Gu Linlang was dragged away by the bodyguards, one of them covering her mouth.
She struggled desperately, but her frail body had no strength left.
All she could do was cry as she was forcibly taken out of the surveillance room.
Chen An looked mockingly at the door after it closed again, a sinister smile lingering on his face.
“Compared to Shen Nanyue, you’re behind by a hundred thousand miles in both looks and figure. If I hadn’t wanted to use you to lure over a top-tier prize like Shen Nanyue, I wouldn’t have given you a second glance.”
As he muttered his complaints, he turned back toward the monitors.
The moment he looked at the screen, however, his expression changed.
The surveillance feed had completely broken down.
The image resembled an old black-and-white television with no signal, the entire screen filled with flickering static.
“What happened?”
It had been a very long time since he had felt this kind of panic.
Suddenly, Chen Tianming burst into the surveillance room.
“This is bad! The police are here!”
The news hit like a thunderbolt.
“The police? How could they know about this place?”
To outsiders, the Chen family estate looked nothing more than a once-prosperous property that had fallen into decline.
Almost nobody came near it.
Who had called the police?
Looking at the dead surveillance screens, Chen An already had a suspicion.
He made a decision immediately.
“Everyone retreat to the basement. You go upstairs and stall the police.”
Chen Tianming nodded and hurried out of the room.
At that moment, Shen Nanyue and Zhou Yushen had already escaped from the room.
When Zhou Yushen said the door would open in one minute, he hadn’t been lying.
Li Che and Shen An’an had arrived with a key and unlocked the door.
Zhou Yushen and Shen Nanyue quickly stepped outside.
“An’an, are you alright?”
“I’m fine, Sis.”
Shen Nanyue carefully looked her over from head to toe.
Only after confirming that Shen An’an was truly unharmed did she finally relax.
Li Che was holding a small laptop, his expression serious.
“The basement has been sealed off. All the bodyguards are retreating there.”
As he spoke, he showed them the screen.
The entrance to the basement was hidden behind a false wall in the main hall where Shen Nanyue had first arrived.
It was a concealed door.
Without a thorough investigation, the police would never discover it.
On the screen, Chen An was leading a large group of men down through the basement entrance.
The entire group looked vicious and intimidating.
“Is there another way out?” Zhou Yushen asked.
“I haven’t found one yet,” Li Che replied.
After a moment of thought, Shen Nanyue spoke.
“I know where another exit is. Follow me.”
As she said it, she naturally reached for Zhou Yushen’s hand and led him down the corridor.
Zhou Yushen froze briefly.
Looking at her back as she walked ahead of him, a warmth rose unconsciously in his chest.
Meanwhile, Shen An’an trailed behind, staring at her own empty hand in disbelief.
In the past, whenever her sister led the way, she was always the one whose hand got held.
She puffed out her cheeks unhappily.
The next second, someone grabbed her hand.
Li Che leaned close to her ear with a grin.
“You’ve got a boyfriend now too, little sis.”
Shen Nanyue turned her head and shot him a glare.
Li Che’s smile only widened.
Holding Shen An’an’s hand, he followed after the other two.
Shen Nanyue led them through the corridor and then along a narrow side passage.
After several twists and turns and roughly three minutes of walking, they reached the end of a dirt tunnel.
“This is…?”
Li Che frowned.
Only moments ago they had been walking through a clearly man-made underground structure.
How had it suddenly turned into an unrefined tunnel?
The walls were nothing but packed earth.
A faint but unpleasant smell lingered in the air.
Shen Nanyue pointed toward the ceiling.
“I think that’s a manhole cover.”
She had previously investigated the back area of the Chen family estate.
If her guess was correct, this basement had been constructed near the rear street behind the estate.
There was an abandoned manhole cover on that street.
When the bodyguards had brought her down earlier, she had noticed a dark passage extending in its direction.
Perhaps when the Chen family built the basement, they had accidentally dug too far and broken into this area.
Filling it back in might have attracted attention from people above ground, so they simply abandoned it.
Everyone followed her gaze upward.
Sure enough, there was something that looked very much like a manhole cover.
There was still a considerable distance between the tunnel floor and the cover above.
Li Che immediately contacted the bodyguards waiting outside to meet them at that location.
The bodyguards arrived quickly.
When the manhole cover was lifted, the glow of the streetlights spilled into the tunnel, bringing a welcome touch of warmth to the darkness.
A rope was lowered down.
“Ladies first,” Li Che said.
Shen Nanyue immediately gave Shen An’an a gentle push.
“An’an, you go up first.”
Shen An’an was moved to the front of the line.
Knowing there was no time to waste, she secured the rope around herself and began climbing.
The bodyguards above pulled a few times, quickly helping her out.
Next came Shen Nanyue.
Then Li Che.
Zhou Yushen was the last one left below.
When the rope was lowered once more, Zhou Yushen had just reached out and grabbed it when Chen An arrived with a group of men.
The moment Chen An discovered the escape route hidden beneath the manhole, his face darkened immediately.
Zhou Yushen saw him as well.
The instant he recognized Chen An’s face, the mocking look in his eyes deepened.
Slowly, he released the rope he had been holding.
Watching from above through the open manhole, Shen Nanyue’s heart skipped a beat.
What was he doing?
“Young Master Zhou, it’s been a long time.”
The voice was familiar.
So was the face.
Zhou Yushen’s expression was as cold and unfathomable as a frozen lake, carrying both indifference and danger.
“Yes. It’s been a long time.”
He emphasized every word.
Shen Nanyue was stunned.
He knew Chen An?
Chen An’s gaze shifted toward the manhole above, and a cold smile curved his lips.
“Do you really think you’ll be safe just because you’ve made it up there?”
The moment he finished speaking, the sound of fighting erupted near the manhole cover.
Zhou Yushen instinctively looked up and saw only the fluffy back of Shen Nanyue’s hooded head.
From Shen Nanyue’s perspective, a large group of Chen family bodyguards had appeared in the back alley.
There were more of them than the people they had brought.
As the two sides clashed, they quickly found themselves at a disadvantage.
Li Che instructed Shen Nanyue and Shen An’an to stay where they were before rushing into the fight himself.
Shen An’an didn’t know any martial arts and could only remain beside her sister, trying not to become a burden.
Shen Nanyue turned back toward the tunnel below.
A smile appeared on her face.
“Chen An, before coming here, I already called the police. Do you really think we’d dare come without making thorough preparations?”
In reality, she hadn’t made any such preparations.
She was simply trying to mess with Chen An’s mindset.
When he first learned the police were coming, he had managed to stay calm.
But now, faced with Shen Nanyue’s deliberate provocation, an ominous feeling began creeping into his heart.
His expression darkened.
He stared at Shen Nanyue as though she were already a corpse.
“If failure is inevitable today, then I’ll make sure one of you dies with me!”
He raised a hand.
Immediately, the bodyguards behind him surged forward, charging straight toward Zhou Yushen.
Without hesitation, Shen Nanyue threw a small bottle toward the feet of the leading bodyguard.
The bottle shattered on impact.
A thick cloud of white gas instantly poured out.
Startled, the bodyguard stumbled and crashed to the ground.
The men behind him didn’t see what had happened and tripped over him one after another, collapsing into a tangled heap.
“Zhou Yushen, get up here!”
Shen Nanyue hurriedly grabbed the rope and gestured frantically for him to climb.
— The end of the Chapter–
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