701: Lifting of the wind column

However, Su Chen did not intend for the Wind Hashira to reach his own level; he only needed the Wind Hashira's killing intent to be enough to make enemies briefly fall into a state of helplessness.

This was an instinct. When facing a life-or-death threat, and when that threat was sufficiently great, a person would be left with nothing but fear and despair, unable to even conceive the thought of fleeing.

After Su Chen taught the Wind Hashira the three types of Breathing techniques, the Wind Hashira immediately began to attempt them, but he soon felt an uncomfortable sensation, his breathing becoming extremely obstructed.

It felt as though his body was severely congested; using Shadow Breathing felt like having his nose mostly blocked, leaving only a tiny slit to breathe through. It was very uncomfortable, as if he were on the verge of suffocating at any moment.

After lasting for only about thirty breaths, the Wind Hashira was panting heavily, his face flushed bright red.

"Thirty breaths. Not bad."

"Breathing techniques need to be combined with training to significantly improve your strength, so what you need to do today is very simple: weighted running."

Weighted running?

The Wind Hashira raised an eyebrow slightly; this did not seem difficult for him at all.

Su Chen took out a dozen small iron weights from the house and strapped them to the Wind Hashira's limbs, then said calmly, "Your task is simple: run 150 kilometers today."

"I've calculated it. The perimeter of the Demon Slayer Corps headquarters is about two kilometers. You only need to run around it seventy-five times, and during that time... you cannot stop."

A rare look of seriousness appeared on Su Chen's face.

The Wind Hashira's expression changed slightly. 150 kilometers, and weighted on top of that—although the iron weights didn't feel too heavy to him, 150 kilometers was still quite a distance.

And he couldn't stop.

"Oh, right."

Su Chen added, "You must finish within today, and you must use Shadow Breathing at least three times while running."

The Wind Hashira took a deep breath and immediately ran off to the side.

It was fine at first.

But by the time he reached ten kilometers, the Wind Hashira began to feel a bit of fatigue, though it wasn't intense yet. By the time he reached fifty kilometers, he was already drenched in sweat.

Still, it wasn't too much of a problem.

It wasn't until after one hundred kilometers that the Wind Hashira felt his whole body weakening. Running one hundred kilometers continuously while weighted—if not for the fact that his Physical Body was already extremely powerful, how could he have persisted for so long?

His speed began to slow, but his gaze remained unyielding.

From setting off in the morning until the sun went down and night fell, the Wind Hashira's figure finally appeared, swaying, at the entrance of Su Chen's courtyard.

This day had almost completely drained his stamina.

Being able to reach Su Chen's door was almost entirely due to his willpower; otherwise, he would never have been able to persist for such a long time.

Su Chen glanced at him: "Not bad. Come back tomorrow morning."

The Wind Hashira gritted his teeth and wobbled home. The next morning, he arrived early at Su Chen's courtyard again, his entire body wracked with a tearing, excruciating pain.

Su Chen was still sitting cross-legged in the courtyard: "The requirements are the same as yesterday. Be back before nightfall."

His Shadow Breathing was different from other Breathing techniques. The final state of the Breathing techniques in this world was to awaken a Mark, but Su Chen did not like that method; its drawbacks were simply too great.

Shadow Breathing did not have such drawbacks. After Cultivating it, one could not only achieve strength surpassing that of awakening a Mark but also not have to worry about dying young.

However, the price to pay was also very high.

Just like the Wind Hashira, he might need to put in an immense amount of effort to fully master this Shadow Breathing.

Over these two days, Su Chen was also researching the Fifth Form of Shadow Breathing.

The core of Shadow Breathing was related to assassination, so the Fourth Form must also be close to assassination.

Among the current four Moves of Shadow Breathing, three belonged to the auxiliary type, and only Shadow Assault was an offensive type, which was clearly insufficient.

Thus, Su Chen decided to set the Fifth Form as an offensive type.

A special energy existed in this world, but the people here only knew how to absorb it through Breathing techniques. In Su Chen's hands, however, he could manipulate this energy at will.

For example, other Breathing techniques were clearly only able to enhance one's attack power, but Su Chen could modify them. For instance, the Third Form of Shadow Breathing could reduce one's presence countless times, allowing one to walk past someone while being completely ignored.

Invisibility was not true invisibility; this world could not yet achieve that level.

It could only lower one's sense of presence, making it impossible for others to notice, but even that was extremely overpowered. Using this Move in actual combat produced excellent results.

It didn't take long for Su Chen to decide what the Fourth Form would be.

Shadow Breathing was positioned as an assassin type; since that was the case, he would choose high burst damage, but for a single target.

"Shadow Breathing... Fifth Form, Brutal Strike."

This Move could be used in conjunction with other Shadow Breathing skills; the power it dealt would exceed Shadow Assault, though it dealt damage head-on.

For the next nearly half a month, what the Wind Hashira did remained almost unchanged.

He continued to run every day until nightfall, which also attracted the attention of the other Hashira.

Through constant running, the Wind Hashira's mastery of Shadow Breathing became increasingly proficient. Before, he could only hold it for thirty breaths, but now he could hold it for one or two minutes.

Breathing techniques could transform a person's body and even enhance recovery.

The upper limit of this Breathing technique was almost on par with Sun Breathing; it was just that Su Chen hadn't fully developed it yet. During this time, he hadn't been idle, but instead constantly updated the Sixth Form and the Seventh Form.

The Sixth Form was called Shadow Clone, creating a Clone that dealt the same damage as the main body, but only for a single strike.

The Seventh Form was called Shadowless Sword, which could deal damage from all directions simultaneously, catching the enemy off guard.

Currently, the Wind Hashira had only mastered the first two forms and wasn't even fully proficient in them yet, but even so, he could clearly feel his Physical Body growing and achieving a Breakthrough.

His strength had increased by at least nearly twenty percent compared to before, which made the Wind Hashira increasingly excited.

In the time that followed, Su Chen increased the distance for the Wind Hashira by twenty kilometers every two days.