Chapter 524: Replacing Lungs

The distant, melodious chime of bells rang out—ding-dong-ding.

"An hour's up? Already?" Claudia, sipping her mana potion, quickly drained it in one gulp; subjectively, she had barely just accepted the jump-rope girl's quest, yet the bell had already sounded again.

The players wasted no time, grabbed their gas cylinders, and hurried back to Luo Binxun's Store.

The store's front door stood wide open; the centipede octopus, submerged in its fish tank, used telekinesis to simultaneously control a broom, a mop, a rag, and a wrench, cleaning the house and patching leaks—still a fair amount of work remained.

"Back already?" Luo Binxun, the shopkeeper with a semi-transparent body, sat behind the counter, setting down the cigarette box he had been fiddling with. "No trouble on the way?"

"The priest in the church was parasitized by some kind of mechanical serpent and attacked us. Do you know what's going on?" Wanli Fengdao asked gravely.

"Maybe it was the Returners? They love launching terrorist attacks on anyone who dares leave their rooms."

Luo Binxun spoke indifferently, his left hand taking the metallic gas cylinder gleaming with silver sheen, his right hand lifting his shirt to peel back the skin on his ribcage, revealing internal organs composed of intricate machinery.

Claudia and the other players' pupils contracted—on Earth, companies like Prometheus had produced small batches of high-precision embodied intelligent robots for medical, elderly care, and military use.

But their level of refinement paled in comparison to Luo Binxun's—each of his fingers, each muscle, had independent degrees of freedom, driven by joints measured in millimeters, even micrometers.

If embodied intelligent robots on Earth were 100% advanced, the T-800 from Terminator might reach 130%, then Luo Binxun was at least 220%.

As for Grey Rain, she couldn't be measured by this standard—she had once wept profusely while writing an essay for a junior high Chinese exam, sincerely wishing for the nation's rainfall, river discharge, solar energy, and wind energy to increase tenfold.

She had burned out the AI grader.

"."

The players watched in silence as Luo Binxun removed the metal-bottle-shaped left lung from his chest cavity, replaced it with a new one, and exhaled deeply with visible relief—"Haa—"

He placed the old lung on the table; through the dashboard, its internal pressure showed zero, with no residual high-pressure gas.

The two new lungs instantly became semi-transparent as they settled into place; Luo Binxun closed the skin over his lungs, then swiftly pulled open the fridge door. "I haven't breathed this freely in ages—help yourselves to the ice cream. Also, a friendly reminder,"

His expression turned serious, earnest. "Your time is running out."

"Understood, thank you." Li Cheng found matcha ice cream in the fridge, added some ice cubes, packed it in an aluminum foil thermal bag, and without hesitation turned and sprinted out onto the street, racing toward the town center.

"W-why not wait until the centipede octopus finishes repairing the house before acting?"

Mian Yue chased after him, gasping for breath. As an agile, long-range transcendent, she could run a marathon without breaking a sweat—but now, it felt as if her entire body were wrapped in weighted blocks, every movement consuming ever more energy.

Li Cheng didn't look back. "There are six high-pressure gas cylinder lungs in the church. Two were delivered to Luo Binxun. That leaves us with four."

"What do you mean?"

Mian Yue's eyelid twitched. She had viewed Dreamland through the lens of scripted quests, assuming the six gas cylinders in the church were system-provided buffers in case any were damaged in combat.

Li Cheng kept sprinting toward the town center, then spun around nimbly, lifted his shirt as Luo Binxun had, and peeled back his chest and abdominal skin to reveal his exquisitely detailed mechanical organs.

"?!"

Claudia nearly jumped out of her skin—she instantly thought Master Pi Fu was pulling another stunt, attaching mechanical parts to himself with his patchwork item.

But she quickly realized: Master Pi Fu had been with the team the entire time—he had no opportunity to do something like this.

Li Cheng turned back around, still not looking back. "This is Dreamland's passive effect.

From the moment we first felt abnormal fatigue, our bodies had already become mechanical, just like the townspeople's. Like them, we must periodically replace our lungs to survive. Otherwise, we'll grow increasingly exhausted."

Mian Yue's face paled; she reached for her hair—and beneath it, found a skin layer that could be peeled back.

Beneath it, the bottle lung showed only 10% high-pressure gas remaining.

The Fungus King was the same—his fungal-fiber organs had been entirely replaced by machinery, so perfectly that even he hadn't noticed the change.

"No wonder the mana potion's effect has been drastically weakened. No wonder we can't open the player interface." Wanli Fengdao clenched his lips tightly; more than shock, he felt frustration.

Frustration that at level 33, with all his experience, he hadn't realized it sooner.

"Don't dwell on it. We're inside Dreamland, bound by its laws. And carbon-based brains are inherently simple—if you input pain, it believes pain; if you input pleasure, it believes pleasure."

Li Cheng offered the reassurance casually, weaving through alleyways until he reached the base of the clock tower.

The girl with the jump rope emerged from the shadows. "You're late."

"Late, but not yet too late." Li Cheng handed over the insulated bag with the matcha ice cream. "How do we get into the castle?"

"Take this." The girl pulled a brass key from her personal pouch and placed it in Li Cheng's hand. "It was given to me by my brother, Will. You'll still need to get past those gargoyle statues."

"If you see Will, remember to deliver a message for me."

"Mom's calling you home for dinner?" Li Cheng weighed the key in his hand.

"No. It's time to let go." The girl drew a deep breath—and vanished again.

As she disappeared, the gargoyles perched atop the castle tower noticed Li Cheng and the others, shrieked in unison, and dove down with flapping wings.

After relentless battle, weary and drained, Li Cheng silently replaced his left lung with a new one, then tossed the remaining three bottle lungs to Wanli Fengdao.

Xiao Dao Ge, Claudia, the Fungus King, Mian Yue—four players. Three gas cylinders. Not nearly enough.

Hss—

Before Wanli Fengdao could speak about distribution, the Fungus King drew his two cleavers, stepped past the others, and turned his head slightly to ask Li Cheng: "Once we find the astronaut Will, will this all end? Will we recover the banished griffins and restore our original bodies?"

Li Cheng nodded. "Yes."

"Then I will fight." The Fungus King turned back, and his countless mycelial filaments unfurled, stirring without wind.