Chapter 357: Star Gloom

And in the next second after they were thrust out, the Bloodsucking Vine remnants, having lost their energy support and parasitic target, withered and carbonized rapidly, finally turning into a foul, sticky sludge that dissolved into the raging Dark River.

The icy river water enveloped them again, but this time they were moving at high speed.

Lin Yifan's consciousness nearly scattered under the immense pain and shock, yet he clung to that direction—the direction that resonated with the pale blue starlight!

He didn't know how long they were swept, until that chaotic thrust was completely exhausted.

Splash!

Their speed slowed, and finally they were once again carried forward by the rapid current.

But this time, Lin Yifan's blurred vision caught that the left bank seemed no longer so distant, and the terrain appeared altered. The pale blue glow of the distant moss also seemed more concentrated.

On his left shoulder, the explosive pain persisted, but the frantic proliferating sensation and the feeling of life force being drained vanished. All that remained was a more tattered, charred, blurry wound ravaged by multiple energies; blood still seeped, though more slowly.

More importantly, the faint resonance emanating from deep within his soul, linked to something in the distant darkness, while still weak, became clearer!

It's right ahead! Somewhere in this hopeless underground world!

Lin Yifan mustered his last ounce of strength, dragging Lingling, and began to laboriously paddle toward the bank, toward the direction of the resonance.

Hope flickered like ghostly fire, wavering in the boundless dark hell, feeble yet stubbornly refusing to die.

He must reach it.

Cold and excruciating pain are the only coordinates for his consciousness to revive.

Lin Yifan could not recall how he dragged his battered body, cradling the nearly frozen Lingling, and struggled ashore from the raging, icy Dark River. His memory retained only endless darkness, bone‑piercing cold water, and the relentless, soul‑searing pain and emptiness at his left shoulder.

He collapsed onto the Rough, wet, cold rocks, like a fish out of water, gulping breath after breath, each inhalation pulling a tearing pain through his whole body. The frigid air entered his lungs, delivering a needle‑sharp sting, yet it forced his scattered consciousness to coalesce.

"Lingling..." his hoarse voice rasped as he struggled to turn his neck.

The little fox, damp and curled in his neck hollow, its tiny body cold, breathing faintly, yet its dark eyes barely stayed open, conveying stubborn vitality. "Cold... Yifan brother..." she whispered in a faint whimper.

Still alive. All still alive.

Lin Yifan let out a slight sigh of relief, but immediately a greater despair descended like the darkness of this underground world.

He struggled to prop his upper body with his functional right arm, scanning his surroundings.

It seemed to be the edge of a massive underground cavity. Beneath his feet lay cold rock; not far away the Dark River rushed on, exuding chill, its black water bottomless. Overhead rose a towering dome whose summit was invisible, with only scattered pale blue moss on distant walls casting ghost‑fire‑like faint light, barely outlining the space—vast, empty, deathly silent, suffused with an eternal cold and desolation.

What chilled his heart most was his left shoulder.

The horrific flesh‑like growth formed from the Bloodsucking Vine debris had vanished, apparently shattered completely by the prior chaotic energy blast and the Dark River's scourge. Yet what remained was an even more ferocious, terrifying wound!

The entire left shoulder and part of his chest were now a blur of flesh and blood. The wound's edges displayed bizarre char, icy crystals, and corrosive marks—the aftermath of multiple clashing energies. Deep within the lesion, fragments of stark white bone and faintly pulsating, dull‑colored vascular nerves could be seen. No massive gush of blood, only the result of severe loss and cold, yet even slight movement still caused tearing pain and minor oozing.

That arm was utterly useless. Moreover, the wound itself continuously drained the little life force he still possessed. Cold and hunger were like festering sores, relentlessly corroding him and Lingling.

No medicine, no food, no safe Shelter. In this utterly dark underground world, they were like two ants lost in a dead end.

