The Devil's Cage

Kieran grabbed Lander's arm, tightening his palm slightly.

Instantly, the pain made Lander's face twitch a little, but he held on and didn't cry out in pain. He then looked at Kieran with a puzzled and angry gaze.

"Pardon me! Forgive my recklessness, because of some incidents, I have to be vigilant!" Kieran apologized.

"Vigilant?"

Lander raised his bruised hand and showed it to Kieran and said directly, "If such actions can lower your vigilance a bit, I don't mind, given that you know where Harold is!"

Lander ended his words with a stern tone and a severe countenance. Even though he suppressed his volume, he still sounded very commanding and powerful. But only towards a commoner though. To Kieran, Lander's manner of speech were nothing by a slight breeze on his face.

He didn't even care about the threats within his words.

Kieran had many tricks to keep himself away from harm, though the sudden test with his grabbing made him feel apologetic, even though he had many reasons behind.

Therefore, after some slight muttering, Kieran decided to reveal some details. "Truth be told…"

He was ready to reveal everything he knew about Harold to his father, but after a few words escaped his mouth, Kieran clearly picked up the sound of an approaching heartbeat.

The person seemed to be moving stealthily towards the wagon, carefully, delicately.

Even the bodyguards around didn't notice anything unusual, or…

The person was one of the bodyguards, thus never raised any attention of his colleagues.

"The Night race? Or something new?"

Almost instantly, Kieran locked on the person's malicious intent.

After all, Harold's previous wagoner, Bill, was also a Night monster.

So when the words left Kieran's mouth, they had been fully altered.

"Truth be told, I know where Harold is. He's with Herbert, so he is quite safe for now! The reason I am here is to search for food and medicines. After all, just like you know, Herbert got caught in some trouble. Even though Pierre tried his best to deal with the problems, accidents happened!"

Although it was a lie, but a lie based on true incidents.

The situation had worsened since Herbert was already on the wanted list. Most probably, he would encounter some ambushes as well, and during those potential ambushes, Pierre would be the one to step forward bravely.

Though it might also be Joanna's wagoner, Cass.

Kieran wasn't sure who it would be, maybe both. So, he purposely hid the exact process and brushed it off vaguely.

Kieran's statement also made Lander nervous right away.

"Is Harold fine?" He asked anxiously.

"I've said it before, he is safe. Otherwise, I wouldn't be here!" Kieran pressed on with his lie.

"I'll make arrangements right away! Shall we head back to my place for now?" Lander asked Kieran.

"As you wish." Kieran nodded with a smile.

The journey that followed was silent all the way inside the wagon. Lander was worried about Harold's safety and Kieran was polishing his own plans.

An eavesdropper had appeared out of the blue in Kieran's plan.

Where was Herbert hiding?

No one knew, but based on Lander's performance now, Herbert was behaving just as Kieran had expected, hiding in a extremely concealed place. Even Lander who had quite the influence over the city couldn't locate him.

One could imagine how much manpower was poured into the search for his son based on Lander's anxiety. If even Lander couldn't locate them despite using so much manpower, Kieran didn't think he could perform better than them and locate Herbert.

Maybe the men who went to search were not even a match for Kieran's single hand, but in terms of searching, it was always the numbers that performed better.

After Kieran saw Lander's behavior, a thought came to him.

Maybe Herbert wasn't even in Herl City!

The reason that the dungeon world before Kieran's eyes was worthy of the suffix "world" was because of the wholeness of the vast and extensive history and culture.

Each time Kieran carried out his main mission, all he did was scratch the surface of such history; he was neither able to nor had the time to approach more of those.

In other words, if Herbert really wasn't in Herl City, locating him would be like searching for a needle in a haystack.

If Kieran's theory was correct, it was not possible to locate Herbert at all.

Then, could he lure Herbert to look for him instead?

When the eavesdropper appeared, Kieran's thoughts made him think about how to lure the eavesdropper out at the first moment.

Kieran then spread out the thought he had in his mind. With his understanding of Herbert, the scholar was not some old-fashioned geezer, nor would he adhere to a single defensive spot to the end.

If there were some other, better, safer methods, Herbert would not hesitate to take them.

After all, Herbert showed quite the trust towards Kieran.

Back in [Ancient City Foreign Matter], the hardships of the journey, the life and death situations had formed a thick bond between both of them, an unbending friendship.

If Herbert knew Kieran was fine, surely he wouldn't stay down and not ask questions.

"So I have to declare to the world that I'm back?"

Kieran muttered in his heart, leaning back on the seat.

Kroom, Kroom, Krooom!

The wagon's wheel ground over the pebbles on the ground as it drove.

Then the wagon was driven into a courtyard within Herl City. The black fence gate opened up swiftly with two attendants pushing it.

After the wagon went around a mini square, it stopped at the main building's doorstep.

Lander jumped off the wagon in a hurry and went into the house after summoning his butler.

Kieran who came down later also followed up quickly after a quick glance around.

He caught sight of a wagon full of bodyguards and tons of attendants within the courtyard.

"Wonder how many of these fellas are here with hidden agendas…"

Kieran exclaimed in his heart.

Most of the Night race monsters were not strong to Kieran, but the ability to disguise as someone and hide really caused Kieran to scratch his head.

Other than knowing that pain could force the Night monsters to break their cover, Kieran also couldn't differentiate the Night and human accurately.

"A higher level Intuition or some identifying skills could work!" Kieran pondered the question, but regardless of what it would be, it was not something he could achieve for the time being.

"Maybe I can use what I already know…" Kieran thought once more.

Maybe Herbert who mastered the Neegor Dynasty history and studied all the legends and rumors deeply could find some breadcrumbs but not Kieran.

Not that he looked down on himself, but it was a fact, a fact that accumulated years and years of study.

"Good day, Sir 2567. Master ordered me to lead you to the study room. If you may, please follow me!"

An attendant walked out and bowed at Kieran, before he gestured, leading into the building.

Kieran stepped forth, trailing the attendant, but the moment he stepped on the flight of stairs, his body froze.