In the end, nothing had changed. Behind the door was still the dimly lit room; outside, the corridor remained shrouded in gloom. At the corner of the hallway hung a pair of ox-horn oil lamps, their bean-sized flames flickering like a pair of eyes watching him. The wooden stairs, the ox-horn lamps, and the deer head mounted on the wall all reminded him that he was still in a ‘dream.’

“No, something must be wrong!”

The game he played was called “Hunter,” the latest generation of online games, wildly popular. It had only been open for three months, yet the number of stable online players had already surpassed eighty million.

Just now, Logan Carter had tried 49 times in a row and finally managed to take down a vampire boss—one of the top ten most powerful monsters known. After defeating the boss, his global player ranking shot up by a hundred thousand places, landing him in the player hall of fame and making him a star player. Countless platforms reached out to him, and earning a million a year was no longer just a dream.

That feeling was as refreshing as drinking a glass of ice water in the dog days of summer—absolutely exhilarating!

But, as enjoyable as the game was, the idea of actually living in the world of “Hunter” was something Logan Carter was a million times unwilling to do.

The world of Hunter could be summed up in eight words: “monsters, war, plague, famine.” In four words: “hell on earth.”

For an ordinary person—even a noble—living to old age in peace was an extravagant hope.

“I want to go back! I don’t want to stay in this godforsaken place! Oh heavens, can you not mess with me like this? I’m still just a baby, I can’t handle this kind of torment from you!”

In order to return to Earth, Logan Carter decisively abandoned Lord Ox and instead sought help from the traditional gods of Huaxia.

While praying, Logan Carter didn’t sit idle. He kept walking in and out of the door, trying to travel through a wormhole back to Earth, but nothing around him changed. The “space-time wormhole” he’d imagined had dumped him in another world and then simply left.

Finally, Logan Carter gave up. He leaned against the door and collapsed weakly to the floor.

He didn’t know how long he sat there, but nothing around him changed. All signs pointed to the fact that he had truly crossed over into the world of “Hunter.”

Logan Carter had a certain quirk—call it a strength if you like—his nerves were especially tough.

After the initial shock, he quickly recovered.

“Logan Carter, the father of this body is even a baronet, with a family estate of a thousand acres. That’s not a bad background at all... Wait, why does the surname Laplace sound so familiar? Could it be because of the great scientist Marquis de Laplace?”

Marquis de Laplace, full name Pierre-Simon Laplace, was the founder of celestial mechanics, the creator of the theory of cosmic evolution, the founder of analytical probability theory, and the proposer of the famous determinism (now disproven). In terms of scientific contribution, in his era, he was second only to Newton. As a top physics student, Logan Carter had certainly heard of Marquis de Laplace.

“No, no, it’s not because of Marquis de Laplace. I feel like I just saw this surname somewhere!”

This sense of familiarity wasn’t new. When he first crossed over, he’d already noticed that the environment around him looked very familiar, as if he’d just experienced it not long ago.

“Something’s not right, really not right.”

Logan Carter stood up, retreated back into the room, and carefully examined the wooden table in the center.

The candle on the table flickered gently, the parchment cover on the table reflecting a milky white light. Closing the book, he saw the title on the cover: “An Introduction to Alchemy—by Albert.”

More memories surfaced in his mind, belonging to the body’s original owner: “I’m actually an alchemy apprentice. Half a year ago, a passing mage discovered my alchemical talent, so my father spent a fortune to build me a basic alchemy lab. Unfortunately, I’m dull-witted, and after half a year of study, I’ve made almost no progress... Wait, there’s something else in my mind!”

Logan Carter realized that deep in his mind, there seemed to be a fog, and something hidden within it was about to burst out.

“What is this? What is it?” Logan Carter scratched his head instinctively.

‘Ding!’

His head suddenly jolted, and Logan Carter saw the air in front of him brighten slightly. A talent tree appeared in the air before his eyes, called the “Path of Alchemy.”

“Alchemy talent tree! Isn’t this only in the game? Did this thing cross over with me too?” Logan Carter almost cried out.

In “Hunter,” his game character was a famous alchemy-type hunter, and his greatest asset was alchemy.

The reason Logan Carter chose this path was because the physical laws of the Hunter world were almost identical to those of the real world. Alchemy in the game was essentially chemistry on Earth, and chemistry fundamentally belonged to the field of physics, which was closely related to his major in materials physics.

As a top student in materials physics, he thrived in the field of alchemy. Within three months of the game’s launch, he had become a world-renowned master hunter.

The alchemy talent tree before him had only activated the first tier of talent, called “Friend of Elements,” and only one point was lit.

Logan Carter focused his attention on Friend of Elements, and the description of the talent immediately appeared.

“Friend of Elements: For every point activated, Elemental Perception +100, Elemental Control +100.”