The darkness is taking over. I fall and I see nothing, the bottom is obscured, even though I'm able to see in the dark, I'm blind. The present moment slows down. The Slimes fall around me, with me, towards an invisible ground. I try to grab the Maccaterro's body and throw it under me. My plan is to listen to the sound the corpse will make when it hits the ground and use Shadow Step to move on the ground without crashing. I fall, I fall, it must have been nearly five minutes or maybe more, the fall is so long that I've lost track of time.
I still strain my ears, but the wind whistles in them, making it more difficult. I begin to hear new sounds, like a downpour of large drops hitting the ground. The sound is faint, but I finally catch the sound of Slimes' bodies exploding upon hitting the ground. So, I prepare to use Shadow Step at any moment. One second too late and I end up like the Slimes. "Splat" a duller, wetter, and duller sound is heard, and without waiting, I use my skill. I become a small cloud of shadows and move towards the ground.
Upon touching the ground, I explode into a myriad of small shadows, but I reform afterward. The sensation is very peculiar, I feel like my body is stretching everywhere, but it's not very pleasant. The Slimes continue to fall to the ground and cover it with a thick, slimy, and slippery layer. I try to look around me, but it's so dark that I can only see about ten meters away from me.
I have fallen deeply into the bowels of the earth, into this abyss. Even though the situation seems less than optimistic, I'm lucky to still be alive, and most importantly, I have the advantage of accessing my shop no matter where I am! The only drawback, in my opinion, is that I don't know how I'm going to get out of here and back to the surface. I'll eventually find a way to do it, though, I motivate myself.
....
Mordakus the Lich
After the man explained to me how the shop works, I entered the alchemy workshop. The room presents the same landscape as the main shop.
Several alchemy tables made of black stone surrounds a large screen. The owner has already explained to me how everything works. Without wasting time, I head to the screen and look at the catalog it displays. The ingredients, resources, tools, everything is there, from the most common to the rarest. I am horrified to see the presence of some resources that I considered to be legends. I buy the ingredients I need and return to one of the tables to start repairing my phylactery.
With caution, I remove my skull from my shoulders and take off my phylactery attached to it. I gaze at it for a moment, examining all the cracks it contains, and consider myself lucky to have discovered the Void Mall.
I begin to take out the ingredients it has gathered: the skull of an ancient Demon-King, three Nyx flowers, two onyx, and a vial containing the blood of a fallen angel.
I grab the vial and pour it into a marble bowl. Then, I grind the three Nyx leaves in a mortar while murmuring incantations under my breath. I mix everything together until I obtain a thick and sticky paste. With surgical precision, I apply the mixture to my phylactery. The paste sinks into the cracks, creating a stronger connection between the object and my soul. Once all the fissures have disappeared, I take the skull and add the two onyx stones into the empty eye sockets. I place my phylactery in the cavity of the skull and finish my incantations. The whole process takes me several hours, but the result is impeccable.
My phylactery is now more resistant and harder to destroy. The most amazing thing is that, thanks to the high-quality ingredients used, my phylactery offers me almost three times more mana than before. Having finished what I had to do, I leave the alchemy workshop, smiling, knowing that my immortality is now more assured than ever and that I have the advantage over the Emperor of Death.
.....
The Slimes always fall to the ground like rainbow rain. I use my Crafting skill to make stone stakes in the ground. After making about fifty of them, spaced apart, I smile, happy that my plan is working. The Slimes that fall into the crevice smash on the ground and die, but with the stakes in place, they impale themselves and their energy crystal shatters on one of them usually.
The Slime shower lasts for about fifteen minutes more, and then it stops. The sound of large drops finally ceases, and an almost total silence sets in. I imagine I could use my Crafting skill to create steps up to the top, but I don't think it's a good idea. I'd be too vulnerable, and I wouldn't have anywhere to run if a monster attacked me. I don't feel confident enough to take my chances, even though I can sense their presence through the vibrations. My plan for now is to explore the crevice and the surrounding caves and try to climb in the meantime. If that doesn't work out, I'll take steps and climb up that way if I don't find any other paths.
Lost in thought, I start to hear and feel powerful vibrations. Knowing that something big is approaching quite rapidly from my location, I try to find a place to hide. Concentrating, I perceive a cavity a little further on. The cavity is large enough for two to three men to pass through. I retreat into the cavity and focus on the vibrations that are becoming stronger and stronger.
A few moments later, a huge monster swallowed all the remaining slime and headed towards me, causing me to retreat even further into the wall where I was hiding. The monster, having found me, tried to eat me and smashed its head against the wall, but to no avail. It remained there, huddled up, waiting for me to come out of my hiding spot, which was not going to happen. Taking the time to observe it, I noticed that this massive creature could only be a Serpatte, a hybrid between a giant millipede and a large snake. It measured about ten meters long with a long-segmented body and many thin legs on the sides. It had a gray-black body, multiple faceted eyes, and large mandibles instead of an ordinary jaw. The creature could be easily identified by the ring of bone that protected its third body segment. They usually lived in underground complexes connected by passages that they had chewed over time or pre-existing ones, much like this crevice.
As I backed up a bit since the creature had started to ram into the wall again, I noticed that the cavity surprisingly opened up to a double floor, and behind it was an even wider corridor. So, I decided to venture into it.
After what seemed like about ten minutes, I saw a gate that appeared to have been destroyed, as if several people or monsters had forced it. Measuring about three meters tall and almost as wide, one of the gateway doors is still intact, but the second one is in poor condition. On the remaining door, I can see bright blue lines that shine in the darkness. They form a drawing of people looking up at the sky, as if they were praying to the sun or stars. It must be the remains of an ancient civilization, probably the ones who built the ruins on the surface, I think as I touch the stone bindings with my hand.
Before venturing inside, I decided to go back to the Void Mall.