Chapter 6: Ransack to Epiphany

Chapter 6:
Ransack to Epiphany

 

“SO, DO YOU KNOW how to shut it down?” Loren knew they had to somehow lay these ruins to rest, but the concept of doing so didn’t intuitively make sense to him.

“Lower your expectations a bit. There are plenty of things even I don’t know,” Lapis said.

She knows so much about ruins, but not the thing it’s most critical for us to know, Loren found himself thinking.

“In the first place, it changes from ruin to ruin,” she added huffily. “There’s no unconditional method that works for every single one. It is not that I’ve neglected my research.”

“S-sure.”

“It’s written all over your face, Mr. Loren. You shouldn’t look at people like that.”

“In that case, where exactly are we headed right now?” Ritz butted in for the first time, having been quietly listening from behind. Loren had the same question, and it would conveniently change the topic.

Lapis still looked a little displeased as he urged her on with his eyes, but after heaving a profound sigh, she answered: “I thought it would be prudent to first visit the private rooms of the ancient kingdom residents who operated these facilities. Someone was once responsible for all this, so it’s with their things that we’re most likely to find the manual to this place.”

“You mean people actually lived in here?”

As far as Loren knew, no one had any detailed information on where the ancient kingdom’s capital had actually been. Some said it lay at the bottom of the sea; others speculated it had flown through the sky. However, there were no credible records of its location, or of how it had fallen. If any kind of legitimate hint were ever found, adventurers would surely swarm the area seeking lost knowledge and technology, and it would soon be stripped to the bone.

That said, Loren highly doubted such information would be unearthed in the wild, untamed land near a frontier town. In fact, given this ruin’s purpose, he didn’t want to believe any human had ever withstood living there. It shocked him to think that people of that vaunted kingdom had deigned to sleep in such an inconvenient hellhole.

However, Lapis went on like this was the most obvious thing in the world. “While they did possess teleportation magic, such spells take up an enormous amount of mana. It just wouldn’t be worth it to waste so much power every time they needed to get from the lab to town and back, you know?”

“No. I don’t know.”

“Considering the cost, they likely decided to just make a residential area at the testing site so they could live there comfortably.”

“Is that how it works?”

“Yes, that is precisely how it works. And so, there should be a residential area in these ruins for the researchers and other related parties. I’m going to fish through the documents there for you-know-what, and if I find something else nice, I plan to secretly make off with it.”

“Don’t boldly proclaim your thievery,” Ritz tiredly retorted.

Lapis didn’t skip a beat, clenching her fist and making an even stronger declaration. “The owners have been dead for several hundred years. It’s not theft; it is my right.”

“But you know,” Loren cut in, “if this place was dormant until recently, doesn’t that mean the people of the ancient kingdom turned it off or whatever? Wouldn’t they have taken anything valuable with them when they did?” It was what he would have done had he been in charge of the place.

Lapis abruptly deflated, disappointed. “Yes, perhaps. And in that case, all the important documents might have been taken as well.”

“What will you do then?”

“What will I do?”

Seeing as she returned the question, Loren sent a troubled look behind them. Ritz’s party was no longer in any state to fight. Ritz and Nym were still able, but Chuck was wounded, and Koltz was just an old man now that his magic had run out. Loren himself couldn’t say he was in great condition either.

His greatsword’s edge had been nicked against the hard skin, flesh, and bones of the mock-goblins, and the flat wasn’t much better off. It was starting to bend ever so slightly. Granted, the mock-goblins weren’t solely to blame. He had come straight here from a battlefield, never once stopping to give it proper maintenance. This he did feel the need to repent for, but regrets would not better the situation.

“It might snap in another three swings.”

“That is a problem. Should we also scrounge up a new weapon for you while we’re here?”

“No. I’ll think about it when it actually breaks. Right now, the information should be our priority.”

“Now you’re getting it. And off we go!” With that, Lapis threw open a door halfway down the passage. She had done so without checking for traps, which took Chuck the thief by complete surprise, but Lapis brazenly stepped forward without a care in the world.

I guess we’re in the residential area already. She must figure no one was gonna booby-trap their own door. Granted, Loren also thought Lapis was being way too gung ho about all this. She didn’t even hesitate before she started digging through the drawers.

“Is this gonna be okay?” Ritz warily entered a bit behind, but all Loren could do was shrug. It was true he had no answer, and not saying that aloud was the least consideration he could offer.

“I happen to know a thing or two about ruins. Just leave it to me,” said Lapis.

The room did in fact give off the air of past habitation. There was a desk, a bookshelf, and a bed, and they were all falling apart. A testament to the many long years they had been left unattended. Furthermore, the way Lapis showed absolutely no reservation as she crudely flipped things over and turned them inside out either meant she really was as knowledgeable as she claimed to be…or she was acting out at random with no goal in mind. It was hard to decide. At present, she looked far more like a burglar than a priest.

