Chapter 341: From Acceptance to Assault (4)

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Proofreader: Xemul

The sun had gone down, and it was well after dark when they finished going through the whole town and collecting all they could in the name of investigation.

The sorting of the goods was almost finished, the bags were packed. Moving out at this hour would be difficult, yet staying in some building in such a deserted town was too creepy. So, in the end they decided on the night camp in the town square. Just then, Lapis shouted hysterically.

“Eh?”

Loren, who had embezzled a large percentage of the town’s wealth via Gula, was busy doing manual labour to at least help the soldiers with their work, when he heard Lapis’ voice and stopped.

Lapis was by herself at a distance, sorting through some of the remaining treasures. When Loren looked at her to see what was going on, he saw that she was holding something that looked like a doll with a metallic sheen in her hand.

“What’s wrong?”

“No, just that this thing… I think it is a magic tool, but I have no idea what it is.”

The doll-like object that Lapis presented to him had a metallic sheen, but it appeared to be made of iron or some other common metal rather than any kind of precious metal. Although it did not look valuable, if it was a magical tool, it could not be an ordinary item, but Lapis had no idea what it was used for. 

If Lapis could not recognize it, it was a suspicious object, which warranted Loren’s caution.

“Is it dangerous?”

“Well, I’m troubled because I can’t figure that out.”

Lapis looked at the doll in her hands from various angles and examined it thoroughly, but still could not identify it. After a while, she shrugged as if giving up and made to stuff the thing into the cart loaded with goods by the Empire soldiers.

“Hey…”

“I don’t know what it is, but it is a magic tool. I don’t think it’s a good idea to just throw it away, so I thought I’d let the soldiers collect it.”

Although Lapis seemed to have a point, Loren wondered if it would be a good idea to carelessly throw something that could be dangerous into their luggage. However, they also couldn’t throw it away, since there was no doubt that it was a magical tool.

While Loren was pondering what to do, one of the soldiers noticed and approached them to ask what was going on.

“Can I help you?”

“We have an unknown magic tool, and I was wondering if you could keep it for us.”

“I see. In that case, we will take care of it.”

The soldier responded very politely, and Lapis handed the doll in her hand to him.

The doll did not look that big, but it seemed to be much heavier than the soldier had expected, probably due to the fact that it was made of metal. He failed to hold it and dropped it to the ground.

“Are you alright? It’s unexpectedly heavy.”

Lapis bent down to pick up the doll that the soldier had dropped.

The moment Loren saw the soldier placed a hand on his neck and smiled wryly in embarrassment, he felt a creeping sensation running down his neck and grabbed Lapis, who was bending over, by the waist.

“Loren?! There are eyes all around you, we can’t…”

Loren, disregarding the improper words Lapis was about to spit out, kicked the ground as hard as he could and jumped backward.

The ground was being pulled toward the doll that had fallen at the feet of the soldier, who looked dumbfounded as if he couldn’t understand what was happening.

“Ah?”

He sounded extremely confused as he was pulled toward the doll together with the whole ground.

The stones that paved the square and the earth and sand beneath it became one mass, enveloping the human figure, and the soldier, who was not fully aware of the situation, was caught in its way.

In the darkening plaza, there were echoes of the earth, sounds of hard objects rubbing against each other, and the scream of the soldier who was caught up in the mass and crushed by it.

“What happened?!”

Surprised by the noises, the soldiers readied themselves while the earth and sand that had gathered around the doll slowly began to take a humanoid shape as if to mimic the shape of the doll in its center until a clay figure appeared, so tall that one had to look up at it.

“Is this some common thing that an average citizen can buy?!” 

Loren, who was trying to distance himself from the clay figure while still holding Lapis by the waist, asked, and Lapis answered with regret.

“It’s a trap. It must have anticipated that someone would come to collect the town’s goods and placed it here. How could such a dangerous thing be on the market?”

The clay doll, which had finished taking shape, swung its arm. The thick arm made from earth and stone moved with speed and crushed a cart it made contact with. 

Seeing the collected goods loaded on the cart flying about, the soldiers immediately formed a formation and faced the clay figures with weapons in their hands. Their speed was quite impressive, and it was clear that the soldiers were well trained, but the clay figure rushed into them with such a stance and vigor that suggested there was not a shred of thoughts about defences in its mind.

The clay figure, whose own weight alone must have been quite substantial, rushed into the soldiers with such force that it was impossible for humans to stop. The formation of the soldiers was broken, and several of them screamed in pain as they were caught in the rush of the clay figure and knocked to the ground.

Then, without mercy, the clay figure stepped on them. Bright red blood splashed, and the soldiers convulsed as they were crushed by the massive figure, their limbs bent in strange angles.

The soldiers’ morale was not dampened by the fact that their fellow soldiers had been savagely trampled. They boldly launched an offensive attack on the clay figure with their spears and swords. But their opponent was made from earth and stones, and no attack seemed to be getting through properly, whether they were made by spears or swords. 

