Lu Xinyi silently walked behind Li Yuren, the two of them being sandwiched between Jiao Jiao and Fu Rui. Fu Rui had taken the lead, keeping their captives and their injured comrades in the middle while he and Jiao Jiao protected them from both ends.
With the torches lighting the way, only the sounds of dripping water could be heard. Even their breathing was louder than anything around them.
“Are we there yet?” Jiao Jiao asked behind them.
“No,” Fu Rui replied and stopped. His hand reaching up to touch a fox mark on the cave wall. It was weird. He could clearly remember that these kinds of marks were faded, but now, it was as if it was repainted to its original state.
“We have to be careful. Seems like there was someone who arrived earlier before us,” he added.
The group continued to walk until they heard a hissing sound ahead of them. Fu Rui lifted his hand, motioning everyone to stop. Their ears picked up the hissing sound again, and it became louder.
Fu Rui threw the torch he was holding ahead of them, instantly illuminating what was waiting ahead. Lu Xinyi’s eyes grew wider. She stepped back in fear. It seemed that they ended up in a snake’s pit. Green long venomous vipers swarmed, making a ball with their bodies.
“Green bamboo vipers…” Li Yuren muttered under his breath but was still heard by everyone.
“Is it poisonous?” Lu Xinyi gripped the straps of her backpack.
“These snakes have a potent hemotoxin. The bite wound usually feels extremely painful like being branded with a hot iron, and the pain does not subside for a day.” Li Yuren bothered to explain. “Within a few minutes, the infected area swells, turns black, and dies.”
“In a cave? I don’t believe that this is just a coincidence. Someone must be trying to trap us. There wasn’t a pit of snakes the last time we were here.” Fu Rui scoffed. “Jiao Jiao give me your torch. We must have taken a wrong turn last time.”
Jiao Jiao gave her torch without a word, and they traced back their steps from the last turn they had taken.
As he said that, the ground started to tremble. The stalagmites above them shook, debris came falling to them.
“Earthquake?” Zhang Qing asked worriedly as she hugged her younger brother closer.
“Run!” Jiao Jiao yelled which made everyone moved at once.
Lu Xinyi could only follow their lead. Her body had yet to fully recover, and her wounded leg forbade her to run faster. Seeing her predicament, Li Yuren pulled her wrist and dragged her away from the falling stalact.i.tes. At that split moment, Lu Xinyi was almost crushed by a huge stalact.i.te that fell on her. If Li Yuren hadn’t pulled her… Lu Xinyi thought. Her face turned pale from fright.
Li Yuren released her but stayed closely near her as they followed Fu Rui’s group.
“Stay close. If you can’t run anymore. Tell me so you won’t get left behind,” Li Yuren said.
Lu Xinyi complied without a word, gripping her flashlight tighter as if it could save her.
Lu Xinyi panted but shook her head. She could not bother him any longer. He’d already saved her life twice, and she was really grateful for his help. However, she would rather not give him any troubles in fear that she might hurt Shen Yi’s feelings once he finds out what transpired within the cave.
The quake slowly came to a stop which made the group wary of their surroundings. Such an unlucky day to be trapped inside the cave! Just as they thought that they’re finally safe, the ground began to shake again. Because Lu Xinyi and Li Yuren were behind, the group failed to notice that the ground where Lu Xinyi stood broke, revealing a huge hole beneath her.
Her scream echoed within the tunnel they were in. Li Yuren extended an arm to catch her, but this time, he was too late. Lu Xinyi was swallowed by the darkness below.
“Lu Xinyi!”
—-
When Shen Yi’s team reached the end of the tunnel they had taken, they were surprised to see a huge stagnant lake inside the cave. In Jin De’s estimate, the lake could be as large as four Olympic size swimming pools. On the other side of the lake, there were four tunnels ahead.
‘So many tunnels. Where are the tunnels leading us?’ Shen Yi thought.
His eyes swept to the guards he brought with him. Just like him, they were wearing appropriate gear for this task. Aside from the elite guards of his family, he also brought to professional cave explorers with them.
Shen Yi clenched his fists. His wife had been missing for almost 48 hours, and the only trace they had found were her footsteps left in a muddy path at the entrance of the fox’s den.
‘Xinxin…”
“Boss, we only have half an hour to survey the area, then we will have to retreat outside,” one of his elite guards reminded him. He and Tian Lingyu agreed to meet outside after two hours whether they found Lu Xinyi or not.