“She definitely knows more than us. Let’s leave her to it,” Loren said. It was the greatest reassurance he could muster.

“Isn’t there anything halfway useful in here?” Lapis muttered.

Lapis’s search took her from room to room in a flash. She hadn’t found what she was looking for but still managed to unearth several books, ornaments, and coins of a bygone era. The books were written in a script neither Loren nor Ritz could read, but according to Lapis, a few of them did have to do with the ruins. They would apparently be sufficient evidence for the party to claim they had completed their exploration.

“Could we just call it quits with these and leave without you?” asked Ritz.

His party’s job had been and still was to explore the ruin; it had nothing to do with putting an end to its operation. Now that the quest was complete, it made sense for them to return to town and report in. They could then entrust the matter of shutting the facility down to the country or the guild’s top brass.

Loren didn’t see this as heartless. He would have proposed something similar had he been in their shoes—especially when one of their allies was injured and their fighting capability had been halved.

“I don’t really mind, but good luck getting out,” Lapis said lightly. Yet her tone made clear that she understood the state of Ritz’s party. In their current condition, they’d be fine if they were profoundly lucky and escaped the cave without any encounters. However, if they ran into another pack of goblins—or even just one of the larger mock-goblins—they were almost certainly done for.

As such, their choices were to either brave the old danger and depart or to risk the new danger that came with accompanying Loren and Lapis. However, the latter option came with an additional frontline fighter and a priest who could use blessings. Both options had pros and cons. It was ultimately a decision for their party to make, and they didn’t need an outsider to weigh in.

“Wouldn’t you be better off leaving with us?” Ritz offered. “It’s not like anything’s gonna happen here in the next few days, right? Let’s go report it and leave it to someone higher up.”

“By higher up, do you mean a gold or an augent rank?” Lapis asked. “How long will it take for them to arrive, I wonder?”

These ranks were one and two above silver, respectively. The system went copper, iron, silver, then gold and augent. However, it was said that anyone who could reach those higher ranks possessed powers exceeding the limits of mortals. The guild elevated only those who would prove without doubt they had earned the title, and such adventurers were few and far between. The number of gold-rank adventurers in the world was barely in the triple digits. Those who had reached augent were in the low doubles.

The legendary rubrum rank, highest in the lands, numbered so few that they could be counted on two hands.

In any case, there was no telling how much time and money it would take to mobilize such limited personnel.

“I won’t stop you, if you want to leave,” said Lapis. “I’ll pray for your safety.”

When she put it like that, Ritz could do naught but shut up and look down.

“You’re pretty ruthless,” Loren whispered to her.

“Nobody stands to gain from forcing them to come with us,” she replied just as quietly.

“And you’ve already somehow concluded I’m sticking with you?”

“Well, that’s, ah…” Flipping wildly through the book she had pulled from one of the bookshelves, Lapis fell into a troubled silence. Eventually, her hands froze. She looked up at Loren. “Won’t you? Come with me, I mean.”

“That ship has already sailed. Don’t plan on leaving just yet.”

“That’s good. Amazing as I am, this would be too much for me to handle alone. Thank you.”

Loren scratched the tip of his nose, averting his eyes from her beaming smile. He had just realized he had no memories of ever being properly thanked. Lapis’s straightforward words and expressions didn’t make him feel bad, not at all, and yet, for some reason, he found himself beset with embarrassment.

“Oh, and to repay you, Mr. Loren, I have some good news.”

“What is it now?”

Having come so far, Loren didn’t take the words “good news” too seriously. Not a single good thing had happened to him since he agreed to join Saerfé’s party on a goblin hunt. And while he silently lamented this, he made sure the grief didn’t reach his face.

Ignorant of his mental anguish, Lapis proudly brandished her latest book before his eyes. There was no doubt it was old. Perhaps by coincidence, or because it was kept well-preserved, despite the fading and the worn edges, the letters printed on it could be made out quite clearly.

“You think I can read that?” he asked.

“This is the ruins manual I was looking for. It dutifully spells out precisely how to deactivate it.”

“You can read text from that era? That’s pretty incredible.”

“Well, I’m not a priest of the god of knowledge for nothing.”

I’m not so sure about that, Loren thought. He studied the tome closely. Lapis had peeled back the black leather binding, gesturing at a certain page and insisting the instructions lay upon it. Of course, Loren couldn’t make heads or tails of it.

“Are all of his priests so well versed?”

“Some of them are. Namely me.”

Given how Lapis’s eyes trailed a bit to the side as she said that, Loren surmised this ability actually had nothing to do with her being a priest. It was just Lapis being herself.

“So what are we supposed to do?”

“There’s apparently a control room. We’ll be able to deactivate the facility if we fiddle with the access panel there, so that’s where we should head now. Mr. Ritz, what is your party going to do?”

