Chapter 136: Dark Green Core

"AAAGH!"

A agonizing scream burst from my throat before I could even count to two. Viora had violently pulled and twisted my leg in one swift, ruthless motion. The bone popped back into its socket with a loud, sickening sound that echoed off the deep walls of the pit.

Tears of pure pain welled up in the corners of my eyes, and I slammed my fist into the dirt, panting heavily.

"It is back in place," Viora reported calmly, as if she hadn’t just shattered my sanity for the second time today. "The joint is secure, but the muscle is severely damaged. You still cannot put full weight on it."

"You... you lied about counting to three..." I wheezed, wiping the cold sweat from my forehead.

"If you expect it, your muscles tense up," she explained simple words. "It is easier this way."

"Remind me never to ask you for medical help again," I muttered, leaning my head back against the stone wall.

Despite the terrible pain, the throbbing in my leg was slowly changing from an sharp, unbearable agony into a dull, heavy ache. I could at least wiggle my toes now. The endurance points I had put into my stats from the Mermaid Gate were finally doing their job, keeping my body from completely giving up.

I took a few deep breaths, forcing my mind to focus back on the real objective.

"Alright," I said, my voice rough. "Now that I’m not totally crippled... where the hell are we?"

Viora turned her head toward the center of the pit.

"We are beneath the throne room," she said softly. "The air down here is old. But there is a light over there. I think."

I followed the direction she was pointing. Far across the dusty, dark cavern, a faint, dark green glow was pulsing rhythmically in the gloom.

Thump... Thump... Thump...

It looked like a heartbeat.

I narrowed my eyes, trying to see through the thick shadows. Sitting on top of a broken stone altar was a giant, corrupted crystal heart. Black, vein-like roots spread out from its base, digging deep into the bedrock of the palace foundation.

And surrounding the altar were dozens of dark, slender shapes crawling out from the cracks in the floor.

"Shadow creatures," I whispered, my hand instinctively dropping down to the ground to grip the handle of my dagger.

"They have not noticed us yet," Viora said, stepping slightly in front of me to block my body with hers. "Their eyes are focused on the core."

I looked up toward the ceiling of the cavern. High above us, the faint, tiny hole we had fallen through was completely out of reach. There was no way we could climb back up to Seok, Black, Jisu, and the others.

"We can’t go back up," I muttered, analyzing the situation with simple logic. "Which means the only way out of this nightmare... is to go through that altar."

Viora didn’t argue. She simply raised her small hands, purple strings of containment mana beginning to flicker faintly around her fingers.

"I will protect you, Woo Jin," she whispered, her voice carrying that subtle, quiet intensity once again. "No matter what comes out of the dark."

I looked at her back, feeling a strange mixture of relief and lingering fear. She was dangerous, unpredictable, and completely obsessed with me. But right now, in this dark, bottomless pit, she was also the only ally I had.

"Just don’t slap me again," I grunted, slowly pushing myself up against the wall to stand on one leg. "Let’s finish this."

"Yeah, but finish what?" Viora asked suddenly.

I froze, one foot propped up against the stone wall as I balanced awkwardly on my good leg. "What?"

"Finish what?" she repeated, turning her head toward me in the dark. Her voice was completely deadpan. "You said ’Let’s finish this.’ Finish what?"

"Oh..." I blinked, staring at her blankly. "I mean... the monsters?"

"I see," Viora said, giving a small, serious nod as if I had just shared a master plan. "That makes sense."

’What makes sense? Why is she acting like she have lost some of her intellect somewhere?’

I let out a weak sigh, rubbing the back of my neck. "Why did you ask it like that? You sounded like a professor giving me a quiz."

"You were trying to sound cool," she murmured softly. "I wanted to make sure you actually knew what you were saying."

"Hey! I was trying to raise our morale!" I whispered back aggressively, feeling a hot flush on my face. "We are stuck in a pit with broken bones! A little dramatic line helps!"

"It was a bit cringe, Woo Jin," she said flatly.

"Cringe?!" My jaw dropped. I almost put full weight on my left leg in shock, but a sharp twinge instantly reminded me not to. "Did you just say cringe? Where did you even learn that word?!"

