The Sorcerer's Handbook

Long before he ever set foot in the Abyss, Ashe had heard countless rumors about it.

Most of what he knew came not from what he had picked up at Shattered Lake, but from the Swordswoman’s idle complaints during their chats.

Almost every region where sorcerers gathered in large numbers eventually spawned an Abyss nearby. Sometimes, one would manifest directly beneath a bustling metropolis, becoming a permanent subterranean hazard that could never be fully eradicated. The monsters within were endless. The slightest slip-up could send a tide of beasts crashing into the streets above.

In the bygone eras when the human population was sparse and civilization fragile, the Abyss was a nation’s most pressing concern, a matter of existential national defense.

But as the number of sorcerers skyrocketed and their civilization entered an era of rapid, explosive development, the balance shifted. While the Abyss grew stronger in tandem with the rising tide of magic, the monsters’ evolutionary pace could never keep up with the exponential advances in sorcerer technology. Year by year, the threat posed by the Abyss steadily declined.

Eventually, its status plummeted from a grave existential threat to a mere daily chore, barely even registering as a footnote in national security briefs.

The Blood Moon Kingdom eventually handed its Abysses over to adventurers, or, more accurately, utilized them as a convenient dumping ground for the barbaric, combat-addicted sorcerers unsuited for civilized society. Meanwhile, the Gospel Kingdom assigned each of its Abysses to the Bluebeards for suppression. Bluebeard was not a branch of national defense, but a private corporate military. In short, the Gospel Kingdom leased the Abysses out, allowing corporations to manage the subterranean hazards as they saw fit.

In the old days, the Abyss was a looming terror, practically screaming its intent to swallow humanity whole. Now, it felt more like a reclusive beast, quietly muttering for everyone to just leave it alone.

Of course, this pacification only applied to the first layer. The deeper strata of the Abyss remained profoundly deadly, even to Sacred Realm and Legendary sorcerers. Tumbling into those depths still meant certain death.

For a village-born sorcerer like the Swordswoman, venturing into the Abyss was the single best way to harvest resources and gain practical combat experience.

Materials harvested from Abyss Monsters were highly lucrative. Beyond forging equipment, they could be refined into specialized potions that boosted resonance rates with specific spirits. A Wave Potion, for instance, drastically increased a sorcerer’s chances of summoning a Wave spirit.

Furthermore, Abyss Monsters occasionally dropped intact spirits upon death, essentially turning the Abyss into a pocket-sized copy of the Virtual World. The catch, however, was that this was, at the end of the day, no actual Virtual World. Sorcerers who died inside died for good.

Worse, the Abyss was notoriously volatile. If luck ran out and it ”boiled over,” monstrosities from the deep might wander up to the first or second layers for a ”casual stroll. ” This was no rare anomaly, and even Sacred Realm sorcerers could end up slaughtered. Ultimately, if a high-ranking sorcerer ventured into the upper levels just to farm low-level mobs for easy gold, it really could provoke those deeper monsters to surface in retaliation.

As the popular Abyss lore ironically put it, ”You bully my minions, I’ll bully your little friends, and we’ll call it a perfect exchange of younglings.”

Thus, adventuring in the Abyss remained a volatile gamble of risk and reward. Back when society was underdeveloped, sorcerers had no choice but to descend into the abyss to scrape together resources. But now that civilization had progressed, most preferred to stay safely at home, quietly honing their crafts until they became Legends before ever stepping outside. In the modern era, no one with a choice would willingly risk their life in the dirt.

Back then, before the Swordswoman had competed in the intercollegiate gala, she had been in a tight financial spot. Her constant, dramatic complaints to Ashe about the mortal perils of the Abyss had carried a single, underlying subtext, which was essentially, ”I’m adorable, so please support me financially. How could you bear to watch such a cute girl risk her life down there?”

In return, Ashe had always nodded along to her tales of woe vigorously. Could he bear it? Of course, he could. It wasn’t him risking his neck down there. As far as he was concerned, she needed to get back to grinding those dungeons so he could live the good life.

It wasn’t that he refused to support her; he simply lacked the funds to do so.

Shaking off the memory, Ashe turned to their current guide. ”But I remember hearing that the terrain of the Abyss shifts constantly. Isn’t that chaotic shifting the reason sorcerers can’t establish permanent bases layer by layer?”

Annan nodded. ”Exactly. The Abyss does shift frequently, but when it alters, it doesn’t take the people inside with it. Only the layout itself moves, while the structural archetype remains intact. Dungeons remain dungeons, caves remain caves, and mazes remain mazes.”

”The logic after that is pretty simple,” Annan continued, gesturing around them. ”Since the Mermaid Weed hasn’t ’died,’ the terrain it occupies doesn’t shift when the rest of the Abyss transforms. Even the ground, buildings, and walls in direct contact with its roots stay locked in place. As long as the Mermaid Weed is widespread enough, it anchors and stabilizes the entire local terrain.”

”What about the monsters?” Ashe asked.