Ritz glanced at his comrades, then Lapis, for a short while, looking lost. Finally, he found his resolve. “We’ll go with you guys. I get the feeling we have better chances together.”

“Is that so! Then we’ll have to hurry. So long as we make it, this incident is as good as resolved.” Lapis closed the book and tucked it under her arm.

Their plan was decided—all that remained was to carry it out. That was what Loren read from the stiff faces before him, but he reserved some private room for pessimism. No way would they reach the control room without incident.

“Whoever managed this place was an upright person. Relatively speaking. I mean, he didn’t hide the answer in obtuse riddles or send us on a wild goose chase for random keys,” Lapis said as she jogged—presumably toward where she thought the control room lay. “The dreadful ones give you such terrible riddles, they make you want to grab their creator by the lapels and scream, ‘How was I supposed to know that?!’”

“You sure about that?” None of this really scanned to Loren, but that wasn’t the real issue. For starters, now he was wondering where she’d gotten the chance to explore ruins before. And while he did want to ask, when he considered the terrifying answers he might get, he duly decided against doing so.

“I just read about it in a book,” she said.

“That so.”

She had apparently noticed his implication. Her reply sounded like an excuse, no matter how he sliced it, and Loren had his doubts. Incredibly strong ones at that. Lapis was the sort of girl he’d readily believe if she claimed to have rummaged through ten, even twenty ruins before.

“I really did read about it!” she insisted.

“Yes, yes, we believe you, so please get back on track!” Ritz exclaimed from his place running a bit behind. While his party had decided to tag along, that didn’t change the fact they were in no state to fight, and their leader had no interest in increasing their odds of encountering goblins.

Loren was pretty sure Ritz would be able to handle quite a few normal goblins on his own. After a run-in with their more developed cousins, however, it seemed he had come down with a terrible reluctance to fight any more goblins ever again.

“Dammit, what a terrible quest,” the warrior sighed.

“My thoughts exactly.” Loren couldn’t blame Ritz for the anxiety. Now, he didn’t know what exactly a typical ruin exploration entailed, but he wanted to believe this specific ruin was exceptionally horrible. Surely not all such quests could be this bad. I guess they’re pretty unlucky for having accepted it.

“We’re also pretty unlucky for wandering in here by chance,” Lapis muttered beside him.

“Do you read minds or something?”

“Your face is an open book, Mr. Loren. You really should take care.”

He rubbed his face to rid it of whatever clues were apparently on it. The mercenaries he’d known had never really examined each other’s expressions too closely, and none of them ever tried to guess what was on the other’s mind. Everyone had his own story, and everyone kept to his own. Perhaps that was why he had never been told such a thing before. Still, for her to guess his thoughts so accurately, he had to wonder just how easy his expressions were to read.

“Incidentally, the tough luck award would have to go to the party Mr. Ritz is—was competing with.”

“Yeah, point taken.”

“Now then, let’s stop talking for a moment so that I might inform you we’ve arrived.”

Lapis had stopped in front of a set of double doors, quite a large one at that. They had no visible knob or keyhole, and for a moment, Loren carefully studied the whole doorway, wondering how it was supposed to open.

Lapis wasn’t so cautious. She brazenly walked up and swiftly swiped her free hand—the one not holding the book—against its surface. The line her fingers drew burst into light; the door swung inward without a sound.

“That’s something,” he murmured.

“Don’t be too impressed yet.”

The door had opened up to a vast room. The wall directly across from it was entirely lined with stacks of large, glossy black boxes, though their purpose eluded Loren. Once again, they were covered with letters he couldn’t read, and patterned with twisting, meandering lines that rolled horizontally across their surfaces.

Nothing else notable occupied the space. It was a terribly dreary, empty room, though for some reason, the double doors on the left and right walls caught his eye.

“This has to be the control room. From here, we can manage the facility operations.”

Lapis walked up to the wall of boxes and stroked the surface of one. Then she began tapping at it with some sense of purpose. It wasn’t long before the letters and lines scrawled across the box wall’s surface shifted in response to her movements, though Loren could only tell that something had changed, and he didn’t know to what end.

“Do you know what you’re doing?” he asked.

“Of course I do. Just leave it to me. This should be a cinch to someone of my…” Lapis stopped.

Something had clearly gone wrong, and as Loren peeked at her hands, he noted a stream of bizarre red letters flowing across the surface of the box directly in front of her.

“That’s…not right?” she murmured.

“What is it now?”

“This is strange. For some reason, I’m being booted out. I managed to bring up the command console and was just about to enter the abort key. But. Well.” Lapis repeated the same exact motions, an unsettled look on her face. The same bright red letters once more ran across the box.

Loren couldn’t read them, but he knew she had been rejected again. As the party exchanged anxious looks, Lapis furrowed her brow, flipped through the book again, and tilted her head.

“How peculiar. I don’t think I did anything wrong.”

“Any ideas as to why it wouldn’t work if you did it right?”

