The Devil's Cage

Panda Novel

Black cats and crows were deemed as an ominous sign by people, their appearance always accompanied by death or something related to death.

The folklore of Edatine also had similar sayings but to the Demon Hunters, who were always hunting evil pagans, the sayings were not mere myths or legends, they were real.

Therefore, after Bloody Mary appeared on the coffin as a cat, Anderson, Holuff, and the other Demon Hunters were alarmed.

As for the squeal of cat Bloody Mary?

The Demon Hunters saw a talking stone before, a cat talking was nothing to them.

Kaboom!

The coffin exploded, Demon Hunters quickly dodging.

Dark green mist from the coffin gushed out and filled the area in an instant.

Tsssssss!

A sizzling noise sounded from the ground, as if something was being corroded, and inside the dark green mist, a figure wobbly stood up.

Vigor mortis!

The Demon Hunters exchanged quick gazes and reached out to their respective weapons.

Anderson even tossed a potion out.

Pak!

After the sound of breaking glass, a strong wind blew.

The dark green mist was carried away and the figure inside the mist was revealed.

It was Miers in her mummified state wearing her coffin attire.

Or more accurately, Miers was arranged to show up by the Witch.

Looking at their revived old friend, the Demon Hunters showed hesitance in their eyes for a few seconds before they replaced it with a determined look.

The friendship would never be forgotten, but they would also never forget their duty as Demon Hunters.

Leave the professionals to do their thing.

Sloth always acknowledged the saying and carried it out wholeheartedly.

Who else was more suitable than the Demon Hunters in dealing with monsters and pagans?

Even though this evil being was once a Demon Hunter, it wouldn’t change anything.

“You bastard! What have you done?”

Cat Bloody Mary ran back with its angry bellows. Compared to its previous state, its black fur became drier and a large area on its body had gone bald.

“Is there anything easier than this?” Sloth pointed at the battle that broke out further away and started to calculate in his mind, not paying attention to Bloody Mary.

His mind was filled with several sets of numbers as he calculated, and after he filled in all the blanks with answers that he knew, the odds slowly became clear.

“Brother, time is running out,” Sloth told Kieran.

He then looked at cat Bloody Mary.

“What are you trying to do?” Cat Bloody Mary looked at Sloth vigilantly.

“I am not good in battle,” Sloth was being honest.

“I am not suitable to battle in my cat state either!” Bloody Mary emphasized.

“No, no, no. I need you to do what you do best,” said Sloth with a smile.

“What I do best?” Role playing?” Bloody Mary was surprised.

Sloth didn’t say anything else, pointing at the panic crowd.

His answer was obvious.

…

Back at the mysterious factory workshop space, the battle was still going on, and it had gotten fiercer.

God of War’s armor was filled with battle scars and his movements were slowing down, like an old bullock pulling a broken cart.

Lady Calamity, on the other hand, was different.

She wasn’t just attacking fiercer, she was quicker than before.

Kieran was adapting to his new body in this space while he observed their battle.

He hoped to get some knowledge about this particular space through observing the battle.

It was without question a very effective method.

Kieran could now better control his body and clearly felt the changes, his original skills all available to him once more and he had a deeper understanding of his current body.

His current body was formed completely out of his divinity, albeit it was modeled after the blueprint of his original body.

However, if he would get hurt in this space, what he would be losing wouldn’t be blood but his divinity!

That was why the God of War wore a set of heavy armor and Lady Calamity hid in the dark.

They were all instinctively protecting their divinity.

As for where the armor and darkness came from?

The Power of Faith!

Kieran was very sure of it because everytime God of War’s armor was damaged, the battle scar on it would give out the presence of the Power of Faith.

Kieran was not a total stranger towards the Power of Faith. Therefore, he had arranged some backups for himself.

From how things were looking, his backups were much more useful than he thought.

Quietly adjusting his breathing and his divinity body, he was waiting for the chance to strike.

When Pride swung his sword at the statue back at War God Temple, Kieran felt it and he squinted his eyes, diving into the shadow and quietly sneaking behind God of War’s back to deliver a kick.

