The Devil's Cage

Dark clouds covered almost half of the bright moon.

As the steam from the sea kept rising to the sky, the moon started to become blurry.

Yet under the blurry moon, a minimal amount of moonlight shone over the blazing figure. Following its blazing fire, the night became bright, dazzling and even eye-catching.

It looked like there was a smaller burning sun rising up high in the night sky.

Though, the soldiers on the battleships couldn’t admire such a peculiar scene.

The rampant aura brought forth endless chaos, the dense sulphuric scent was like a sign of a volcanic eruption.

Trembling with fear, the soldiers who had weaker wills started to mutter gibberish to themselves, they fled in disorder around the ship deck.

Some of the stronger willed soldiers were frozen as well when they saw the devilish figure, only a single thought lingered in their mind.

How could the Sanctuary house a devil? Why would the Sanctuary send out a devil?

General Barry was asking the same question too.

Compared to his men, General Barry knew the identity of the devil floating in the sky.

It was 2567, the assistant of God of Earth.

The bait that started the series of events but wasn’t he imprisoned by Smulder?

Why would the devil appeared before them?

All of a sudden, General Barry thought his plans were compromised, he was trying to find the flaws within.

Any perfect plan would fail because of unexpected circumstances, so a wise man would prepare a contingency plan in case such incidents occur.

General Barry was no exception, even more so because of his position and authority. He had more contingency plans than others.

Still he wasn’t fond of the scene, he couldn’t appreciate the scene at all.

General Barry was looking coldly at his useless men.

Despite being known as elite soldiers, they were only elites to the commoners, not the mystics.

The chaotic scene reminded General Barry of a bird’s nest being destroyed by rocks.

His gloomy mood plummeted even more and eventually infuriated him.

"Get off!"

General Barry kicked away one of the escaping soldiers before him and quickly headed towards the boxes.

After inputting some complicated instructions, the two smaller boxes opened up.

Two strange beings walked out of the boxes. They had the head and body of a lion but wings were on its back. The wings on it were strong, a slight flap would bring up a strong wind, it sent all the escaping soldiers falling on deck.

Its limbs were covered with snake scales, especially its claws at the end, it looked more like a iron forged weapon than a lion claw.

Gak Tsk, Gak Tsk!

As both the monsters took steps forward, their iron claws gave out an irritating screech when they touched the deck, leaving marks on the plank.

As both the monsters walked, they were wiggling their robust tail which was similar to a fish and at the end of their tail, there was a eerie head of a human! The human head had no nose, mouth or ears but four pairs of eyes, lining up from its forehead to its chin. Its eyes were blinking non-stop, emanating a haunting green glow.

Following the monster’s movements, a rotten stench floated across the deck.

The fallen soldiers were struggling on the floor, giving out cries of panic ceaselessly. However, such struggles caught the attention of the monsters. Without any hesitation, both the monsters threw themselves over to the struggling soldiers and devoured them after a hungry roar.

After a series of agonizing cries and chewing noises, both the monsters were covered with layers of blood and minced meat. They walked towards General Barry with a face of satisfaction.

"Finished your meal? If so, go have some exercise!"

General Barry didn’t even lay eyes over his dead men, he pointed at Kieran in the sky and Smulder at the beach.

In the general’s point of view, he was not moved by his men dying in vain. If all his useless soldiers’ lives could be traded for Smulder’s life, he wouldn’t mind to pay ten times, hundred times over. He would gladly pay the lives of his men rather than revealing his trump card at this moment.

After all, his ambitions wasn’t only limited to the Sanctuary, he had more on his mind.

General Barry’s ambitious thoughts made him very confident after he revealed two of his aces.

"Die Smulder! Die 2567! Both of you despicable bastards, you should die a graveless death!"

The general shouted loud.

Wuung!

Both the monsters roared at the sky following their master’s shout and dashed out to their targets like arrows let loose.

...

At the beach, Smulder saw the monster charging at him but compared to the hideous monster, he was more concerned about Kieran.

Smulder frowned as he recalled the previous scene.

"This ain’t right! He didn’t break out of a desperate situation but it’s the evolution of his bloodline!"

After a sudden realization, Smulder’s calm facial expression became heavy.

As the only living Holy Knight of the Sanctuary and with an intact legacy within him, he understood what a bloodline evolution meant.

The bloodline evolution was a special change that only occurred on the hybrid descendants of the Magic species and human.

It was a rare and extremely harsh special evolution.

According to the books that he studied before, only one in a hundred blood descendants of the Magic species would trigger such a change and among the hundred ones that triggered the change, only one will emerge successful.

If failed, the bloodline that the blood descendants relied on to survive would suffer a heavy loss, following a decrease in its strength.

However, if the process was successful, the bloodline power would multiply!

The slim bloodline will be denser and more powerful, thus inciting a qualitative change. On top of that, it was not impossible for them to reach their ancestor’s power if successful.

The books in the Sanctuary had the exact recordings.

That blood descendant that achieved his ancestor’s power level would no doubt become the strongest person in his era.

He would reign over everything on earth and no one would dare to oppose him.

According to the books, an elf bloodline descendant once succeeded in the special evolution before. He was still considered as a peace lover though.

But, what if the person who succeeded the evolution process was a descendant of the devil?

Smulder squinted his eyes at the blazing figure floating in the sky.

He was sure Kieran had high density of devil blood in him, otherwise he would not be so sensitive to the Sanctuary Force.

Now, Kieran has completed the bloodline evolution. the density level of his devil blood was enough to frighten even Smulder.

A human with the devil’s bloodline and a devil’s descendant that has completed the bloodline evolution. Even if both were the same person, Smulder could no longer treat him the same way he did.

"Nikorei... Hiak! SCRAM!"

Smulder muttered heavily as he recalled some of his memories.

When the rotten stench assaulted and interrupted his thoughts, he gave out a cold grunt and launched a punch at the monster before him.

This punch was different than the one before, which was lacking the power and stance.

As Smulder laid out his punch, a pillar of light blasted out from him.

As it pierced the sky above him, the white burning Sanctuary Force formed a set of armor over Smulder, covering his entire body, including his hands and head.

The Sanctuary Force armored punch hit hard on the monster’s skull,

BANG!

While higher up in the sky, Kieran raised his magma arm and grabbed the charging monster’s mouth.

Gush!!

Both Kieran and Smulder exerted their power at the same time.

One of the monster evaporated under the Sanctuary Force punch, similar to the battleship previously.

The remaining monster had its neck snapped by the powerful magma grip, tearing it into half.

Both the monsters were killed at the same time and when Kieran and Smulder has gotten rid of the obstacles, they turned at each other, exchanging gaze.

The fiery eyes of the devil against the burning white glare of the shining armor.

When both their gazes locked, sparks flew and an immense suppression aura blasted out in the field, spreading across every inch of the visible battlefield.