“If I had any ideas, I would have done something about it by now. Maybe the equipment itself has begun to malfunction over the years? In that case, there’s nothing I can do.” Lapis slid her fingers over the box’s surface again.

This time, the entire box turned red with black letters cascading across it. This sudden change made the wary veteran adventurers lurch back. Loren remained by Lapis’s side, anxiously watching over her.

Lapis put a finger to her chin and pondered the matter a while, then clapped her hands together. “Oh, that’s right. Why, this used to be a research facility, didn’t it?”

“What about it? And wait, what does the red mean? What does it say?”

“A research facility is where you find researchers,” said Lapis.

“That sounds about right.”

“And researchers should all be properly registered to the facility.”

“So what? What are you trying to say?”

Loren’s grew slightly irritated as he failed to follow, but Lapis paid his mood no mind. She was already back to sliding her fingers over the box.

The letters streaming across the surface gradually increased in number and speed, until eventually the light from the walls surrounding them changed to an uncanny red. All three of the room’s doors suddenly flew wide open.

“Hey? What just happened?” Ritz asked, frightened.

Lapis’s hands froze. “I failed the biometrics,” she replied without looking his way.

“Bio…bio what now?”

“This equipment was engineered so only registered researchers could input orders. When someone outside the system—meaning me—touched it, it rejected my commands.”

“That can’t be good.”

As they began to realize what was going on, Ritz’s party grew flustered. Lapis continued her work regardless.

“And because I failed three times, the system went into lockdown. Now it won’t do anything for me.”

“Is that what the red letters said?” Loren asked, but he had a vague sense that he was wrong. He was growing increasingly pessimistic, which was completely warranted, seeing as everything about his life lately had tended to take a turn for the worse.

“No, that’s something else. The first red letters were warnings, but not anymore.”

“Then what do they say now?”

“To put it simply, we have been identified as unlawful entrants.”

What Lapis so casually divulged was, in fact, a serious problem, the sort that should never be treated casually. This new information brought a tight smile to Loren’s face and pale horror to the others’. Lapis simply continued her work.

“The hell do you think you’re doing?! You just made things worse!” Ritz howled, but before he could grab Lapis, he was restrained by Nym and Chuck. They knew hitting her wouldn’t accomplish anything, but it was clear from their faces that they didn’t know what to do either.

“The facility’s defense system has been activated,” said Lapis.

Maybe Lapis thought she was making sense, but Loren didn’t have a clue what she meant. “Could you be a bit more specific? What exactly are we expecting?”

Lapis took a moment to get her thoughts in order before spelling out the situation. “The facility has identified us as intruders and is directing the goblins to remove us from the premises.”

Despair washed over the party’s faces. Loren, meanwhile, gripped his sword in both hands and prepared for battle. He needed to be ready for close combat if one of the large mock-goblins appeared, but there was no guarantee that was what they were facing. While the room had three entrances, he couldn’t imagine the enemy would flood in from each one simultaneously. What’s more, if they were just facing ordinary goblins, the situation wasn’t completely hopeless.

“I’ll try my best to cheat the system,” Lapis said. “We’re safe the moment I’m in—it won’t matter how many goblins there are.”

“And you want us to buy time, right?”

“I’m sorry I have to ask it of you. But I will be defenseless while working.”

“How do we know you can do it?” Ritz asked. Despite his despair, he was painfully aware that fighting was now his only option, and his grim expression showed that resolve.

Again, Lapis never stopped tapping away as she answered, “Because I’m a priest of the god of knowledge!”

“That’s not a justification, you know?” Loren retorted.

She was getting quite a bit of mileage out of that line, and she honestly seemed to believe she could explain away nearly anything with it. Loren feared that, at this rate, she was going to give other people some strange ideas about this god-of-knowledge business. I wouldn’t want them to have any misguided expectations when they meet a real priest of his.

“I haven’t lied to you, not even once,” she sniffed.

“Maybe not. Whatever. Just keep doing what you’re doing.”

Loren had much more to worry about than misplaced hopes at the moment, so he let that be the end of the matter for now. Lapis nodded in return, for once utterly serious, before immersing herself in the device and hearing no more.

It wasn’t long before Ritz yelled, “They’re coming!”

The wide-open doorways were filled up with the small, typical variety of goblin. However, while there weren’t as many as there had been in the torrent that chased them through the corridors below, the horde was by no means small.

Furthermore, the very ground they stood on had identified them as intruders. If it was taking steps to purge them, there was no telling how many more goblins were on the way. If this early wave was just an indicator, then the next would be even larger—and that might have broken anyone.

“Are you kidding me?!” Ritz howled at the heavens. “Koltz, you stick with the missy! You too, Nym, I’m counting on your support fire! Think you can do this, Chuck?!”

“Can or can’t, I just gotta, goddammit!” Chuck called back with all his strength, no doubt hoping to dispel all worries about his injuries.