”Right now, the mist suppresses them. But surely you haven’t forgotten. This is the very source of the Beauty Mist,” Annan said, a faint smile playing on her lips. ”Even we sorcerers are heavily affected by it. Do you really think the monsters escape unscathed?

”Anything caught in the mist, be it human or beast, is flooded with a perpetual state of euphoria and joy, completely stripping away their will to fight. Exposed to such high concentrations, their psychological thresholds collapse instantly. Roughly once a month, the corpse retrieval unit comes down to harvest the monsters’ corpses. These protective suits we’re wearing? They’re standard-issue gear for those clean-up crews.

Iger remarked dryly, ”Handling surplus population, producing strategic resources, defending against Abyss incursions, and efficiently harvesting monsters... what a remarkably pragmatic facility. Honestly, if you told me the Mermaid Weed Farm doubled as a sewer and a hospital, I wouldn’t even be surprised.”

”Then what about Abyss passages?” Ashe asked, shifting the subject. ”This is the first time I’ve ever heard of them.”

Annan explained, ”Simply put, individual Abysses are not isolated pockets. At the very least, the Abysses within each kingdom are interconnected. The passages are specialized, spacetime-compressing channels that allow a traveler to cross miles of geography to another Abyss in moments. When needed, they serve as a convenient means of fast travel.”

”So with such a convenient transit system—”

Annan interrupted. ”The catch is that the passages themselves shift constantly. A stabilized Abyss like this Mermaid Weed Farm is unique within the Gospel Kingdom. Most Abysses don’t have vast colonies of living organisms to tether them, meaning their geography remains chaotic. That makes the passages far too unreliable for standard travel.

”Furthermore, before sorcerers fully suppressed the Abyss, they couldn’t use the passages safely. By the time they finally had the strength to secure them, civilization had already engineered surface transport that was just as fast. Plus, many people despise the temporal compression effect. A few minutes in the passage could equal several hours in the outside world. Ultimately, it doesn’t save any real-world time. It just makes the trip feel shorter.”

Ashe’s eyes lit up. ”Wait... That’s essentially time travel, isn’t it? If I stay in here for a year, decades could pass outside—”

Annan corrected ruthlessly, ”Setting aside the dangers, your body ages in sync with the outside world. So while you might feel as though only a year has passed, your physical body will have aged by decades. If your goal is simply to leap into the future, sorcerers have far safer ways to decelerate aging without setting foot in an Abyss.”

”I highly recommend the coffin hibernation method,” Harvey interjected, suddenly looking much livelier now that they were leaving the vicinity of the Mermaid Weed Farm. ”Convert yourself into a preserved corpse, and wake up a century later. It only costs a mere thirty percent of your current lifespan. Care to try?”

”Has anyone actually done that?” Ashe asked, skeptical.

”Oh, plenty. Wealthy, terminally ill people used to do it all the time. But they invariably woke up as paupers,” Harvey chuckled darkly. ”The Blood Saint Research Institute even has an entire Hibernation Department dedicated to it. It specializes entirely in bleeding money from desperate, short-lived rich elites. Those fools genuinely believed that future medicine would magically grant them immortality for free.”

”Those who refuse to face their own era are doomed to be abandoned by it,” Iger said flatly. ”Hoping for the future is often just a coward’s synonym for abandoning the present.”

Walking at the front of the group, Pankey suddenly halted. ”We’re here.”

It felt as though they had stepped through an invisible curtain. Leaving the oppressive darkness of the natural cavern, they suddenly entered an underground ruin bathed in a sea of lights.

The brick buildings around them were dilapidated but clearly not ancient. Sconces holding burning torches lined the walls every ten paces, illuminating narrow corridors wide enough for only four people to walk abreast. The sudden transition felt like stepping out of a modern metropolis and directly into a claustrophobic medieval town.

”Another Abyss?” Ashe looked down both ends of the tunnel. ”Why aren’t there any monsters?”

”It means the Bluebeard has already cleared the daily task for this sector,” Annan said, unbuckling her protective suit and pulling off her mask. ”Even the most resilient Abyss needs time to regenerate its forces... Now that we’ve left Vanmura’s jurisdiction, we will begin the Exorcism Procedure to fully purge the lingering effects of the Beauty Mist.”

The Exorcism Procedure could completely eradicate the physiological addiction caused by the mist, ensuring they would not crave its euphoric embrace. Their artificially elevated psychological thresholds, however, would remain permanently altered.

In theory, anyone from Vanmura could undergo the Exorcism Procedure and leave the city. But for those immersed in dreams, it was easy to purge the magic from their bodies, yet nearly impossible to purge it from their hearts. Except for essential business trips, they rarely traveled outside the city.

Pankey pulled six white cups from his suitcase, then turned over his left hand to reveal a crest marked on the back. He dropped a flame into one of the cups and slammed his hand down over the opening.

The flame ignited the air inside, creating a vacuum that clamped the cup tightly to his hand under atmospheric pressure. Almost immediately, blotches resembling insect eggs erupted across Pankey’s body, flowing toward the white cup like students rushing the cafeteria. Visually, it looked as if they were being sucked right into the vessel!

