Normally in novels, there’d be a conveniently placed lake or something to cushion our fall.


    I glance down. No lake. Just solid rock rushing up to meet us. I yank the screaming Bailey towards me, pulling him on top. I’m not sure how much fall damage I’d take, but I’m certain Bailey won’t survive this without some… emergency cushioning.


    I hug him close. The instant before impact, I push Bailey upwards with every ounce of strength in my hands and feet. My body slams into the unforgiving rock below.


    Crash!


    I land squarely on my back, creating a small crater. Yet, still no pain. And I’m still conscious. Huh.


    Bailey flies up a short distance before landing on his stomach with a soft oof. He’s not badly injured, just fainted from the sheer terror of it all. I grab him by the torso and scramble to the side, dodging the rocks raining down around us. The earthquake finally stops.


    I lean against a wall, cursing internally. All that, and not a single scratch. Even the rocks crumble to dust when they hit me. What gives?


    After a moment, Bailey’s eyelids flutter open.


    “That was… close,” I say, helping him sit up a little.


    “Thank… thank you… I… I truly thought… that was it…” Bailey gasps, clutching his chest. His hands tremble. “How… how did you…? My life… I… I owe you… I don’t know how I can ever repay you… thank you…”


    It takes him a while to recover. He’s understandably shaken by the near-death experience.


    I pat him on the shoulder. “I could really go for a good meal when we’re out of here.”


    Pushing myself to my feet, I look back up the way we fell. “Yeah, that was a pretty rough landing. Glad that’s over.”


    Once Bailey’s finally over the worst of the shock, he pulls out a handheld device. A bright light illuminates the area.


    “We’re… a good few hundred meters down, at least. The air’s breathable, thankfully,” Bailey says, his hand steady as he points the small device around the chamber.


    “There’s gotta be a way out. Just… hoping we don’t get another one of those shakes.” He nods towards a faint draft. “Seems like the air’s movin’ this way. Let’s head that direction.”


    Is he Doraemon? Come to think of it, he kinda looks like him too.


    I trail closely behind Bailey. “Cool gadgets. You wouldn’t happen to have a flying drone to scope this place out?”


    “I ain’t got the coin for somethin’ that fancy, that’s for sure. But I wasn’t intendin’ to end up as critter feed out here, so I took a few precautions. Glad nothin’ got smashed in that tumble.” Bailey leads us forward, and a blue glow suddenly spills out from ahead.


    Up close, the glow emanates from a substance coating a large patch of the cave floor. It looks like someone spilled a bucket of luminescent goo.


    “What’s that stuff?” I ask Bailey.


    “Never seen nothin’ like this before. Never been this far underground neither.” Bailey kneels to examine the glowing substance.


    “I guess there’s a first for everything.” I poke it with my boot. The substance feels like clay and doesn’t smell of anything. “Let’s keep going.”


    Bailey nods, and we skirt around the glowing patch. We continue until we reach a large opening in the wall. Bailey points. “There’s a draft comin’ from here. Fresh air, too.”


    The opening leads into a tunnel, quite different from the cave we were in. Bailey stops at the entrance. “Looks like someone dug this out.”


    I drag my fingers across some unusual, shallow markings on the walls. “Probably a long time ago. We should keep going, before another earthquake hits.”


    “Aye, if we get another shake like that, we could be stuck down here for a good while,” Bailey says, hurrying into the opening. I follow quickly.


    Those markings look like they’re made by pickaxes and chisels. Someone dug this a long, long time ago. The markings are almost completely weathered away.


    Something else feels off. It’s too quiet. Besides the occasional drip of water and Bailey’s heavy breathing, there’s nothing. No small creatures, not even bugs. It''s like a subterranean library, except instead of books, we have rocks.


    “Are we going deeper?” I ask. I feel like we’re constantly moving downwards.


    Bailey glances at his device. “Aye, goin’ deeper underground, it seems.”


    I stop. “Why would the exit be deeper underground?”


    “Don’t rightly know, but it’s where that fresh air’s comin’ from.” Bailey points at his device.


    Suddenly, a loud alarm blares from Bailey’s device. “Oh no…” Bailey quickly drops his bag, pulls out a mask, and tries to shove it onto my face.The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.


    “What are you doing? What’s happening?!” I try to fend him off.


    "Get it on! Quick! The air''s goin'' bad! We ain''t got much time!" Bailey yells as the alarm blares.


    I yank my mask off. “Where’s yours?!”


    "I''m...I''m fine. Just..." Bailey stammers.


    “I don’t need it! No time to explain, I am immune,” I interrupt, swiftly forcing the mask onto his face, adjusting the straps.


    A thick blue smog instantly fills the cave. The alarm screams.


    “Which way?!” I shout at Bailey.


    He’s frozen, eyes wide, clearly struggling to process the sudden toxic atmosphere.


    “Which way?!” I repeat, louder.


    Bailey flinches, snaps back to reality, frantically waves his device around, before finally pointing down a tunnel.


    I grab Bailey’s bag in one hand and his arm in the other, and we bolt. After a frantic couple of minutes, the tunnel opens into a larger cavern. The alarm on Bailey’s device mercifully cuts out.


    "By the stars...I...I almost...that was it..." Bailey stares at me, eyes still wide with shock. "Just...how...? You''re...You''re fine?"


