The world seemed to tilt on its axis. Chen Jue collapsed onto the mossy ground, his hand clamped over the two tiny puncture wounds on his forearm. His heart was hammering against his ribs like a trapped bird, and the adrenaline of the hike had turned into a cold, paralyzing terror. In his mind, the bite of a snake in a tropical jungle was an immediate, agonizing death sentence.
"Jue! Oh, god, there's so much blood! It's turning black!" Wang Bai wailed, though there was barely a drop of red on his skin. She stood ten feet away, her face a mask of fake horror, making no move to touch him. "Zhang Rui, we have to get help! We have to find a doctor before the venom reaches his heart!"
"The clue!" Zhang Rui hissed, pointing to the scrap of parchment Chen Jue had dropped in the dirt when he was bitten.
