Chapter 217 Trapped in a Maze
Nonetheless, he had never guessed Veronica would take those brown shoes and wear them without a shred of hesitation.
Stepping on the ground, she mumbled, “It actually fits me quite nicely.”
She then wore the other shoe.
With both shoes worn, she hopped around. “It’s not bad. They’re quite comfortable.” While saying that, she continued to walk ahead.
It was only after she took a few steps that she noticed total silence behind her. Turning around, she found Matthew standing in the same spot.
“What are you standing around for? Are you waiting to die here?” Pouting, she was a bit displeased.
Matthew replied, “Wow, Roni, you’re very brave.”
Even though people were not as superstitious and old-fashioned as before, a lot of people still feared the deceased’s possessions, as some would avoid them completely.
Some would even wish they would not touch the deceased’s belongings in their lives. On the other hand, Veronica did not reject this notion with disgust, as she accepted the reality of the situation they were in.
The man only felt more admiration toward her.
Upon understanding his words, Veronica looked down at the pair of shoes before saying, “I’m only lending them for now. When we get out, I’ll still return these to the girl. Besides, we still don’t know how deep and big the basement stretches or if the terrain is all smooth like now. We’re basically going in blind. If I were to walk barefoot and hurt my leg, it would only slow us down even more. The more time we spend here, the more danger we will be in. I, for one, do not want to die here.”
Even though Veronica was self-admittedly tough, she was still a bit hesitant when it came to wearing the shoes. This was why she wanted Matthew to go take them.
She wanted to use Matthew to boost her own courage, as she thought that if he dared to touch it, why would she not dare to wear it?
She braced herself and decided to wear the shoes.
No matter how afraid she was, she did not want to show it in front of Matthew.
This was because Veronica knew that she had no choice left. If she really walked barefooted, she would get hurt eventually. If her wounds got infected or she had no way to continue on, this would land them in an even more dangerous disposition.
“I’ve already wanted to ask what kind of person your master is. Why does he know how to use a gun?”
Matthew finally asked the question he had been curious about for a long time.
Smiling, Veronica raised her eyebrows smugly. “Of course he knows how to use it. My master knows everything. Not only does he know taekwondo, he also knows kickboxing. His forefathers were all soldiers. According to Crayson, his father was an expert marksman and personally taught him how to shoot. That was how he had quite an aim when he was young. After that, he became a soldier before leaving the army and became a hunter when he returned. I even heard from Crayson that he became a grave robber. But, he later quit doing that because it was illegal.”
The mention of Crayson made Veronica babble on, and she looked a lot more relaxed.
“Interesting. Too bad he had such a stupid disciple,” commented Matthew as he approached her and held her hand. To that, Veronica only rebuked, “Matthew, are you looking for trouble? Do you want to see how my master will deal with you when I tell him about this?”
“Shh.”
The man held her hand tightly while making a quiet gesture with the other. “We don’t know if there’s a drinkable water source in this place yet. So, we should talk less and preserve our stamina.”
His words seemed to make sense as Veronica considered the situation they were in and chose not to argue with him anymore.
She then handed the phone to Matthew to let him keep it.
Taking the candle, Matthew stood in the middle of the hallway. “Don’t move. Let’s see which way the wind blows.”
They had a lit candle inside the basement, where they could use it to determine the direction of the wind and, from there, if there was an exit.
As expected, the fire flickered.
Seeing this, the two soldiered on.
As the time slowly passed, the two people walked around for a long time in the basement only to find themselves right where they fell down.
Frowning, Matthew said in a low tone, “We’ve been walking for over an hour, yet we’re actually back at the same point. If I’m not wrong, we should be stuck inside a squared shaped maze.”
Veronica, who did not reply to him, only stood there with a troubled expression as she slowly closed her eyes and retraced the path they took.
“If so, we’ll have to walk again. But this time, we need to mark the path we walked.”
“I have the same thought as well.”
The two then held hands and began walking again.
Fortunately, there were oil lamps situated throughout the basement, ensuring that they had a proper view of where they were going.
At every corner, Matthew would use the lamp to burn the walls a little until there was a little black spot on them.
Taking off her earrings, Veronica used the sharp piercings to mark the spot with ‘1’.
In the second corner, she marked ‘2’.
“That’s very smart of you.”
Matthew praised her outright as he thought more and more about this woman, who was a diamond in the rough and was full of wisdom as well as secrets, that he had found, causing his curiosity to grow and making him expectant as to what she would do next.
At the same time.
In the Kings Residence, they had noticed the disappearance of Veronica and Matthew. Even though they had called them, they could not reach them.
By this point, Elizabeth and Thomas were sure that both of them were in danger, so they immediately watched the surveillance footage to look for them.
Unfortunately, only the front porch and the backyard’s surveillance were switched on while the others were not.
In the footage, they only managed to see Veronica and Matthew exit the living room.
After that…
No further sightings of them could be found.
“Find them. Send out our people in secret immediately. Find Matthew and Veronica no matter the cost.”
Elizabeth sat on the throne chair as she slammed the desk with a worried expression. “Thomas, buy a plane ticket flying to a destination abroad under Matthew’s name. Just say that he went abroad for business and would not return so soon, so as to prevent this from leaking and making the employees waver.”
“Understood, Old Mrs. Kings.”
Nodding, Thomas immediately left to handle the matter.
Matthew, as the president of Spinfluence Group, needed to deal with a countless number of things daily.
His busy workload, paired with the incident that happened at his wedding and the appearance of Tiffany, who exposed herself at Elizabeth’s birthday banquet, attracted a lot of attention.
Even though this did not cause too much harm to the Kings Family financially, it did attract a lot of news agencies that all reported on this and also wanted to interview Matthew.
If even a rumor of Matthew going missing were to be spread now, the reporters would only embellish this, causing a chain of irreversible consequences.
It was not until Thomas had left that Elizabeth asked, “Conrad, how about you be the company’s temporary president for these few days?”
Conrad, with a sad expression, sighed. “Since Matthew is now missing, I can only step up temporarily. After all, we’re family. It’s only something that I should do.”
He lowered his head subtly, but one could see a hint of ploy flash across his eyes.