He looks passably all right, Loren thought as he swung his sword. He had been given ample space to wield it without issue. The problem was its durability—for now, he chose not to think of it and smacked the weapon’s edge into the goblins that leapt at him.

It was more a club than a blade. A few of the leaping goblins were torn in two; those that weren’t crackled with the dull snapping sounds of broken bones as they fell writhing to the floor. Loren crushed the ones who survived underfoot, his eyes already seeking out his next challenge.

One of the large mock-goblins had arrived.

“Oh, for crying out loud! It’s here!” Ritz called.

“I’ll deal with it.”

It was entirely possible that no weapon in the ruins could endure the might of that towering mock-goblin. The monster ran at them, its empty hands gaping, ready to grapple. Trauma from the previous attack locked Ritz and his party in place, but Loren brandished his greatsword and charged.

He lowered the blade with a yell; the brunt of its force struck the mock-goblin’s left arm and sank in from its shoulder to its collar bone.

The wound poured black blood. As the mock-goblin cried out in pain, Loren dug his foot into its torso and kicked to yank the blade out. With the force of the release, he swung again. He aimed at the mock-goblin’s flank, which had been left wide open as it held its broken left arm. Luckily, the sword struck where there was no bone. The strike tore through, undeterred by the monster’s sturdy skin and flesh. Its entrails splattered to the floor.

That didn’t stop it, however. It grabbed at Loren before he could exit his own swing. He was, for a brief moment, dumbfounded by its sheer strength. Then he recovered himself and pulled the sword back for a thrust. The blade’s pointed end found its home in the mock-goblin’s windpipe, the hole it opened spraying air and blood as the monster finally fell to the floor.

“Damn, that guy’s really something,” Ritz muttered in a daze.

“If you’ve got time to be impressed, use it to kill some goblins, would you?” Loren shouted back as he glanced down at his sword. Though stained black with blood from hilt to point, it didn’t look too damaged yet. But the reverberation from the strike to the mock-goblin had told him the blade didn’t have much left to give.

“That’s not good,” he murmured, as he mowed down the goblins closing in on him.

While the blade had the durability to withstand normal goblins, the larger ones were a different story. Each attack he unleashed against them significantly worsened the weapon’s condition.

“How much longer, Lapis?!”

He didn’t understand what exactly she was doing to the ruins, but she’d said the goblins would no longer be an issue if she succeeded. At the moment, his only option was to trust her and pray that she finished before his sword was completely useless.

“I’m doing my best here,” she replied.

Beside her stood Koltz, who could do nothing. Next to him was Nym, who nocked arrow after arrow, picking out goblins with impressive accuracy. With every twang of her bow, a goblin’s throat or eye exploded in blood. But each fallen monster was all too quickly replaced by another in the endless stream that followed.

“Unfortunately, I’m up against the safety measures of the ancient kingdom,” said Lapis. “Why, it’s unimaginable to think they could ever be so easily overcome. Please understand you’re putting me on the spot here.”

“Quit beating around the bush! I’m asking for an estimate.”

“More than a few minutes but less than an hour.”

Loren clicked his tongue—what a horrid answer, absolutely ambiguous and totally useless. He didn’t even have the means to measure an hour here. Sure, if he were in a town, he could check the magic clock that was erected per regulation in every square. But outside of towns, there was hardly any means of checking the time to such an accurate degree.

He was more than well aware of how pointless it would be to shout at Lapis now. But here he was, buying time, without knowing how much to bargain for.

“If only I had some magic left,” Koltz moaned.

“You had no choice. No one blames you,” Nym consoled him, voice level. But her face turned grim as she tapped her quiver to listen for its contents. “Ugh. I’m almost out too.”

She would have been better off if she could have recovered the ones she’d fired, but the room had devolved into an all-out brawl. She wouldn’t get that chance.

“There’s no end to them! I can barely step anywhere with all these dead bodies!” Ritz snarled.

Still, so long as more mock-goblins didn’t appear, Chuck and Ritz could handle the rest without issue. Normal goblins were no match for these silvers.

As the mounds of corpses increased, choking the room with their size and stench, Loren noted the appearance of collector goblins here and there.

“So they’ll do their job even at times like these,” he said.

“Yes, well, they are valuable resources,” said Lapis, not turning from the boxes, “and valuable data, after all.”

Loren took out several goblins with one swing and held his sword ready for the next volley before turning his head to Lapis. No matter that he had to keep fighting, taking care not to slip on the blood and guts smearing the floor that glowed ever stronger—he paused. He couldn’t let that slide. “Could you repeat that?”

“They are valuable resources and valuable data?”

“I get the resource part. Data?”

“The bodies. I’m positive they’re being used as data for goblin enhancement. You can only truly accumulate combat data through physical experience, after all.”