Annan explained, ”Artifact Spirit, Exorcism. Beyond eradicating addictions, it clears heat and toxins, beautifies the skin, refreshes the mind, ensures dreamless sleep, strengthens vitality, and balances yin and yang. It’s an incredibly expensive piece of sorcerer technology and a major export for Vanmura. Honestly, using it just to cure addictions is a massive waste. Ordinary people usually just go to the hospitals on the outskirts of the city for standard exorcisms.”

Since the area was safe, the group decided to rest while the Exorcism Procedure did its work. Though the white cup looked like it would painfully suck at the skin, Ashe found the sensation surprisingly pleasant. His skin tingled faintly, as if hundreds of mosquitoes were simultaneously drawing out fat, blackheads, acne, and all sorts of deep-seated impurities.

Lys pointed at the blotches forming on Ashe and laughed out loud. ”Hahaha! Daddy, you’re so dirty!”

Ashe glanced over and noticed she was practically spotless. Despite her cup trying its hardest, it could barely extract a thing. Meanwhile, his own body was covered in grimy spots, so filthy that not even years of working at a construction site without ever washing could have left him in such a state. It felt as if hundreds of cockroaches were crawling all over him.

”Oh?”

Seeing the strange curve of Ashe’s lips, Lys grew uneasy and took several steps back. ”Wh-what are you smiling at? Ah! Don’t come near me!”

”Time for a phobia attack!”

Ashe lunged and grabbed Lys, rubbing his blotchy skin against her like a person enthusiastically petting a cat. The sheer visual horror was too much for her. Her mind faltered, her eyes rolled back, she began to foam at the mouth, and she could barely manage to pull out her hand mirror. ”Help... someone help...”

Feeling the trembling Lys in his arms suddenly go still, Ashe blinked and gently let her go.

Did I go too far and actually scare her unconscious? I mean... It’s just like throwing a box full of cockroaches at someone. Surely that wouldn’t knock anyone out cold.

At that moment, Lys broke free and looked down at him with a quiet, steady gaze. ”Fun, is it?”

”I mean, I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t. But it’s really not that much fun...”

She furrowed her brows and planted her hands on her hips. ”Do you find it fun to gross me out?”

For some reason, Ashe felt Lys suddenly take on the stature of a rational, older neighborhood sister, while he was like a mischievous child caught misbehaving. He offered a sheepish smile. ”Well... not that fun, really...”

”Don’t do that again, or I’ll start to dislike you.”

She glanced down at his ice-covered right hand. ”Does it still hurt? You’re already in bad shape, and I’m still making you carry me...”

Ashe flinched. He was about to reach out to her, but pulled back and called over to Iger instead. ”Iger, I think Lys had a mental breakdown from my gross antics. You need to... Wait, Iger, what are you doing?”

Unlike the rest of them waiting quietly for the procedure to finish, the fraudster was hiding under a blanket, keeping himself completely concealed. Without a doubt, he had snatched it from Pankey.

Annan was also hiding under a nearby blanket, making the two of them look completely out of place with the rest of the team.

”If a kid’s mind breaks, just beat them mercilessly. Either the problem fixes itself, or the person raising it fixes it,” came Iger’s muffled voice from beneath the blanket. ”All you need for the job is a belt.”

Curious, Ashe approached. ”What are you doing under there? Let me see—”

”Piss off, you deadhead!”

A fist shot out from beneath the fabric, knocking Ashe flat on his back. He hadn’t expected a Mind Class sorcerer to have proficiency in the Fists and Legs Class[1]. He hadn’t even had time to dodge!

Lying on the cold floor with his arms and abdomen aching all over again, Ashe cast Sword of Joy on himself to blunt the pain and sat up. He spotted Lys standing beside him. Before he could speak, she wrapped her arms around his neck, rested her chin on his shoulder, and nuzzled against him. ”Stop fooling around. I might not always be this playful, but whichever me it is, I still like you.”

Ashe shivered from head to toe, a profound sense of dissonance washing over him. No, this mature, older-sister tone should be reserved for Quinna, or maybe even Annan. Speaking to me like this will make people question my parenting methods!

He could forgive Annan and Pankey staring, but now even Harvey was giving him a deeply perverse look. Ashe could practically feel his standing in the Funeral Agency plummet into ”do not approach” territory.

I get it. So this is how you are taking your revenge? Lys, you are cruel!

Suddenly, everyone’s Book of Gospels popped open simultaneously, each displaying a glittering bookmark. Everyone froze for a moment as comprehension dawned.

Pankey noted, ”We’ve only been in the Abyss passage for a few minutes, but over two hours have passed in reality. It’s past midnight... It’s already May 20th!”

”Does the second future ranking update right at midnight?”

”What kind of ranking is it?”

”Did Annan’s plan actually work?”

With a flurry of conflicting thoughts, they opened the bookmarks together. The title of the second leaderboard materialized before their eyes.

[Family Ranking]

1. It’s just a nickname for saying he knows how to throw a punch ☜