Walker Of The Worlds

Chapter 3035: Dimming Lights

Some time earlier, before the battle in the square...

Within the stone-walled sanctum of the Earth Flame Room in Ember Hollow Hall, Lin Mu sat cross-legged on a carved stone dais, his breathing slow and deep.

The air shimmered with heat around him, waves of orange, yellow and gold swirling as the ambient energy was steadily drawn into his body. The dual nature of the Earth Flame—rich in both fire and earth elemental essence—responded greedily to Lin Mu’s cultivation technique, flowing into him in a steady rhythm.

It had been over a full day since he began this focused session, and the result was already astonishing.

Within his body, two radiant cores spun with increasing speed.

One was nestled deep in his heart—the Fire Core, glowing like molten gold.

The other throbbed with dense heaviness in his spleen—the Earth Core, a rotating orb of brown and ochre energy.

Both were part of the Omnicore Ascendancy Technique, and both had grown visibly stronger. Lin Mu could feel it. A solid 2% gain in just over a day.

That kind of growth was unheard of.

"If I tried this with herbs or qi-rich spirit plants, I’d need literal tons just to match this output," Lin Mu mused, opening his eyes slightly.

They shimmered with flecks of gold and brown, the fire and earth elemental lights reflecting in his irises.

And yet, the flow was slowing now.

The supply from the Earth Flame array embedded in the room’s floor and walls had begun to hit its upper limit. It wasn’t that the Earth Flame itself was exhausted—on the contrary, Lin Mu could tell that the ambient energy within the basin was vast, almost endless—but the array responsible for channeling and regulating it had its own limits.

For most cultivators, that would be a safety feature. For Lin Mu, it was an inconvenience.

"Let’s see what happens if I push it," he muttered.

With a twist of his will, he began forcibly drawing the Earth Flame essence in greater quantities, actively compelling the array to release more than it wanted to. The delicate runes etched into the stone floor pulsed uneasily, their light brightening then flickering as Lin Mu’s forceful absorption began bypassing the intended threshold.

A low hum filled the chamber.

Sparks of flame licked across the walls, dancing dangerously in the sweltering air. Lin Mu, still in the eye of the storm, didn’t flinch. His Burdenless Dominator Physique could easily withstand the temperature—what would have reduced most to a pile of charred bones only felt like a warm summer day to him.

Crackle!

Rich Crimson-gold flames burst from the array, rising like a fountain around Lin Mu. He exhaled slowly and released his internal restraints entirely, allowing the array to funnel energy at maximum capacity.

The results were immediate.

His Earth and Fire Cores began spinning rapidly, so fast they buzzed like tuning forks inside his body. They pulsed greedily, their hunger rising as they latched onto the energy like starving beasts. The fire burned brighter in his heart, while the earthy resonance in his spleen deepened, shaking his bones with power.

But while Lin Mu remained calm and stable, the rest of the Ember Hollow Hall began to feel the effects.

Elsewhere in Ash Crown City...

A faint flicker went unnoticed at first. The ornate streetlamps lining the main roads—metal rods with runic nodes that siphoned controlled amounts of Earth Flame to illuminate the streets—began to dim.

It was still broad daylight, and most of the city’s residents were going about their day as usual. But a group of children playing in the alley next to a smithy noticed something strange.

"Hey! Why did the lamp go out?" one girl pointed up.

Her friend squinted at the tall lamp, which now sat cold and dark. "Maybe it broke?"

"No," a third child said, frowning. "That lamp’s never gone out. My dad says the Earth Flame never dies."

And yet, as the seconds ticked on, more anomalies emerged.

At a nearby forge, a blacksmith cursed as the fire in his furnace sputtered and died. "What the hell? The flame’s gone cold!"

A chef in a roadside eatery shrieked. "The stove! My dumplings!"

Within minutes, across a wide portion of Ash Crown City—particularly the northern edge near Ember Hollow Hall—buildings relying on Earth Flame arrays began experiencing mysterious shutdowns.

Doors slammed open, merchants grumbled, cultivators cursed, and citizens muttered about strange fluctuations in energy.

No one knew the cause, but confusion began to brew.

Back at the square...

In the wide, bustling plaza just outside the inn where Meng Bai and Daoist Chu had staked out the Hooded Tracker’s location, the change went unnoticed. Street vendors were too busy yelling over customers. Bystanders were engrossed in the spectacle of the fight between Meng Bai and the arrogant young man.

The street lamps here also dimmed and flickered—but the crowd was too caught up in cheering or betting to care.

Only a few sharp-eyed cultivators glanced at the now-dark lamp poles.

"Huh," one muttered. "That’s odd..."

Back in the Earth Flame Room...

Lin Mu’s brow furrowed slightly. The pressure of the Earth Flame inside the chamber had reached a near-uncontrollable level. The array beneath him glowed dangerously, red-hot and pulsing, as the spiritual mechanisms reached their limit. But Lin Mu didn’t stop.

He remained seated, like an unmoving mountain in the heart of a volcano, drawing every last drop the array would give him.

The Burdenless Dominator Physique wasn’t just protecting him—it was acting like a converter. Lin Mu’s internal meridians were channeling more elemental essence than they ever had before, distributing it to both his Earth and Fire Cores in perfect balance. Neither overwhelmed the other. Neither stalled.

"Just a little longer..." he thought.

Another pulse passed through his body, and this time he heard it.

A faint crack.

Not from himself—but from the floor.

Lin Mu’s eyes opened, glowing brightly with twin elemental auras. "Oh," he muttered with realization. "I might be overdoing it..."

But despite the warning signs, he smiled faintly and whispered, "Just a little more."