Chapter 37 (2/2)

“Another enemy” Chris continued to breathe to adjust himself. After two consecutive battles, he had expended quite a bit of stamina, and this new enemy, from their rhythm alone, seemed to be a lot stronger than the rest.

“How difficult, my body is getting worse and worse by the years” Chris squinted his eyes. [Respiratory Art] was a wonderful thing, by practising it alone, one would be able to adjust their own rhythm, thus improving one’s health and lifespan.

But as Chris was constantly going on his adventures, constantly using various [Respiratory Art] techniques to fight, his body was instead becoming worse. For example, Metal Rhythm forcefully adjusted his body to match that of metal, thus throwing his own rhythm into chaos and causing a tiny bit of imbalance within himself.

As this imbalance accumulated, it would grow to become a hidden internal wound that when erupted would immediately take Chris’ life.

“Kill me! Somebody, please kill me!” the axe-wielding goon from before was screaming like mad. After contracting the [Black Crow] disease, his entire body was writhing and squeezing itself, causing him extreme unbearable pain, to him, death was a kind of release.

He staggered towards Chris who was standing closest to him, forcing Chris to split part of his focus to pay attention to him.

“You’ve caused enough disturbance here. Time for you to rest, Chris Modo!” Yadley didn’t pay any attention to the axe-wielding goon, his eyes became sharp as he ordered with a strange tone: “Bizarre Scales, kill him!”

A dark golden glow flashed briefly and vanished as the axe-wielding goon’s body was instantly ripped apart. The golden glow followed the splashing blood right in front of Chris as a set of razor-sharp claws came down on him, but for some reason, the creature’s movements hesitated for a brief moment.

The smell of blood filled the air as Chris dodged to one side. A long wound appeared on his right hip, if it were just a bit deeper, it would’ve punctured his organs. If that thing earlier had attacked him directly without the axe-wielding goon in its way and without that slight hesitation, his body would’ve been ripped cleanly in half.

“Thank… you…” the axe-wielding goon’s body was ripped in half at his stomach, collapsing to the ground with an expression of release before dying.

“What sort of animal is that?” in Chris’ panic, he only managed to see some dark-gold scales: “And what is that extreme imbalanced rhythm? It reminds me of Reya’s chief, Comoros. No, that thing’s rhythm is even more imbalanced than Comoros!”

“Again!” Yadley’s cold and strange tone ordered again, causing Chris to hurriedly jump away. He was most afraid of enemies whose speed or strength far surpassed his own as it would be hard for the various applications of [Respiratory Art] to be used.

Chris quickly jumped into a narrow alleyway. The main road was too wide to provide him any protection from this sort of speedy enemy, only the complicated paths of the alleyway would give him a chance to restrain that creature and win.

There was another thing, why did that creature hesitate briefly before attacking me? Do I have something that’s affecting its actions?

Chris’ mind was turning desperately.

With another flash of the dark golden glow, Chris managed to grab a ledge above just in time to avoid this attack.

“Continue… Bizarre Scales!”