The crescent moon shaped qi energy wave was detected by God of War, but he did not turn around.

Compared to his old rival Lady Calamity, a demi-god was nothing important in his eyes.

With that thought in mind, God of War punched Lady Calamity away from him and then suffered a great loss.

Bang!

The crescent moon shaped qi energy wave struck God of War’s armor, causing the damaged armor to shatter after a vigorous shake.

Pak!

As though the armor was a breaking ceramic pot, the shattered armor fell on the ground and further broken into smaller pieces.

God of War was shocked but Kieran wasn’t.

A split second in the battlefield was enough to determine victory.

The charged Devil Flame roared and was fired out at God of War again.

Kaboom!

As the blazing waves rumbled, God of War squealed in pain.

It was obvious that without his armor protection, God of War was not as powerful as rumoured.

Even with his armor, the God of War was far from Kieran’s initial expectations.

That kind of battle instinct and techniques were a total insult to the name God of War, but Kieran didn’t exactly hate it because everything that happened granted him a huge advantage!

What else was better than an enemy who had nothing but brute force?

It would be the enemy’s slow reaction and absence of any battle techniques.

Boom!

Booom! Booooom!

After the first fireball landed, Kieran did not hold back and Devil Flame was fired like a barrage of cannon shots, every single blast relentlessly landing on God of War.

Injuries soon started to appear on God of War, his divinity starting to slip away.

Energy is conserved. While one side was losing energy, the otherside would surely acquire the energy.

Maybe the methods varied accordingly but nature never changed.

[Absorbed Destruction divinity 0.1%]

[Absorbed Destruction divinity 0.1%]

[Absorbed Destruction divinity 0.1%]

…

Endless notifications popped up in Kieran’s vision.

“As I thought! So this is Edatine’s own recursive rule? Or the special rule in this space?” Kieran squinted his eyes, tending to lean towards the latter because only the latter could explain why the God of War and Lady Calamity insisted on fighting in this factory workshop.

Plus, it also explained why God of War declined after the Black Cataclysm. It wasn’t just the thinning of his believers, it was also because when he first entered this space, he accidentally fell for the trick.

As for why the God of War and Lady Calamity insisted on fighting in this space, was it to keep Edatine away from the collateral damage?

If Lady Calamity had the same level of intellect as the God of War and was not driven by her beastly instinct, Kieran would believe it, just like what happened now.

“Roar! Roar!” Lady Calamity growled at Kieran. She couldn’t even voice a complete word, let alone a sentence, as if she was an animal.

Kieran couldn’t help but shake his head. It was obvious that the Witch had done an outstanding job.

In order to better enjoy her own investment, the Witch must have planted more than one line of defenses.

Otherwise, even if she had completely lost her mind, with her divinity intact and no lack of Power of Faith, she would have regained her sanity.

His notorious reputation had proven that the Witch had meticulously set him up before this.

Though… in the meantime, it seemed like Kieran was the biggest winner.

Three more balls of Devil Flame crashed into God of War.

Unlike the charged one, Kieran just simply tossed them out but the Devil Flame was already at rank VI.

Right after the first wave of Devil Flame, [Destruction] divinity had reached 21%.

[Destruction: With this divinity, you will be empowered when carrying out similar actions. Destruction divinity is currently at Standard rank, you will receive +2 in similar action that you perform.]

…

Unlike the 1%-15% range, which was at Feeble rank, the divinity was raised to Weak rank at 16% and now reaching 21%. It was considered Standard rank.

Would new ranks or changes appear in the future, Kieran had no idea.

For now, the threshold of a single rank was 5% and it provided Kieran with an advantage.

The changes to Devil Flame were the most straightforward, it was a change of quality.

A charged up Devil Flame that had rank VI attack and simply tossing out a rank VI attack Devil Flame were two very different concepts. They were not in the same category anymore, even when they shared the same attack rank.

Moreover, the charged up attack of the latter would increase the attack rank to rank VII!

It would be his strongest attack at his current stage.

Without a second thought, Kieran laughed at a rank VII Devil Flame!

Immediately, his surroundings were distorted by the heat.

