"I'll bring it to you when I go to find Grandma Qing later," Shen Liannuo, worried about the situation outside, arranged for Meng Tianhua and his wife to go to the underground secret room first to ensure their safety and that of their child.
"Okay, okay, okay, we'll go down first then." Du Juan didn't dare to cause any trouble and immediately took her child down the stairs.
Meng Tianhua looked back at Shen Liannuo and Lu Yanming, frowning as if wanting to say something, but he sighed and turned to go down.
After they had gone down, Shen Liannuo said, "Let's go get Grandma Qing and Qiao Ziqian."
With that, she pressed the secret room switch. A faint rustling sound was heard as the bookshelf slowly moved back to its original position.
The study immediately returned to peace.
Lu Yanming held a cigarette in his hand and looked at Shen Liannuo meaningfully, "I didn't expect you to be so meticulous in your actions."
"Lives are at stake, how could I be careless?"
Shen Liannuo said as she walked out of the study.
But the moment she reached out to open the study door, intense gunfire erupted outside.
She froze, "This is bad," then she dashed out of the study, saying to Lu Yanming, "Go out and see what's happening, I'll go find Grandma Qing and Qiao Ziqian."
She secretly felt fortunate that she had sent Meng Tianhua and his wife to the secret room with the two little ones, otherwise, this situation would have terrified them.
"Okay."
Lu Yanming raised his hand, brought the cigarette to his lips, and said while biting on it, "Be careful."
His cautionary words were drowned out by the clamor; how could Shen Liannuo hear them?
She quickly ascended the spiral staircase, moving with great speed to the second floor, and headed straight for Old Madam Qing's room. As she passed Qiao Ziqian's bedroom, she didn't forget to knock on his door.
Knock, knock, knock—
The fierce knocking sounded like banging. Shen Liannuo shouted through the door, "Qiao Ziqian, something's happened, come out quickly!"
After shouting, Shen Liannuo, without waiting for Qiao Ziqian's response, immediately ran towards the end of the corridor, with Old Madam Qing's room on the left.
"Grandma Qing..."
She called out as she ran, but when she was only one step away from Old Madam Qing's bedroom door, she stopped.
Shen Liannuo stared blankly at the open bedroom door and the shattered glass in the corner of the corridor. Her heart sank, and a bad premonition arose.
"Old Madam Qing?"
After a mere two seconds of hesitation, Shen Liannuo immediately rushed into the room.
As expected, as she had feared, Old Madam Qing was nowhere to be found.
"Grandma Qing? Old Madam Qing?" Shen Liannuo suppressed her rising anxiety, rushed to the bathroom, and yanked open the bathroom door. Old Madam Qing was not there either.
Outside in the villa courtyard, gunfire erupted, the sounds of fierce exchanges making one feel the danger of a hail of bullets. The two Tibetan mastiffs in the yard barked incessantly with each piercing cry.
With Old Madam Qing missing, Shen Liannuo was extremely worried. She immediately took out her phone to call Meng Jingwei.
She found Meng Jingwei's number in her contacts and was about to dial when she hesitated, "No, I can't call her now."
With the Zhuo Rui Technology auction imminent and the Tang family lurking, Meng Jingwei was already in a precarious situation; Shen Liannuo couldn't add to her troubles.
In a moment of hesitation, Shen Liannuo put away her phone and hurried out of the room to Qiao Ziqian's door, "Qiao Ziqian, open the door!"
She knocked heavily on the door, muttering, "The fighting outside is so fierce, can't you hear it?"