Through the soul link, Xiao You's breath remained as faint as a spider's thread, seemingly on the verge of severing; he could only vaguely sense that she still "existed" somewhere extremely distant or isolated, in a terrible condition.

A dead end. A true, hopeless dead end.

Exhaustion, pain, cold, hunger, despair… crashed over Lin Yifan's nerves like a tide. He even entertained the thought of giving up, perhaps sleeping here forever, ending the endless agony—a kind of release…

Just as his gaze began to drift and his consciousness was about to be swallowed by darkness—

Buzz…

A faint, yet oddly familiar throb, like a second heartbeat, suddenly emanated from deep within the ferocious wound on his left shoulder!

It was that pale blue starlight! The last strand of the extinct Star‑Void power in Xiao You's blood! It had not yet completely faded!

It was like the most tenacious spark, hidden deep within the charred, necrotic flesh, now flickering extremely weakly yet continuously. Moreover, its flicker was clearer and more rapid than when it was in the Dark River.

The source it sensed… was right nearby! Very close!

Lin Yifan jerked his head up, his drifting gaze refocusing, like a dying traveler spotting a mirage—whether illusion or not, it was the only hope!

He strained his eyes toward the direction of the throb.

What his eyes met was still darkness, rock, and scattered pale blue moss. Yet when he gathered all his spirit to sense, he could indeed detect, in a certain direction, a minute, distinct flow of the surrounding cold energy.

"Lingling..." Lin Yifan's hoarse voice carried a faint rekindled glimmer, "Feel it... that direction... what's different?"

Lingling weakly lifted her head, her tiny nose twitching, the dim rune mark on her forehead warming slightly. She strained to sense, and after a moment, a flicker of doubt crossed her dark eyes.

"It seems... a bit different... over there... the energy is... heavier? older?" she described uncertainly, "And there's a... unsettling feeling... yet... somehow alluring?" The feeling was contradictory, instinctively making her wary.

Enough! That's enough!

Lin Yifan clenched his teeth, using his right arm to laboriously lift himself. Every movement made him sweat cold, pain so intense he nearly collapsed.

He tore off a relatively intact strip of cloth from his body, clenched his teeth, and with one hand and his teeth, clumsily yet desperately wrapped the horrific wound on his left shoulder as best as he could to prevent further abrasion and infection. The process was tantamount to another torture.

Having done all that, he was nearly exhausted. Yet he dared not stop.

He carefully tucked Lingling into the tattered lapel of his chest garment, preserving as much of her body heat as possible.

Then, relying on his right arm and stubborn will, he dragged his nearly numb lower body, beginning to crawl step by step, laboriously toward the direction of the throb.

The Rough rocks scraped his knees and elbows, the icy chill constantly sapped his warmth. Darkness, like thick ink, enveloped everything, with only the distant pale blue moss—like a ghostly eye—coldly watching his tiny, hopeless struggle.

Crawling. Endless crawling.

Excruciating pain and cold were like two vicious jailers, constantly torturing his will. His consciousness blurred repeatedly, only to be yanked back each time by the persistent faint throb deep in his left shoulder wound.

The resonance grew ever clearer.

The flow of energy in the air became increasingly evident. No longer merely cold, it now mingled with an extremely faint, indescribable… gravity? As if the darkness ahead were a miniature black hole, slowly devouring all surrounding energy and light.

It even gave him the illusion that his crawling speed had slightly increased? Or perhaps the space ahead itself was "pulling" him forward?

He didn't know how long he had crawled, and just as Lin Yifan felt his life force nearly spent and his consciousness about to plunge fully into darkness—

His hand met only emptiness.

The ground ahead suddenly vanished!

He jolted to a halt, his body nearly toppling from inertia!

Cold sweat instantly soaked his body. He cautiously leaned forward to look.