You mean… Loren looked down at the tens—hundreds—of goblin corpses at his feet. Their bodies would be collected and recycled somewhere in the ruins, thereby producing new goblins. When that happened, the machinery of the facility would rummage through their dead brains, extract all their valuable experiences, and apply those to the new specimens. These accumulated experiences were the cornerstone of goblin enhancement.

Loren understood that already, but a new epiphany left him faintly dizzy, and he had to hold his head. “You mean, the more we fight…”

“The tougher the goblins become. Incidentally, as long as the bodies have been built, it apparently only takes a few seconds to install the experiences. At least, according to the manual.”

Just as a chill ran down Loren’s spine, the next batch of goblins roared as they barreled headlong through the open doors. Ritz and Chuck fought these newcomers with haggard faces, and they tensed all the more as they noticed something different about this oncoming wave.

The previous goblins had been goblins, plain and simple. They’d blindly swung their weapons, haphazardly guarding themselves with crude shields. These new beasts moved with purpose—they knew how to manipulate their weapons, and they seemed accustomed to positioning their shields. Their fighting style diverged wildly from any goblin the silvers had ever fought before.

“What’s up with them?! They’re not going down easily!”

“Stay down like a good goblin!”

Still, their techniques were crude and childish, and no match for silver-rank adventurers. That said, they were still a threat in sufficient numbers. While they had yet to suffer any major injury, Ritz and Chuck were both decorated with minor cuts and bruises. Worse, once upon a time, every one of Nym’s arrows had reliably taken out a goblin. Now, one here, another there, they deflected her shots with their shields.

Then Lapis read out something no one wanted to hear. She was tapping the boxes with her left hand and flipping through the manual with her right. “Once a sufficient number of normal goblins have accumulated these experiences, thereby establishing their validity, the information will be applied to the enhanced versions.”

If they could trust what she read, then soon enough, the knowledge these lightweight goblins accrued would be transmitted to the next batch of enhanced mock-goblins. The mock-goblins were already a trial and a half to defeat. If the next time they attacked, they came equipped with an understanding of how to truly fight, their threat level would be unfathomable.

“My weapon’s barely holding up,” said Loren. “The day one of those things comes at us armed is the day I throw in the towel.”

His sword had survived sorties with typical goblins before, but with their newfound, albeit rudimentary, combat skills, the new generation had taken to hitting it with their swords and shields. Loren wasn’t even fighting a mock-goblin, yet he saw thin, all-too-visible cracks spread along its length.

He could feel his sword’s fragility when he gripped the hilt. With each passing slash, Loren worried it would cry out and snap. He’d get no rest, though, as the stream of goblins showed no sign of thinning. They burst into the room one after another, and now even Loren had his share of minor wounds.

Finally, the bad news arrived.

“The big one’s here!”

Ritz pointed grimly toward a doorway shadowed by a conspicuously taller silhouette. Granted, only one mock-goblin stood before them, but unlike the prior versions, this one held a massive wooden club.

Loren rushed forward as soon as he saw its weapon, smashing into it with all of his momentum. Neither Ritz nor Chuck nor Nym could handle this monster, he knew that. It was his responsibility.

He did not have the element of surprise. As Loren’s sword came down, the mock-goblin met it with a hammering blow from its club.

The air echoed with the clash of metal on wood, and Loren’s slash was diverted. To his disconcertion, Loren found himself at a disadvantage in both weight and physical strength. As they shoved against each other, Loren and his sword were losing. He lurched backward as the club swiped through the air where his head had been, forcing him back even further.

The mock-goblin closed the distance and swung again; Loren just managed to draw his hefty blade back in time to block. He summoned all his power to press back against the wood.

“Bastard…”

No matter how hard he pushed, he could barely match his foe’s enhanced strength. As they shoved, competing for the right to live, the mock-goblin’s eyes narrowed ever so slightly.

“Did…did you just smile?” Loren didn’t know if it could understand him. But the moment those stifled words escaped his lips, the mock-goblin’s mouth joined its eyes. Its smile now was wider, deeper.

It was sneering at him.

The moment he realized that, Loren heard it—the snap within the depths of his mind.

“Don’t underestimate me, dammit!”

If he couldn’t compete with the brute strength of arms, the answer was simple. He needed to use more than just his arms.

Something within urged Loren forward like a red-hot stake hammered into his brain. It drove him to launch a kick into the mock-goblin with all his might.

It faltered ever so slightly. Retreated a step. But the smile hadn’t vanished from its face. As if to say it had no doubt this puny human couldn’t hope to match its strength, that Loren was trying to put up a strong front. That it knew he was a weakling, struggling to the last. The mock-goblin knew that if they continued exchanging blows, it would undoubtedly come out the victor.

Then that smile—that sneer—stiffened.

Loren stood before it. He had crossed the distance between them at a speed that made clear he hadn’t given a single thought to defending himself. His next blow was once again intercepted by the mock-goblin’s club, but the impact felt different this time.

