closer and the feeling of weightlessness appears again.

The eyelids were drooped, and the black and red light in front of his eyes became thinner and almost completely disappeared, replaced by moonlight-like darkness and soft white light that grew.

The consciousness is bathed in it, and just like enjoying every nap normally, traces of doubt flash past in the intoxication.

It gently stretched out its cool and soft hands, trying to remove the disharmony in this tranquility.

This self-defeating action awakened Kraft's keen consciousness, suspicion quickly developed into alarm, and everything that happened was pulled out of memory and reanalyzed.

Intuition tasted the malice that shouldn't exist in the soft and gentle feeling.

The speed of its fitting suddenly became faster, as if it sensed Kraft's change, and wrapped it up faster from behind.

The reckless movements reveal more of its incongruity, like a starfish turning over its colorful and beautiful back and spitting out its stomach pouch to feed. Extreme incoherence, sticky nausea, impact on the senses that were immersed in comfort just a moment ago, and drastic changes in nerve impulses stimulate the brain and reach deep into the soul.

When the otherworldly part didn't respond, the conditioned reflex formed by Kraft's years of training in his soul was activated. His grandfather's countless teachings and beatings gave him extraordinary reaction speed.

All the muscles in his body were mobilized, he lowered his head to dodge the possible attack, smashed it back with his elbow joint, then turned around and retreated to distance himself.

He felt as if he was tearing something apart when he moved. Fear forced him to touch the hilt of the sword hidden under his robe. His newly opened eyes could only see the red color of the lenses because they were not used to the light.

The blade of the sword was unsheathed and swung upwards towards the felt position. He tried his best to restrain his urge to slash with all his strength, leaving room to change his moves. The first sword was just to force the opponent back and buy time for his vision to return to normal.

He carefully felt the power coming from his hand. Whether the opponent chose to avoid the edge temporarily or block it head on, it was exactly what he wanted.

Unexpectedly, the sword blade seemed to have cut into something. It was powerful in the loose and fragile object, splitting several uneven structures.

There were exclamations and screams from behind, and the chaotic footsteps in the distance indicated that many people were fleeing from here. Fortunately, there were no approaching footsteps to interfere with the judgment.

His vision is gradually recovering, and he looks through the red glass to inspect the results of the chop. No matter what it is, whether it's a human or a ghost, it's definitely not going to feel good to be pulled out of a big hole.

Kraft forced himself to open his eyes wide. The dazzling light caused the circular pupil muscles to contract sharply, and the lacrimal glands secreted tears. He had to fight against the instinctive reflex of closing his eyes and try his best to see clearly ahead.

He saw that huge and ferocious crack, which did not exist in some ooze monster or mysterious enemy.

It was a wooden wall.