58: Chapter 58 The Lungs Contain Golden Breath!

9:40 AM.

The First Peoples Hospital, rear dedicated passage.

Usually, it was quiet here, with at most two or three medicine carts passing slowly; the floor was clean, the corridor long and empty, and the incandescent lights made one's eyes feel dry.

But today was different.

The sides of the corridor were packed with people.

Several white-haired, steady-looking elders with temporary passes hanging on their chests were talking in low voices. The hospital leaders beside them only dared to smile and nod, not daring to interrupt. Further in were the hospital's Vice President, the Director of Thoracic Surgery, the Director of Anesthesiology, and several others Su Ye couldn't name, but their refined temperaments made it clear they were people of high status in the province.

This kind of lineup was truly rare.

"Is the monitoring equipment ready?"

"Has the plasma arrived?"

"Clear the upstairs passage again; don't leave any unauthorized personnel."

"Where is Elder Zhou?"

Everyone was very nervous. Su Ye realized he had still underestimated the weight of today's surgery; no wonder Elder Zhou was so serious and solemn.

Soon, the patient arrived.

The person on the stretcher was covered by a light gray thin blanket, with oxygen at the nose and monitoring leads on the chest. The person was excessively thin. Behind the stretcher followed two people who looked like doctors, carrying medical record boxes and imaging data. Further back were several people who clearly weren't from this hospital, dressed low-key but possessing an extraordinary aura.

The Vice President personally went up to greet them, his voice two notches lower than usual.

"Elder Zhou is already waiting outside the operating room." A man who had come down from the provincial level nodded, his gaze worried.

As Su Ye looked at that old man, he felt an indescribable coldness seeping out from the old man's body.

Zhou Jingtang walked into the operating room alone.

Su Ye followed him in.

Changing, washing hands, disinfecting—after the whole process, the entire operating room had been completely cleared until only a few core people remained.

Once the door closed.

The outside world seemed to be completely cut off.

The patient had already been transferred to the table.

Getting closer, Su Ye could see the appearance of this military big shot more clearly.

The old man was indeed very old, with deep furrows on his face and a complexion of grayish-white after a long illness. His eye sockets were slightly sunken, and his lips were dark, like an old lamp that was about to burn out.

Su Ye glanced at Zhou Jingtang.

The old man stood at the lead surgeon's position, his expression heavier than usual, and the usual gentleness in his eyes was gone, replaced by an almost cold focus. He didn't say another word, simply raising his hand to take the scalpel.

"Let's begin."

The knife went down.

The incision was opened.

Skin, subcutaneous tissue, fascia—separated layer by layer. The suction device hummed lowly, blood was quickly sucked away, and the color of the exposed tissue looked somewhat cold under the shadowless lamp.

Zhou Jingtang gently peeled back that final layer of concealment.

The next moment—

Boom!

Everyone was instantly horrified.

A golden light suddenly appeared, and an incomparably sharp blade-like intent, like countless invisible tiny blades, instantly burst out from deep within the old man's Pulmonary Hilum, fiercely sweeping across the entire operating room. The metal instruments on the tray all vibrated, emitting a very fine and dense hum.

The powerful impact instantly knocked everyone in the operating room unconscious.

"Elder Zhou!" Su Ye cried out in alarm, but Elder Zhou had already fainted.

Su Ye was stunned, his gaze firmly seized by the scene before him.

Just now, the moment that old scar was completely uncovered, a dazzling golden light suddenly exploded from deep within the old man's Pulmonary Hilum, like a remnant sun that had been wrapped in flesh and blood for too long, suddenly pouring out its brilliance. In an instant, the golden light was fully revealed, and the sharpness, mixed with a faint mist, gushed out!

They were entrenched deep in the Pulmonary Hilum, strand by strand, thread by thread, like golden mist, like blade-wire, moving silently between the flesh and blood. It was hard to imagine how much pain this old man was in. Whenever the old man's remaining breath moved slightly, that clump of golden "mist-blades" would rise and fall with it, its edges vibrating like a golden storm hidden in the chest cavity, ready to cut open, grind down, and swallow everything around it.

The bullet fragments left in the old man's body when he was young had long since been ground to pieces by this terrifying Gold Breath, turning into the most insignificant glimmer of golden light within it.

Su Ye had no doubt that if an ordinary person stuck a finger in, they probably wouldn't even have time to scream before the entire bone was ground to pieces by that clump of Gold Breath, flesh and all, turning into a puff of blood mist.

It's Transcendent!

The old man's problem wasn't a matter of bullet fragments at all!

It was Metal Element Evolution!

The Metal Element anomaly caused the old man to slowly wake up. His body was already different from ordinary people, and the anesthesia had long since failed. He had been locked by the Gold Breath in his body and couldn't wake up; now that the Gold Breath was released, he opened his eyes, which were frighteningly sharp.

The old man noticed the unconscious Zhou Jingtang and showed a complex expression of guilt.

"Old Zhou, in the end, I've dragged you down. My life is probably at its end. It's a pity... what kind of state our country will become in the future, I probably won't be able to see... I actually wanted to go long ago, but my children wouldn't let me. In this life, I've seen everything I should see and done everything I should do; there's really nothing left to miss."

Just then.

His gaze suddenly paused.

"Young man, you?"

At this moment, Su Ye had already moved closer. Previously, the old man was lying down with a limited perspective and couldn't see Su Ye, who was standing further back. But now, Su Ye was close to him, and those clear eyes were staring fixedly deep into his chest cavity.

All the doctors in the operating room had been knocked unconscious by the mysterious power in his body, yet now there was a young man still standing, staring at him with a fanatical gaze. Even for an old man who had seen many great scenes, it was somewhat startling.

Meanwhile, Su Ye's Mental Energy had silently seeped in.

"It's just as I thought. Lung Metal, Lungs Harboring Metal Breath—these are characteristics of Gold Breath evolution. However, it still hasn't condensed into a Core. It seems things at the Golden Core level are extremely rare. And this Gold Breath is extremely dense; any bullet fragments were likely easily crushed by it long ago..."

Listening to this strange young man's low murmurs, the old man felt as if he had seen a ghost.

He knew the world was about to change.

That great fog, the secret military research data from those years, and those reports that couldn't be made public—all were faintly pointing to the same thing. A new change was coming; the new era might be brilliant but was also full of hidden dangers. The order of the old world was about to become unsustainable.

Who exactly was he?

"Young man, do you know exactly what my situation is?"

The old man stared fixedly at Su Ye, his voice changing.

And Su Ye, at this time, finally raised his head, his expression complex as he spoke softly.

"Lungs Harboring Metal Breath."

The old man's eyes were completely shocked.