Going Down

“Leave?”

“Yeah. What, you want to stay here forever?”

The pain in his body was gradually fading, and his HP was steadily rising at a visible rate.

Ye Yousheng noticed the number “200” engraved on the bottle—so it restored 200 HP.

Although he had only recovered less than half, it was more than enough.

On the cap was the image of a pointy-eared little girl wearing round glasses and a mage hat—he instantly recognized it as the famous Inbas-brand potion.

After moving his body a bit and confirming nothing felt too wrong, he took off his T-shirt, which was too tattered to even look at, and tore off the remaining pant leg, turning it into shorts.

Alicia’s face flushed red as she covered her eyes with her hand, peeking through her fingers.

“This is the twenty-first floor! Out of thirty floors, this is already the lower levels! To get back to the surface, we have to go up twenty floors! And also—don’t strip in front of me!”

Ignoring her, Ye Yousheng asked,

“Don’t you have something like a teleport scroll?”

In games, items like return scrolls were common.

With how advanced magic seemed in this world, he assumed something similar must exist.

“As if it’s that convenient! Random teleportation without a destination might exist, but a fixed teleportation array requires five high-level mages working for an entire week!”

Immediate rejection.

“Five high-level mages for a whole week… I thought it was just lazy game design…”

He recalled how that same game didn’t have return scrolls either.

After beating a boss, you always had to walk all the way back—

And sometimes you’d die to random mobs on the way out.

Absolute garbage design.

Back then, he thought the developers were just trolling players.

But now… if that game was based on this world, it actually made perfect sense.

Other “unfair” mechanics too—like monsters not dropping money or supplies—

In reality, they were completely reasonable.

Then another thought crossed his mind.

If teleportation arrays required that much effort…

Then the person who threw him into this labyrinth—how powerful were they?

When he stepped into that alley, he hadn’t seen any magic circle at all.

Yet within seconds, after Yiwu warned him, a fully formed magic array had already appeared beneath his feet—and activated.

Setting up a magic array remotely, completing it in seconds…

Why would someone with that level of power target him?

Was it related to Little Red Riding Hood… or was that person her?

“So basically!”

Alicia’s voice snapped him out of his thoughts.

She spoke with extreme seriousness.

“Even though this dungeon is one of the smaller ones among the Seven Great Labyrinths, each floor is about two-thirds the size of Arana! And there’s only one staircase per floor! We’ll definitely run into tons of monsters!”

“Isn’t that why you’re here? You made it down twenty floors alone, so going back up should be easy. I’ll leave it to you, Miss Alicia.”

Ye Yousheng spoke sincerely.

Dignity meant nothing—survival did.

“Eh? Uh… I…”

Alicia suddenly became awkward, gripping her staff tightly and lowering her head, unable to meet his gaze.

Sensing something off, Ye Yousheng walked closer and crouched in front of her.

“You… can’t stand up, can you?”

“…”

No answer.

Which was basically confirmation.

His Observe skill wasn’t high enough to see her status, but her behavior said enough.

When she sat up earlier, she had needed both hands for support.

Even handing him the potion—she had thrown it instead of passing it.

Ye Yousheng reached out, grabbed her chin, and forced her to look up at him.

“Tell me the truth. This is important.”

“Ugh…”

Her face turned red like a boiled octopus, but she didn’t resist.

In a barely audible voice, she said,

“I… can’t stand for now… and my magic power is affected too… I only have about one-third of my usual strength… it might take three days to recover…”

“Side effects from that sound?”

“Yes… that was Death Knell’s Death Tremor. It has high damage, wide range, and can shake the mind of other beings—it’s extremely powerful. But it comes at a cost.

Every time it uses that skill, the crack in the bell covering its head grows larger.

No one wants to expose their weakness, right? So it rarely uses it…”

Ye Yousheng released her chin and said coldly,

“But it still used it. And almost killed both of us.”

“…Mm.”

Alicia lowered her head, looking dejected.

But then something clicked—why was she acting so weak?

She was a genius mage from Gray Magic Academy!

With that thought, her usual confidence returned, and she snapped,

“Then why weren’t you affected at all?!”

Ye Yousheng shrugged.

“Who knows. Maybe I’m just built different.”

In truth, the reason he wasn’t affected was because of the third effect of his skill—[Game Life].

Immunity to mental abnormalities.

At this moment, he had no idea just how broken that effect was.

It meant his mind was like an unshakable fortress—

And magic, which relied heavily on mental stability, would also remain unaffected.

“Anyway… since you can’t move…”

Ye Yousheng looked at Alicia with a dark expression.

“Wh-What are you trying to do?! If you try anything weird, I—I’ll use magic!”

But he didn’t stop walking toward her.

Seeing this, Alicia panicked and began chanting,

“O flames that burn all things! Gather—”

“Got you.”

Before she could finish, Ye Yousheng scooped her up in his arms.

“Wahhh—?!”

Caught completely off guard, she forgot the rest of her chant.

“Since you can’t move, I’ll control your mobility. I’m leaving this dungeon, and you’ll assist me.”

A completely overbearing declaration.

Honestly, kind of shameless.

And yet… Alicia couldn’t refute it.

She clutched her staff tightly, eyes shut, not daring to move.

“Is this fine? Or should I carry you on my back? Or maybe over my shoulder—it’d be faster…”

She immediately opened her eyes.

“N-No! This is fine!”

“Good. Then we’re going.”

“Wait—!”

He didn’t give her a chance to object.

Without hesitation, he walked out of the safe room.

“You’re not seriously planning to climb twenty floors, are you?! That’s impossible! I don’t even remember how I got down here!”

“Up? Who said we’re going up? That’s too far.”

The dungeon had thirty floors.

They were currently on the twenty-first.

Climbing up meant twenty floors.

No magic, one half-dead fighter, one half-disabled mage—

That wasn’t happening.

So instead, he flipped the logic entirely.

Ye Yousheng tilted his chin downward and calmly said something that left Alicia stunned.

“We’re going down.”