Chapter 161: I Have a Partner (2)

"He is still inside the laboratory. If he were here, I suppose we would have the materials," Ye Lang replied. At that moment, he was standing atop a "small hill," looking out over the vast laboratory. He realized just how enormous it truly was, wondering why he had never noticed it before.

Nonsense. Previously, he had been a normal person, so naturally he wouldn't have noticed. But come to think of it, this laboratory was indeed large enough, easily the size of a basketball court. It was a mystery how Cold-Blood Thirteen had ever managed to construct it.

And not just this one; the First Laboratory was the same. One could only imagine that the laboratory further inside would be even more massive.

"Go find him!" Cold-Blood Five said. She didn't mean she wanted to ask Cold-Blood Thirteen for materials; since Cold-Blood Thirteen was here, did she really need to ask whether Ye Lang knew how to do it?

To her, Cold-Blood Thirteen was the true alchemy master, someone who could surely help her resolve this issue. She must have had a momentary lapse in judgment earlier to have ever thought Ye Lang was capable.

Yes, she must have been out of her mind!

"Find him? Very well, we can see what he's up to in there anyway!" Ye Lang heartily approved of the suggestion, grabbing Cold-Blood Five by the hand and pulling her toward the Third Laboratory.

"Frank!" Cold-Blood Five said coldly.

"Oh, I'm sorry, I accidentally grabbed your hand—it's so cold!" Thinking his grip was the cause of the chill, Ye Lang instantly let go. The word she uttered was simply the reason why he released her.

If it hadn't been so freezing cold, he might have continued holding it.

The chill was not because Cold-Blood Five was cold-blooded, but because she was wearing gloves—special gloves that clung to her skin, making them feel just like actual skin.

Because of this, Cold-Blood Five hadn't minded being held by Ye Lang. Though she could feel the touch through the skin-like gloves, she hadn't cared, knowing it wasn't direct skin-to-skin contact.

Even so, this was the first time anyone had ever grabbed her hand; previously, no one had ever dared to touch her.

If she hadn't been telling Ye Lang to let go, what was Cold-Blood Five shouting about?

It was simple: Ye Lang was heading in the wrong direction again!

"This way!"

This time, it was Cold-Blood Five's turn to grab Ye Lang's hand and drag him along. She seemed unconcerned with such trifles; achieving her goal was what mattered most.

"Isn't it that way?"

"This way!"

"Are you sure?"

"Shut up!"

...

Cold-Blood Five dragged Ye Lang to the entrance of the Third Laboratory and came to a halt. She stared up at the massive doors, which towered over her by dozens of times, and fell into deep thought.

"What's wrong?" Seeing her suddenly stop, Ye Lang asked casually, completely unaware that they were already standing before the gates.

"We are so tiny now, how are we supposed to open this door? Normally it would be easy—I could open it myself," Cold-Blood Five frowned and said.

"You can open it?" Ye Lang asked in a daze.

"As long as it's a door, I can open it. It's a skill every assassin must learn," Cold-Blood Five nodded.

She had gained entry to this laboratory not through authorization from Cold-Blood Thirteen, meaning she had no proper way to unlock the doors. However, she possessed the ability to bypass them herself—it was one of her specialized skills.

Just as she claimed, she was an assassin. During covert operations, she frequently encountered locked doors, which had led her to rigorously train herself in unlocking mechanisms.

While she was not particularly proficient in alchemy, she was exceptionally skilled at cracking alchemical array doors. Even Ye Lang might not have matched her speed.

Under normal circumstances, she would have had no trouble opening this door. But shrunk down to her current minuscule size, it was utterly impossible. Even if she destroyed the alchemical array, she lacked the strength to push the heavy portal open.

And Ye Lang was in the exact same boat!

Yet—"To get into this laboratory, we don't necessarily have to open the door!" Ye Lang stood gazing ahead, one hand supporting his chin as if deep in thought.

"If we don't open the door, how are we supposed to get in?" Cold-Blood Five asked with a hint of curiosity. This place was heavily defended by alchemical arrays everywhere; bypassing the door meant destroying those arrays, which was dozens of times harder than simply unlocking it.

"We'll crawl through! We're so small now, we can slip right through the gaps," Ye Lang replied nonchalantly. "Being small has its perks, you know."

...Cold-Blood Five fell silent. She seemed to have overlooked that very point. Some alchemical arrays existed solely to keep people out, leaving tiny gaps impassable to normal-sized humans.

"Right here, Little Five, use your battle qi to blast a hole through!" Ye Lang walked over and pointed at a specific spot.

"Why don't you do it?" Cold-Blood Five said coldly. It was obvious he was trying to make her do the heavy lifting.

"I don't have battle qi," Ye Lang replied calmly.

...Cold-Blood Five froze for a moment, then walked over to the designated spot. She leaped upward, her body seemingly hanging suspended in mid-air for a split second.

Immediately following that, she brought her thumbs and index fingers together to form a triangle!

"Hah..."

A visible wave of battle qi erupted before Cold-Blood Five. The energy wave traced a graceful arc through the air, slamming into the wall with a brilliant flash of light!

When the battle qi dissipated, a large hole had been blasted into the wall—well, large enough for Ye Lang and her to crawl through.

Cold-Blood Five landed on the ground, grabbed the collar of Ye Lang's shirt, hoisted him up with one hand, and leaped up to catch the edge of the opening.

"Little Five, do you take me for a cat? Let me down!" Ye Lang protested from behind.

"Up you go!" Ignoring his complaints, Cold-Blood Five said coldly.

Hearing this, Ye Lang very sensibly chose to climb up, scrambling over Cold-Blood Five's body and intentionally stepping on her a few times to exact petty revenge for being manhandled.

"Hmph, you'd better watch your step!" Lacking any immediate way to deal with him, Cold-Blood Five gritted her teeth and threatened.

"Thanks for the concern, I'm already being very careful!" Ye Lang foolishly assumed she was worrying about his safety regarding the situation ahead.

...Cold-Blood Five fell silent again, genuinely wondering whether Ye Lang was merely playing the fool or truly lacking in wits.

Choosing to drop the matter entirely, she crawled through the hole after Ye Lang, passing through the wall. However, Ye Lang suddenly halted at the exit, leaving her confused as to what was happening ahead.

"What are you up to now?" Cold-Blood Five felt an urge to push him down, though she managed to suppress the impulse for the time being.

"I'm looking at Cold-Blood Thirteen..." Ye Lang replied.

"You see him? That's great, then why are you blocking the exit?!" she snapped, shoving Ye Lang forward. He wouldn't die from a fall anyway.

"Ah..."

"Thud!"

Ye Lang crashed heavily to the ground. Cold-Blood Five leaped down shortly after, landing beside him and giving him a few sharp kicks—partly to check if he was still breathing, and partly to return the favor for being stepped on earlier.

"Are you dead yet?" she asked coldly.

"Not yet!" Ye Lang answered as he picked himself up. "Though... someone else might already be dead!"