The Devil’s Cage

Layers of thin blood veil were moving forward rapidly under Bloodman Odork’s control.

Odork was moving forward quickly and Emma Eddie who was following behind had to slightly run in order to keep up with Odork’s steps; Emma Eddie was not one bit worried though.

She had just realized how good the moving blood veil was, it would expose every single trap along the way and disable them by corrosion.

It wasn’t a large area of corrosion though, it just destroyed the one or two key parts of the contraption, rendering the whole trap useless, like a machine gun losing its trigger.

A firearm that couldn’t fire was far less than a torch.

Seeing how the thin blood veil easily achieved something a lot of common men dreamt of, Emma Eddie’s eyes couldn’t hold back her admiration and jealousy.

Who didn’t want to be different from the commoners?

Who didn’t want to transcend over the shackles of mortals?

However, reality was always cruel, no fantasy would be able to stand a single blow in front of the harshness of the real world.

Huu!

Emma Eddie took in several deep breaths, she discarded the impractical fantasy from her mind and focused on the situation at hand.

Death Knell’s appearance was a grave situation for her, she even started to worry about her fate and future deeply.

As for Kieran?

Emma Eddie had no good impression of this bastard that simply treated her as bait, she hoped that the cold gloomy bastard would just drop dead.

“Damn it! First Mr. Ghost, now Death Knell, are you going to provoke Grudge Dragon next? Although you are quite close with Fist of Justice, do you really think you are justice itself? Trying to cleanse the city of its poisonous tumors?”

“No, no way! How would a cold bastard like you be so generous?! There must be some benefits driving your actions! I bet you didn’t know staying alive is the most important part! Death Knell and Mr. Ghost are two completely different people!”

Emma Eddie worried even more as she cursed in her heart.

Mr. Ghost was scary because of his capricious mood and the fact that he was powerful by himself.

While Death Knell was scary because of the mystery behind his organization and the discipline they had.

10 years ago, Death Knell introduced himself in Alkender City and no one could precisely state the background of his organization up until today.

All people knew was how powerful the organization was and the tattoo on the faces of his men but…

The scariest thing was the members without the tattoo!

They were spies hiding around one’s surroundings in plain sight. One could never spot the spies of Death Knell and they would deliver the fatal blow to their targets during critical moments.

Emma Eddie had heard about such rumors in the streets more than once, like some gang leader being killed by their right-hand man.

Each time she heard such news, her back will turn cold and she’d have goosebumps all over her skin.

There was nothing worse than one not being able to trust the ones they held closest.

Once she thought about the potential happenings and the possibility of her being the next target, more rage exploded from her heart uncontrollably; the rage didn’t agitate her or trigger her bad temper though.

A cold, dark feeling descended from above her head suddenly, Emma Eddie shivered before she could even get angry.

“Stop!”

Emma Eddie called out to Odork under her breath.

Odork was stunned when he turned around and looked at Emma Eddie with a puzzled gaze.

“Back off now!”

Emma Eddie then ran back to where she came from without further explanation.

A cold sweat broke out on Emma Eddie’s forehead and drenched her back wet.

Scary! It was too scary!

She felt an existence ahead of the corridor they were traveling through that frightened her like never before.

The scary existence was like a monster’s wide open mouth, waiting there silently, waiting for her to come closer and then… swallow her.

“What is that? Death Knell’s men? Or…”

Panicked, Emma Eddie’s mind was spinning quickly, trying to find a solution.

It was one of her special skills, calming herself down quickly with more speculations.

However, this time it was a little different, the more she speculated, the more panicked she was.

In the end, she realized her running was getting slower and slower, her body getting weaker and weaker, even Odork behind here was nowhere to be found.

“Illusions?” Emma Eddie asked herself after realizing the situation.

There was no answer.

A pale white hand suddenly came out from the dark, seized her by the neck and lifted her up in mid-air.

The suffocation instantly caused Emma Eddie’s brain and body to go out of control. She tried her best in breaking free from the palm but she realized she couldn’t even move a finger.

“Am I going to die? Am I going to die here? Fine… I lived like a dog anyway, nothing worse could happen after I die…”

Lack of oxygen to her brain plus the illusion’s effect were decreasing her will to live rapidly.

The girl from the streets looked up with her blurry sight, looking at the ceiling above her helplessly.

The ceiling that she was looking at felt like a screen, playing back her entire life.

Her tragic youth started when she was abandoned on the streets, she had to fight with the stray cats and dogs for leftover meals.

Up until her rebellious teenage days, she lived like an idiot while trying to show off her achievements.

During her young adult days when she had to fight almost every day, she took risks regardless of the consequences just to feed herself better, dress with better clothes, and have a roof over her head.

Yet in the end, all she welcomed wasn’t a fruitful future but death.

“Despair, you b*tch…I give up… You…Win.”

Emma Eddie squeezed the words out from her mouth despite the suffocation, it sounded like her last words as her voice was so dim it was hard to hear.

Even the person who was taking away her life couldn’t hear it.

But, Kieran could.

So he came.

BANG!

The ceiling of the corridor was smashed to bits, together with the playback projection of Emma Eddie’s life.

Under the dazzling sunlight, Kieran came from the sky and landed on his feet on the head of the owner of the hand.

Bang!

The head was squashed like a watermelon run over by a truck; the brains splattered.

The red and white were extremely dazzling under the warm sunlight, what was more blinding was that figure though.

Emma Eddie saw the figure under the backlight. The dazzling sunlight blurred out the figure’s face and expression, showing only the quiet shadow and dark profound figure, plus the calm voice.

“As promised, you are under my protection.”

It was that hateful bastard!

Climbing back from the precipice of dying, Emma Eddie commented on the figure when she heard the voice after the entrance; the bastard’s voice didn’t sound as disgusting this time.

Then, Emma Eddie’s sight slowly cleared up.

Under the dazzling sunlight, she saw the faintly smiling face and another thought popped up in her mind: not too bad looking.

Emma Eddie’s gaze at Kieran slightly changed after that but Kieran didn’t care about any of that.

Kieran was completely captivated by someone else’s action.

“That place is also your target as well? What do you really want?”

Kieran muttered to himself softly before merging himself into the shadows close by; he vanished at the next moment.