The Devil’s Cage

Ka, Kakkak!

A frosty layer of ice spread throughout Edgar’s body. When the icing finally stopped, the Night race leader has turned into a frozen statue.

A moment later…

BANG!

A powerful force from the void smashed the frozen statue to bits.

Everything happened too fast, just as Kieran wanted to send a thought to stop the process, Edgar was already a bunch of crushed pieces.

The system notifications kept pinging him but he didn’t have the time to care.

Kieran’s attention was placed on the little spider that was dancing and jumping for joy.

Although there wasn’t a conversation between him and the spider and Kieran didn’t know how to read a spider’s expression, his heart felt a faint joyous feeling coming from the spider.

”What the!?”

Kieran was shocked over the little spider crawling over the spider web with items, swallowing something into its petite body. Then a full stomach sensation was transmitted to Kieran’s heart, assuring Kieran that he wasn’t hallucinating.

”The remainder of the soul is repairing itself?” Kieran guessed.

Kieran had the guess early on about his equipment retaining a part of the original soul of whatever that was imbued in it. Though the remaining soul could repair itself through devouring and other methods was out of Kieran’s expectation.

Subconsciously, Kieran glanced over the three great items that were already gloomy and withered.

Rust and fractures covered the three great items, if Kieran didn’t witness the power of these three great items moments ago, he would have thought they were just some random pieces of junk.

Obviously, the repair or restoration of the spider soul didn’t appear out of thin air, after analyzing the things before him with a calm mind, Kieran grabbed his chest.

He felt immense heartache!

A heartache that even a breath through his lungs could tear his body apart and it was spreading through his chest.

A Scrooge has lost three ”great items” before his very eyes.

Once the thought of those items might be Legendary or above, Kieran even had to rely on [Arrogant Word]’s tilt to stand properly without falling, yet the little spider’s mirage didn’t care so much. After a full meal, it went back into the wristband.

The black color [Mardos Arm] suddenly gave out a lustrous golden shine that lasted around four to five seconds before fading off.

It then returned to its original black wristband with the spider icon on it, just that the spider had become more and more lively, even the attributes undergone drastic changes.

[Name: Mardos Arm]

[Type: Armor (Right hand wristband)]

[Rarity: Legendary]

[Defense: Extreme]

[Attributes: 1. Spider Webbing II, 2. Web Bind II, 3. Soul Devour II]

[Effect: Hell Fiend Spider Fire]

[Prerequisite: The one who killed Mardos (Binds to player)]

[Able to bring out of dungeon: Yes]

[Remark: Mardos was hatched from a Hell Fiend Spider egg that was left on earth, through a special and hastened hatching process, it had a growth disorder in nature, in addition to losing the intellect, strength and lineage of a Hell Fiend Spider, all it had was the natural predator instinct, still it was not to be underestimated.]

...

[Spider Webbing II: Fire a tensile and sticky retractable spider web no longer than 30 meters, the spider web has a Powerful defense, target is required to have B Strength or above to break away from the stickiness, 20 second duration, 3 times per day]

[Web Binding II: Fire a 5 meter radius sticky spider web laced with poison, binding multiple targets 50 meters within sight, spider web has a Powerful and above defense, target would required to have B+ Strength to break away. The poison will force the target undergo 3 times Constitution authentication of B+, B, B-. If target failed all 3 authentication, target will receive Powerful poison attack. If target fail 2 authentication, target will receive Strong poison attack.

If target fails 1 authentication, target will receive Average poison attack, 15 seconds duration, 2 per day]

[Soul Devour II: Player will absorb the soul energy of each target kill, replenishing player’s HP, Stamina, the recovery rate is based on the target’s soul level. The soul can be temporarily stored in the wristband, able to replenish at will. The restore level is equal to 3 Moderate Wounded Status worth of HP and Stamina]

...

[Hell Fiend Spider Fire: When using Spider Webbing or Web Binding, bound target will receive Strong fire damage and Average negative energy corrosion. Able to activate Hell Fiend Spider Fire at your will.]

...

”Attributes level up? A new effect?” All the attributes had a considerable enhancement, especially [Soul Devour II], it can really save my life during crucial moments!”

Kieran glanced over [Mardos Arm]’s description in awe.

His heartache was instantly halved, at least he still got something out of the loss.

As for relying on [Creature of Desire] to earn him more equipment and items?

That was not an option for Kieran.

[Creature of Desire]’s [Devour] special effect will only eat all the loot cleaner than [Mardos Arm], Kieran would not even get the leftovers from the creature.

In fact, it was exactly as Kieran’s thought.

Edgar’s death caused his Creature of Desire to turn into a rootless duckweed, floating aimlessly, although it was controlling tons of Nights and Mutants but without the middleman to sync the process.

The mechanical Creature of Desire spun its gears rapidly and had fallen into a chaotic state, it had lost its purpose and goals within an instant.

Yet, Kieran’s Creature of Desire hasn’t, with sufficient intellect, Kieran’s Creature of Desire took the chance and started its counterattack. Its half melted body didn’t gather and recover anymore, instead, the wide mouth filled with grinding sharp teeth bit hard on the mechanical body.

Kieran’s Creature of Desire started to swallow its counterpart. It altered its original way of grinding off its opponent piece by piece after its counterpart was at lost of actions.

It was similar to a greedy snake trying to swallow an elephant!

Compared to its counterpart, Kieran’s Creature of Desire was like a small cauliflower snake trying to swallow an elephant. Even a seven to eight-meter long python would explode when trying to swallow an elephant, let alone a cauliflower snake.

However, Kieran’s Creature of Desire was different. It was formed by Kieran’s desire and used the Eye of Chimeras as the catalyst, it was a monster at birth, a monster that used Kieran’s heart as its foundation.

The human heart was infinite, it was able to store a whole mountain and house the sea, even occupy the whole heaven and earth.

With such a foundation inside the Creature of Desire, let alone its counterpart which was a few times bigger than itself, even the Night and Mutant monsters below were not spared.

It wanted to swallow everything within its grasp.

When the summoning time was up, the Creature of Desire went away in a satisfied manner.

Dong Dong Dong!

Kieran’s heart started to beat rapidly again.

He could easily feel the part in his heart which belonged to the Eye of Chimeras had grown stronger, though it didn’t start a fight with his human or the devil part right away but it decided to lay dormant for the time being, as if it agreed to Kieran’s previous agreement during their ”talk”.

The prerequisite of [Fusion Heart] didn’t change but Kieran knew it within himself if he wished to not give up his position as the host to his ”guests” he will need to get stronger!

Getting stronger faster than the Eye of Chimeras and the devil could cope! To the point that Kieran could keep his thoughts away, without worrying about himself being turned into a puppet of flesh and blood.

He was clear that either the Eye of Chimeras or the devil could faintly share his emotions as well. Without utmost confidence, he didn’t want to tip the balance of the current situation.

He raised his head to the system notification after.

[Eliminating key person in main mission, completed main mission in advance!]

[Player will leave the dungeon in 10 seconds…]

[Please take whatever items you wish to keep with you.]

[Note: Any items that exceed the maximum weight will be discarded!]

...

Another 10-second duration before leaving.

Different from his previous 10 seconds leaving which he had in control, Kieran went over to the unconscious Herbert in a hurry and anxious. He took out the pen and paper in Herbert’s coat and quickly wrote down his thoughts.