The frost didn’t settle on clothing. It solidified the air inside their lungs.
Every breath Lin Ke drew cut like powdered diamond dust against the lining of his throat pipe. At three Degrees of star-heat, heat movement in the air had ceased to exist.
The surrounding spiritual energy had condensed into suspended needle-crystals of superconductive quartz. They drifted through the pitch-black deep pit like tiny blades. It glowed with a faint, violet eerie glow that chimed when they grazed the bronze narrow high walkway.
A sharp, brittle snap echoed from Meng Shan’s position.
The iron-hard metal warrior grunted, stumbling half a step. The thick, rocky hide over his forearms—normally capable of deflecting high-grade flying swords—had crystal-hardened into rigid glass-fused slate.
Hairline fractures spiderwebbed across Meng Shan’s knuckles, weeping frozen droplets of brown lymph that clattered onto the metal grating like dried peas.
“My inner channels are locking up,” Meng Shan ground out. His jaw muscles shook with rhythmic tremors. “The heat is bleeding straight through the soles of my boots. If I channel earth-force, the channels shatter like chilled fine china.”
Elder Wu DeZheng was already huddled against the narrow high walkway railing, his purple silk robes stiff as sheet metal.
