Chapter 512: The Assassin’s Skill Upgrade

Luke ran into the temple with Layla in his arms.

“She’s going to die,” he said flatly.

“There’s nothing you can do?!” Artemis shouted.

“You want me to brew an antidote in under twenty seconds for a poison I don’t even know? I’m a botanist. I don’t understand venom like this, and I don’t have the right skills.”

Luke laid her body on the ground, straightening her so she could breathe. He dumped everything he had from his storage item around them, but he didn’t even know where to start.

“You evolved a potion-related skill in the past. Figure something out, damn it!”

“I don’t know how, Artemis,” Luke said, pouring every antidote he’d taken from the alchemists into Layla’s mouth.

“You ate poisonous plants and crossed a forest that literally produced venom. You found a way then.”

“That was my body adapting. I don’t know how to help her.”

Layla began to convulse. Her body jerked violently, foam forming at the corner of her mouth. Nothing he’d given her worked.

Luke pulled the kunai from her body.

“Suck out the poison!”

“That only works in movies, and it’s already in her bloodstream.”

Her spasms grew worse. Luke stripped off her boots, gloves, and damaged clothing. Her body was swelling. Some of the fabric was burned from the explosion, but the real wound was in her leg, right where the kunai had struck.

“Snake… the daimyo talked about snakes. That has to be it. Hemotoxic venom. If it reaches her heart, it’s over.”

Luke licked the poison from the kunai blade and took some of her blood into his mouth.

“I’ll use my blood to try to create something.”

His body would produce antibodies to the venom. The problem was keeping Layla alive long enough for that to matter.

He made two shallow cuts above the wound to force bleeding and slow the spread of the poison. Then he tied off her leg to reduce circulation in the area.

Layla was drenched in sweat, her body still trembling, but Luke knew that alone had bought her time.

He placed a damp cloth on her forehead, trying to calm her.

Luke grabbed a wooden cup, held it over a torch to burn out the air inside, then pressed it against the wound, creating suction to slowly draw out contaminated blood and keep it from circulating.

Layla whimpered in pain, broken sounds slipping from her lips. At the same time, Luke used telekinesis to tend to the cauldron, forcing his mind to work through how to make a potion.

Depending on the type, a healing potion could make things worse.

For long hours, he stayed beside her while she burned with fever and muttered fragments of her life.

“Mom… I’m sorry,” she whispered again and again, always her mother.

Luke continued administering the alchemists’ antidotes in small doses, trying to suppress the symptoms while he worked on creating his own using his blood. At one point, he drove a kukri into his own body, piercing his stomach and tearing out a piece.

He had to drink a Verdant Vitality Potion immediately just to survive that.

He dropped the piece of his own stomach into the cauldron and kept going.

When the antidote was finally ready, he tried to give it to Layla, but she spat it out.

“Drink it, you idiot.”

She kept choking and coughing.

“Tastes bad…” she murmured, delirious.

“You’re dying, dumbass.”

At least the effects were starting to fade. Luke grabbed one of the coconuts from the palm trees and cracked it open. He scraped out the white flesh, mixed it into a bowl with the antidote he had prepared, and carefully fed it to Layla.

After tasting the antidote himself, he realized just how awful it really was. And that was coming from someone who had eaten plants, bark, and dirt-covered roots without hesitation. Even for him, this crossed a line.

The coconut helped. A little. The milky liquid that formed was still foul-smelling, but there was a faint sweetness that made it barely tolerable. Once Layla stabilized, Luke laid her down on a mattress and cleaned the wound on her body.

Then he collapsed onto the floor, staring up at the ceiling.

“Damn… ninjas…” he muttered, yawning. “Three days awake. No sleep. I even performed surgery on myself.”

As his eyes finally started to close, his thoughts drifted back to the daimyo and those damned metaphors about tea. He opened his system interface and looked at the faces of Charlie and Angie. Their displays were gray.

“Sorry, you two… it’s going to take me a little longer. Wherever you are, I hope you’re safe.”

Then his gaze shifted to the system notification that had been hovering there ever since he killed one of the ninjas.

[Your skill Basic Blood Regeneration is evolving…]

[Your skill Basic Blood Regeneration has two available evolutions.]

[Choose the new evolution of your skill.]

“Go to hell, system. I just want to sleep.”

And that became Luke’s routine over the following days, tending to Layla, managing the poison with coconut pulp, waiting patiently until she finally began to recover.

***

Layla opened her eyes, her head pounding. The first strange thing she noticed was the ceiling. It wasn’t the ceiling of her little house back in Maine. No, this was different.

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

“Where am I?” She sat up, confused.

She tried to remember how she’d gotten there, but her mind was blank. The room was small, its walls made of stone. There were no windows. It was bare, lit only by a torch mounted on the wall.

When Layla sat up fully, the blanket slipped away, and she noticed something else.

“What are these clothes?”

That was wrong. Very wrong. Why was she wearing men’s clothes? She glanced at a small table nearby and spotted a potion vial. Instinctively, she used [Identify].

[Verdant Vitality Potion (Rare): A healing potion infused with the invigorating essence of the Energizing Luminous Mushroom, stimulating the body’s tissues and accelerating their natural recovery. The potion enhances regenerative processes and can even aid in the minor restoration of damaged limbs, bones, or tissue, mimicking the growth patterns of plants. As the body is revitalized and re-energized, stamina, resilience, and endurance increase. Restores 1550 HP and, due to intense physical activation, may cause a slight rise in libido.

“Li… li… libido?”

A sharp pain flared low in her body. When she looked down, she saw blood on the sheets.

Her hands began to tremble.

The door opened.

“Hello, Layla,” came a familiar voice.

“Y-you bastard. W-what is going on here?” she demanded.

“Layla, we made progress,” he said calmly. “And you’re waking up late. You delayed all my plans. Sleeping for a whole week is a bit excessive.”

She stared at him, lost. Her memories offered no help.

“B-bastard! What do you mean, progress?” she asked.

He sat down in the chair beside the bed. “You know.”

“I-I know what?!” Her words rushed out. “And why do I feel pain… down there? And why is there blood on the sheets?!”

“Do I really need to explain the obvious?”

Layla froze as panic surged through her.

No. No no no. This isn’t happening. I didn’t do anything. This can’t be real.

“Relax,” he continued. “I took care of you the whole time. You should be thanking me.”