The strange man continued to instruct Martin.

"When you wake up, the Guards will discover you’re dreaming. Go to the second window on your left. First, throw the flowerpot on the table in front of the window toward the door, then jump out."

"Run straight ahead. You’ll find a button-shaped relic. Pick off the dried blood scab from your finger and give it to the relic. Press it, and it will take you somewhere safe."

"Then you can prepare for the blood exchange according to the formula. Once you’ve finished, they’ll never be able to find you again."

After he finished speaking, the man from the pickle jar vanished in an instant before Martin’s shocked eyes, leaving only the trashed laboratory behind.

Martin’s fingers pressed against the documents to his side, smearing them with blood.

That man from the pickle jar... was him!

He could no longer control his trembling body and staggered backward.

Fear spurred Martin to open his eyes, and he returned to reality.

He was still lying on the chair. The pickle jar behind his head was now completely empty.

But the surroundings were a complete mess. For some reason, there was a chaotic smear of blood on the documents in the distance, as if someone had scribbled all over them.

’I was already in the dream state. Who did this?’

’Did someone come by just now?’

Just as Martin was pondering this, a sudden noise came from the laboratory door.

"What are you doing in there!" The Guards were banging furiously on the door. "Don’t think we don’t know."

It was over. They had discovered he was dreaming.

They would probably suspect he’d been corrupted by the dream. They might even wipe his memory. Martin knew how they operated.

’They won’t believe me.’

During his time under surveillance, Martin had grown to distrust the officials. In many cases, they tended to use extreme measures, nipping any potential threat in the bud.

Martin instantly remembered the instructions the man from the pickle jar had given him before leaving. He rushed to the second window on the left.

There was indeed a table in front of the window, but there were many flowerpots on it.

’Which one?’

The man from the pickle jar hadn’t specified.

The knocking grew louder. Martin followed his gut, picked one at random, and threw it. Then, he prepared to jump from the window.

CRASH! The door was smashed open.

This was the third floor. The fall would cripple him, if not kill him. While Martin hesitated, the Guards who burst in had already raised their guns and aimed at him.

A gunshot rang out. Martin felt a bullet graze his calf.

The Guard who fired had slipped on the wet soil pouring from the shattered flowerpot. His aim went wide, and the bullet missed Martin’s leg.

But the gunshot startled Martin, and he leaped down.

As he fell, a forklift carrying cargo slowly drove by. Martin landed right in the soft foam cushioning on top of the goods, then rolled off the side and onto the ground.

He was covered in dust but completely unharmed.

The forklift driver slammed on the brakes and stared blankly at Martin.

But Martin didn’t stop. He scrambled to his feet and kept running forward.

After tumbling on the ground, he had lost his sense of direction. The only thing in his mind was the Canned Man’s words: "Run straight ahead."

At every fork in the road, Martin ran straight ahead. He didn’t duck into hidden alleys, but sprinted along the main road.

The Guards behind him quickly gave chase, but they were constantly obstructed by all sorts of things.

Workers carrying relic containment materials, transport vehicles loaded with relics, visiting government officials, stretchers carrying injured investigators...

All these things cleverly blocked the Guards’ path, drastically slowing their pursuit.

The Guards were extremely familiar with this locked-down military zone, yet they couldn’t even catch a medical staff member who wasn’t running particularly fast.

The electronic screens in their hands continuously displayed Martin’s position, but they just couldn’t seem to reach him.

It was as if something was deliberately holding them back.

The shouts behind Martin had faded. He ran all the way to the end of the road, which led to a relic transit warehouse where less important relics were temporarily stored.

He burst through the warehouse doors and kept running forward.

Row upon row of shelves were filled with a dazzling array of items. Most of these relics were sealed in special boxes.

’Where are the warehouse Guards?’ Martin found it strange. Although these were less powerful relics, they were still relics, and there were so many of them.

In the past, this place was always heavily guarded, and entry required passing through multiple security checks.

He didn’t know that the warehouse Guards had been urgently dispatched by the Guard team to intercept him, only to get trapped elsewhere.

Martin kept running until he stood before a completely empty row of shelves.

On this shelf lay a single red button, resting quietly in the center. It looked like it had been there for a long time.

The button looked like a common emergency stop button, with a few unremarkable wires connected to its back.

But Martin knew that nothing in this relic warehouse was as simple as it seemed.

The blood on his finger had dried.

Martin picked off the thin scab of blood and placed it in front of the button.

Sensing the scab, the button’s wires whipped around like tentacles and pierced straight into it.

The scab slowly vanished. A ball of red light traveled along the wires to the button, which lit up as if it had been powered on.

Martin eagerly pressed it. Immediately, he felt himself separate from the world, as if a thin film had covered his skin.

His body suddenly floated into the air. Then, he saw everything around him begin to accelerate.

Walls flew toward him, passing through his form. The base’s barbed-wire fence also passed through his body, followed by mountains, lakes, and rivers.

Martin drifted outside the world, watching the external environment shift continuously. By the time he slowly decelerated again, the sky had turned dark.

He came to a stop in a small alley. The thin film gradually disappeared, and Martin landed back on the ground.

Stepping out of the alley, Martin looked at the unfamiliar signs around him. It took him a great deal of effort to recognize the script. 𝘧𝑟𝑒𝑒𝘸𝘦𝘣𝑛𝑜𝘷𝑒𝓁.𝘤𝘰𝓂

’Is this... Bangkok?’

...

Meanwhile, the Guards stood in front of the red button, staring at each other in dismay.

They had seen Martin rush into the warehouse on their trackers and thought they had him cornered. But then they watched his position change at an incredible speed, shooting out of the base and flying toward the other side of the Earth.

Their tracking range wasn’t long enough. Martin’s whereabouts were now unknown.

The warehouse Guard came running over in a hurry.

"Captain, we were just trapped by a convoy..."

The Guard Captain waved his hand dismissively and pointed at the button. "What relic is this? He must have used it to escape."

The warehouse Guard quickly pulled out an electronic tablet, scrolled through the inventory list, found the corresponding entry, and handed it to the Guard Captain.

The Captain looked at the relic’s description, utterly baffled.

’The Earth Emergency Stop Button?’