The Devil’s Cage

The rain was getting heavier and the day was getting darker but it didn’t stop the enthusiastic reporters. They widened their eyes at the fields of St. Paolo School.

There was a 3 to 4-meter tall wooden pile stuck on the field, on the top of the pile was a head and the lower part was the body that was badly pierced through. The limbs were placed on both sides of the woodpile accordingly. Anyone who saw the woodpile from afar might have thought they saw a deformed mini-giant.

Anyone who came close to the scene could feel the blood overflowing, the cruel dismembered body, and the freaky arrangement.

For normal people, it was the things they dreaded and would avoid like the plague but for the reporters, it was a hard to come by scoop.

Each of them held the umbrellas on their shoulder, clipping on the handle with their right wrist and holding pencils in their palms, drawing down the scene quickly on their notebook.

Some who finished earlier shifted their attention to the officers around, and their attention was captured when John came down from the wagon.

“Chief! How do you see this murder case?”

“Chief! Is the murderer provoking the police with his work?”

“Chief! Chief! Do you have the confidence in catching the culprit?”

…

The questions that showered down on John’s face were even more terrible than the bad weather.

John who already had a heavy heart because of another murder case didn’t have the mood to entertain the reporters, his face was still as dead waters. If he didn’t care about the bad reports on the police’s image, he wouldn’t mind sharing the taste of his fist with the senseless reporters.

But now?

“Carl? Carl!?” The chief officer shouted.

The young officer swiftly came out from the campus, “Yes sir!”

Carl who was drenched by the rain saluted to his superior upon meeting him.

“Increase the police line for another 50 meters, as for anyone who trespasses the vicinity, lock them up as suspects!” The chief officer ordered.

“Yes, sir!” Carl answered loudly.

Then, a chaotic scene happened in front of the school.

“Noooo!”

“You can’t do this! We have the right to know!”

“Yeah, it’s free journalism!”

“We are here for the truth!”

…

The reporters voiced their objection but it was useless.

Under Carl’s lead, a dozen more officers who were angered under the rain were moving out like a human wall, pushing the reporters further away, step by step.

There were even a few among the officers who had a shorter tempers and didn’t mind beating the reporters with their batons.

John saw the scene too, if it was during normal times, he would stop his men but now he would not.

Not just because of taking revenge on the reporters but also for a smoother operation.

The chief officer held the umbrella and helped the elderly sister down the wagon, and he also said, “2567, please!”

“Em!”

The voice sounded amid the heavy rain.

John unconsciously traced the voice to its owner but he didn’t see anything at all.

Although it wasn’t exactly the first time he encountered such a situation, the chief officer still felt shocked but he didn’t forget his duty.

“Sister Moni, do you need some rest? I’ll help you back to your room,” John said.

The elderly sister rejected the suggestion.

“I want to have a look at the body!”

“Ugh… very well!”

John eventually compromised against the stern tone of Sister Moni but in his heart, he had prepared himself a while ago.

A dismembered body appeared in St. Paolo School, if someone said it wasn’t related to the school itself, John would never believe it.

Before this, Sister Moni had suffered quite the shock from the body of her student Torti and if she had to go through the process again, even a person in their prime wouldn’t have accepted it well, let alone an elderly woman.

Everything was as John’s expected though, the one who died on the school field was one of St. Paolo’s and he was also someone Kieran knew.

Reed, the security captain of the school, a middle-aged man that was loyal to the sister and faithful to his duty to the school.

Now, the middle-aged man was dismembered on the spot.

Looking at the scattered body, Kieran’s gaze scanned the area but he didn’t find anything.

Musou level [Tracking] could already allow him to find traces left behind by a special existence but still, he didn’t find any traces left by the culprit.

“It wasn’t the special existence but a normal human? Did the culprit use the rain to cover the murder?” Kieran glanced over the ground once more.

The firm ground was filled with rainwater, Kieran could still pick up some footprints but the rainwater was gushing hard, washing away the traces rapidly.

No doubt the footprints were left behind by the officers who arrived later at the scene and as for the culprit’s?

It might have been lost in the rain a while ago.

Kieran looked up at the woodpile again.

“A 3 to 4-meter tall wooden pile, its surface diameter is over 15 cm. There aren’t marks of ropes around the woodpile which means the murderer lifted the pile with his bare hands and plunged almost 50 cm deep in the ground…”

“It’s nearly impossible for a common man to do this, other than Sister Moni and Guntherson, are there some other powerful ones in the mystical realm?” Kieran wondered in his heart.

The appearance of a new era wasn’t completed with one stroke.

The Church of Dawn was eliminated but there was St. Paolo School and Sister Moni, Guntherson, the remnants of the old age, so it wouldn’t be strange if there were more that stayed behind.

But…

“These individuals worked together with the Wayne Family?” Kieran’s eyes had doubts all over them.

It wasn’t the suspicion about the strong laying their pride down and working with the normal ones, neither was it the grudges they had for Wayne Family.

No matter how strong the powerful ones were, they would need to eat and sleep, needed a place to rest, especially as the remnants of the old age, they would understand their position even better in the new era.

The grudges with Wayne Family? Well, it was self-explanatory.

The real reason that Kieran felt doubtful was the arrangement of the murderer.

The body that appeared in the station wasn’t bait to lure the sister out but a real ace card from the murderer, so it was not necessary for the ambushes along the way.

Now, with Reed’s body in front of him, killing a security captain out of threatening means, his body would be enough, there was no need to arrange the body like this and even without any other special arrangements behind it.

It was very… unnecessary! That’s right, unnecessary!

“If it was Wayne Family who did this, they shouldn’t have held back and at least will spend their effort in a certain point, unless…”

“Not just a single party that has their eyes on the school? Two? No, no, I think it’s three! At least three parties had their desperate gaze set on St. Paolo!”

Kieran’s squinted eyes were shining brightly.

Why? Were the treasures of the Church of Dawn not enough?

The abundant amount of gold that formed the tidal wave and could have easily squashed a person, regardless of the intentional parties that eyed the gold or the guardians of the gold.

Kieran looked up again, observing Reed’s restless death and turned to the elderly sister who sunk into sorrow. He went off in the rain without saying anything else.

Any words in that particular moment were helpless and weak, and while words didn’t work, it was best to take action.

Kieran always thought the saying was precise, an eye for an eye, and blood debts should be paid with blood!

The rain somehow grew bigger, the bell beside the school field was rung.

Dang! Dang! Dang!

The bell rings overpowered the rain as the security members were sending their captain off.

They meticulously tidied up their captain, tried their best to make their captain look presentable. The crowd eyes were red and many of them couldn’t help but wipe off the tears from their eyes.

The sorrowful atmosphere gathered but further away, a couple of malicious watchful gaze behind the rain was sizing up the scene in a ridiculing manner.

They were like hungry wolves showing their claws, venomous snakes revealing their fangs.

They were looking at their prey, figuring out where should they strike.

Suddenly…

KABOOM!

An explosion that shook heaven and earth sounded off from the outskirts of the city.

It was where Wayne Family’s manor was located.

The slumbering city in the rain was completely awoken, people stared at that direction with astonishments.

Especially those hiding in the shadows that bore malicious intent, when they saw the blazing light shine through the night sky covered in rain, each of them had a bad feeling in their heart.

It was like… a great disaster was imminent!