Chapter 43: The Secret in the Secret Base

  Sun Heng's brother arrived very quickly, and after he came, Li Huanhuan and I also gained our freedom. It is said that the order he brought saved us. After seeing the order, the public security bureau here allowed Li Huanhuan and me to leave the hotel and regain our freedom.

  This was naturally achieved with the help of Old Chen, whom Sun Heng had sought out. Li Huanhuan and I quickly thanked Old Chen and Sun Heng, then rested for two days to make sure no one was following us before bringing Sun Heng's brother, Ying San You, to an abandoned mine in the western mountainous region of our province.

  Ying San You is a man who rarely speaks. Since we met, he has only spoken two sentences in three days. One sentence was "My name is Ying San You" and the other was "Sun Heng asked me to come". As for anything else, no matter how I ask him, he remains silent, just smiling at me.

  I don't know if it's his personality or his habit, or maybe the rules of their unit. Anyway, after trying several times, I decided not to talk to Ying San You again.

  Li Huanhuan didn't care about this, she focused on driving and leading the way, as if there was only one person in the car.

  When we arrived at the mine, it was already 4:10 in the afternoon. After getting off the car, Li Huanhuan took us on a nearly ten-kilometer mountain road before arriving at a very hidden abandoned mine entrance.

  As for abandoning the car and walking on mountain roads, Li Huanhuan explained: "The car will leave traces and it's easy to be tracked, it's safer to walk."

  San had been getting anxious for a while, probably worried that the dim light at night would affect his work. As soon as we arrived, he hastily took off his backpack and rushed into the mine tunnel that had appeared before us.

  Li Huanhuan and I immediately followed up and soon came to a steel gate.

  Li Huanhuan pushed forward and opened this door, she had opened this door before, so it was very smooth.

  Three friends smiled and gave Li Huanhuan a thumbs up, but still didn't speak.

  We walked in together and soon saw the second gate that Li Huanhuan mentioned. This gate was made of alloy, with a numeric keypad on it, which looked like an electronic password lock at first glance.

  Li Huan and I voluntarily retreated and gave the place to Ying San You. I also took a flashlight to be responsible for the rear guard, preventing anyone from sneaking in and ambushing us.

  This is the secret base of the Wanlong Association, and apart from a handful of people who know about it, not many others are aware of its existence. But just in case, I've made preparations anyway.

  Li Huanhuan was in charge of keeping an eye on Ying San You, and she still didn't feel at ease with the unfamiliar Ying San You.

  Ying San You, being a professional, quickly opened the second door and looked like it didn't take any effort at all.

  We continued to walk inside and soon saw the third gate. This gate was very strange, there was nothing on the door panel, just a whole piece of iron plate. Li Huanhuan and I felt strange, and Yu San also had an expression of incomprehension, occasionally turning his head to look at me and Li Huanhuan.

  I couldn't help but go forward and observe too. After a long time, I admitted defeat and retreated. Li Huanhuan was the same, observing for a while before retreating back.

  San You's face began to sweat, and soon he was sweating profusely in the middle of winter, leaving him at a loss.

  I saw him take out one by one the exquisite instruments, try them one by one, and then put them back one by one. After an hour or so, San You sat on the ground in a dejected manner, with a face full of disappointment and helplessness. He finally spoke his third sentence: "Can't open it."

  Li Huan and I were in a great hurry, went forward again to observe and touch, even knocked, but the result was still the same - couldn't open it.

  There isn't any keyhole or electronic keyboard, nor can I see any buttons. How am I supposed to open this door?

  I fell into deep thought and remained still for a long time.

  Three friends on one side also had a thoughtful and worried look, motionless.

  Li Huanhuan was still searching around for something that might be a mechanism or button, but there was no progress.

  We were blocked here at the third gate and completely lost our way.

  Time slowly passed by, and I didn't know how long it had been. Seeing that Ying San You had no other way out, and Li Huanhuan was no longer looking for the mechanism, I suddenly remembered a story:

  A long time ago, there was a rich man who, when he was about to die, wanted to choose one of his three sons to inherit his family business. So the rich man came up with a question to test his three sons and invited relatives and friends to witness it. The question was: how can you use only one copper coin to buy something that can fill an entire room?

  The rich man's three sons each took a copper coin to the street to buy something that could fill up a room, while the rich man stayed at home waiting for news.

  Soon, the rich man's eldest son bought back a cart of straw. The rich man looked at it and just nodded without saying anything.

