Liam's gaze wandered around the lake, taking a measure of the huge place. He had to dive into this freezing cold water and search for the required herbs.
Unfortunately, Liam's knowledge when it came to herbs of the nether realm was extremely limited just like the rest of the world.
In fact, he recognized only three of the ten herbs that he needed for the potion brewing, and that too thanks to the information that he had gathered from the Itaka city lord.
As for the other seven, he had no idea what sort of herbs they were. He only knew how they looked and their name.
Fortunately, the recipe provided at least these basic details. Otherwise, he would have no place to start.
Liam stood still observing the lake for a couple more seconds as it seemed very unusually calm and quiet without even the occasional jumping of a fish.
"Hmmm… Doesn't look like I am going to find any herbs here… Well, I just have to dive and find out." He stretched his limbs and then without further adieu simply jumped into the water.
"Mother fcker!" Although he had already expected it, the freezing cold water still struck him like a bolt of lightning.
"Hmmm… Isn't this a bit too much?" There was something off because, with his upgraded stats and his Level 49 constitution, he shouldn't be feeling a sting like this.
It was as if the cold was reaching his very core, freezing his body from the inside to out. "I need to do this fast."
Liam quickly took out a bottle of underwater breathing potion that he had in his inventory and emptied the contents in his mouth before dunking his head back into the water.
He began swimming downward and soon it became completely dark. It was a deep lake, despite not looking that deep from the surface.
Liam paused for a moment and then took out a glowing stick from his inventory space. This was a small common item that had a rune inscribed on it and could be used as a candle.
He gripped it in between his teeth and began to swim further down to the floor of the lake. The more he went deeper, the colder the water became.
He only swam for a couple of seconds when new notifications began to roll out.
[Ding. You are currently affected by extreme cold]
[Ding. Your movement speed is reduced by 50%]
[Ding. You feel sick]
-5
-3
-5
…
…
…
Seeing that his health had promptly started to drop, Liam frowned.
"Perfect! Just what I needed." He sighed softly as he tried to circulate mana through his body which was now starting to feel cold and frigid. He could barely move.
As if this was not enough, the other entity clinging to him immediately sensed his weakness and came out to play.
DIE! DIE! DIE!
Gorak's loud screams started once again blasting in his brain.
Liam's face twitched, wanting to kill the bastard all over again. He gritted his teeth, bore everything, and kept going downward.
Even if he could not scour the bed of the entire lake, he at least wanted to explore a small part of it to make sure that he did not miss anything.
So with his health still continuing to drop, he quickly moved as fast as he physically could and reached the bottom.
Once he was there, he roamed around for a couple of seconds to take a good look. However…
"Damn it. This is just plain rocks. There is nothing else here." Liam could only see small white color rocks everywhere.
Weirdly, they seemed to be even colder than the surrounding water. This made him take a second look at the stones to check if they really radiated a wave of freezing coldness.
Normal stones were not usually capable of doing something like this.
He reached his hand closer to the stones and bingo! Just like he thought these stones were not simple. They were as cold as ice cubes.
Liam bit the bullet and picked one up, bearing the biting cold that seeped from the touch but surprisingly the white thing was not a stone at all! It was a scale!
All the small white crystals lying on the lake bed were scales!
And there were so many of them. To the extent that he could see, the entire bed of the lake seemed to be covered in similar scales.
These scales definitely belonged to the beasts inside the lake.
To shed this much, there had to be several beasts inside the lake which did not seem to be the case as he had not run into even one until now.
The lake as well was very calm without any ripples. All this could mean only one thing.
Liam's eyes widened in shock and it took him one second to put everything together.
The silent area, the presence of no other beasts, the freezing cold lake, and not a single fish in sight, all of this could mean only one thing!
There was an apex predator somewhere in this lake!
And right now, Liam was in the most vulnerable position he could possibly be in!
He was already at half his health and it was further continuing to bleed quickly. His movement speed was reduced and his entire body was almost frozen.
In this state, if he by chance got caught by something at a higher level, then it was definitely game over.
He had already died once before and Liam did not mind it because he had gained so much more because of that death. The profit was much bigger than the loss.
But he was not an idiot to die for nothing!
So he instantly kicked his legs down with as much force as he could muster, propelling his body upwards.
He also used up the mana he had stored and started casting fireballs to warm up the water around him.
If there was a beast in this lake, it had probably noticed him already so there was no point in being subtle about the escape.
He simply threw all caution to the wind and ran away as fast as possible!
Compared to the descent, the return trip was much faster as it only became more and more comfortable the closer he got to the surface.
He was only seconds away from reaching the surface and jumping out of the lake. However, before he could do so, a loud siren-like sound echoed in the waters.
The calm lake became turbulent and Liam could definitely feel something coming at him at top speed!
"Damn it. This is not going to end well. LUNA!"
Liam called out to the white fox and instantly his ride appeared above the lake. Now all he had to do was reach forward and push through that last few inches of water above his head.
Glugg. Glugg. Glugg.
Glugg. Glugg. Glugg.
Liam tried to shoot upwards when suddenly something red came at him.
It looked like a rod made of flesh or at least that's what he saw in the split second as the thing's speed was insane.
"No, I cannot dodge this completely." Liam knew his options. He instantly turned his body at an angle and made sure that he was on the same axis as the rippling waves.
This gave him the additional boost that he needed and he used it to zoom out of the lake waters.
This was enough for the white fox to take action. Luna spotted him the moment he reached the surface of the lake.
She immediately grabbed him just like Liam always did by the scruff of her neck and the two of them flew up, away from the lake.
However, they were still not quite free. The red rod still came after them and almost touched Luna's tail.
Now that they were up in the air, they could clearly see what it was. The red rod was a tongue covered with what looked like a million blisters.
Something oozed out of these blisters and chances were that it was highly poisonous.
But at the last moment, before the tongue could grab onto Luna's tail, Liam slammed a fireball onto the rod.
Flesh sizzled and another loud roar erupted from underneath the lake as the tongue rapidly withdrew like a stretched out rubber band.
Liam and Luna, now both high up in the air, panted loudly taking a breather. It was impossible for another attack to land on them unless the beast inside the lake could fly.
A couple of seconds passed and nothing came after them. So clearly that did not seem to be the case. They were safe at least for now.
However, just as the duo stared at the lake waters, ready to bolt at any instant, a pair of big bulging yellow eyes silently appeared underneath the clear waters.
They finally got a chance to take a look at the beast residing in the lake. It was a giant white-scaled toad!