Heh, even if he had to spend days looking for her, he would. Caving could be dangerous due to the hazard of falling rocks, hypothermia, getting lost, and isolation… and especially falling which was the number one cause of injury among cavers. In some caves, one had to even risk drowning.
Lu Xinyi couldn’t swim. This what the lake reminded of Shen Yi. It would be disastrous if Lu Xinyi fell into this. He had to find her soon.
As his group finished checking the tunnels, leaving marks they could use later, the ground began to tremble beneath their feet.
—-
“Where are you going?” Fu Rui grabbed Li Yuren’s arm as the latter started to walk in the opposite direction where the exit was. Bringing with him the spare flashlight that Lu Xinyi lent to him before falling down the hole.
“Enough! I only followed you because of Miss Lu. If it wasn’t for her, do you think I will waste my time here with you? She’s my responsibility. Children of the Wolves… no, you are now called b.l.o.o.d.y Wolves, aren’t you?” Li Yuren threw Fu Rui’s hand away from him. He snickered, eyes filled with mockery. “Such cowardice I’ve never seen any mercenaries before.”
“What did you say?!” Fu Rui roared in rage. His brother, Fu Shuren, stopped him. Fu Rui gave him a confused look as Fu Shuren shook his head, knowing what his younger brother was planning.
“Miss Lu, even if she was naive to realize that you held her captive, willingly helped your injured companions. Now, if you’ll excuse me.” Li Yuren turned around and left without a word.
“Do you think we should follow him?” Fu Rui asked his brother.
“There’s no need to. We might only delay him from finding Miss Lu. Our top priority is to bring Zhang Sheng for medical treatment. Miss Lu has only helped him lowered his fever, but the poison on his blood should be treated.”
Fu Rui didn’t respond, but his mind was weighing what Li Yuren had said earlier. Lu Xinyi didn’t hesitate to help them when they were in need, and yet the moment she fell down, they’d turned their back on her.
“Fu Rui, it can’t be helped right now,” Zhang Qing said. She also wanted to find Lu Xinyi, but her brother’s condition couldn’t be ignored any longer. “If Miss Lu managed to get out of this cave and once Sheng is stable, I’ll find her myself to pay my debt on her.”
“I won’t let you go alone then. I’ll go with you,” Jiao Jiao decided.
She knew Lu Xinyi was aware that they were dangerous, but what she didn’t understand as to why the latter still choose to help them when she could leave with Li Yuren earlier. If Li Yuren chose to kill them the moment she took Lu Xinyi to gather utensils, he could easily manage to defeat Fu Rui and her other injured comrades.
“Then, we’re all the same. In the future, we will settle this favor that Miss Lu has given to us.” Fu Shuren nodded. As the leader of the group, he had failed to protect them and put them in a dangerous situation by agreeing to accept their last mission.
With a heavy heart, the Children of the Wolves continued without Li Yuren and Lu Xinyi. They could only hope that there would be a chance to meet Lu Xinyi in the future.
—
Lu Xinyi didn’t know how long she’d been unconscious when she was woken up by the dripping water on her face. She groaned as she rolled onto her side, feeling her sore muscles. The moment she opened her eyes, she felt the pain all over her body. She stiffened as the last moments of her falling down rushed to her brain.
Where was she then?
She s.h.i.+fted her body to sit up, making her hiss in pain. Her hands reached out to the ground, trying to feel where her flashlight was. She hoped that it hadn’t crushed from the impact when she fell.
Her hand touched a cylindrical thing, and she hurriedly checked if it was her missing flashlight. She released a breath she didn’t know she was holding when the small flashlight lit up, flickering a little before giving a steady light.
Being alone inside the cave was to become engulfed in chilling blackness. The absence of light meant the absence of its warming touch. Even with her flashlight, Lu Xinyi couldn’t see anything.
Underfoot, the loose stones s.h.i.+fted, twisting her ankle one way and then the other. The noise of those disturbed rocks echoed off the dense stone cave walls. Ahead was the sound of water flowing. Without even a match to cast light into the darkness, there was no way she could tell how deep it was or if her next step would take her into its frigid depths.
As afraid as she was, she believed this was a good place to lie low and think of a suitable plan. The more she thought she was in deep s.h.i.+t, the more her hatred for Meng Jiao grew. Did that b.i.t.c.h intentionally left her in the wilderness to die? To die under the hands of the bandits or become a meal for beasts?
Just as she was thinking about beasts, her ears picked up the sound of growling near her.
‘s.h.i.+t. s.h.i.+t. s.h.i.+t. What’s that?’ She mentally screamed. Before, she had seen a pit of poisonous snakes, now, what was waiting ahead of her?