“What the hell is that? What did you do, Lapis-chan?”

“It’s not my fault!”

Gula, who was at a distance and was not involved in the initial chaos because she was not helping with the soldiers’ work or interested in Lapis’ work, raised her voice, and Lapis raised her voice in protest at her rude question.

“An earth golem, huh? That thing ain’t looking edible.”

“If you’re not going to intervene, just be quiet. And Loren, could you please put me down? My clothes are getting stretched.”

“Oh, sorry.”

Loren gently released his grip on her clothes, and Lapis got to her feet and adjusted her dishevelled garments.

Meanwhile, the clay figure continued to attack, and another cart was smashed by a swinging arm, splattering wood fragments and a large number of copper coins.

“First of all, >.”

Gula called her magic, and a ball of flame flew toward the clay figure, leaving a red trail in the darkness of the night.

As soon as the ball landed, it made a roaring sound and sprayed flames, scraping at the clay figure.

“Gula! You’re getting our soldiers caught in the crossfire!”

“You’re right…” 

Fortunately, no soldiers seemed to have been caught up in Gula’s magic, but those who were nearby the clay figure to attack it were agitated by the heat of the explosion and the flames, and they rushed away.

In the meantime, the clay figure sucked up more earth and sand from under its feet, and the parts that Gula had destroyed with her magic were easily repaired.

“It’s a pretty capable golem with auto-repair capabilities…”

“This is not the time to be impressed.”

The soldiers’ attacks didn’t seem to be getting through, and if the golem was repaired immediately after a casual attack, it would be quite difficult to destroy it to the point that it stopped working.

Still determined to do his best, Loren readied his greatsword and rushed toward the clay figure, which the soldiers were having trouble dealing with.

The clay figure immediately swung its arms to intercept Loren as he approached, but the greatsword Loren wielded cut off the earth-and-sand arm with such an ease that he felt almost no resistance. 

With a consecutive attack, Loren lopped off its other arm, but the clay figure sprouted new arms from its torso and thrust them at Loren, who was in the middle of swinging his greatsword.

“You’re a pain in the ass!”

He forcibly pulled back the greatsword and cut off the third arm, but he had to stop the fourth arm, which was stretched to add to the attack, with the flat of his sword, and the impact sent him flying backward.

Even though Loren still kept his stance, he staggered involuntarily as the ground beneath his feet pulled him toward the clay figure while he was trying to lunge forward again upon landing.

The clay figure, not missing an opportunity, rushed forward and swung its arm, and Loren once again caught the attack with the flat side of his greatsword. He rolled on the ground and glared at the clay figure with a scowl.

“Damn it! This bad footing!”

The clay figure would suck up the ground around it at every opportunity to repair itself, making it difficult to find a foothold. And if Loren was knocked down, the clay figure’s arms or legs would attack him, making the fight quite challenging.

While this was going on, one other soldier was sucked into the clay figure, and another soldier who had lost his footing was crushed, spraying red blood.

[‘I’m sorry, onii-san, but this doll is just not a good match for me.’]

Loren, unable to complain about Shaya’s apologetic thoughts, readied his greatsword again and slashed at the clay doll.

The non-living clay figure had nothing that could be siphoned by Shayna’s Energy Drain. Shayna lamented that even if she wanted to siphon the magic power that moved the little doll, which was probably the core of the clay figure, the thick layer of sand and soil would get in the way, making it impossible for her to get to it.

“The damage is unexpectedly extensive… Gula, can you please adjust your timing?”

“Arrrighty.”

Lapis and Gula turned their palms towards the clay doll.

Realizing that they were about to unleash some magic, Loren jumped back to avoid being caught in the line of fire. 

“>!”

“>!”

A glowing white bullet and a red-hot ball of flame were released from their hands, each landing on a shoulder of the clay figure and blew off an arm with a booming sound.

Before the dust settled, Loren, who had been closing in on the clay figure, dodged through the arms that it had created from its torso and sliced the torso right across, separating the upper and lower halves of the body.

But Loren did not stop there; the floating upper body was further sliced in a crisscross pattern, and the remaining lower body was also sliced down the middle from left to right, with a small doll cut in half falling out of the disjointed upper body.

“This should stop it.”

He thrust the tip of his greatsword into the broken doll fallen on the ground and breathed a great sigh of relief as the earth and sand that made up the body of the clay figure collapsed and formed a small pile on the ground.

“We’ve been hit pretty hard.”

Some soldiers were crushed and others were knocked to the ground; there was quite a bit of damage to the Empire army, including soldiers caught in the body of the clay figure.

As he watched the soldiers hurriedly carry away the injured and begin cleaning up the wrecked carts, Loren wrapped his greatsword in cloth and hung it on his back, looking up to the heavens with a sense of foreboding.

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