The Devil’s Cage

The expression on Larry’s face could not fool Kieran.

”What’s wrong? Something fishy?” Kieran waved the white keycard before Larry.

”Hold on!”

Larry went back into the pit without giving a direct answer.

After a while, he came back with a money detector equipped with ultra violet light.

Kieran passed the white keycard to Larry and took a glance at the money detector.

He did not ask why Larry would have such a thing inside his safe house. If he were to guess, he would say that the safe house was hidden for a reason, and the fact that it was hidden made it perfect for conducting illegal activities safely. Larry belonged to a gang after all.

After Larry placed the white keycard under the money detector, he started to rant about the results, ”I hope I’m wrong about this... Damn it! It really is Sphendix!”

”Sphendix?” Kieran asked, raising his eyebrow.

He could not find any information about that name in his memories.

”Sphendix! The Sphendix Corporation! Specializing in medical equipment and military construction! Half the hospitals in the city have been built by Sphendix Corporation, and over a quarter of the police and military equipment are made by them!”

”They’re a really big player! I’m so dead! I’m telling you, I’m dead! If we stepped on their toes, we’re both dead!” Larry fell to his knees on the floor, covering his face in despair.

”Calm down! Haven’t you thought about why you would have crossed them?” Kieran raised his voice, trying to calm Larry down.

If Larry’s face hadn’t still been wounded and covered in blood, Kieran would have used a more direct way to calm him down. He did not want to get any blood on his hands, though.

”Why? Why is this happening?”

Larry looked stunned as he kept mumbling to himself. All of a sudden, he raised his head and said, ”The witness! That goddamn witness was one of Sphendix Medical’s discharged employees!”

”That son of a bitch! I was fooled by that bastard! He said he had some huge secret about the beast, but it was actually about Sphendix! Otherwise, why would Sphendix want to assassinate me? They must’ve thought I knew the secret, too! After all, I did take the witness in!”

As Larry started to figure everything out, he looked infuriated.

”I’ll f*cking kill him! I’ll rip him to pieces!” he shouted.

”So what are you waiting for? Pack your things and let’s go see this witness you’re talking about! If Sphendix is really as powerful as you say, then we don’t have any time to waste!” Kieran told Larry as he walked to the car.

...

Kieran was already familiar with driving after that first time.

Larry had just bandaged himself up, but he still remembered the first time he’d sat in the car with Kieran and knocked his head against the dashboard. He strapped on the seat belt this time.

As Kieran kept accelerating though, Larry’s pale face got even whiter.

He thought that he was going to be fine, but when Kieran barely avoided hitting a couple of trash cans and turned into an alley, he could not hold back anymore and shouted, ”Slow down! We might be in a hurry, but I don’t want to die in a car accident!”

He kept holding onto his seat handle and screaming of panic. He hoped that the handle would be strong enough to keep him safe, but as Kieran narrowly missed a fire hydrant, he could not help screaming again.

Obviously, the handle did not provide him with any sense of security, and Kieran was ignoring his ranting. He just kept stepping on the pedal, the car going even faster.

”You crazy bastard! Stop the car! I want to get off!”

The accelerating speed of the car made Larry’s voice sound distorted. He was frightened to the point that he could not even speak properly.

Kieran was not crazy though, and he did not have a death wish either. His C- Intuition and D Agility just allowed him to perform and act beyond ordinary human limits.

Kieran had everything under control, even that extremely dangerous situation was unfolding according to his calculations.

Since Kieran was getting more familiar with driving, some of the calculations were getting easier for him, and naturally, the car’s speed was getting even faster.

If they’d taken the original route, it would have taken them an hour to get there. Under Larry’s guidance though, Kieran chose a shortcut and they reached their destination faster.

They got there in only half an hour, but Larry regretted telling Kieran about the shortcut. He actually wanted to slap himself for his poor decision-making. He totally would, after he had finished vomiting from the rollercoaster ride.

Larry vomited, holding onto the door handle of the car.

Kieran naturally moved away, avoiding the vile stench of Larry’s bile.

He looked towards the two-storey, half-independant house not far away. It was the house Larry had arranged for the witness to stay in the meantime, a middle class residential house far away from any gang harassment. There were even policemen patrolling around the area from time to time.

It was safe and hidden, just like Larry had mentioned, but that was only under normal circumstances.

It would be no use against Sphendix Corporation’s power. Even the police officers might be working for Sphedix, for all they knew.

The influence of money was infinite at certain times.

After taking a glance at the building, Kieran walked up to the front. Before he entered the house, he halted.

Despite the door in his way, he could pick up a faint smell of blood coming from the inside of the house.

He took out his [M1905] and carefully turned the doorknob.

Kieran was not sure whether the killer had gotten what he wanted or was still inside the building.

According to Larry, he had arranged for three men to protect Leonard, which was the name of the witness. It was what Leonard had requested, and based on the potential value of Leonard’s information, Larry had granted his request.

Kieran did not place any hope on Larry’s men, but he still wished the outcome would be different than what he feared.

The doorknob opened easily with the slightest pressure from Kieran. Kieran pushed it open and saw a dead body. Its head had been blown off as it lay down on the floor before the door.

In the living room, near the still turned-on television, were two more bodies that looked the same.

No doubt they had been Larry’s men. Reality was always cruel.

After a quick glance, Kieran could tell that Larry’s men had been killed without any resistance. They had been of no use in protecting the witness.

Kieran went straight up to the second floor and saw two rooms with their doors open.

Beside the doorknob was a clear footprint.

It seemed like the intruder had entered the house without any holdbacks, they had kicked down the doors when they made sure that no one else will pop up in the house.

Kieran found Leonard in the room on the right side of the stairs. Or to be exact, he found Leonard’s dead body. His body was in complete disorder. It was quite much for the eyes. His limbs were bent in unnatural ways, most of his teeth had been knocked off, and his scalp had been cut in half.

Kieran turned his attention to the messy room after pausing on Leonard for a while.

”Were they looking for something?”

The room was really messy and it seemed like it had been searched by someone. Kieran squinted and activated his [Tracking].

When everything was revealed to him, Kieran quickly picked up some traces on the floor beneath the bed. When he looked underneath, there was nothing there except a couple of pieces of folded newspaper.

He took the newspaper and inspected the folding lines on it.

It was easy for Kieran to know what the newspaper had been used to wrap by looking at the lines on it.

It was what he and Larry had suspected. Leonard had been hiding a secret.

The intruders had been one step ahead of Kieran, though.

Kieran frowned, but he did not rant about the fact that he had not gone there faster, or about the fact that the Sub Mission had delayed the progress of the Main Mission. Leonard’s body was stiff.

From the looks of it, he must have been dead for at least five to six hours. Kieran had barely entered the dungeon by that time.

Even if he had rushed to the scene right after Larry had informed him of it, it would not have changed anything.

Kieran was sure that Larry’s earlier phone call to Leonard had been answered by someone else.

After taking a deep breath, and figuring out the details, Kieran took a final glance at the place and prepared to leave.

He could not figure out what Leonard had had with him or what secret he had been hiding, but one thing was for sure. Leonard had either been really bad at hiding things, or the intruder had come in suddenly and he’d not had much time to hide the items he’d been holding. Instead, he had simply stuffed them under the bed.

Unconsciously, Kieran threw away the newspaper he had picked up. As the newspaper fell to the floor, it opened up to the front page, revealing the title on top.

As Kieran caught a glimpse of the title, he stopped and picked up the newspaper again to read it.