Cough, cough, cough…

His lungs felt as if they were burning. He’d fallen from a great height, but by some stroke of luck, he landed on a very soft mushroom.

The giant mushroom was flesh-colored, with black weeds growing around it. Impossibly, though, it was incredibly springy, spreading the full impact of his fall evenly across its surface.

Even after taking a large dose of enhancement potions, Li still felt like his body was about to fall apart…

“Ah…”

He was still alive… He hadn’t died…

He couldn’t believe it. He really couldn’t…

He raised his head. Apart from the glowing crystals, there wasn’t a trace of light above him. It was as if everything had been swallowed by darkness—just like the despair in his heart. There wasn’t a glimmer of hope in sight.

This was the place known as the Abyss of the Underworld…

This bottomless abyss had been called the entrance to hell since ancient times. Anyone who fell into the Abyss of the Underworld was considered dead.

This was the deepest abyss in the world. Even if you survived the fall, the ravine was shrouded year-round in poisonous fog and miasma. Sometimes, winds from the Northern Continent carried the poison from the depths to places where people or other creatures lived. Anyone who accidentally breathed it in might lose consciousness—or die on the spot…

If he hadn’t drunk an antidote… he’d already be dead by now…

He thought so, but he couldn’t bring himself to feel relieved.

He’d come within a hair’s breadth of death, but that wasn’t even the worst part. The worst part was… no one who fell into this abyss had ever made it out. Not once, in all of recorded history…

…

At some point, Li opened his eyes. He had no idea how long he’d been unconscious, but it seemed he could move a little now.

He struggled into a sitting position. Every bone in his body felt like it was about to come apart. He felt over himself and faced the truth: when he fell, all the potions he’d been carrying had been scattered somewhere else.

His lungs still burned. He opened the system interface, and the status readouts for his body were all a complete mess!

If he had to describe it, it was like a pile of shit that maggots had burrowed through countless times.

“Cough, cough, cough…”

Water…

Was there water here…?

He looked around. There was nothing there, and it was so quiet it felt as if the whole world had died.

“Is that…”

Suddenly, he spotted a familiar figure amid the black, furry growth. Li hurriedly crawled over.

It was her! It really was her!

That long, brown hair that looked so utterly ordinary, and that face he’d never be able to forget!

He crawled to her side and grabbed her hand. Only then did he realize that nearly all her bones were broken. Her breathing was incredibly faint. She was still alive, but she was close to death.

He remembered something and hurriedly felt over her. Unlike him, she’d carefully kept all her important belongings safe.

“Found it. Found it…”

Potions. She still had potions.

Since the bottle had to be carried around, and a potion was an alchemist’s lifeline, it had been made from special crystal—extremely expensive and hard as stone.

Li knew what it was just from the color. It was the Pal enhancer he’d made…

But this wasn’t what he was looking for.

He felt over her full, delicate body again. For Li, it was nothing to be embarrassed about anymore. He’d been exposed to far too much back when he was a child in the palace. Besides, this was her—there was even less reason to feel awkward.

At her chest, he finally felt that little thing!

“So it’s here…”

He didn’t even hesitate. He yanked it, clothes and all—rrip!—tearing a hole in the fabric as he pulled the thing he wanted right off her.

It was a tiny bottle. Inside, the potion glimmered with a faint blue light…

He’d given it to her because she was his apprentice. It was an extremely precious potion. It couldn’t bring the dead back to life or cure every illness, but it could stabilize most conditions… It took incredibly expensive ingredients and an extremely difficult process to make.

He gently twisted off the cap and touched the tip of his tongue to the potion.

“Cough, cough, cough!!!”

Even if good medicine tasted bitter, this stuff really did taste awful…

He glanced at the figure beside him, then crawled toward her. Without a second thought, Li lay right on top of her. Her full, soft body had probably made countless people lose their heads, but right now, enjoying it was the last thing on Li’s mind.

He gently pried her mouth open, put the potion in his own mouth, and kissed her.

There was no way she could take the medicine on her own in this condition. It was something his teacher had taught him. The most important thing now was that she absolutely couldn’t die. She couldn’t die yet!

Using Pal’s power and his tongue, he slowly worked the potion into her mouth, a little at a time.

“Hah…”

A glistening thread of saliva stretched between them. It was all done now.

“You can’t die… You mustn’t die… I’ll use everything I’ve got to keep you from dying here. I won’t let you… If you died just like that… Heh… Hahaha…”

How could he let her die just like that? How could he!

She had to pay back this hatred a hundredfold, no matter what!

There was still a chance. He still had a chance!

It was here!

In this place!