“Sister isn’t like that…no…” Ye Liunian murmured.
Suddenly she raised her head, her moist eyes fixed on Tang Nian, then got up, knelt on the bed, and grabbed Tang Nian's clothes.
"Master Tang, please, please save my sister!"
"I don't know where your sister is."
"She, she must be at the Ye residence! She must be with that man! She must be!"
Ye Liunian kept repeating "sister" and "Ye residence" in her mouth, her eyes reddening and tears slowly streaming down her face.
Whether it was the candlelight or her flushed face from excitement, Tang Nian could see red in her tears.
Ye Liunian took two more steps forward and held tightly to Tang Nian's clothes, refusing to let go no matter what Tang Nian said.
Tang Nian looked at Lou Mu with pleading eyes.
"Miss Ye, we can't guarantee what we'll see inside the Ye residence, and we might not be able to protect you. Are you sure you want to go?"
"I want to go!" Ye Liunian shouted before Lou Mu could finish speaking.
She struggled to her feet and staggered toward the outside.
Ye Liunian, who always cared about her image, was now disheveled and unkempt. If it weren't for her determined gaze, they would have thought she was going crazy.
"Alright then, let's go to the Ye residence and find out what's going on."
The group arrived at the Ye residence, which was still as desolate as Tang Nian had seen it last time.
Ye Liunian seemed to have regained her composure and led them to the backyard behind the artificial hill: "I don't know how to open this mechanism."
Lou Mu was about to step forward to explore when he heard Tang Nian's voice: "Can we just blast it open?"
Lou Mu listened to whatever Tang Nian said.
He immediately raised his hand and blasted it, sending up a thick cloud of yellow smoke.
"Cough cough cough..."
Tang Nian waved her hand forcefully in front of her eyes and tried to open them, barely managing to make out the dark passage through the yellow smoke.
This time, the secret passage was very different from the last time. In the pitch-black passage, a torch was now hung every few steps, as if to welcome their arrival.
Tang Nian carefully drew her longsword and held it in her hand.
Just as he was about to walk down first, Lou Mu stopped him.
"I'll lead the way, you bring up the rear." He looked at the young prince.
"No, you don't know where to go, I'll lead the way." Tang Nian refused without thinking, "You just need to protect Ye Liunian."
After speaking, Tang Nian walked into the brightly lit dark passage.
A faint smell of smoke wafted from the secret passage from time to time, and sometimes wisps of smoke could be seen drifting in.
It probably came from the opera house.
Sure enough, this secret passage also leads to the opera house.
"I'll explore this secret passage again when we get back," the young prince said.
With his skills, he was perfectly suited to explore this network of secret passages.
He was also very curious about where this vast secret passage led.
Tang Nian nodded, not daring to turn her head at all, only daring to stare at the road in front of her and the occasional forks in the road beside her.
I'm afraid something might suddenly jump out.
Suddenly, Tang Nian slowed down.
"We'll be there after this bend," she whispered.
Upon hearing this, even though there were people guarding her from both the front and back, Ye Liunian didn't know where she got the strength, but she suddenly pushed herself and rushed through the turn.
"Hey!"
Tang Nian was knocked off her feet and instinctively reached out to grab Ye Liunian, but she couldn't even touch the hem of Ye Liunian's clothes.
Immediately afterwards, Ye Liunian screamed.
"Let's go! We need to get there right away!"
When the three rushed to the underground study, they found Ye Liunian collapsed on the ground.
Before her were two human skins.
The three exchanged a glance, then carefully stepped forward and lifted the human skin.
The images above are unmistakably those of Ye's father and Ye Liusi!
Could Ye Liusi also be a monster in human skin?
This realization made Tang Nian's hands and feet turn ice cold.
“There is wood ash in these people’s skin.”
Lou Mu picked up a small amount, rubbed it in his hand, and gently smelled it: "It's the same as the one in the theater."
Why is there also peach wood ash?
Could it be that the collaboration between the opera house and the Ye family is fake?
The Ye family were puppets of the opera house from beginning to end.
And what about Ye Liunian? What is she anyway?
Tang Nian helped Ye Liunian up and let her lean against the back of the chair.
"Senior sister, come and see."
The young prince peeked out from behind the bookshelf and waved to Tang Nian.
"Senior sister, this book can't be touched."
Following the prince's hand, one could see a lone book standing in the middle of the shelf at the very bottom, with the books on either side pushed aside by the prince and lying haphazardly on the ground.
Tang Nian squatted down and reached out to try a few times. Suddenly, the book flipped upwards, and then a rumbling sound came from the tunnel.
Instantly, the floor shook, and Tang Nian quickly grabbed the bookshelf behind her.
The bookshelf slowly opened to both sides, gradually revealing a dark cave.
There was even a secret passage beneath the study!
Tang Nian stood at the edge of the cave, looking up at the darkness below, but could only see pitch blackness.
She turned to listen, but heard nothing.
She thought for a moment, then got up and went behind the desk. She fumbled around under the desk for a while and, unsurprisingly, found a tinderbox.
She lit the tinderbox and tried it; it could still produce tiny sparks.
This light is enough to light the candle.
"You stay outside and watch over her. Lou Mu and I will go down and check on her."
Inside the secret passage was only a small, hidden room, whose layout was no different from the study above.
Tang Nian used a tinderbox to light the candle in the secret room that had not yet burned out, and then looked around with the candlestick in hand.
"Lou Mu, come and see quickly."
Suddenly, Tang Nian straightened up, waved the papers in her hand, and spread them all out on the table.
Lou Mu casually picked up a document: "This is... the contract signed between the Ye family and Song's Pharmacy?"
No, it should be said that Song Shiyan signed a contract with a mysterious person.
The contract clearly states in black and white:
Today, Song Shiyan received...ten thousand taels of gold to...collect placenta...with Ye Baichuan as witness, signing and affixing his seal.
The date on the signature indicates that Song Shiyan was only twenty years old.
Besides the names of Song Shiyan and Ye's father, there was another name in between, but it was completely soaked in ink and could not be seen at all.
They then examined the other sheets of paper as well. The messy handwriting on the paper was barely discernible to the two of them as being written by the same person.
After much deliberation, they pieced together what was originally the story.
At that time, Song Shiyan had just reached the age of twenty. His father's sudden death led this playboy to take over the pharmacy.
Song Shiyan, who knew absolutely nothing about business, made a mess of the pharmacy, which was on the verge of closing down.
Fortunately, his younger sister, who was a few years younger than him, knew pharmacology and could save lives, which allowed Song's Pharmacy to survive for a short time.
But how could Song Shiyan be willing to let his younger sister support him?
Not to mention that she was the one he loved.
At that time, rumors had already begun to circulate among the people.
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com