Chapter 534: Breathing (1/2)

The dark room filled with shadows that flitted about everywhere. Spirits slammed furiously into the bronze lamp’s green light, intent on breaking through the light barrier.

Wayfarer’s corpse struggled for freedom while Yu Hengluo sat cross-legged beneath the lamp, silently watching over the sarcophagus. The forms of Wayfarer and Yuying sat suspended in the void, one in front of the other.

……

Behind the chamber was an realm of endless darkness. Lu Yun could only light up a ten-meter corner by using his Mistfire, Voidfire, and Skyfire in conjunction. The sound of heavy breathing seemed to approach from the distance.

As he advanced, it grew in volume—and in a lapse of concentration, he allowed his own breathing to overlap it in rhythm. Slowly, he began struggling to breathe. His lungs expanded and contracted like a huge pair of bellows, puffing up his chest to the point of bursting.

Lu Yun gasped. He tried using internal energy to control his lungs, so that he might free it from the breathing he heard. To his horror, the energy in his body was no longer his own to command. It gathered in his lungs, drawn by the force there that was running wild.

“This isn’t good.” He paled slightly. If he allowed this to continue, all of the energy in his body would be sucked into his lungs—perhaps even his spirit, as well. If that happened, they would explode with energy.

“Scaled-Dragon King!” He hurriedly glanced to the side.

The Infernum in question couldn’t reply as his own chest was as inflated as a bloated toad’s. Everywhere else on his body was the shriveled opposite. Not only his qi, but also his flesh and blood had been sucked into his lungs.

The Scaled-Dragon King’s lungs grew bigger and bigger, until all of his limbs retracted into his chest. He was now completely spherical.

Pop!

Before Lu Yun could react, the Infernum ruptured into a spray of fragments that scattered onto the ground.

“Nascent spirit soil.” Lu Yun noticed a tiny bit of black sand among the remains. The sand was identical to that found everywhere in the ghost realm.

What a potent layout! His heart trembled with awe. In the instant of the Scaled-Dragon King’s death, he’d finally seen the hidden layout for what it was.

The Scaled-Dragon King was stronger than Lu Yun in cultivation, and had a formation of heaven and earth he’d personally drawn for the ghostly soldier. In terms of raw power, the Scaled-Dragon King was equal to a void-realm peerless immortal—certainly many times higher than returned void cultivator.

His body and lungs were commensurately more durable and powerful too. When the breathing affected him, he’d sucked in his entire self and instantly detonated on the spot. In other words, the effect of the layout correlated to the strength of those that it affected.

Lu Yun noticed its effects on the little nun as well.

Slowly but surely, her chest cavity was expanding. The light of his talisman was insufficient to seal off the bizarre breathing’s influence. He waved her into the resurrection layout in hell as quickly as he could.

If she stayed around, the same thing would happen to her as had happened to the Scaled-Dragon King. It was trivial for Lu Yun to revive the latter; to do so for the nun would be a lot more complicated.