The Devil's Cage

Overlapping shadows of armored figures started to emerge inside the mist.

The clunking noise of armor and weapons mixed with the raging neighs of the war horses as the Black Knights emerged once more in a group of hundreds.

"Schmidt, Raul, get to the car and get away from this place! 2567, buy me three minutes!"

Charles’ face looked panicked as he noticed the Black Knights’ sudden appearance.

"Three minutes? Consider that done! Schmidt, the machine gun and the magazines!"

Kieran cut the bullsh*t right away, taking the light machine gun and the magazines from Schmidt and waiting by the path the Black Knights would pass through.

Kieran had no idea what Charles wanted to achieve, but he was sure it would be something that would threaten the gray mist.

Otherwise, the Black Knights wouldn’t have appeared in such a timely manner.

The mist seemed to possess a much higher intellect than Kieran had anticipated. It turned out that it could even read common words.

"What kind of monster are you?" Kieran muttered.

He was careful not to get too close to the primitive forest, The way the mist had appeared before had helped Kieran come up with some theories.

The mist could not appear out of thin air. If it wanted to appear, it could only do so around or within the primitive forest’s perimeter. Otherwise, it would need to rely on the Black Knights in order to move around.

Although it had displayed its ability to make the Black Knights disappear, no one could guarantee that it couldn’t transport other living beings as well.

Plus, who knew where the mist would transport its target?

The sacrificial room Kieran had ended up in had been okay, but what if it took them to other places where immense danger loomed?

What if it transported them 1,000 feet up in the sky or inside an active volcano?

Kieran had no intention of fighting hand-to-hand with the Black Knights.

As the muzzle of the light machine gun flashed repeatedly, bullets poured down on the Black Knights like heavy rain. The Black Knights, who had been going through the primitive forest, were now under attack. Sparks flew as the bullets clashed with their armor.

Their armor was easily pierced by the firearms, the impact of the bullets causing the Black Knights to topple off their horses. Although their armor recovered from the bullets’ damage and the Black Knights were still alive and kicking, they fell off their horses, messing up the formation behind them.

Kieran knew what his goal was. He just needed to stall the knights for three minutes. He didn’t have to kill them.

He might have seemed to be pulling the trigger non-stop, but he was actually choosing his targets carefully. The targeted knights toppled over, landing on the others behind them.

The Black Knights halted under the merciless downpour of bullets and retreated back into the primitive forest.

Kieran’s face didn’t betray any delight at beating his enemies. He knew that the real battle had only just begun.

A clear galloping sound could be heard from both sides.

The Black Knights’ front line had been stopped, so they had chosen to take a detour around the forest and surround Kieran.

Suddenly, Kieran saw hundreds of Black Knights on both his left and right side.

The burning sunset shone down on their black armor and weapons, producing a cold halo-like reflection.

The dazzling halo was filled with killing intent.

Layers of thin mist started to escape from the Black Knights’ armor and spread throughout the sky as they charged from both sides. The mist formed an enormous face in mid-air. It had two deep eye sockets, but lacked any visible eyes, nose, mouth and ears.

The deep darkness inside the ghostly eye sockets looked like it could suck in a human soul.

Kieran ignored the Fear Debuff and stared straight into those deep black sockets.

He lifted the light machine gun with his right hand, firing at the eerie face as he used his left hand to take out two grenades and throw them at the charging knights.

"Try these new-age weapons, you f*cking monster of the past!"

After two loud explosions, several Black Knights had been blasted away. The charging knights were halted once again. However, the enormous face in the sky let out an ear-piercing wail and charged right down at Kieran.

The color and form of the face were exactly like the mist monster’s, causing Kieran to raise his guard up high. He quickly rolled to the side, dodging the attack before the enormous face suddenly exploded.

Bang!

The space and sky around Kieran filled with that blurry gray mist.

"2567!"

His comrades were shouting his name from afar, but Kieran couldn’t hear them anymore.

Although he was not transported anywhere by the mist, the mist could still block all sunlight and sound.

Kieran let out a breath of relief inside the mist.

He was standing on solid ground, so things were not that bad.

"It didn’t transport me anywhere else? Is it running out of tricks? Or is there some other kind of arrangement in place?"

Kieran scanned the mist around him, trying to guess what it wanted from him.

Suddenly, the mist formed a mini tornado right before his eyes, rapidly growing about five meters tall. When the tornado reached its peak, a huge figure walked out of it.

"What the hell?" Kieran’s eyes widened.

Each step of the emerging figure made the ground tremble. It was the devil statue. Although it had no eyes, it made Kieran feel like it was looking at him.

"This is the monster behind the mist?" Kieran thought as he scanned the statue.

It was different from the one he remembered. Although it was still glowing like a dim oil lamp, the thin mist was now circling it. Everything was obvious from Kieran’s point of view.

Meanwhile, the gray mist blocking the sunlight and sound gathered around the devil statue like a group of swallows returning to their nest.

The huge devil statue grew even bigger as it sucked in the mist, expanding like a balloon.

Seven meters, eight meters, nine meters...

It finally stopped when it reached 10 meters.

Kieran frowned as he looked at the energy stream rumbling around and the solid rock of the statue. He found it hard to strike for an instant. This was the first time he had come across such a huge enemy.

Even the two-handed [Arrogant Word] seemed like a toy compared to it.

The statue’s hand, which was about six-meters long, swung a two-meter wide greatsword at Kieran as if it was a door. The violent wind produced by the swing caused Kieran to stagger.

However, it didn’t take him long to notice the peculiarity of the statue. The whip was supposed to be made out of stone, but it was actually as soft and flexible as a snake.

As the greatsword produced an air-breaking sound, the whip moved silently towards Kieran’s body, trying to wrap around him.

Kieran instinctively jumped away.

As his feet left the ground, the statue spread its 20-meter long wings and flapped them hard.

A tremendous cyclone was blasted out towards Kieran, sending his body flying backwards and crashing into the stone gate that had appeared out of the void.

Translator’s Thoughts

Dess Dess

I apologize on behalf of the author if you feel the recent chapters its boring. (It is a filler since Kieran purposely extended this for his own gain, he could just have went straight to the Shephards and end this arc asap.) (Nope)

The end of this arc is coming soon and the debut of the second monster.

Plus the intermission, we will get to know more about Lawless.