Chapter 1 Falling

The sensation of falling is enough to wake someone from a nightmare, causing their heart to clench, limbs to stiffen, and a silent scream to escape.

Strangely, when the two of them suddenly fell, only Bei Ling cried out...

Xiao Tan, who was usually easily startled, became unusually calm at this critical moment. In a split second, he backhanded Bei Ling's wrist, pulling her above him with his own strength in mid-air.

In this emergency, his instinct was to lift his teammate up and become a human cushion himself, showing that this kid was indeed a good person. Of course, if they were falling into an abyss, this action wouldn't make much difference; it would only be the difference between dying above or below.

Fortunately, the feeling of falling lasted only a few seconds, followed by a splash as the two of them fell into the water almost glued together.

Darkness fell, and the sensation of falling stopped abruptly. Xiao Tan suddenly felt a chill on his back, followed by pain and a stifled sensation. But at that moment, he was delighted, because he knew that falling into the water meant he wouldn't die, at least not yet.

The impact of the two falling into the water was enormous, and they continued to sink rapidly. Xiao Tan knew that they were not out of danger yet. He held his breath, and when the momentum slowed, he immediately began to kick his legs. He didn't let go of Bei Ling's wrist. After rising slightly, he used his left hand to hold Bei Ling and his right hand to paddle, struggling to swim upwards.

Before long, their heads emerged from the water, and both gasped for air.

"I can swim!" This was the first thing Bei Ling shouted after taking a couple of breaths.

"You should have said so earlier, you nearly killed me." Xiao Tan said, letting go of Bei Ling and keeping a little distance from her, he began to paddle with both hands.

"Say what?" She smacked Xiao Tan on the forehead. "Did I get a chance to say anything?"

"Ouch..." Xiao Tan cried out in pain. "When I was holding you and swimming up, why didn't you move at all?"

"You took it upon yourself to be a lifeguard, so I had to cooperate." Bei Ling replied. "If I struggled, and you stubbornly persevered, what if we both drowned in the end?"

"Oh, oh..." Xiao Tan continued, "Right, are you okay?"

"Not really." Bei Ling replied. "I want to beat you up."

Xiao Tan thought Bei Ling was blaming him for dragging her down, and he said helplessly, "You can't completely blame me, can you? How would I know the roof beams would break, or the floor would collapse?"

"Heh..." Bei Ling gave a dry laugh, taking it as a response. She couldn't really argue, after all, she had grabbed Xiao Tan's wrist, causing them to fall together. If her first reaction had been to jump backwards, she might still be up there. Then she could have found a rope or something to save Xiao Tan too, which would be better than both of them being trapped in this place where no one could hear them.

At that moment, there was no light source near Xiao Tan and Bei Ling. Only a tiny bit of light came from the extremely distant opening above them, the one they fell through. Unfortunately, that opening was indoors, not in the open air, so that little bit of light couldn't illuminate the depths of the underground.

Although they were talking, they couldn't see each other in the darkness. But because they were close, and there was the sound of paddling, they could still tell where the other was, even if they couldn't see. Bei Ling had just reached out in the dark and knocked Xiao Tan on the head.

"Crap, my flashlight was in the last scenario..." Xiao Tan was about to say that his lighting equipment was damaged, but suddenly felt Bei Ling put something on his head.

With a click, a bright light appeared. Xiao Tan now wore a yellow miner's helmet.

"Eh? You still have this equipment?" Xiao Tan asked. He remembered that in the first scenario he met Bei Ling, she had tried to trade him this thing for a flashlight.

"Yeah." Bei Ling replied. "I remember I wanted to trade this for your flashlight, but you actually gave me one and said something like... 'It looks stupid on you, so you keep it'."

"Then why did you keep it until now? This kind of equipment isn't worth anything anymore." Xiao Tan said.

"This lady hates being rejected." Bei Ling said, tapping Xiao Tan's head again. "Look at you, wearing this kind of stupid equipment, it's so harmonious..."

"I really miss the time when I first met you." Xiao Tan looked bitter. "The Bei Ling Xiaogu who called me 'Xiao Tan-ge' and politely traded equipment with me is gone forever..."

Bei Ling felt exposed for having a black history and changed the subject in embarrassment. "Stop rambling! Turn around and see if there's anywhere to stand. Do you want to stay in the water until your stamina runs out?"

Xiao Tan shrank his neck and really stopped talking. He slowly turned around in the water, shining the light around at the surroundings and above.

