“Aren’t you very capable and resourceful? If you would just beg me, perhaps I will let you go if what you say sounds good to me.”

Zhu Yan continued behaving arrogantly. He thought that maybe he would be able to relieve the pain of being abandoned by the shopkeeper by acting aggressively.

Lin Mengya knitted her brows tightly. This guy must think that she was at a loss of what to do to him.

“Beg you? Is that all you can do? I think I might die even faster if I were to beg you. Forget about it, I’m going to look for Xiu. At the very least, she’s much more useful than you.”

With a look of disdain on her face, Lin Mengya’s mood changed completely and abruptly and Zhu Yan was taken aback.

Seeing that she turned to leave without any hesitation, Zhu Yan, who was unhurried at first was now beginning to panic. He leaped forward and stood in front of Lin Mengya. He stretched out both his arms to block her.

“Stop! Don’t you go to her! Using poison is the only thing that shameless girl knows! Humph, given that there are so many people, she’s lucky not to have killed herself with poison!”

Lin Mengya could not help smiling to herself at the sight of the vicious expression on Zhu Yan’s face.

This guy was way too inexperienced. He had flipped with just a little prodding from her.

Lin Mengya crossed her arms as she stared at the young man standing in front of her. The situation had turned around. Now, she was one who was calm and composed.

“Step aside, I am not planning on being implicated by you.”

When Zhu Yan realized that Lin Mengya still did not trust him, he grabbed Lin Mengya’s arm roughly and dragged her along with him.

“Let’s see who is better between me and that shameless girl!”

Lin Mengya, who did not see this coming, almost fell over.

However, she quickly adjusted the rhythm of her footsteps and followed behind him with ease now. She was even smiling at the corners of her lips.

The sound of heavy footsteps quickly gave her an idea of the situation.

There were a large number of people. She had to deal with this situation with great caution.

“Let’s move to a higher spot where we can have a bird’s eye view of them.”

Lin Mengya need not worry that Zhu Yan would somehow regret this and back out of this. He was obviously a dim-wit.

She believed his mind was already preoccupied with how he would outdo Xiu.

Zhu Yan glanced at her then puckered up his lips as he continued to drag Lin Mengya along angrily. He did not look back again as he led her to shuttle back and forth in the house.

Zhu Yan had chosen to take all the small inconspicuous paths. It would be difficult for anyone who was not familiar with this place to catch up with him.

Soon, Lin Mengya who was running behind Zhu Yan arrived at an attic.

The two ran quickly up to the second floor. Lin Mengya intentionally looked out of the window so much so half of her body was outside the window.

The view from the second-floor window was not too bad. The group of men in black who had broken in was in full view from where they were.

After she took a quick glance, Zhu Yan dragged her down from the second floor once again.

They supposed those people searching all over had caught a glimpse of her shadow.

She had not detected the scent of Xiu all this time while running around and supposed Hongyu had led her to the safest place she could think of.

This was also the reason she insisted that Xiu had to stay close to Hongyu.

With Xiu around, she would be able to pinpoint their whereabouts.

In addition, she bought time by appearing now and then so as to make sufficient time.

“This is so troublesome! Why don’t I just activate the mechanism here to get them all killed?”

Zhu Yan said with impatience in his voice. He did not wish to run around with Lin Mengya like an idiot.

“Is there a mechanism? Where is it?”

Lin Mengya’s face fell. Damn it, how could it not occur to her that Candle Dragon Cult would not merely plant some agents given their usual practice.

“There, it’s in the dungeon. However, once the mechanism has been activated, there would be no way to stop it. If your accomplices happen to come by, they might get injured by accident.”

Zhu Yan gazed at Lin Mengya with an evil look. He was offering her a dilemma.

After all, the people outside were still unaware of the situation inside. Once the mechanism had been activated, any reinforcements from outside that arrived risk being injured.

Nevertheless, if they did not activate the mechanism, they could not possibly keep fleeing from place to place.

“Bring me to go and have a look at the mechanism. Oh yes, apart from you and Zhu Yun, are there any other people who know about this mechanism?”

The person who gave them away had to be someone from within this house.

Perhaps it was someone by Zhu Yun’s side. With such a person around, there would be no secret that could be hidden from these people no matter how great the secret was.

“Apart from me and the shopkeeper, there are few who know about it. I won’t let whoever betrays the shopkeeper of regardless of who he is!”

A chilling look appeared in Zhu Yan’s eyes.

Zhu Yun was the person he respected most and he was the most intimate person to him. Therefore, he would resort to extreme measures in order to protect the godlike figure in his heart.

Lin Mengya glanced at him and she could tell that he was an extremely ruthless and cruel person despite he being completely unskilled in terms of martial arts.

She made up her mind in that instant.

“Let’s go. Before they discover us, let’s go over to take a look first.”