A heat that could burn one’s soul gathered in Kieran’s hand.

Grrrr! Grrrr!

As if she sensed danger, Lady Calamity started to back away.

God of War also sensed the danger despite him being engulfed in flames, running towards the exit of the workshop right away.

He ran towards the exit with all his might but it was already too late.

While charging up, Kieran was prevented from using Devil Flame at the same time but he could move freely, appearing in front of God of War in a flash.

“Get away from me!”

God of War growled angrily and swung his strong arms at Kieran, trying to shove him away.

Those powerful arms formed by pure divinity were empowered by a layer of obvious Power of Faith.

The Power of Faith made God of War’s attack extremely terrifying, especially his momentum.

His arms were like two falling meteors, trying to bring destruction upon the land.

But… it was too slow!

It was so slow because while Kieran’s hand had touched the God of War, his arms were still lingering mid-air.

Rank VII Devil Flame then exploded!

The whole mysterious space seemed to have been dented by the power, a layer of black appearing above Kieran’s palm before the blistering light exploded.

The high temperature alone could vapourize the metal and iron in the workshop.

The whole factory workshop fell into silence.

Then—Kaboooooom!

After an ear-deafening blast, half of God of War’s body was blasted away. The other half of his body was also quickly melting.

His huge body shrunk smaller than a common man as he fell to the ground. On the remaining half of his head, his only eye widened as he stared at Kieran in front of him, surrounded by the Devil Flame and looking like he was descending from a blazing heaven.

“Lies! These are all lies! I-I was tricked!” said the God of War.

The God of War finally realized something on the verge of death, but it was too late.

Since the God of War was an enemy, Kieran would never hold back.

“Wait! I will tell you a secr-”

Kabooom!

Before the God of War even finished pleading, Kieran charged up his Devil Flame and blasted straight into God of War’s remaining face.

This time, the God of War finally died.

Kieran didn’t like to chat with the enemy that he was fighting.

The best enemy in Kieran’s mind was the dead one.

Moreover, Kieran knew what the God of War was trying to say: it was none other than the Witch’s setup.

The setup could be categorized into two parts.

The first part was that God of War first entered this place accidentally and was ambushed by Lady Calamity, who still wasn’t her current self but a demi-god. The God of War was utterly shaken when he realized the demi-god Lady Calamity was able to absorb some of his divinity and at the same time, she had her eyes on this mysterious space, so she instigated Edatine V to launch an attack at the south.

Then, it was the start of the Black Cataclysm that the Witch had plotted for a very long time.

The astronomical amount of deaths catalysed Lady Calamity’s growth.

At the same time, in order to not lose his believers, the God of War cast his divine miracles oftenly at the mortal realm so that he could absorb the Power of Faith that was obviously way beyond his limits. Hence his current form, which was seemingly powerful but actually weak on the inside.

“The shackle from the people’s beliefs… a double-edge blade?”

While Kieran savoured the divine flames burning around him, the filtered Power of Faith became the purest of energy and nourished his body. Kieran then looked at Lady Calamity, who kept dodging the flames since the first burning.

Kieran’s [Destruction] divinity was raised to 30% after killing the God of War.

[Destruction: With this divinity, you will be empowered when carrying out similar actions. Destruction divinity is currently at Strong rank, you will receive +3 in similar action that you perform.]

…

Buffing Devil Flame with [Destruction] divinity, it was safe to say that Kieran could easily apprehend Lady Calamity, who was as damaged as the God of War.

Although she was much quicker and not as slow as a snail like God of War, she was also burdened by the mixed Power of Faith.

Plus, the mysterious space wasn’t a spacious area to begin with, the exploding Devil Flame easily able to create a scorching environment quickly.

More importantly, the only exit was behind Kieran.

In short, Kieran had everything under control at the moment with absolute advantage.

He could have simply swung his hand and destroyed Lady Calamity to acquire stronger powers.

Kieran raised his hand, Devil Flame burning and roaring once more, but it wasn’t fired this time.

In a threatening tone, Kieran commanded Lady Calamity, “Sit!”