In any case, the miner's helmet was still very practical in this situation. At least it was a lighting device that could be operated without constantly holding it in your hand.

As the light moved, the two finally saw some of the surrounding conditions. The underground pool they were in wasn't very large. A stone bank was only about ten meters away. Directly above the pool was a vertical cylindrical passage, the path they had fallen from. The entrance at the top of this passage was the collapsed hole in the kitchen of the empty house, while the shape at the bottom of the passage expanded outwards. Overall, the space above the pool looked like an inverted funnel, making it impossible to return the way they came.

The pool was surrounded by stone walls on all sides except for the stone bank.

Xiao Tan and Bei Ling had no choice. The immediate priority was to find a place to stand. The two swam over one after the other. When they climbed onto the bank, they were both panting and sat down on the ground to rest.

The series of events had only taken a few minutes, but their Survival Value and Stamina Value had been significantly depleted. Falling from a height into the water had caused Xiao Tan to lose 67% of his Survival Value, while Bei Ling lost 59%. Of course, that wasn't too bad. In reality, people jumping into water from that height could die on impact, but the physical qualities of the game characters were higher than normal, allowing them to survive.

Staying afloat and swimming to the shore had cost them more than 300 Stamina Value, which was nearly 20% for two level 17 players.

"I say... could it be that we've discovered some kind of ancient tomb?" Xiao Tan turned his head and looked behind him, where there was a deep path leading to an unknown destination.

"What? Are you fantasizing about this lady stripping off and practicing swordsmanship with you?" Bei Ling replied, actually making a rather shameless statement.

"Well... I was going to say that we might be able to find equipment, skills, hidden quests, or something..." Xiao Tan said. "But you suddenly brought that up..." Before he could finish, he was knocked on the head again. Even through the miner's helmet, it still hurt.

"So you started thinking dirty thoughts too?" Bei Ling scolded.

"The way you used 'too' is really... Ouch... Okay... It's all my fault, alright?" Xiao Tan had definitely been bullied a little too much.

The underground pool was as cold as an ice cave, and both of them were soaked to the bone, making them shiver. They didn't stay in place for too long to recover, just wrung out the water from their clothes as much as possible and rested for a while. When the initial fatigue had dissipated, they got up and walked towards the only passage.

Perhaps the rocks in this passage had the property of absorbing light. After walking a short distance, the two realized that anything slightly further ahead looked like a dark shadow. The light almost completely disappeared beyond ten meters.

Another noteworthy point was that this road was not an upward slope, but a downward incline. They had already reached a very deep place when they fell into the pool, and this road was leading to an even lower place. What was going on? Could this be a direct route to the Senluo Treasure Hall (netherworld)?

After walking for another ten minutes, the downward slope stopped and became basically level. The tunnel became wider and wider. Unknowingly, the height and width of the surrounding tunnels had become large enough to accommodate a subway train.

"Do you smell that?" Bei Ling suddenly asked. The air in the cave was damp and stagnant. About a minute ago, she had smelled a strange, fishy odor. It wasn't a good sign.

Xiao Tan looked Bei Ling up and down with a strange expression for a few seconds. "You're not going to tell me... that you... you know... I didn't know this game could even simulate..."

"Simulate your head!" Bei Ling's face turned red, and she tore off his hat, scolding him harshly as she hit him on the head.

"Okay, it seems I misunderstood..."

"Idiot! Moron! Scum!"

"Hey... you can say that without being censored..."

"Hmm... Hmph..." Bei Ling took a deep breath, trying to calm down. "I'm going to have to look for something like a big paper fan in the auction house. My hand is getting sore."

"I'm sorry..." Xiao Tan said. "My head is too hard."

"Is that what you need to apologize for?" Bei Ling put the hat back on his head with a thud.

"Anyway... it's all my fault, alright?" Xiao Tan said. "You don't always have to hit me, do you? Can't we solve problems with words..."

"Xiao Tan-ge..." Bei Ling interrupted with a smile, her tone friendly, but her eyes filled with murderous intent. "Please turn around and throw yourself back into the pool."

"You might as well just hit me..."

Roar—

Suddenly, a roar clearly made by a non-human creature interrupted their conversation.

Whether the monster was annoyed by their conversation or had discovered the existence of prey and was coming to hunt, a loud crawling sound of some kind of giant creature was coming from the tunnel ahead, rapidly approaching the two players...