  The second son of the rich man also bought back a large pile of cotton. The rich man looked at it and just nodded, without saying anything.

  The family members and friends present found it strange that the eldest son's purchase of straw, although not enough to fill the entire room, was almost sufficient, and could be said to have met the rich man's requirements. The second son's purchase of cotton was also similar, basically meeting the rich man's requirements. But why didn't this rich man speak? Was he still not satisfied?

  Just as everyone was puzzled, the third son returned with empty hands, but with a small candle in his pocket. Almost everyone felt puzzled and thought that this small candle could not fill such a large room, and the third son would surely lose this time.

  The rich man then smiled and joyfully announced: "The winner is my third son, and he will inherit my property..."

  Everyone including the elder son and second son did not understand, thinking that this was a rich man's favoritism towards the third son, an unfair test, and demanded that the rich man explain.

  The rich man just smiled and let everyone wait, saying that by nightfall everyone would understand completely. As a result, when night fell and it was pitch black all around, when the third son lit the candles, making the whole room bright, everyone was speechless.

  This is just a story that many people know, but I thought of something else from it: that is our habitual thinking, which may not always be correct. It may mislead us and make us deal with the problems or things we encounter based on habit, resulting in completely incorrect results that do not meet our expectations. So sometimes, we must think from a different angle and use a different method to solve the problems we encounter. In fact, many times, changing one's perspective can turn the problem into a non-problem, making it easy for us to solve.

  Now the three of us are thinking about how to open this door. In our habitual way of thinking, to open this door, we first need to find the keyhole on the door, then find the key, and that's it. Or if it's a modern electronic password lock, then we need to find the keypad, know the password, enter the password, and that's it... wait, wait.

  But now we've encountered a problem here, we can't find the keyhole or the password keyboard. Shouldn't we think from a different angle? If this door isn't an ordinary door that doesn't need a key to open and doesn't require any password to open, then does it mean...

  "I've got it! I know how to open it..."

  Three friends and Li Huanhuan turned around to look at me, their eyes full of doubt. I took a few steps forward, pushed the iron door in front of me with force, and heard a soft sound. I was overjoyed, confirming that my suspicion was true, and said: "Come and help, this door needs to be pushed open with force, not opened with a key or something."

  San responded immediately and came forward to help me push the door. Li Huanhuan also figured it out after a moment of confusion and rushed over to assist.

  The iron gate slid inward quickly under our joint efforts of three people and was slowly opened.

  At this time, Li Huanhuan and Ying San You looked at me with a hint of the same expression in their eyes. I was worried that they would ask more questions, so I quickly said: "I suddenly thought of it. Let's hurry up and go inside, we've wasted quite some time just now."

  Three friends gave me a thumbs up and left first. Li Huanhuan then pulled my hand, and generously praised me: "Well done, you're indeed the kind of person I like, smart enough!"

  I smiled and stopped talking, pulling Li Huanhuan to chase after Ying San You.

  I quietly asked Li Huanhuan on the road: "How many more doors are there? Why is it endless?"

  Li Huanhuan thought for a moment and said cautiously: "There might be one last door, I've heard of it before, but I don't know the specific situation."

  When we caught up with Ying San, he was already busy opening the fourth door. This time he was very forceful and soon opened the gate, stretching out his hand to indicate that Li Huanhuan and I could proceed.

  Li Huanhuan went in first, I exchanged a glance with Ying San, and he walked in second. I followed third.

  There were four doors in total, and this time we walked in less than fifty meters before seeing a partition wall made of stone and cement. On top of the partition wall was a small window, through which I caught sight of what was inside at a glance.

  They were rows and rows of large metal trunks, each about half a cubic meter in size, looking like they were specifically designed for storage. The metal trunks were neatly arranged on the ground, which was also covered with large pieces of carpet, apparently to prevent moisture and shock.

  At this time, San You suddenly said to me and Li Huanhuan: "My task is completed." After he finished speaking, he turned around and left, and didn't even ask what was inside these large metal trunks.

  I didn't say much either, I saw Yingsan off for a while, and it wasn't until he left the mine that I went back.

  Li Huanhuan had already started searching through the metal boxes. I saw that inside the metal boxes she opened, there were guns, bullets, hand grenades and so on, as well as clothes and shoes, it looked like a warehouse. However, no money was seen, nor did we know if it was placed in the remaining boxes.

