Our Binding Love: My Gentle Tyrant
chapter-349-30041322

The Imperial Family’s Orphan

“Your Majesty, what should we do now?”

Mo Linyuan waved his hand. “There are so many of these tunnels. Being this complex, the mountain might be hollow. We’ll go out, gather all the manpower and search from the top to the bottom of the mountain. Be a little attentive, we’ll definitely find either the exit or entrance!”

“Yes!”

Everyone hurriedly withdrew. After entering this area, the air circulation was profound. Clearly, there were air vents, and there were also more than one. As long as they looked carefully, they would definitely find it.

At this moment, Ye Mu followed Lin Zhizhao. This half section of the maze had the same pattern as the previous one. From time to time, there would appear a door at the end of the path, and at times, elsewhere.

When Ye Mu encountered a blocked path, she instantly blasted it away.

She didn’t show it, but in her heart she knew her internal energy had been used up to an extent. So after destroying another door, Ye Mu rubbed her hand and asked Lin Zhizhao.

“How much longer will we be able to go out? My hands ache!”

Lin Zhizhao was already numb going all the way down. He had always known Ye Mu had outstanding martial arts, but he didn’t know she was actually so powerful. Hearing what she said, he grumbled, “When you move your hands*, do it lightly. If it hits the dragon pillar and the entire underground collapses, you won’t be able to escape no matter how strong you are!”

*implying the destruction carried out by Ye Mu

Ye Mu grunted. “Alright, hurry and lead the way.”

Carrying out this way, they walked into numerous forks and arrived in another secret chamber. At this time, both of them were exhausted. They decided to sit down and rest, but when Lin Zhizhao turned a corner and planned to sit there, he suddenly cried out in surprise and the luminous pearl fell from his hands!

Ye Mu picked up the pearl and walked to him. “What happened?”

Under the lights of the two luminous pearls, Ye Mu saw a dead person shrunk against the corner, seeming to have died some years ago and had deteriorated into bones early on.

Lin Zhizhao was a cowardly person, but unexpectedly, he fixed his gaze on those dead bones. In the end, his whole body trembled.

Ye Mu was skeptical. Looking at those dead bones, it looked like a woman’s. Could it be Lin Zhizhao’s family?

Lin Zhizhao forced himself to look away, and said to Ye Mu hoarsely, “Let’s go!”

But Ye Mu hugged her arms against her chest, unruffled despite the situation. “Are you not going to explain? Who is this person?”

Lin Zhizhao looked left and right evading the topic. “How would I know who she is.”

Ye Mu raised her eyebrows. She lifted her foot. “So you don’t know. I’ll kick her since you don’t know. You still won’t feel sorry?”

“You dare!” The expression in Lin Zhizhao’s eyes immediately changed.

Of course, Ye Mu wouldn’t possibly kick it, but her stance still looked like it. She snorted. “I also feel upset at being brought to this ghostly place. What do you think, do you think I dare?”

Seeing Ye Mu not scared at all, Lin Zhizhao didn’t dare to gamble, so he softly said, “Don’t! I—I’ll speak.”

Only then did Ye Mu put her foot down. Lin Zhizhao gazed at that hollow skeleton. The rims of his eyes were red. After a long time, he hoarsely said, “She was my mother.”

Ye Mu continued to ask, “So what about you, what’s your identity?”

Lin Zhizhao became silent.

Ye Mu said with a smile, “The matter has come to this point, yet you’re still hiding the truth from me. We don’t know how many more mechanisms there are ahead of us, and we may not necessarily be able to go out. So, here, I can agree on a three-point law* with you.”

*约法三章 – idiom, meaning to make simple rules that all parties can abide by.

Lin Zhizhao stared at her.

Ye Mu said, “No matter if we can go out or not later, I’ll let you go. I won’t kill you.”

Lin Zhizhao startled. “You won’t kill me?”

He had harmed Ye Mu twice, how could she not kill him? She definitely was lying! Lin Zhizhao inwardly thought to himself.

“If you had seen me before, then you should know, I never break my promise.”

Lin Zhizhao looked at her and said, “So, you promise not to kill me?”

Ye Mu said, “That’s right, I promise I won’t kill you. After we go out, I also won’t let Mo Linyuan kill you. But in the future, whether you fall into our hands or not depends on yourself. Right now, we’re in the same boat, so I think we should trust each other. Being frank and open is important.”

Lin Zhizhao then lowered his head, as though pondering it over.

A short while later, he nodded. “Okay. There’s no harm in telling you anyway, and it’s also easy for you to kill me.”

He looked at the skeleton locked in the corner, eyes filled with pity. Then, he suddenly said, “Did you know? Two hundred years ago, the empire’s imperial family didn’t die.”

Ye Mu naturally knew this. If they died, where would the City Boundary Map have come from?

“Originally, the empire left a treasure with a total of two maps. One is the City Boundary Map, the other is the Bright King map. Among them, there is only one map that has the treasure, while the other is originally for the emperor’s imperial tomb. There are countless mechanisms inside which can be said to be a trap.

“But at that time, all the surviving imperial descendants weren’t important figures. They were sent away before the empire was destroyed, so even if they got the two maps in the end, they wouldn’t know which of the two maps is the treasure, and which one is the emperor’s imperial tomb.

“Later, after the City Boundary Map was stolen by someone, the remaining imperial people could only watch over the Wang Ming map. It has two sides, one side is the complex underground palace route, and the other is the map and coordinates.

“Because of the crown prince, they wanted to work on the dream to restore the imperial family. Hence, from generation to generation, they used all their efforts and resources to look for the treasure.”

At this point, Lin Zhizhao wanted to laugh. “It’s really too bad, they spent two hundred years and found this place from the Wang Ming map that has no single character. And in reality, besides ruthlessly giving them a beating, the Wang Ming map is not the treasure map. Underneath, is all traps.”

He looked at those dead remains, coldly smiling as he said, “And the reason why they came to this ending is because of my mother who died here.”

He walked over. After fumbling for a while from the body’s remains, he took out a small one-sided mirror.

“My mother was a really excellent mechanic. Because she fell in love with my father, she invested all her life for him. At that time, after my father found the location from a different entrance, many people died as a result of the mechanisms. My father didn’t give up, he thought having mechanisms around the treasure was normal, but he didn’t want to die. So he told my mother to come down and check.

“But my mother was quite reluctant, because at that time, I was still small. She was afraid that if she went down, if it was the emperor’s imperial tomb and she had to face the numerous mechanisms, she could die inside. But my father said, all his life, he had been a person in complete isolation, what matters most are me and my mother. He also said, if she doesn’t come out after half a day, he’s ready to pay any price. Even if he has to dig up the mountain, he will save her.

“And now, the one who understands mechanisms most and is the most excellent in martial arts is her, so he hoped, for his sake and for preventing so many people from dying in vain, that she could go down to thoroughly investigate.”