The Devil's Cage

An alley behind Harvest Inn.

Rachel was smoking a cigarette, squatting down without the least concern about her image as she inspected 'J.Pearlman,' who Kieran had thrown on the floor.

White light with a dash of jaded green appeared from Derder's hand and swiftly enveloped 'J. Pearlman'.

Lawless crossed his arms and watched quietly. He was standing beside his friend, looking at the undoubtedly long process and asked softly, 'You said the Fisherman is possessed?"

Lawless purposely emphasized on the word 'possessed.'

It was the explanation that Kieran came up with when he introduced Lawless to the situation.

Kieran was clever in avoiding words like 'personality.' He'd also clearly stated that Derder was a doctor during the introduction, but he distinctly pointed out that Derder was here because of 'J. Pearlman'.

As for the truth behind the show?

Kieran will never tell Lawless, and in order to achieve the goal, he had to attract Lawless' attention.

"Something similar, but I am not sure what it really is."

"The only thing I am sure of is that the person who possessed J.Pearlman is extremely conceited, had a trick or two, and maybe had access to a sizeable information network in the city, but by no means is he deep enough in all this. Therefore, there should be some forces behind him, but their strength pales in comparison to this particular person," said Kieran.

Kieran would not hide things from Lawless, most of the time.

"Can you explain slower and simpler? I still don't know what is going on."

"Maybe all the cleaning and washing of tables and glasses have made my mind slow because I felt like I've cleaned everything that I have to clean in the next ten years!"

Lawless purposely softened his voice when he said the last part, but Kieran heard the cold laughs from Rachel.

Obviously, if they hadn't wanted to introduce Lawless to Derder, Lawless might have still been cleaning the inn.

But of course, the cleaning will continue shortly after this meeting and will be prolonged indefinitely.

Kieran looked at his friend with a pitiful gaze.

"He tried to kill my companion with traps, but my companion saw it through, and yet the man didn't concede. Instead, he acknowledged his mistakes and vowed to take revenge, saying that at the next meeting, I better wish I was dead."

"On top of that, he knew that I have certain curse dispelling abilities. He should be watching me since the last curse dispeller incident, but that's all he knows. He didn't know what happened after that and thought everything else was just my plans."

"At least he thought so and arranged accordingly."

"So he is quite conceited, he thought he was the smartest of all."

Kieran acknowledged the High Demon as a companion.

Acquiring a companion in the dungeon world wasn't easy, but not outrageously hard either.

For a lone wolf solo player, a good companion proved to be a great help; therefore, no solo player would mind having an extra companion.

Of course, a lot of them still ended up clearing dungeons alone because a good companion was hard to come by.

Lawless nodded out of realization. He further asked, "I understand about the man's power, but what about having forces behind him?"

If this culprit weren't strong enough, he wouldn't have known about the Freedom Alliance or the Guardians.

Lawless knew it very well as a high-ranker. Thankfully for Rachel's constant reminder, otherwise, he would not know anything about the organizations until now.

However, he couldn't understand why his friend was so sure that there were forces behind the man.

"Did you forget about the players on the train?" Kieran asked.

"I guess I must have forgotten about that after I put my cleaning cloth away."

Lawless shrugged helplessly and asked more, "So what should we do now? Find the guy with the clues we have and bring hell to him?"

Lawless spoke with excitement; it sounded like he had broken free from shackles.

Kieran saw Rachel take a heavy puff from her cigarette as a significant portion was burned off in an instant. Once again, Kieran grieved for his friend in his heart and shook his head.

"No point in doing so. Those men will not know anything."

"That guy may be arrogant, but it's all built on the intelligence that he thinks he has. Would a guy with imaginary intelligence leave clues behind like that?" said Kieran.

"So we just sit back and watch?" Lawless asked anxiously.

He was eager to leave Harvest Inn for a while. Now, whenever he saw pails, mops, or even cleaning cloth, his heart would beat faster and felt cold, his forehead will sweat.

Kieran didn't say anything. He pointed at Derder.

Everything had to depend on Derder's precise diagnosis before any decisions were made.

Although Kieran caught him before he could escape, the person vanished and allowed J.Pearlman to fall back into Kieran's hands.

The person thought he had grasped a life-saving card, but Kieran didn't mind the misconception.

At least it would buy Kieran more time.

Quietly, Kieran exchanged a gaze with Rachel. Rachel nodded subtly.

"How is it?"

Kieran walked over to Derder.

"I am sure J.Pearlman is still in there, but I don't know where that guy went." Derder shook his head and pretended to be helpless.

To make things look real, he even breathed heavily.

"Okay. Leave the rest to me." Kieran then grabbed J.Pearlman and walked deeper into the alley.

Lawless wanted to follow, but Rachel grabbed his collar.

"What?" Lawless looked at Rachel with a confused gaze.

"It's none of your business. Go back to mopping." Rachel said coldly.

"I…Huh?... Fine!"

Lawless wanted to argue, but when he saw Rachel's glare, he turned around and gone back into the inn.

After she made sure Lawless had gone in, Rachel looked at Derder.

"How?"

"Bad, worse than my initial expectation."

"This is really bad news. But with this, you can truly get close to that bastard, so it's a somewhat good start. What do you plan to do next in the treatment process?"

Rachel took a puff from her cigarette and blew a ring of smoke.

"I'll try to become Lawless' friend." Derder replied honestly.

"Easy. With his flawed personality now, it's easy." said Rachel.

She then looked deeper into the alley, the spot that was covered by supernatural darkness.

"Is everything fine in there?" Derder asked out of discomfort, for he heard faint gulping noises.

"Believe in 2567. It's just some problem that he has to solve along the way."

Rachel then turned around and went into the inn.

Derder spared another glance at the darkness before following.

Although curious about what was going on inside, he didn't think it would be a good idea to probe.

Maybe 2567 was having some ferocious beast inside?

Derder went into the inn as the thought lingered in his head.