  I quickly went forward to help search, opening the boxes one by one to see if there was any money or anything else of value. As for guns and ammunition, as well as clothes, we wouldn't consider taking them away to sell. Firstly, it's not allowed by the country, and secondly, Li Huanhuan and I couldn't move them even if we wanted to. However, I still kept a watchful eye out and picked up two handguns that looked pretty good, tucking them into my waistband in case of an emergency.

  Li Huanhuan saw what I did and also came forward to take a small, exquisite handgun and hid it on her body. We then used our flashlights to search around here for a while, and finally looked through almost all the boxes, but still couldn't find the cash that Li Huanhuan mentioned.

  Li Huanhuan was getting anxious and also a bit angry: "What if there's no money at all? This is just a warehouse, the money shouldn't be hidden here."

  I thought so too, and took out the flashlight to start searching around. Li Huanhuan also did the same as me, starting to search along the surrounding mine tunnel.

  I felt that maybe this time we would gain nothing, so when searching, I was a bit distracted. Li Huanhuan, however, was very serious, she almost stopped at every step, looking very carefully.

  I soon bumped into Li Huanhuan, and neither of us noticed anything. I sat down on a trunk filled with clothes, picked up one of those black clothes they wear, and was about to speak when I saw a stack of money underneath the clothes.

  I immediately called Li Huanhuan over and pointed it out to him. Li Huanhuan was overjoyed, exclaiming: "It was hidden here all along! We've finally found it..."

  She quickly threw out all the clothes from several boxes containing clothes, and indeed, there were several stacks of money inside the boxes.

  This stack looks like 10,000 yuan, and we found a total of ten stacks, which is one million yuan.

  Looking at the 100,000 yuan in front of me, I was very excited. In my life, I had never seen so much money at once, how could I not be excited?

  Li Huanhuan was very calm, looking at the 100,000 yuan and said disdainfully: "What's all this? 100,000 yuan, what can it do? It's not even enough to buy a bathroom... No, there must be more money here, we just haven't found it yet. Let's keep searching."

  I found it strange and couldn't help but say: "You've already found 100,000 yuan, will there be more?"

  Li Huan nodded firmly: "As far as I know, there are at least 50 million in cash stored here. We've only found 100,000, what's that?"

  So Li Huan and I continued to rummage through each box, taking out almost everything and placing it on the ground. Soon, the ground was piled high with guns, ammunition, clothes and other things, but unfortunately we still couldn't find any cash.

  Li Huanhuan reluctantly wandered around the original place, and soon said: "There must be some hidden compartments here that we haven't found. Let's put all these things back in the box and take a closer look."

  I didn't say much, seeing Li Huanhuan's excited look, so I helped her put those things back in the box one by one and tidied them up.

  After we finished all these, I felt very tired and a bit hungry. Looking at the time, it was already early morning of the second day, and we had actually searched for a whole night.

  Li Huanhuan was also a bit tired, sitting on a trunk to rest, while taking out food from the backpack we brought and handing it to me: "Eat something, if you can't find it, it's our fate, after all the hardships of coming here, but only found a mere 1 million..."

  "I munched on my food, chuckling and saying: 'A hundred thousand isn't a small amount, it's enough for me and Dongfang Yu to use for school. You know the people from our hometown, they can't even earn this much money in their entire lifetime, yet they're still living very fulfilling lives..."

  Li Huanhuan was both angry and amused, and couldn't help but say: "Do you know what? 100,000 yuan is a large sum in the countryside, but if I want to make a name for myself in the provincial city, it's only enough to buy a bathroom. Are you asking me to sleep on the streets from now on?"

  I also know that the current housing prices are ridiculously expensive, 100,000 yuan can only buy a bathroom, so I said: "Let's take a break and continue looking later, maybe we'll find something affordable."

  Li Huanhuan suddenly stood up, stamped her foot and said: "I won't leave until I find this money..."

  Li Huanhuan's sudden kick made me forget to eat the food in my hand, because I discovered a problem: under Li Huanhuan's feet was empty space, and her kick only produced an empty echo.

  Li Huanhuan stared at me in shock, and she immediately discovered this too. She quickly stomped her foot again, listened carefully, and then put down the food in her hand, overjoyed: "This...this is empty below..."

