The Devil's Cage
The Devil's Cage - Chapter 502: Withered Path

Smulder felt the subtle atmosphere at the very first moment.

His breath turned heavy again.

Eventually, he was smart enough to neglect the mystics spectator crowd, he turned around to the negative energy-filled city and marched towards it.

Surprisingly…

CHANG!

When Smulder was marching forward, he suddenly knocked himself onto the black mist of negative energy, producing a huge clanking sound and was forced back a few steps.

Smulder looked at the negative energy with an odd gaze and before he could react to what happened, something happened to the field of negative energy.

A vague decaying force seeped through the ground and headed for Smulder. In fact not only the Holy Knight alone but all the mystics spectators around him as well.

"Back off!" Smulder shouted loudly, reminding everyone as he released Sanctuary Force from his body.

The dazzling white light in the darkness was unmatched but it also became the target for all the negative energy.

The scattered negative energy clump seemingly came to life and threw itself towards Smulder like a hungry jackal.

Even though it was vanquished by the Sanctuary Force within an instant, it kept coming back at Smudler, ceaselessly, relentlessly. More importantly, more and more negative energy started to gather in attacking Smulder.

It turned into huge shadowy claws, hurling its sharp edge at Smulder, bringing up a fierce gale as it moved.

Even Smulder's expression turned bitter when he was up against hundreds of thousands of shadow claws. He quickly took a few steps back, getting himself out of the attacking range before he stopped moving.

Smulder's expression was ugly, not only did he not Ciaran City, he suddenly realized he and his group has been deliberately plotted against by someone from a while ago.

From the moment Simon fell into Barry's ambushing plans, everything had been exceeding their grasp, and everything that followed after was definitely someone trying to play and tease them by putting out bait and luring them to keep risking their lives. When they were forced to a difficult position and felt helpless, Smulder and co. would have to call for reinforcements.

Then, Kieran arrived.

"Barry's target is the Bird of Death?"

The sudden thought rose in Smulder's heart but he quickly shook it off.

"No, not him! It isn't his style!"

The unknown enemy made Smulder's expression become even heavier.

He raised his head at the negative energy-filled city, spinning his gears rapidly in his mind.

"Give up?" There wasn't such a phrase in Smulder's dictionary.

...

While going through the black negative energy clump, the comfortable feeling spread from his body to even his soul, making him feel like he could sleep soundly.

If it wasn't for Ohara beside him, Kieran surely couldn't help but moan out of comfort.

Though, Ohara's condition was different. Even though she wasn't really receiving any physical damage, her ugly expression told Kieran that she wasn't feeling too well.

"How are you doing?" Kieran asked.

Kieran wouldn't acknowledge the thoughts of hers trying to treat him as someone's reincarnation but after tons of kind acts and tender care, Kieran wouldn't mind helping her if it was within his own capabilities.

"I..I'm fine! It's just that the air here is so thick, it's making me feel sick as if I walked it a slaughterhouse, that bloody stench is causing me nausea."

Ohara replied to Kieran's concern with a smile.

'2567 has started to accept me! I must work harder!'

Ohara quietly clenched her fist. Kieran didn't see that as he turned back around, otherwise, he would regret his extra concern for her.

Kieran glanced over the straight path before him and he sized up the thick jungle on both side, he couldn't help but furrow his brows.

It should be a hot summer during June and the trees and plants should be luxuriance, yet under the negative energy filled Ciaran City, the place was dark and cold. Those plants which should have flourished in brilliant green had turned yellow, some of the trees even withered completely.

Dead trees!

"Even plants couldn't survive the negative energy corrosion?" Kieran muttered with a frown.

Negative energy corrosion was a terrifying phenomenon, it might be less effective from the start, at most causing some nausea but as time went by, the corrosion would be fatal to humans or even plants.

Looking at all the withered plants and trees, Kieran speculated that there weren't any normal human beings living in Ciaran City anymore. One needed to know that plants had extremely high resistance against negative energy corrosion compared to humans, some plants could even resist a mild level of negative energy.

Fuuu!

Kieran took in a deep breath after coming up with that conclusion.

Although the previous news told him there might not be any living survivors in Ciaran City, seeing it for himself was a totally different feeling.

The wind was still blowing as it carried the dense negative energy with it. It whipped up a thin layer of sand on the withered path, turning it into a tiny whirlwind, spinning around the path.

The whole path was silent and without any presence of the living, all that was left was the low wailing of the wronged souls.

Kieran could clearly feel the existences of those souls even without activating [Tracking].

He that felt the souls were undergoing changes in the environment. They were absorbing the negative energy, transforming from a common translucent soul to a wrathful evil spirit.

Kieran could already paint the picture, a few days later, even the spot he walked passed will be filled with evil spirits and the numbers would surpass the ones he exterminated back then by a whole lot.

But Kieran didn't strike beforehand because it wasn't necessary.

Under such a huge environment, although the evil spirits were scary, regardless of what the amount was, they couldn't harm him at all. The huge negative environment was also his home turf!

So some things would become easier in here than outside, such as locating a hidden Fallen.

With the buff from [Fiery Sulphur], a fireball with Strong attack appeared on his left hand instantly.

Fuuuosh!

Kieran hurled it out with his might and the fireball was thrown at the signboard at beside the path, bringing a scorching gale with it.

It was a metallic signboard, with the main pole as thick as an arm's width and a signboard of two palms wide and a meter long.

The surface on the signboard was covered with a layer of black paint and the word "Welcome to Ciaran City" was written on top with white paint.

Although the negative energy corrosion turned the signboard into a mottled piece of metal and even half of the words were covered by blemishes, it was still sufficient for a clear read.

But soon enough, the mottled signboard melted under the burning flames, revealing a black figure escaping behind the signboard. It moved fast like a shadow escaping the light, flashing away in the blink of an eye but of course Kieran was faster, or more precisely, Kieran predicted its movement.

Kieran dashed out and blocked the black figure's path and unleashed a kick at it.

Souuuuum!

A half-moon qi energy wave scratched the darkness before his eyes.