by Chuuni Suki
The large sword flew with great velocity, and when it collided with the shield that the golem knight had set, the shield was flipped. Not missing that chance, Shia swung Doryukken from below. The golem knight which had a large build received the impact in its abdomen and floated in the air. Although it tried to swing the large sword in desperation, Shia raised Doryukken then using the centrifugal force, clashed with the large sword, and this time Doryukken attacked the floating knight from a lower angle.
Just like the previous golem knight, was blown away like a cannonball and flew at the nearby golem knights, swallowing them with its large build and laid on the ground.
A smile floated on Shia's lips. It was not like she felt the pleasure of fighting. She was only happy that she could fight properly. She felt that she could continue traveling with Hajime and Yue now. At that moment, she was a little distracted.
On the battlefield, such a thing is fatal. When she'd noticed, a lot of knights' shields had already drawn near. Somehow, the golem knights decided to throw their shields toward Shia. As expected of golems, they flew with extraordinary power, although it wouldn't be fatal against Shia's strengthened body, they have enough power to cause a concussion. If that happens, it's easy to imagine what'll happen next.
How careless! Though there was no time to think that, she at least tried to steel herself to endure the incoming attacks. Then, a laser-like water current attacked the shields right before they collided with Shia, and it bent their trajectories. The shields passed by the sides of Shia's head, then crashed into the golem knights behind her.
"... ...Unpreparedness is one's greatest enemy. Punishment will be thrice the usual."
"Fue!? Just now, was that from Yue-san? I-I am sorry, also thank you very much! Wait, punishment will be thrice!?"
"Nn... ... don't daydream."
"Uh, yes! I will try my best!"
With a "Meh!" —like feeling Yue scolded her, Shia was also conscious of her small carelessness. She braced herself while reflecting on it. Once more, she tried to defeat the approaching golem knights. With help from water lasers that flew from behind her back, the golem knight that tried to perform a sneak attack from behind of Shia was confirmed to be cleanly bi-sected.
Shia felt a warm feeling inside her knowing that Yue will protect her back. To not show any disgrace in front of her master, she raised her fighting spirit.
Afterwards, the same water current flew at the knight who tried to go into the rampaging Shia's blind spot, and cut it just with sharpness keener than blades. What Yue used was middle-ranked magic from water system called "Rupture." It was a water cutter that fired the moisture in the air at ultra high-pressure.
In Yue's hands were big metallic water bottles. There were also two other water bottles on her shoulder strap. These were something taken out by Hajime from "Treasure Box." Every time Yue muttered the magic's name, water cutter would fly out from the water bottles that she held.
Although Yue was able to use the moisture in the air, she thought it would consume too much magic power to pressurize it from scratch. Moreover, utilizing the exit of the water bottle to aim, the water cutter that came out didn't contain magic itself, so it wouldn't affected by the disintegration and disappear.
Shia's explosive area attack, was supported by Yue's water blade that covered her blind spots. The knights were incapable of breaking the duo's combination, and one by one they were destroyed as if being played with.
Hajime who took a side glance to look at Yue and Shia's splendid cooperation floated a wry smile.
"Oioi, you can do it after all. I wonder if I would also be capable of displaying something good?"
While joking to himself, Hajime started to enter close-combat with Donner-Schlag (...).
He warded off a descending large sword of a knight with Schlag's barrel, and shot its helmet at zero distance with Donner in his right hand. Without looking at that knight who flew backwards, he warded off an attack from behind with Schlag, and shot the knight behind him without turning around, then he squatted down while rotating to dodge large swords that were swung horizontally, the knights' hands were intersected and he shot their sides.
A shot that didn't use "Lightning-clad" ricocheted from the knight's shield and hit a nearby knight's knee joint, destroying its balance. And then he jumped up and while reversing his view, he destroyed the knight and another nearby knight at the same time from overhead. He parried large swords aimed at him with the back of his hands, then fired to his side while mid-air and four knights' heads were shot and crushed at the same time. As he landed, he took the bullets from "Treasure Box," and reloaded the guns by spinning them, and he resumed shooting while spinning. The surrounding knights were blown away radially.
Doing that, without leaving a chance to be scratched, they slaughtered those golem knights one by one.
However...
"... ...?"
