Chapter 35: The Trap Within the Trap

After listening, Chen Chunsheng gave an innocent, bitter laugh and said, “See? I told you it wasn’t me, but you still won’t believe it.”

Old Mo shot him a vicious glare. “Even if it’s not you, it’s still your fault. If it weren’t for your mission, none of this trouble would have happened! In one hour, have your people bring me a thousand gemstones, or your life is forfeit.”

“I wasn’t the one who caught them! You guys—”

Old Mo pressed his knife to Chen Chunsheng’s throat again.

“All right, all right, calm down. I’ll send someone to mine gemstones right now.”

Chen Chunsheng hurriedly called for people to start mining. Shen Xin, recalling how useful gemstones were for his own cultivation and thinking it was convenient to get some while he was here, said, “I’ll go supervise the mining.”

“I’m coming too!” Chen Jiawang wasn’t a fool; he had his eyes on the gemstones as well. Last time, the pieces he dug up all went to girls at nightclubs. This time, he was determined to get more.

Old Mo nodded, choosing to stay behind to watch Chen Chunsheng, worried the man might try something sneaky.

An hour later, a group returned to the cavern hall.

Old Mo immediately asked, “Well? Did you get enough?”

Chen Jiawang patted his backpack and grinned. “More than enough.”

Just then, the phone rang again. Shen Xin quickly answered and put it on speaker. The person on the other end gave only an address, telling them to deliver the gemstones to the specified location and the hostage would be released.

Shen Xin agreed without hesitation.

The three of them, not pausing to rest, climbed out of the sinkhole. By now, it was already past ten at night. The drop-off was set at a place in She City called Wuxian Ridge.

They sped all the way to Wuxian Ridge, arriving after eleven. Old Mo told Tang Ziran to find a hotel and get some rest, and Tang Ziran nodded her agreement.

Wuxian Ridge was a tourist spot, but it was closed by this hour. Not that it mattered to them—they scaled the wall and hurried toward a small temple atop the ridge.

Without GPS navigation, they might never have found the little temple in the mountains. It was called Yuan Temple. From the back of the hill, it looked simple and unadorned, no walls, just a solitary palace of blue bricks and green tiles.

They stepped inside. By flashlight, they could see three clay statues of the Taoist trinity, a small altar, an incense burner, and a few blackened plates.

It looked as though few people ever came to offer incense.

Chen Jiawang set down the backpack. Shen Xin called the number again, and this time someone picked up.

“I’ve left the gemstones inside Yuan Temple. Release the hostage! Otherwise, I’ll hunt you to the ends of the earth!”

The other side simply replied “Okay,” then hung up.

“What do we do now?”

“We keep watch nearby, then follow them!”

The three of them pretended to head down the mountain, but doubled back quickly from another direction—in less than five minutes.

They hid behind the temple on the ridge. Sure enough, within moments, two furtive figures slipped into Yuan Temple, picked up the backpack, and left.

Shen Xin and the others quietly followed. After leaving Wuxian Ridge, the two got into a car and sped away.

Shen Xin’s group tailed them.

Unexpectedly, the car headed straight for the highway without stopping, driving all the way to Niu City.

“So it was someone from Niu City behind this? But who?” Old Mo muttered. It was already past three in the morning. The three were exhausted and hungry, but they dared not slack off, continuing to tail the car.

The car circled around the city several times before finally pulling into a luxury villa community—Champs Park.

Anyone living in Champs Park was either rich or powerful; the property prices here were astronomical, far above other developments.

The men got out and exchanged a few words with the security guard, who let them through. Shen Xin and his companions slipped silently over the wall.

The two men looked around carefully, then entered one of the villas.

By now, it was past four in the morning. The villa, dark just moments before, suddenly blazed with light—clearly, its occupants were now awake.

Old Mo and the others crouched in a shrub, observing. Old Mo said, “Shen Xin, teleport us to the rooftop. We’ll sneak in from above.”

“Got it.”

Shen Xin obliged, teleporting them to the roof. The villa had five stories, about twenty meters high, and even a rooftop garden.

They arrived on the roof and immediately looked for cover, afraid of being spotted by cameras.

But after a quick check, they saw no obvious surveillance. Under cover of darkness, the three crept to the heavy iron rooftop door.

Old Mo took out a set of keys and, after a bit of fiddling, unlocked the door. They slipped inside, careful and silent. Beyond the door was a stairwell, leading down to a security door—which, surprisingly, was not locked.

They crept in, wary of triggering any motion-activated lights, and searched room by room. With Old Mo’s skills, no lock posed a problem.

The fifth floor, being the top, was uninhabited and filled with storage. They found nothing.

On to the fourth floor—nothing. Third floor—they found three teenage girls. Old Mo didn’t harm them, just knocked them out.

Down to the second floor, where a few sleepy men were found. Old Mo knocked them out as well and tied them up.

“Looks like it’s the first floor, then.”

Shen Xin felt nervous. If they didn’t find Shen Lan on the first floor, they’d be in real trouble.

This time, the three didn’t bother hiding. They leaped straight from the second floor to the first. Eight men in the hall gaped at the sight of them dropping from above—just long enough for all eight to be taken down.

Old Mo and Chen Jiawang didn’t hold back. The men on the floor couldn’t even cry out, just twitched in agony.

Shen Xin teleported the two delivery men into the wall. His teleportation couldn’t pass through solid matter, so the men were slammed against the wall so hard that cracks formed in the tiles.

Old Mo let out a surprised grunt and muttered, “They’re all ordinary people.”

Chen Jiawang quickly picked up the bag that was supposed to hold the gemstones. He opened it—inside were nothing but rusty, battered objects. Not a single gemstone.

“Where are the gemstones?”

“And my daughter? Did you release her?”

“Where’s my sister, Shen Lan?”

The two men, held by Shen Xin and his companions, were bombarded with questions.

“What gemstones? Who’s Shen Lan? We don’t know anything!”

Old Mo had no patience for this. He slashed one man’s throat, then glared at the other. “Talk, or else!”

“Ah… ah! I’ll talk, I’ll talk! We’re antique smugglers! We picked up the goods at Yuan Temple in She City’s Wuxian Ridge and brought them here to the buyer!”

“Liar! Still making things up at this point!”

Old Mo flicked his knife, slicing off the man’s ear.

“Ah… ah! Please, spare me! I swear it’s the truth! If I’m lying, may heaven strike me down, may my whole family perish!”

Shen Xin saw the man was crying and snotting uncontrollably, and caught a strong stench of urine. Looking down, he realized the man had wet himself in terror.

If he was faking, his acting was better than any movie star’s. Yet Shen Xin couldn’t shake the feeling something had gone wrong. Had they been on the wrong track all along?