Before him yawned an immense, vertically plunging abyss! Beneath the chasm was not absolute darkness but a faint, nebula‑like pale blue glow. Though extremely weak, it was enough for him to discern some features along the abyss's edge—

Countless massive, broken, rust‑corroded metal structures, like the skeletons of great beasts, jut out from the abyssal rock walls, covered with thick moss and fungi that emit the same faint azure glow. These metal structures are of an ancient and strange style, not natural creations, and faintly display a never‑seen pattern full of geometric beauty.

And the powerful source of resonance and energy attraction that draws him here originates from the deepest part of this abyss! The core of that pervasive nebula‑like azure radiance!

There, something seems to be…

Lin Yifan's gaze fixed on the lower abyss, about dozens of meters away, where a relatively flat and broad platform extended from a massive metal wreck on the rock wall.

On the platform, the azure moss glow was noticeably brighter than the surroundings.

And at the very center of that dense azure radiance, there was, astonishingly, a… structure?

It was a small, ancient altar or stone platform made entirely of an unknown black stone. Its surface was engraved with incomparably complex, profound star‑trajectory patterns, and in the grooves of these patterns, a liquid azure light—like a condensed galaxy—was slowly flowing!

These liquid azure lights are the source of all illumination in the abyss! They emit a pure, icy, Star‑void power that shares its origin with Xiao You yet is far older and more majestic.

And at the very center of the stone platform, where the liquid azure light was densest, three fist‑sized, entirely jet‑black objects hovered, their surfaces naturally bearing countless ever‑changing silver star‑spiral patterns—fruits? Or perhaps some kind of energy crystal?

They resembled three miniature black holes, silently hovering there, rotating slowly. Each rotation stirred the thin energy in the surrounding space, which, like docile lambs, was devoured and absorbed.

That powerful energy attraction and resonance stem from these three mysterious "Star‑void fruits"!

Lin Yifan's heart pounded wildly!

Hope! This is hope!

He could clearly feel the faint azure star‑glint deep in his left‑shoulder wound now beating at an unprecedented frequency, transmitting an intense yearning! As if a child long away from home finally sensed a mother's breath!

The power contained in these three fruits could certainly heal his injuries! Even… it might greatly benefit Xiao You!

But… how to go down?

The platform lay dozens of meters below, its surrounding cliffs steep and smooth, covered with rusted metal and hazardous moss. In his current condition, climbing down was impossible. Jumping straight down was a certain death.

Just as Lin Yifan grew frantic, his gaze swept over the rock wall at the platform's edge.

There, some massive, heavily rusted metal pipes and cable remnants hung like dying vines, dangling from above and extending toward the platform. One of them was especially thick; despite severe rust, its structure seemed relatively intact…

An adventurous plan instantly formed in his mind.

He carefully stepped back, finding a sufficiently solid rock. Then he stripped from his body every item of usable length—a tattered strip of cloth, a thin yet sturdy metal wire originally meant to bind a wound (picked up from the ruins), and even the last sturdy fibers from his trousers.

Using one hand and his teeth, he painstakingly linked these materials together, crafting a barely long but extremely crude Rough rope. He tied one end tightly around the solid rock, and the other end around his waist.

This is his Unique hope.

He inhaled a breath of icy air and glanced at the trembling Ling Ling in his arms, whose eyes now sparked with hope.

"Hold on to me."

Having said that, he no longer hesitated, using his last strength to seize the Rough rope and begin descending toward the abyss, toward the platform emitting azure light, inch by inch, laboriously.

The rope scraped against rock and rusted metal, producing a teeth‑aching sound, ready to snap at any moment. His body swayed in the air, the wound on his left shoulder repeatedly striking the cliff, delivering waves of suffocating agony.

The descent was slow and painful, like a pilgrimage toward an unknown fate.

Finally, just before his Physical Stamina was about to be completely exhausted, his feet touched the edge of the platform.

He collapsed onto the cold, metal platform covered with azure moss, gasping heavily, nearly exhausted.