While counterattacking the golem knights, Hajime raised his eyebrows in doubt. The reason being that, although a lot of the golem knights were destroyed, there was no change of density that approaching.
It seems, Yue and Shia were also having that doubt. Finally, when they carefully observed the battlefield, the golem knights that they had defeated could not be seen.
"... ...Replication?"
"Looks like it."
"That can't be!? Then, it won't end at all!"
That's right, after the golem knights were destroyed and lost the glint in their eyes, more knights with the same glint and body as those knights were reproduced in no time and rejoined the rank.
Shia raised a panicked voice while mowing down the approaching knights. It was reasonable to say that, after all no matter how many she defeated there was no meaning to it. However, Hajime and Yue were calm, there was no impatience in their expressions as they kicked around the golem knights. This might be what is called a difference in experiences. They had experienced something like this many times in the depths of the Abyss. Naturally, they were stronger now.
"... ...Hajime, if it's a golem then there must be a core"
Just as Yue had said, it was normal for golem to have a core inside its body, and that core was the source of its power. The core was made using demonic beasts' magic stones. It was written down on blueprint of Oscar's cleaning golem. What Yue said was to destroy that core.
However, Hajime floated a bitter expression having known Yue's proposal.
"What can I say, these guys didn't have a core at all."
"... ... Really?"
"Aa, I have confirmed it using magic eye, there is no mistake about it. Although I was able to find some suspicious magic power from the golem..."
"I-it ended with that after all! It'll be bad if this keeps up!"
Shia raised her voice filled with impatience. Hajime only let Shia's shout pass through his ears, then used "Mineral Appraisal." For golems that operated without core, he wondered, "Are they made using special ore?"
His thoughts were right on the money.
Induction Ore
An ore that naturally induces magic. It was able to establish a connection of magic power between two or more induction ores, using one ore, other ores with an established connection of magic power can be remotely controlled.
These golem knights made using induction stone must have something that acted as a remote control. Although Hajime and his party thought it was replication, it was actually rearrangement by manipulating the ore, they only needed to add to the parts that were insufficient. It's actually more like reconstructing rather than replicating.
If you looked carefully, you'd notice that the floor was also made using the induction ore, and parts that that appeared to be cut away could be seen. Those were probably used to replenish the parts of the golems. Without defeating the controller, it'd be truly endless.
"Yue, Shia. There must be something that's controlling them. Because it's seriously endless, let's breakthrough them!"
"Nnh."
"B-breakthro
ugh? Affirmative!"
Under Hajime's signal, Yue and Shia immediately dashed out toward the altar. Hajime advanced using Donner-Schlag's rapid-fire against the knights and as they scattered a path was created, two grenades were thrown toward the knights that approached from behind. With a big explosion in the back, the golems knights were felled one after another by the blast and the shockwave.
Shia advanced through the space that Hajime made, while rotating Doryukken, mowing down golem knights all the while. The golem knights were skillfully throwing their shields and large swords at Shia only to have Yue's "Rupture" come and split them.
Hajime whose duty was to guard the rear, fired his railguns in rapid succession at the golem knights approaching from behind. Using the opportunity, Shia passed through the encirclement and arrived in front of the altar. Next was Yue who arrived in front of the door after jumping over the altar.
"Yue-san! The door-!?"
"Nn... ...It was sealed after all."
"Au, as expected!"
In front of their eyes were the suspicious altar and door. They had guessed it'd be sealed. That's why, they originally thought it'd be troublesome and decided to slaughter the knights instead. While they resolved to release the seal on the door. Shia complained as usual, which resulted in knights flying in from the stairs.
"I'll leave the seal to Yue. It'd take too much time to breakthrough it using transmutation."
Hajime stood beside Shia to look out for her back. Just as Hajime said, to forcibly use transmutation to breakthrough the door, although it might be possible, it'd consume large amounts of magic power in this area, and it'd also take a lot of time. That's why, having reached the altar with the yellow crystal with so much effort, it was faster to release the seal normally. Hajime who thought so, left the duty to Yue who had bad magic consumption.
"Nn... ... leave it to me."
Yue readily acknowledged that and immediately took the yellow crystal from the altar. That crystal was in a square made of pyramids shape, if you looked carefully it was made from combinations of solid blocks.
Yue looked back at the door behind her. There were three indentations there. Yue thought for a while, then started to disassemble the square of pyramids. She reassembled those blocks to make new cubes that fit the indentations.