It was a nerve-wracking journey but they managed to dodge those people looking for them.

These people should not be familiar with this place and this somewhat boosted Lin Mengya’s confidence.

What she was fearful of would be that some of the people who set this place up had infiltrated into this group of people.

It appeared that the person had merely revealed the information and time of the move out of this place. To be able to plant oneself secretly around Zhu Yun and not be discovered was an extremely difficult thing to do.

Zhu Yun was a sophisticated and cautious man. He could even run circles around Lin Mengya. For the person who wished to be a secret agent planted by his side, he would have to extra careful to achieve this.

The two finally came to the front yard where Lin Mengya had been locked up earlier.

“Do you mean the dungeon is here?”

Lin Mengya whispered in surprise. Zhu Yan turned around and gave her a mocking smile, then he entered the room in a few quick steps.

With the ease of familiarity, he turned a decorative flower vase, and instantly, the part of the floor by the vanity table opened up into a hole which was the entrance leading into the dungeon.

Lin Mengya stared at the entrance in great surprise. Who would have expected Zhu Yun to hide his secret right below her feet?!

“Let’s go. Just don’t be surprised by what you will see in a moment.”

Zhu Yan carried a lamp from the table and shone into the dark hole as he spoke with a contemptible tone.

Nevertheless, neither was Lin Mengya a greenhorn.

It was just that she found it difficult to grasp what was on Zhu Yun’s mind. She followed Zhu Yan down a flight of steps into the hole slowly.

The opening to the hole quietly closed up as they disappeared deeper into the hole.

In that instant, the tunnel seemed to become even darker.

Fortunately, however, it only took a very short time before Zhu Yan led her over a bend and lit the light in the tunnel with the lamp in his hands.

Although the light in the tunnel was not big, it was extremely bright.

It ought to be because the surrounding was utterly dark.

Lin Mengya was not aware of how far she had been walking while following behind Zhu Yan. It was when Zhu Yan lit up the tenth light that there seemed to be the scent of blood in the air.

“This is where we call the beauty’s room. Although there’s nothing in here now, we can still have a good look around.”

Perhaps because this place was so hidden away, Zhu Yan reverted back to his arrogant attitude and jeered at Lin Mengya once again.

However, Lin Mengya could already guess what kind of place this beauty’s room was used for.

There was a tightly shut metal door at the deepest part of the tunnel.

Zhu Yan reached out and gently pushed on the door. From beyond the door, the intense stench of blood almost made Lin Mengya throw up.

However, Zhu Yan seemed to be used to this smell.

He took a deep breath and sounding as if he was intoxicated, he said, “Many beautiful girls came out of this beauty’s room. The shopkeeper once said that no man on earth is able to escape from the charm of beautiful women.”

What he said was true.

Lin Mengya tried to calm her nerve as she followed behind Zhu Yan to step into the room filled with the bloody stench.

The darkness in the room was dispersed by the lamp Zhu Yan was carrying.

With ease and familiarity, Zhu Yan lit up all the lights in the surrounding.

Lin Mengya, who was standing at the door, finally had a good look at the inside of the room.

It was an empty underground dungeon. There was nothing left in the room now.

However, there was a five-meter square pool at the center of the room which was filled with clear water.

However, given that it had been filled with human blood for a long time, the white jade at the sides had been strained to look pink.

The slabs which used to be bright and shiny were covered with bloody veins resembling that of the human.

Now the scent of the blood should be much more subtle than before. They ought to have thoroughly washed this place many times.

Lin Mengya circumvented the pool and got to the other side. If not for what Hongyu told her, she would never imagine this pool was once filled with the blood of countless young women.

“Sumei used to frequent this place. Actually, there didn’t use to be the stench of blood here, because a lot of costly perfumes and spices were used to mix with the blood. There’s actually not much smell now. Honestly, I rather missed the feeling in those days.”

Zhu Yan had spoken those words to provoke Lin Mengya because she kept making him feel humiliated.

In fact, he did not come here often. Usually, he visited with the shopkeeper a few times every month.

It was just that he savored the feeling of being pleased with himself if he could frighten Lin Mengya.

“Really, but do you know that this place might be haunted? The wronged souls of girls who died had been trapped in here. Your body is stained with their blood and soon, they would come looking for vengeance. Look at these web-like patterns on the stone slabs! Don’t they look like the network of veins in the human body?”

Lin Mengya said with an attitude of indifference. There was a cold, creepy element in her gentle voice at this moment.

All of a sudden, she sneered and reached out her hand to point at the green stone slab, saying, “Look, every branch of the veins is one wronged soul. They are coming to look for you now!”

Zhu Yan could not help but look in the direction her finger pointed. Just as she described, there indeed was a network of red veins that appeared on the greenstone slab.