Viora didn’t answer. A tiny, almost hidden twitch at the corner of her lips told me she was doing it on purpose.

The absurd banter actually made the cold, heavy pressure in my chest loosen up a bit.

For a second, I completely forgot that we were buried under tons of rubble with giant shadow beasts hanging around us. It felt surprisingly relieving. My heart stopped hammering like crazy, and I took a proper, deep breath.

Viora took a half-step forward. "Alright. Wait here. I will go clear the path."

She was about to stride straight toward the horde of creatures with her glowing purple mana already forming around her body.

"Wait!"

I reached out instantly, grabbing her shoulder to pull her back.

"What is it?" Viora asked, stopping immediately without pushing my hand away. "I can sweep them away with a punch."

"No... wait," I whispered, my voice dropping into a tense murmur. "I think there is something wrong."

Viora stayed completely still, letting me hold her shoulder. "Wrong? What is wrong?"

I didn’t answer her right away. I leaned forward slightly, squinting my eyes as hard as I could into the thick gloom.

The dark green glow in the distance was pulsing like a heavy, sick heart. *Thump... Thump... Thump...* But as my eyes adjusted to the flickering light, I noticed something else.

Thin, ghostly strings of dark green mana were floating upward from the crystal heart.

They weren’t just drifting randomly into the air. They were stretching straight up, like long, glowing spider webs, disappearing directly into the deep cracks of the ceiling—right toward the upper levels where the royal throne room and our party were supposed to be.

"Something seems to be really wrong here," I muttered again under my breath.

"Yeah, I get that," Viora whispered back, her tone sounding slightly exasperated. "But *what* is wrong?"

"I don’t know," I said directly.

Viora went entirely silent. She turned her face toward me in the dark, her eyes blank, but I could practically feel her staring at me with pure disbelief.

"What?!" she whispered loudly.

"I mean it! I don’t know yet!" I murmured back frantically, waving my hand in the air. "I just have a bad feeling! Look at those green strings going up into the roof! That core isn’t just sitting down here. It is pumping something straight up into the upper floor!"

"You said ’something is wrong’ with so much confidence," Viora muttered, letting out a tiny, dramatic breath. "I thought you noticed a secret trap or a high-rank boss mechanism."

"I am a human, not a cheat code!" I grumbled back in a harsh whisper. "Give me a second to actually think!"

I clamped my mouth shut and focused my mind.

I forced myself to ignore the dull, throbbing ache in my knee and analyzed the whole layout. The green mana strings moving up... the corrupted crystal heart... the weird shadow creatures crowding around it...

’Wait a minute,’ I thought, my mind racing through the historical lore of the Great Fall.

The upper chamber was supposed to hold the Crimson Lineage barrier around the whole kingdom.

And now that I look at it closely, I think it might have been corrupted by the Elven and Dragon Alliance’s spatial magic.

If those green strings were feeding dark mana *upward* into the upper floor... then it meant the Elves or Dragons were trying to expect the power straight from the heart of the Vampire Kingdom.

They were actively draining this thing’s blood-mana line!

’If that core keeps pumping that green gunk up there, the barrier above will break way and the whole kingdom will fall into pieces... Which means we will get stuck here, forever!’

"Viora," I whispered, my voice turning completely dead serious. "We have to stop those green lines of mana from getting absorbed. If those green strings keep reaching the ceiling, the whole upper floor is going to collapse on top of Seok and the others, including us."

"Okay," Viora said simply. She didn’t question my logic for even a second.

She lifted her hands again.

But as she raised her arms, the faint purple aura of her own mana flickered around her fingertips. In the pitch-black darkness of the deep pit, that soft purple glow was like a bright flare lit inside a dark room.

Grrrrr...

A low, wet growl echoed from the shadows near the heart.

The dark shapes stopped crawling around the crystal. One by one, their blank, featureless heads turned slowly toward our direction. Dozens of glowing purple eyes snapped open in the dark, all locking directly onto us.

I went completely stiff.

"Shit," I muttered under my breath. "We have been caught."