While assembling those, Yue observed the indentations in the door. Then, only by carefully observing it she noticed small characters that were carved there. They said...
"I wonder if can you solve it~, I wonder~"
"You'll die if you don't do it fast, you know~"
"Well, it can't be helped if you can't solve it! You're just an ordinary human unlike me after all!"
"Don't worry! Even if your head is bad you can liv-... ... you can't live! How regre~ttable! Pugyaa—!"
They were the annoying sentences as usual. Yue was truly irritated by it. With her usual expressionlessness, she concentrated to solve the puzzle although she wanted to punch the door.
Somehow, Hajime and Shia could feel her anger from her back, and could only curse in their minds while concentrating on destroying golem knights.
"Hajime-sa~n. Please use DOPAh just like before~"
Like a certain black thing from the kitchen, the golem knights swarmed disgustingly, that's why Shia begged Hajime to use a grenade.
"Idiot. That must be thrown where it was sure no trap was installed. If it was thrown near the stairs, you must know what might happen."
"You said it now even after it laid waste to the golems before?"
"Well, it was something Miledi Raisen made. Isn't it possible that it won't react only against golem?"
"Uu, I can't refute that..."
In certain ways, Hajime and Shia only played around with the golem knights so they could make idle talk. In the beginning, Shia was truly impatient about it, but when she saw how calm Hajime and Yue were, she calmed down.
"But, it made me somewhat happy."
"Aa?"
Once more, while smashing a golem knight then making it fly with a kick, Shia blurted that out.
"Just a little while ago, I, who was only capable of running away, was able to fight together with Hajime-san... ... it made me so happy."
"... ...You are truly a curious one."
"Ehehe, I, finally able to flirt with Hajime-san after we capture dungeon ! Yay."
"Oi, you. How did you connect to that, it's the same as raising a death flag. To be a tragic heroine will be too much for you, so stop that. Also, I just can't rebutted it, but you know this material, right?"
"It was, "I absolutely won't let you die, my honey?", something like that? Hajime-san, mouh!"
"You twisted it too much! Recently, although I was scared of your positivity... ... I don't have any appropriate remarks for it..."
They kept chatting for several minutes while repelling those knights. In a way, in the space between the two who kept flirting, "nuu~," a shadow appeared. It was Yue.
"... ...Flirting is forbidden."
"Well, we didn't do anything like that."
"Nufufu, is that what it looks like? How embarrassing~"
"It's better for you to shut up..."
Somewhat, after Hajime look with a side glance at Shia with a tired expression, he turned to Yue who looked a little displeased. However, without re-thinking about this situation, this time she showed a little proud look having done a great achievement.
"... ...It's open."
"How fast, just as expected of Yue. Shia, fall back!"
"Yes!"
Hajime took a peek behind him, and as Yue said, the seal had released and the door was open. There seemed to be nothing unusual inside the room. Hajime told Shia to withdraw, then he retreated toward the room. The golem knights wouldn't able to chase after them if they closed the sealed door. Yue was the first to retreat, next was Shia who jumped beyond the door, and because it was a double door they were on standby at both sides to close it.
Hajime threw several grenades as farewell gifts, and dived into the room. Although the golem knights rushed after their escape, they were scattered by the strong impact that came from the grenades. Their balance were destroyed. Without missing that chance, Yue and Shia closed the door.
Inside the room, using farsight it was confirmed that there was nothing at all. Surely, even if it was not Miledi Raisen's room, there must be some clue leading to it, right?, and that was what they thought while losing their momentum.
"This, isn't it that? Even though there was a conspicuous seal, there was actually nothing inside, is it that kind of punchline?"
"... ...That can't be"
"Uu, Miledi. How much do you want to take us for a fool!"
The trio were dropped because of that most possible possibility, suddenly, they heard the familiar unpleasant sound.
GAKON!
""" !?"""
Along with the sound of mechanisms beginning to operate, the room trembled. Then, G came from the side of Hajime and his party.
"Kh!? What happen!? Did the room just move!?"
"... ...Looks like i—!?"
"Ukya!?"
At the same time Hajime said that, this time the G came from above. Because of the radical change, Yue may have bitten her tongue as she covered her mouth with teary eyes while trembling. Shia fell from the ceiling in a frog-like pose.