The mock-goblin was forced another step back—Loren charged again, even faster this time. His second blow, while quicker, was once again blocked. The third blow was stronger still. Unable to endure any more damage, the mock-goblin’s club snapped in two.

In a panicked attempt to flee, the mock-goblin shoved through the hordes of goblins behind it. But Loren only continued to gain speed. His fourth slash, unleashed while running, made mincemeat of the lesser goblins who found themselves in its path before it struck the mock-goblin’s hand. The force of Loren’s blow severed hard skin and flesh, even bone, as the mock-goblin’s arm erupted in black blood.

The mock-goblin cried out in pain, only to be pushed back even further by a body blow. Loren had entered a tackle as he exited his swing. The mock-goblin couldn’t regain its footing; it could only watch as the greatsword swung once more.

This slash was the mirror image of the previous. It sunk deep into the mock-goblin’s other forearm, then its torso. The blade made it all the way to the other side of the mock-goblin’s body in the blink of an eye. It carried so much force that the mock-goblin’s severed upper body spun up into the air as the rest of it crumpled, spouting blood.

None of this stopped Loren. Accelerating even faster with each step, his arms swung at such speed that the air around him roared. By this point, he was beyond caring where he aimed, or if the edge of his blade even made contact with goblin flesh. The absurd mass of this man and his weapon spun at preposterous speeds, forming a mighty whirlwind.

Any and all who dared touch this wind was immediately severed, carved up, smashed, dismembered, flung about, and scattered, reduced to mere objects. Loren’s fury was so great that Ritz and Chuck stopped fighting and hurriedly retreated to where Nym and Koltz were stationed. If they’d remained on the battlefield, there was no telling when they too would have been dragged into the storm, and who knew what would happen then.

“The hell is that…?” Chuck muttered in a daze. He had, for the most part, perfectly articulated his party’s sentiments.

Loren had become an overwhelming cyclone of a one-sided massacre. Goblins that stood against him were turned to blackish-red chunks of meat, splattering the floor, the walls, even the ceiling. At this point, some goblins even attempted to flee, only to be prevented by the still oncoming stream of their own brethren. In the end, they were all consumed by the storm.

Soon, a few mock-goblins appeared in the doors. They blocked one or two of Loren’s attacks each before succumbing to the fate of the other normal goblins.

“Hey, doesn’t this ring a few bells?” said Chuck. “He moves like the wind, sweeping through all who stand before him. That rumored…”

“The Cleaving Gale?” said Ritz. “Couldn’t be. Let’s be real here. What would such a famous mercenary be doing as a copper-rank adventurer in the middle of nowhere?”

“Oh, come on! How many people could pull this off?!” Chuck practically screamed.

Not that anyone had the answer.

It was said that any mercenary with a moniker could single-handedly tip the scales of war. Among them, the swordsman known as the Cleaving Gale was said to rival those who stood at the very summit of martial skill. In a battle of pure sword technique—so long as magic wasn’t involved—rumor had it he could outdo even the Infernal Edge and the Blade Fiend. Who in their right mind would believe that a warrior so often equated with the grim reaper would be an adventurer of the lowest rank?

Regardless of the truth, the silver-rank party was growing increasingly cornered, and no one denied that Loren alone might be able to overturn what had, until this moment, looked like impending doom.

“Don’t you think it might work out at this rate?” Koltz cheerfully asked.

“Misplaced optimism will be the death of us,” Nym shot him down.

“Then what? You want us to give up all hope?!”

“Wrong. Don’t leave it all to him is what I mean. We are silver-rank adventurers. Where is your pride?”

“That’s, well, that’s true…” Chuck awkwardly scratched his head.

Nym pointed at the man who continued to fight, unfaltering, at a fearsome pace. The man who carved through every intruding goblin without pause. “That there spells trouble.”

“Huh? What about it…?”

Neither Chuck nor Ritz could tell what she meant. Nym was only able to notice the danger thanks to the sounds she could pick up with her elven ears.

“His sword. It’s about to break.”

“What?!”

Loren too was well aware of this danger. He slew goblin after goblin in a frenzy in part because he knew he wouldn’t get another chance. He was already on borrowed time. The shiver in the hilt and the tinks in his ear all told him his blade was at the end of its life.

From time to time, whenever Loren’s emotions reached a fever pitch or he suffered a major injury, something inside him snapped and he found himself exhibiting powers beyond his usual capabilities. This he knew. It was not a strength he could summon on command, so it wasn’t the least bit convenient. But he had been saved by it more times than he could count.

However, he also knew that, if he survived, he would feel like hell soon after. He would be immobile, exhausted, and, to say the least, in a hell of a tight spot. Even so, he thanked his luck that he had somehow summoned the power now.

His body was one thing, though; it would recover. His sword was another matter. It would most definitely give out before he did. And while he could manage to fight with speed alone on his side, at least for a while, soon he would falter, and he would be left with nothing.

