“What happened?” Even though Yan Hong Min liked playing pranks on his juniors and would often get in trouble for the sake of Yun Bei Fen and Luo Lin, he still cared about the two of them. That was why he immediately handed over the prototype of his flower map and some defensive items to Luo Lin when it seemed like Shen Lei might have died and he was also a lot more willing to potentially part with his latest prototype for the sake of his little junior.

There wasn’t much time so Shen Lei made a long story as short as possible. “The demonic faction did something to him so he is now in a coma and can’t defend himself. This … thing seems able to hide someone relatively effectively so I think it would be a good way to keep him at least a little safe. All of us will be busy with the battle so there is no way to protect him at the time. We’ll have to do whatever we can to make his situation better in some other way.”

Yan Hong Ming didn’t even think for a moment and almost threw the bucket into Shen Lei’s arms. “Let me get a few more things for you. He needs something with offensive abilities.” He rushed around to gather whatever he could but, unfortunately, most things required someone to imbue spiritual energy or at the very least conscious use. For an unconscious person, he could at most think of an item or two he had tinkered with in the past.

Luo Lin and Shen Lei naturally wouldn’t reject some help for Yun Bei Fen. Even though this wasn’t what they had come here for, they were both worried about what would happen to him. So getting something from Yan Hong Min was very much appreciated. At the same time, they knew they couldn’t ignore their actual mission.

“Apart from that …” Shen Lei quickly explained how they wanted to make use of the underground building itself to deal with the next batch of demonic practitioners. “Unfortunately, nobody really had the right items with them to make it easy. There were only a few ‘explosive stones’ or something from the Zhen Yan Sect but I don’t think they’ll do the trick. Not alone, at least. Do you have anything else we could use?”

“To blow up a building?” Yan Hong Min paused in his search for defensive tools for his little junior and thought back to one of his experiments from the past. At that time, he had been daring and combined a few ingredients that were already volatile on their own. As a result … well, his Master had to bargain for the materials to repair the house and was laughed at by Sect Master Zhang for weeks.

Of course, he got into trouble because of that, and his precious materials were taken away. Naturally, he slowly built them up again … and then redid his experiment, with an even more powerful reaction. That time, the house had to be rebuilt completely and his Master furiously scolded him.

But could those few harsh words keep a genius like him from exploring the depths of this world’s mysteries and possibilities? Of course not! He had just gotten smarter about hiding his tracks and making sure that if anything went wrong, nobody would suspect him. Thus …

Yan Hong Min went to another box and took out a few items, coughing lightly. “I might have something you can use. You’ll have to be fast though. The reaction doesn’t take long to appear.” Then, he handed the things to both Shen Lei and Luo Lin separately, making sure they didn’t accidentally mix them in his house. He certainly didn’t want to explain to their Master where the house had gone after he came back from the border region.

Shen Lei and Luo Lin looked at the four rather ordinary-looking objects in their hands. One was a kind of bowl that could have held porridge in it once upon a time, another an odd powder-like substance in a glass vial, then there was a marble that shone as if it was made out of some kind of crystal, and finally … the set included a strangely shaped doll made of straw.

The two raised their heads at the same time, exchanging a look. Alright, maybe the items weren’t that ordinary after all. Still, they sure didn’t look as if they were able to bring down a house, much less a building as big as the underground palace. But then, they had to admit that they had no idea how to use these things either. They seemed completely unrelated.

They both raised their heads and looked at Yan Hong Min questioningly. “This is …?”

Yan Hong Min sighed. Ah, people just didn’t get him. Not even his own junior martial brother did! Wasn’t it obvious? “You have to combine them and then it’ll go boom. Really easy.”

Shen Lei raised his brows, suddenly feeling that it might not have been a good idea to come to Yan Hong Min with this. Even though he had been able to take something out immediately that could possibly solve their situation, he still seemed somewhat unreliable. “Well, can you explain that in a little more detail? We won’t have much time and there will be many people around. I’d rather not have any accidents happen just because we didn’t get it right under stressful circumstances.”

Yan Hong Min hummed and then pointed at the straw doll. “To put it in simple terms, you pour the powder all over this, then stuff in the crystal ball, and then you throw it at whatever you want to explode. In fact, you might not even need to stuff the crystal ball in. You can also just throw them together but they need to hit together to work.”

Shen Lei nodded. Alright, that was easy enough. “Then what about that … bowl?”

“Oh, this? Obviously, it’s for protection.” He took it from Luo Lin’s hands, raised it, then hesitated, and turned to Shen Lei instead, putting it on his head. “There. Just wear it like this.”