After confirming the power consumption required to reduce the four-meter tall Second Order Surprisingly Strong Archaic Bear to ten centimeters, Bai Zemin decided to test the power of the treasure he had acquired.

Swoosh!

As he pulled the trigger of Infinite Reduction lightly while aiming at the lifeless beast, a violet-colored beam shot out from the tip of the weapon.

Rather than a beam, Bai Zemin thought it looked more like a kind of scanner like the eye scanners seen in movies where the retina was analyzed by a softly moving light.

After the violet beam of light seemed to scan the entire body of the Second Order Surprisingly Strong Archaic Bear it simply disappeared. At the same time as the beam of light slowly faded away, the creature's body began to become smaller and smaller.

Three meters.

Two meters.

One meter.

...

Under Shangguan Bing Xue's bright eyes and Bai Zemin's excited glance, the giant body began to get smaller and smaller at surprisingly high speeds. 

In just five seconds, the body the size of a large house had now become a small toy ten centimeters tall.

"What is this?" Bai Zemin soon noticed something strange.

Right where one of the beast's legs had been, an object lay on the ground.

"It was probably being blocked by the Second Order bear's body." Shangguan Bing Xue analyzed and stepped forward to pick up the object.

The object appeared to be something similar to a sheepskin. But the most surprising thing was that there were several runes engraved on all over the sheepskin.

In Shangguan Bing Xue's retina flashed the description and details of the object.

[Magic Gunpowder Formula: Black Fire Sulfur - Blood with poisonous properties - Carbon - Soul Stone]

Shangguan Bing Xue had a confused look on her face. She said nothing and simply passed the sheepskin to Bai Zemin for him to see with his own eyes.

After reading the contents of the small sheepskin scroll, Bai Zemin did not know what to say about it.

Gunpowder was a well-known substance long before the Soul Record appeared on Earth. But this was the first time he or she had come across a formula for creating magic powder.

The gunpowder was extremely frightening. Its destructive power was absolutely unquestionable. So, the so-called magic powder should definitely be countless times more powerful and special; even more so considering its ingredients.

Black Fire Sulfur? Neither Bai Zemin nor Shangguan Bing Xue knew where on earth they could obtain such a thing.

Sulfur? Sure.

But, Black Fire Sulfur? Such a thing definitely did not exist on Earth before the arrival of the Soul Record on this planet.

As for the rest of the ingredients, they were much simpler ingredients.

Blood with poisonous properties was quite easy to acquire. In fact, Bai Zemin had killed several mutated and evolved snakes before leaving the university grounds back then. He just needed to keep the blood as it was without purifying it and he could easily obtain several liters.

Carbon could be found in many factories, there was no need to worry too much about it. He just had to find the right city and clean the monsters inside. As long as they were not unlucky, the group would not encounter monsters that were too powerful.

As for Soul Stones, these could only be obtained by killing enemies. There was no other way.

"Let's just keep this for now." Bai Zemin shook his head and put the sheepskin scroll away carefully. "It will probably be extremely useful to us in the future."

Shangguan Bing Xue nodded silently and did not comment on the matter.

Today it had been proven that mankind's weapons would gradually become ineffective against the evolved monsters.

It took a concentrated bombardment of two M3 IFVs, more than twenty shots, to force an already severely wounded Second Order beast to retreat. You should know that such weapons had enough power to crush entire iron fortresses!

Although Shangguan Bing Xue did not believe that there were many beings with the terrifying power that the bear had used, it had only been a little over twenty days since the eruption of the apocalypse. She was fairly certain that as time passed, Second Order existences would no longer be a rarity as zombies were at the moment and when such a thing happened, mankind should have the power to deal with them.

If humans failed to evolve not only their individual power, but also their weaponry and technology, then the entire human race would probably disappear from existence in the not necessarily distant future.

* * *

Although the Second Order Surprisingly Strong Archaic Bear's size had been reduced to just 10 cm from its original 4 meters thanks to the power of Infinite Reduction, its weight had actually only been reduced by half. 

With Bai Zemin injured and his left arm out, he could barely use 30-40% of his total Strength and if he pushed himself too hard he could open up the wounds that had already begun to heal thanks to his high Health stat. Therefore, with great care, he and Shangguan Bing Xue moved the beast's body onto an ice cart that she laboriously crafted.

Although Shangguan Bing Xue's Ice Maker skill allowed her to make practically anything, in reality it was more focused on simple things. Therefore, to make an ice cart she consumed practically 90% of her total Mana in a very short time.

By the time he and she emerged from the opposite forest, the two soldiers driving the two M3 IFVs were waiting for them outside with anxious hearts.

It had been almost an hour since the two had entered the forest on the other side of the main road without coming out. The soldiers did not dare to go into those unexplored lands by any means; even with two machines as powerful as the M3 IFVs they did not feel safe.

When they saw them leave, they both relaxed and soon the group of four moved back to the central part of the forest opposite the forest where the bear had been killed.

Cai Jingyi and Zhong De practically dashed toward Bai Zemin when they saw him. The duo was  shocked to see his horrible condition; this was the second time they had seen Bai Zemin receive such gruesome injuries. Another proof of how horrendously strong was the enemy which they had managed to survive thanks to him.

While his two trusted subordinates supported him, Shangguan Bing Xue was immediately assaulted by Chen He and Wu Yijun, who began asking questions and checking her condition.

"I'm fine, don't worry about me. The only injured person is Bai Zemin, he was the one who fought hand to hand against the Second Order bear." Shangguan Bing Xue shook her head and looked at the man who was now resting with Lili beside him, who to her surprise, was completely unconcerned about the terrifying bloody wound on his face.

This made her impression of Lili unconsciously improve.

Shangguan Bing Xue could be indifferent and unconcerned about Bai Zemin's current appearance, but this was because she had a special passive skill due to past events that marked her current personality. Therefore, she was surprised to see how another woman, and a weak and powerless one at that, could still look at him with the same look as always even when his face was at very least 40% disfigured.