The Devil’s Cage

The slowly fading book shook violently when Glutton jumped over it, as if the book had met its bane.

The fading speed was probably two times faster than before.

However, Gluttony always jumped on his food with 300% explosive speed, so the book was still a step too slow.

Gluttony grabbed the book, half of which had already vanished, shaking his hand and dragging the half vanished book back, revealing the whole cover.

Then?

Gluttony opened his mouth wide and put the book into it like it was beef jerky. After chewing a few times, Gluttony swallowed the whole thing.

“N-Nice!” Gluttony stuttered his feelings to Kieran.

“Remember the taste?” Kieran asked with a smile.

“R-Remember!” Gluttony nodded.

“Can you find it?” Kieran’s smile was still hanging over his face.

“Can!” Gluttony nodded again.

“Then what are you waiting for? Now, I give you permission to eat anything, ANYTHING, that has the same taste as the book you just ate. The buffet will last until dawn…” Kieran said calmly.

Before Kieran could even finish his words properly, Gluttony vanished on the spot.

W hen Gluttony went off, a sense of coldness appeared in Kieran’s eyes.

After he summoned Luphus for questioning and knew why the whole house that stored the books about Gods had only one ‘Analytics of the temples developments in Naveya City’ on the rack, the coldness got fiercer.

No doubt it was a trap specifically targeted at him.

Who else in the whole of Gordor knew he would go into the house that stored the books about God history?

The answer was self-explanatory.

Other than the God of Knowledge who revealed himself before Kieran earlier, Kieran couldn’t think of another possible candidate.

Although Kieran always held his guard up against a stranger or unknown existence, he wouldn’t simply kill an innocent or unrelated party.

But when hostility was shown?

KILL!

It was a rule Kieran lived by since day one.

“Your Majesty, did you find the books about the history of the Gods?” Luphus hadn’t left after the initial questioning, instead continuing with a careful question.

Although Kieran was still as dull and expressionless as ever, the old ‘wise man’ noticed something was different. However, he didn’t dare to ask frankly.

“Em,” Kieran nodded and looked at Luphus, his meaning obvious enough.

“I know some records about the Gods, but I can’t assure you about their authenticity. That is why the books weren’t placed in this storage house—a lot of people thought these records are nothing but ridiculous stories. If you need any of those, I’ll send someone to get it for you,” said Luphus.

“Bring them here,” said Kieran.

“Right away,” Luphus replied.

…

“You think what you know is the truth ? You are just blinded by some confusing facts!”

An old scholar was slamming the table fiercely, his slim figure making him seem exceptionally angry. After he slammed the table with his hand, it didn’t just shook the glasses, his palm even turned red.

Pain was spreading on his palm but the old scholar didn’t care. Instead, he went around the table and wanted to grab another scholar, seemingly similar in age, by the collar.

The other old scholar didn’t want to show weakness and step back either, so he swung a punch at the the first scholar.

“I have my own unique viewpoint in this and you are jealous of my talents! You have always been like that since we were young!”

The second old scholar shouted at his peer and engaged in a fight as the first old scholar came over.

The other colleagues of the two fighting scholar tried to break them off and calm them down. Their faces showed nothing but bitter smiles because they had seen fights such as these countless times.

Every single time, it would end up in a mess and caused the other colleagues to be helpless. A while later, the same scene would repeat itself.

Persistence! Stubborn!

It was a merit of every scholar but at the same time a flaw as well.

Of course, every single one of the scholars present didn’t think ‘stubbornness’ was a flaw.

Sometimes, they even took pride in being stubborn.

While the scholars were engaged in their usual fighting, a seemingly normal book was shaking in the corner, none of them noticing because of the noisy scene. The book shook like it was sucking on something but he next moment, the shaking stopped abruptly.

A powerful palm grabbed it from the shadow and was then stuffed into a hungry mouth.

Munching sounded throughout the room and the ‘power’ that enveloped everyone quickly dissipated.

Bang!

The rack that the book was on broke as if it was struck by lightning. The little commotion stopped the two fighting scholars.

“Hmph! I have to go tidy up the books!” The first scholar grunted coldy as he disengaged.

“Don’t you dare claim you love books more than me! I am also a book lover!”

The second scholar didn’t want to show weakness at all.

Their colleagues, however, blocked the two of them after a tacit agreement, thinking the fight would continue at the racks, but to their surprise, the two scholars didn’t argue and fight anymore. Instead, they truly went over to the collapsed rack and cleaned up the books; they worked exceptionally well together too.

Although along the process of tidying, the two of them would glare at each other and blow a fuse, they didn’t punch each other in the face anymore.

“What a lucky rack!”

The other scholars exclaimed and expressed their praise before helping the duo.

The two old scholars were no longer at the age of doing labour work.

The younger ones should train themselves harder with ‘work’, especially at night.

Inside another room, the bed was shaking as the couple were ‘working’ on top.

Then, the young man jumped off the bed, barefoot and shirtless, running to the study room for a pink color book.

“The position is still not right. How can a normal person achieve this kind of position…”

“Honey, where are you?”

A sweet moan later, the young man gave up thinking. After a quick glance at the pink book, he was ready for a second round with a new position.

There must be one among the plethora of positions that would suit him.

After the young man returned to the bed, to his honey, the pink book tried to shake again amidst the squeaking sounds of the bed and ‘clappings’, but before it could, it was swallowed by a giant mouth. This time, the chewing didn’t even happen and the book was swallowed straight to the stomach.

One book, two books, three books.

All the special books in Gordor were eaten one after another.

Each time a book got eaten, the translucent figure hiding in a corner of the manor trembled.

The translucent figure groaned in pain as if a part of its flesh was ripped away, but it didn’t stop the figure from doing what it was doing: stuffing books into his cloth-wrapped bundle.

That’s right, the figure with the title of God of Knowledge wanted to run away!

He had never seen a man like Kieran: calm and vigilant yet rampant and ruthless.

Most importantly, Kieran lived by his own rules.

The God of Knowledge knew should he appear and explain himself, the hungry monster would swallow him alive.

Likewise, if he didn’t provide a satisfying answer to Kieran, he would be hunted down.

Therefore, the God of Knowledge quickly took out a piece of paper and wrote something down.

After his little message was written, he sensed the hungry monster getting closer. He grabbed his cloth-wrapped bundle and vanished into thin air, leaving the piece of paper falling down from the air.