    “I am Val, a perfect homunculus created by your dear Master Keyser,” I announce with a grin.


    I place my hands on Bailey’s shoulders, lean in close, and fix him with a serious look. “Don’t you dare risk your life for mine ever again! I don’t want your death on my conscience.”


    Bailey freezes, stammering. "I''m...I''m so sorry. I was just..."


    “I know you were trying to save me. I know you feel indebted from before. But you don’t owe me anything. I saved you because I need you, and I need you alive!” I say firmly.


    Bailey’s eyes well up with tears. "I didn''t think...I didn''t think you''d care, not after...well, after I tried to...you know. Especially considering we only just met."


    “I didn’t mind you trying to poison me, I totally understand. I was a complete stranger who showed up at your door, after all.”


    “But…”


    “I can’t explain everything right now, just remember I am Val. I am Dr. Keyser’s perfect creation. I am not going to die easily,” I tell Bailey, giving his shoulders a reassuring pat. He manages a relieved smile.


    Geez… If we’re going to be traveling together for a bit, he can’t keep interrupting my plans to return to the afterlife.


    Bailey shuffled forward a bit, finding a decent spot to rest. “So, what was that smog?” I asked.


    “Couldn’t tell ya what it was, but this little gadget said it was nasty stuff,” Bailey replied, holding up his device.


    After fiddling with it myself, I asked, “Doesn’t it tell you what it detected?”


    “Didn’t build the thing myself, mind you, but it seems to do the trick. That blue fog nearly got the better of us. I got a snout full of it, and I tell ya, it felt like my lungs were on fire!” Bailey said, snatching the device back.


    “Okay, I guess your money was well spent. Saved your life.”


    “Aye, worth every coin!” Bailey said, chuckling. He rummaged through his bag and tossed me some food.


    At this point, I wouldn’t be surprised if he pulled out a time machine.


    As we rested, small critters scurried past, some familiar. “These little fellas are bottom feeders,” Bailey explained. “They’ll eat just about anything that’s gone to the great beyond around here. Harmless, they are. Unless you’re already six feet under, that is! Hahaha!”


    We hadn''t seen any of these in the previous tunnel or cave. This place should be safer. “What else you got in that bag of yours?” I asked, curiosity piqued. “Any other cool gadgets?”


    Bailey opened his bag, revealing its contents: a bewildering assortment of spices, herbs, and other paraphernalia. I stared, speechless. “Why do you carry so much of this stuff?!”


    “These are my most prized possessions,” Bailey explained. “Traveled the world to find ‘em all. All so I could cook up a good meal for Master Keyser. Shame he’s…” He trailed off, gesturing to the items. Most were spices and dried herbs, some clearly poisonous, others rare and exquisite. A few bottles of medicine were tucked in amongst them.


    Well, I guess there’s no time machine after all.


    After our short break, we got up and kept moving. And there it was—light! We had to be close!


    Bailey and I rushed forward, blissfully unaware. It wasn’t sunlight. Nothing could have prepared us for what we were about to see.


    We emerged into a massive cavern. The light came from enormous, glowing crystals sprouting from the ceiling hundreds of meters above, illuminating the entire space. Below them lay a vast, abandoned city, completely overgrown with vegetation.


    “How deep are we?” I asked, staring at the sight.


    “Near about four hundred meters down…” Bailey read from his device.


    Maybe it’s just an isekai thing, I thought. “Who lives this far underground?”


    “Not that I’ve ever heard of…” Bailey racked his memory.


    “Do you feel hot or anything?” I asked. Usually, it’d be sweltering this deep down.


    Bailey wiped his sweaty palms. “I’m sweating like a hog, but it ain’t the heat. Should we take a gander? That fresh air’s gotta be coming from somewhere.”


    “Yeah,” I nodded, and we headed down into the city.


    Everything looked frozen in time. The plants hadn’t damaged the structures at all; it was like someone had been pruning them.


    Bailey looked intensely interested in the vegetation. “Do you recognize these plants?” I asked.


    He plucked a bit, examined it closely, and then took a cautious nibble. “They look familiar, alright, but…not quite the same as any I’ve seen before.” He chewed thoughtfully. “Tastes familiar, too.”


    “These are edible?” I picked a few and tasted them. I promptly spat them out. They were horrendous.


    “Well, they’re not exactly a five-star meal on their own,” Bailey said with a grin.


    He explained that the plants resembled surface crops—the stuff Mesoselenians grew for food. However, they all looked and tasted slightly different.


    At least Bailey won’t starve anytime soon.


    We entered a few homes. They were empty, but it looked like the occupants had left in a hurry. Broken pots and pans littered the floors.


    “Whoa!” Bailey tripped on something, managing to keep his balance. The object that tripped him turned out to be the city’s first resident—or at least, part of one.


    A couple of long bones lay bare on the ground.


    “Whose bones are these?” I asked.


    “These look like Mesoselenian bones, but…they’re not quite the same.” Bailey pointed to the bone’s width, considerably thicker than any Mesoselenian bones he knew.


    “Okay, I have a theory. This is a city belonging to ancient Mesoselenians—a large group that lived here underground, isolated from the rest of the world. They abandoned it for some reason, and this is what’s left,” I said. Bailey was still examining the bones and plants.


    “Aye, fascinating indeed…This is something else entirely. Never seen or heard of anything like it,” he muttered, continuing to look around.