The Devil's Cage

When the number was revealed to Kieran, more numbers started flooding his mind.

If the number III had appeared before him, then that meant that there would be a I and II, or even a IV or V, and so on.

"So the supposed Executioner was not just Kailuark?" Kieran started to speculate.

Considering Sphendix’s power and wealth, it would not have been hard for them to acquire a bunch of good fighters and make them use a common name or number as a distinction point.

The executioner before Kieran was obviously one of a group. What was bothering Kieran though, was why Kailuark would appear before him.

It was impossible for him to be after Kieran or Larry, so he had to be after Creedo.

Sphendix Corporation must have followed the clues left behind by Larry and discovered that Creedo and Leonard had come in contact. As a result, they had decided to kill the witness.

"Damn, they’re fast!"

Kieran took a deep breath, amazed by Sphendix’s influence and power.

If Kieran had gotten there a little later, the only clue they had would have been lost forever.

Still, Kieran needed a more reliable source to identify the body, even if he was almost sure that it was the Executioner himself.

"Larry, come over here, please! Is this the Executioner that you spoke of?" Kieran asked Larry, who had claimed to be very familiar with the man.

Larry got out of the car right away and approached the body. He shed some light on the dead man’s face, using his cell phone to get a clearer look.

Even though Larry had already confirmed the Executioner’s identity, he took ten more seconds to double-confirm who the man was. The Shadow Stinger himself had asked him to do it after all.

He might be mistaken about Kieran’s identity, but he was 120 percent serious when it came to identifying Kailuark.

After taking a long look at the dead man, he said, "Yes, he’s the Executioner himself! Only the Shadow Stinger could have killed the Executioner with such ease!" Larry’s words held a deep admiration.

"What? What Shadow Stinger?" Kieran was startled by the unfamiliar name.

"It’s fine, I understand. You have to hide your identity, right? Don’t worry, I won’t tell anyone. It will be our secret. A secret between buddies! So tell me, why did you disappear for three years? Was it because of some woman? Or some man?" Larry continued with a grin, his questions betraying his job as an informant.

"No, I’m not some Shadow Stinger!" Kieren repeated.

He could guess what was going on. It seemed like Larry had mistaken him for that Shadow Stinger because of his fight with the Executioner.

"Okay, okay, if you say so! So why did you become a reporter?" Even though Larry had said okay, he still kept trying to get information out of Kieran.

"If you want to wait for the patrolling officers to get here, then by all means keep asking."

Kieran rolled his eyes, fed up with Larry’s persistent questions

He walked to the car’s backseat and grabbed his backpack and the unconscious Creedo before heading to the end of the alley.

"Wait! Wait for me!" Larry quickly followed him.

...

A splash of chilling cold water woke Creedo from his sleep. When he saw Larry before him, a wide grin formed on his face.

Suddenly, he shouted at Larry in a ferocious, yet weak tone, "What the hell do you want, Larry?"

Creedo struggled against his bindings as he shouted.

Despite all his effort though, the rope bindings did not loosen up. Instead, they tightened to the point that they squeezed his fat out.

"You better not struggle too much. I’ve learned this binding method from one of the bounty hunters. The more you struggle, the tighter it gets!" Larry explained with a wide smile on his face.

After that malicious smile, Larry’s face turned violent and he gazed ferociously at Creedo. Before Creedo could utter a word, Larry started punching him repeatedly on the face.

"The Morocco Brothers! Did you hire them to kill me? Did you think I was dead? Think again, you idiot!" Larry shouted in dissatisfaction as he kept punching him.

His voice was echoing around the small underground room, but it was not loud enough to cover the sound of his punches.

Larry used all his might to vent his anger on Creedo. Every single punch hit the man’s face hard.

After about five punches, Creedo’s face had swollen up, the corners of his eyes and nostrils were bleeding, and two of his teeth had fallen off.

Larry seemed to be exhausted from the beating, and he repeatedly took deeps breaths to recover.

Suddenly, he turned around and walked towards a toolbox, pulling out a plier.

"No! You can’t do this! It will ruin your honor and reputation as an informant if you do!" Creedo shouted in panic as he watched Larry walk towards him with the plier.

"Of course I can! I can do whatever I want! What honor and reputation? The moment Sphendix decided to hunt me down, everything went down the drain! What use do I have for honor? Don’t worry, my friend, the night is still young. I’ll treat you very well to repay you for your treatment of me!"

When Larry finished talking, he opened the huge plier and stuffed Creedo’s index finger in it.

Not allowing Creedo to say anything else, he squeezed the plier hard with all his might.

"Aghhh!"

The immense pain had Creedo screaming out loud.

When Larry released his index finger and moved on to his middle finger, Creedo quickly stopped screaming and said, "It’s not me who wanted revenge! I wasn’t looking for trouble with Leonard either! I don’t know why Sphendix would go to such lengths just for one guy!"

Creedo’s words proved that he had misunderstood the situation, but that was exactly what Larry had wanted. He stopped torturing him and looked at Creedo.

"Then who is it? Who the f*ck is ordering your big fat ass around?" he asked.

"It... It’s... Aaargh!" Creedo’s hesitant pause resulted in more pain on his middle finger.

As Larry moved on to his ring finger, Creedo begged him, "Stop, stop! I’ll talk! I’ll tell you everything! Please let me go!"

Kieran was smiling from the corner as he heard Creedo’s begging. As he’d expected, Creedo did indeed know something that the two of them did not. From the beginning of the interrogation, Kieran had been hiding in the corner, out of Creedo’s range of sight.

"Leave him to me! I know how to deal with bastards like Creedo!"

That was what Larry had said when they’d arrived at the underground room that supposingly belonged to a gang.

Kieran did not object to Larry’s help. Just like Creedo, Larry was an informant lurking in the shadows. He knew enough about Creedo to make him talk, so Kieran believed that he could handle the situation.

Reality had proved him right.

While Larry was interrogating Creedo though, Kieran had not been slacking off either. He had been keeping an eye out on their surroundings by using his Intuition.

Larry had assured him that the underground room was not one of his secret hideouts or related to him in any way. He’d said that the gang that owned that place had disbanded, so it would take Sphendix a while to locate them.

Despite Larry’s assurance though, Kieran could not afford to let his guard down. Even if his watch proved pointless, he would not be frustrated about it.

Between risking his life and wasting a little energy to keep watch, he would of course choose the latter.

After quite some time, Larry ended the interrogation with a bitter expression.

"It’s Compton! Compton was behind Creedo! The one and only underground king, also known as Mr. Big!" Larry uttered the name with difficulty, as if it took all his strength to talk about the man behind Creedo.