°(°°)°The trouble! Something really happened to Zhang Chulan!
With Wang Ye joining them, they now had the assistance of the Eight Extraordinary Skills, including the pinnacle of the art of Qimen, Feng Hou, which let its user set the central palace beneath his feet and freely manipulate the four plates within the Qimen layout—the time and space within it, the plates' interactions of generation and restraint, and all kinds of techniques based on the Five Elements. In short, the user could decide everything. Along with Xiao Zizai, Black Pipe, and Wang Zhenqiu, the three temporary workers from the company, the combined force of their assistance and countermeasures instantly put Ma Xianhong in a difficult position.
Before long, after the two sides continued fighting for dozens of exchanges, Ma Xianhong's magical artifacts were one by one destroyed or restrained. Once his Thieving Swallowing Beast, which could absorb and store an opponent's qi and then feed it back to him, was trapped, Ma Xianhong could no longer fight back at all.
Then, after Wang Ye and Zhuge Qing tried to persuade him once more, the situation had become completely irreversible. In the end, Ma Xianhong knew his resistance was useless and defeat was inevitable. Though he was still very unwilling to give up, he had no choice but to dejectedly lay down his weapons and surrender. Black Pipe and the other temporary workers subdued him and sealed his Du Meridian, preparing to take him to company headquarters for further handling.
As they prepared to escort Ma Xianhong away and contact the company, asking the employees stationed around the village to come in and clean up the aftermath—collecting and packing Ma Xianhong's magical artifacts, the Divine Machine Like Flower, fragments of the furnace, and the like—an old man with only a few teeth