Loren slashed through the neck of another mock-goblin, severing flesh and bone all at once. He didn’t know how many he had killed by now.

The moment its head hit the floor, the sword let off a shrill sound. Cracks lanced across the middle and the top half broke off, shattered from within.

“Dammit!” Loren cursed. But the loss of half his blade didn’t suddenly mean he couldn’t fight. The sword had been too long to begin with. Even halved, he could carry on.

However, a decrease in mass meant a decrease in force. Perhaps the lightened load would increase the speed of his swing, but it would decrease the damage dealt by every individual blow.

The broken edge soared out from within the winds of his violence, clashing into the wall.

“Damn, that’s not good! His weapon’s done for! How much longer?!” Ritz called out.

Lapis’s eyes shifted briefly when the blade hit the wall but swiftly returned to the task at hand.

“Hey, how about it? Hey?” Ritz repeated.

“You can rush me all you want. I’m going as fast as I can.”

“I get that, but at this rate, your partner’s going down!”

A shorter blade also reduced Loren’s range. That meant fewer goblins slain in a single attack, and this slowed Loren’s overall pace—he could no longer keep up with the goblin deluge. The only way to win—to survive—would be for Lapis to finish her work.

“I know that, believe me, I do! But I’ve already input the commands to shut down the facility and halt the goblins! It’s just the last one. I can’t make the termination code of this stupid control module work!” Her voice was louder, rougher. She was clearly irritated.

Ritz didn’t understand even half of what she said. “What?”

“In short, the machine I’m operating right now won’t stop properly! If I could stop it, the other two commands would instantly take effect! Then the goblins would stop in their tracks and the place would fall apart and we could all go home!”

“If you just have to get it to stop, can’t you break the thing itself?”

“Oh, why, I hadn’t thought of that! It’s only survived hundreds of years without maintenance, and it works good as new! But yes, it will stop if you break it, so have at it, why don’t you?!”

Lapis stepped back and Ritz slammed his sword into the device. However, his attack left not a single scratch. On the contrary, his sword snapped.

“That’s—it’s so hard!”

“It’s not the material, it’s the spell sequence coating the surface! It’s not going to break from your half-baked attacks! In fact, I’d say nothing short of a magic sword would do the trick!”

Their argument had reached Loren’s ears. He didn’t understand any of the finer details, but apparently, they had two options. Either they got Lapis more time or they destroyed the machine she’d been fiddling with. The machine, however, was protected by some spell that Ritz’s sword couldn’t pierce.

Once he’d thought that far through it, Loren had an idea. Whether or not it would work didn’t quite matter; he just had to do something. Otherwise, he would run out of strength, and then they’d really be screwed.

“Lapis! Get away from there!” he shouted.

Summoning the last of his great strength, Loren took an enormous swing to clear out the goblins around him. He didn’t have time to check if Lapis had followed his command. Instead, he stuffed a hand into his pocket and grabbed the item he wanted.

In most cases, items of this sort activated upon being imbued with a particular intent. If Loren wanted to be extra sure it knew what he wanted, he had to clarify his desires verbally as well. Thus, upon throwing it at the machine Lapis had been working at, he shouted at it, loud and clear:

“You better bloody work!”

The item flying through the air was a golden necklace with a dull glow. It burst with light at Loren’s command and unleashed the spell with which it had been enchanted.

“Disjunction?!” Lapis had already taken a few steps away from the machine—but now that she realized what Loren was up to, she ran for dear life.

Upon collision, the necklace released all the mana it had stored from the time the goblin magician had used it. The burst of power obliterated whatever “spell sequence” had protected the device.

Loren followed this up by chucking the remnants of his sword. “Break already!”

Hurtling with the power of Loren’s monstrous strength, the halved sword spun wildly before colliding head-on with the surface of the machine.

Its defenses dispelled, the machine was no more than base material. Loren’s brute strength could instantly decapitate even a mock-goblin, and that power allowed his broken weapon, now essentially a lump of heavy iron, to tear straight through it. The jagged end of the once-was blade carved a cavernous gash through the machine’s surface and sank deep into its innards.

“Th-that was close…” Lapis murmured.

The necklace hadn’t been given much time to store mana, so its effective radius was evidently quite a bit smaller than it had been, and Lapis had successfully escaped the range of its influence. Even so, one wrong step and she would have lost the use of her limbs again.

The way she looked at Loren nevertheless made it quite clear she was ready to complain all about it. He saw that, felt some odd flare of appreciation, then promptly ran out of strength and collapsed.

“Hey?! Mr. Loren?! Mr. Loren?! Are you okay?!”

Lapis rushed over to him in a panic while the other four watched, entranced. The tower of devices displaying all manner of letters and insignia slowly faded to dull black, inert. Simultaneously, the goblins who had rushed to expel the intruders fell to the floor one after another like marionettes whose strings had been cut.