  I quickly moved forward, picked up a military dagger nearby, and slid it along the seam of the carpet on the floor. The carpet was cut open with a long slit, and I immediately saw a metal plate underneath. The metal plate was isolated, surrounded by concrete floors, and only this place was paved with iron plates.

  Li Huanhuan's face was filled with joy, helping me pry open the iron plate and also throwing it to one side.

  At once, I saw a mountain of money that I had never seen in the first half of my life. My eyes forgot to blink, staring wide enough. Staring at hundreds of millions of cash, I didn't know what to do.

  Li Huanhuan was calmer than I, she took a glance and then said to me: "Finally found it, Jin Cang, we'll be rich soon, no longer as poor and miserable as before..."

  I nodded blankly, forgetting to speak, and stared at the money with all my might. Even the glittering jewelry and gems next to the money were automatically ignored by me.

  Li Huanhuan, however, liked those accessories even more. She picked up a handful and examined them carefully before exclaiming delightedly: "They're all genuine! We've struck it rich!"

  I nodded again, but said vaguely: "So much money, how can we move it back? It's very heavy..."

  Li Huan was taken aback for a moment, then smiled: "I'll go start the car, you pack all these things... just use these iron boxes to pack them, I'll come over and help you carry them in a while."

  I immediately agreed and busily brought over a trunk full of clothes, starting to pack all the money and jewelry into it.

  I packed the money while counting, these are no longer ten thousand yuan per bundle, but one million yuan per bundle, easy to count. This time I was full of energy and used all my strength to pack the money, getting more and more excited as I went along.

  About twenty minutes later, I felt very tired and stopped. At this time, I had already packed 4.5 million into the box, and there were countless pieces of jewelry, anyway, a one-and-a-half cubic meter box was almost half full. In fact, 4.5 million in cash did not take up much space, but those packaged jewelry and other things took up more space.

  I was worried that putting everything in one box would make it too heavy to move, so I got another box, emptied the first one and started packing money again.

  The money here is far more than the 50 million Li Huanhuan thought before, I counted it while pretending to pack, and soon I counted up to 90 million. Looking under the iron plate, there was still a lot of money, I roughly estimated that the money here was at least 120 million, plus those jewelry and gems, it's probably worth several hundred million.

  Of course, I don't understand jewelry at all and have no idea how high their value is. Except for cash, the value of other things is just my estimate.

  After packing three boxes, I finally completed the task of packing. I was exhausted and sweating all over, but at the same time, I felt extremely excited and didn't feel tired at all.

  At this time Li Huanhuan had not arrived yet, so I tried to pull the trunk out by myself. It was too heavy to lift, so I could only drag it out.

  I don't know if it's the power of money, but this time I really did drag a box out by myself. Normally, if I were moving something else, I think I wouldn't be able to complete this task.

  I was also excited to the extreme, and with one breath, I pulled all three boxes containing money and jewelry out of the mine tunnel and onto the muddy road outside. I still hid the boxes in a relatively secret place and found some dry grass to cover them up, just in case someone passing by saw them, it wouldn't be good.

  The high-level members of the Ten Dragons Society were caught, and this secret base was left with no one else knowing about it. This is just convenient for us. At least we can search for money here without anyone disturbing us.

  I waited outside the tunnel for a while, but didn't see Li Huanhuan's car coming. So I entered the tunnel again and greedily divided the box of guns and ammunition inside into two boxes, then dragged them out.

  At this time, Li Huanhuan finally arrived. The car space she drove over was still relatively large. My friend and I put a money-filled trunk on the car together, and then poured all the money and jewelry into this trunk, which happened to be a full box. As for the two boxes containing guns and ammunition, we directly merged them into one box and lifted it onto the car.

  Li Huanhuan then asked me: "Did you take all the money?"

  I nodded, excitedly saying: "I counted it, there's almost 1.2 billion in cash. By the way, do we want to go get some weapons? I see that there are many types of weapons inside."

  Li Huan hesitated for a moment, then shook his head: "No need, we're not going to war, what's the use of so many weapons? Let's leave here early, or else something unexpected will happen."

  I thought so too, and followed Li Huanhuan's words: "Then let's go, where are you going?"

  Li Huanhuan started the car and said while driving: "I want to go to your hometown to take a look, if it's suitable, I'll buy a house in the county town near your hometown. Of course, when you go to school, I'll also follow you to school, I have to keep an eye on you."

  I couldn't help but laugh at Li Huanhuan's carefree and unrestrained laughter, feeling as if everything was just a dream.