Ch 129 – Trapped In A Labyrinth

“Young master, this is merely an underground business. It’s not only the people of the underworld that conduct in underground businesses, even some government officials will participate in it from time to time.” Black Panther interjected.

Lei Yu couldn’t make up his mind at this point. Hu Jiong once again spoke up and Lei Yu agreed to his approach.

“Think about it young master, those that will be participating in the fights all have extraordinary strength. We could go through this route and attract a portion of these people to expand our own group, right?”

“Okay, it’s decided then!” Lei Yu slapped his thighs as he said this.

In regards on how to run this, then Black Panther and Gray Bear would be more familiar with it. Taking a large sum of cash allocated to them by Lei Yu, they quickly began working on the matter.

Now the next thing he had to do was keep his promise. That day he promised the old woman when things were calmed down, he would accompany her to Greece.

Since there weren’t particularly anything going on for now, and Lei Yu didn’t understand how to setup the fight matches, he gave Black Panther full authority to do whatever was needed. He then brought Ai Er back to the Burlinder family’s castle.

“My dear child, you’re back!” The old woman was clearly very happy at Lei Yu’s return. People will always respect others with integrity and Lei Yu was clearly was someone with strong moral principles.

As for the subject of going to Athens, Greece to retrieve a holy object, the old woman didn’t tell her son Hawes at all. It seems like Lei Yu was the only person aware of it. Even if he leaves Ai Er at this place while he leaves the U.S., Lei Yu’s heart will still not be at ease so they brought Ai Er along as if they were going on a vacation.

Without stopping for breaks, they left for the airport. Lei Yu and group left New York towards Athens, Greece – a city filled with many myths and legends¹.

According to the enlightenment the old woman received, they arrived at a mysterious location. It’s already been half a month by the time they’ve arrived here.

This place was surrounded by cliffs, and below the cliff was a rapid stream. Against a cliff wall was a huge rock around ten meters tall and with a diameter of about fifteen meters.

There were no signs of vegetation around here giving it a desolate feel and Lei Yu had felt uncomfortable ever since arriving at this location. Looking at Ai Er, she also had a frown and appears to not like the feel of this place either.

The old woman slowly walked towards the huge rock and waved her hands for Lei Yu to follow her over.

“Will there be a holy object inside?” Asked Lei Yu filled with doubt. He refuses to believe this huge rock itself was the holy object the old woman was talking about.

The old woman suddenly closed her eyes without answering Lei Yu. You can see her hands were trembling non-stop and Lei Yu didn’t know what was causing that.

A long time later, the old woman opened her eyes. “Almighty God! Please forgive my sinful deeds today!”

Lei Yu was extremely confused and didn’t know what the old woman was going on about.

“Child, I will have to trouble you to take the scrolls out.”

Lei Yu nodded and placed the two rings onto his palm. Activating his spiritual awareness, the two black scrolls with a mysterious aura appeared in Lei Yu’s hands. The instant these scrolls appeared, they could feel a slight tremor from the ground that only lasted a moment. Lei Yu was standing close to Ai Er and unconsciously put one of his arms around her waist and the other hand grabbing onto her hands.

The old woman excitedly unfurled the two scrolls, then moved backwards a few steps before standing still again. She then began reading the ancient Greek texts on the scrolls.

Gradually, the previous ground tremors recurred again. Lei Yu followed the tremors with his spirit and found the cause of it, and it was the huge rock in front of them. The shaking of the huge rock starting becoming more intense and more frequent. The loose gravel on top of the rock continued falling down causing “sha sha” sounds as it hit the ground.

A loud “BOOM” noise sounded out. Lei Yu looked intently and was shocked. In the center of the huge rock, a large cave-like hole had opened up. The edges of the hole looked neat and didn’t look like something caused by an explosion. Lei Yu looked at the old woman and paused before asking: “Old madam, this…”

“Child, are you willing to go in together with me?”

The huge cave entrance had a height of about three meters and inside was pitch black. Even with Lei Yu’s amazing eyesight, he still couldn’t see what was inside the cave.

Lei Yu looked at Ai Er; and perhaps out of curiosity’s sake, Ai Er nodded her head in agreement. The three cautiously walked forward into the mysterious large cave that had suddenly appeared.

There were steps inside the cave that appeared to be manmade. But who built these stairs? Lei Yu could not figure it out and had no one to ask. And this feeling like they were going on a quest made him feel somewhat excited.

Slowly going down the steps, the old woman knocked on the walls a few times. *Fu Fu* A sudden brightness flared up. Torches on the wall lit up one by one in an orderly fashion, revealing the scene inside the cave.

Lei Yu carefully looked around and noticed this place was pretty much an underground labyrinth. As you look along the walls, you couldn’t see what was around the corners. The labyrinth was made up of countless intricate paths, and on each wall had carvings of pictures. There were carvings of humans, monsters, scenic rivers and mountains. The three of them could only continue walking cautiously deeper inside.

The old woman has naturally not been here before; she only relied on the mysterious revelations in her mind that allowed her to find this location and the method of opening the cave.

All three of their hearts were in suspense. Even someone like Lei Yu with such a powerful strength could not help feeling excited to the extreme; he was too filled with desire to find out what was inside.

Following the path, Lei Yu was keeping Ai Er close to him as they followed behind the old woman. The three of them were moving very slowly since each step they took was filled with caution. They walked in a straight line and did not make any turns when they encountered a junction.

The light given off by the torches in the labyrinth were quite dim, and add that with the flames dancing around, this place gave off a very mysterious atmosphere. It was so quiet inside here, so quiet that they could hear each other’s heart beat. Lei Yu released his perception ability to his maximum so he could be ready for anything thrown at them.

They had gone past approximately a dozen path junctions. “We’re actually at a dead end!” Lei Yu stared at the wall in front of them with a drawing of a knight on a horse in full armor. The drawing was vivid and extremely mighty, making the knight in the drawing look like it was alive!

“This is not good; I’m not getting any inspiration or guidance. I’m afraid that we might become trapped here!” The old woman said as she frowned.

“Then what should we do?” Lei Yu suddenly became anxious. “If we were to be really trapped here, I might as well break down all the walls here!”

“No!” The old woman was alarmed and hurriedly said: “Please don’t break anything in here!”

Lei Yu looked around. “Things? There are objects in here? Are you talking about the pictures drawn on the walls?”

In fact, Lei Yu did not pay attention that when the old woman was looking at the pictures drawn on the walls, her eyes were filled with respect and devotion as if the ancient gods did exist.

“This is a sacred place and all the holy items are amongst this maze. Child, you cannot forget that this is within a cliff. If you destroyed the walls, not only will the holy objects be destroyed, we could be buried within this place as well so leaving will be impossible by then! Not to mention part of that huge rock may start rolling down the stairs and completely crush us to oblivion!” The old woman’s voice echoed throughout the labyrinth as she said this.

Lei Yu gasped and tightened his hands that were clutching onto Ai Er’s. “I’m sorry old madam, what should we do then?”

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¹ – In the author’s world, there doesn’t seem to be any airports in Boise, Idaho and the 6 other states they will be driving through.