The Spartan closed the door behind him, before taking a deep breath. He had deigned himself to take on this swarm by himself now. He wasn’t too confident on being able to defeat these monsters alone, but he had a hunch that this was something he could do quite well by himself. Each time he had fought these soldiers, he had been wiped of his divinity and too exhausted to fight relatively well. Now?

He was refreshed. He was better than ever. There was a deep pool of divine power he could tap into, as well as being more alert of their presence. He had the capacity to win and all the power to do so. He simply needed to plan well and act accordingly to ensure his safety above all.

Without further ado, he sat down in front of the door and closed his eyes to think over everything he knew about these warriors. They were akin to Achilles in that they were not unkillable, at least unless one destroyed all the flesh protrusions scattered across the back of their legs. They could be killed temporarily, but they will eventually regenerate their lost wounds and regain consciousness. There was the hidden weapon of the cloak over their shoulder that was a part of their body that could entrap any incoming weapons and give them a good means of attack. Their armory consisted of a close range attack with their bone lance and a long range attack with their bone spikes, which had the tendon at the end to act as an anchor to recover their weapon.

That meant he could possibly disconnect their weapon with a good use of his divinity. As easy as it would be to use his powers to strike at all the flesh protrusions at all times, he understood that attempting to do so would lead to inaccurate attacks. That was something he had dealt with before with the second attack.

Now that I think about it, these soldiers did have a common pattern. They liked to open up with their ranged shots all together, which provided a moment’s opening. After the initial salvo, they’d split up to having a few being melees only and others resolving themselves to shooting spikes over and over again. That meant taking out the ranged soldiers would make all of them forced to rely on their lances to take him out once and for all.

But that wasn’t all. I can navigate now into the flesh itself. That means I won’t even need to strike, I could merely plan out the attack and have the damage be dealt without moving at all. The only flaw with this was the further intensive use of my divinity, which means that I would need to hold off on this until pushed to the edge.

He could hear chaotic marching coming closer. Those soldiers had gotten here a lot faster than he had expected, though he wasn’t worried anymore. After that bit of tactical planning, he had far more confidence than before.

He opened his eyes and stood up. He got his spear and shield ready, getting himself into a defensive position. His divinity was activated, isolated specifically within the confines of this room and waited with bated breath for the incoming warriors.

They came in shortly. The rush of fourteen soldiers came into the large hallway, each of them aiming their spikes at him with undisguised fury. Their arms shook as they all filtered into the area, forming a semicircle around him as they all got ready to attack.

Good. That meant their aim might be off and that the navigation would be done a lot easier than before.

These warriors all shook as they took a further step closer. Every one of them lifted their heads up and growled with hate deep in their voice.

“That is twice now. Twice now that you have stolen the divinity of our lord and have used the means for your selfish desires. Your crimes and sins have gone far too much. Do you have any last words before we execute you for your crimes against our God?”

The Spartan mulled over that proposal. He thought long and hard for a while, before looking up and giving a malicious grin.

“Perhaps this is something I should have asked of you.”

The soldiers all roared and launched their spikes, as he expected. As they were all within the sphere of his divinity, he now had the opportunity to strike at the elongated tendon. With such a convenient target in front of him, why wouldn’t he go for it?

He let all of those spikes slam into his shield and was knocked back into the door. However, he made a single thrust with his spear and he was able to navigate a path to each of the tendons. The strike landed and with that, all the spikes fell to the ground without any means of them coming back to the soldiers.

The warriors reared back in shock. However, doing so gave the Spartan the other chance he needed. Once more, he navigated a path to four of these warriors and struck again with his spear. Those fleshy protrusions in their legs all burst open, and they began to dissolve into dust and bone, which left ten of these warriors standing.

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Credit where it was due, they did not hesitate or rear back in fear. They all rushed forward with their lances with a loud battle cry full of fury, all of them ready to destroy the Spartan with this charge. However, this move was one that provided him with another means to dodge and get away from the incoming assault. As they were all coming in from a semicircle, that meant their movement was easily predictable and avoidable.

Dash to the right and move around the incoming charge. All remaining ten of the warriors rushed past him and with the chance given, he struck at one of the approaching legs and ripped it up completely. That soldier fell to the ground with a cry of pain, at least until the Spartan stabbed forward with his weapon and mutilated the other leg.

All of those attacks destroyed the flesh protrusions, seeing as how the soldier dissolved into a pile of dust and bone. The other nine tried to pivot around in a frantic attempt to turn and attack, but that was all for naught. He was given the time to navigate more paths, and once more he struck.

Another four went down. The remainder all roared and charged at him in four different directions in an attempt to flank him. Such an action born of desperation and not one of tactical sense. After all, if they had any kind of thought behind their assault, they would have easily realized that there was no means for them to win anymore in this attack.

They had no ranged weapons at this time. Their melee was consigned to a lance that was attached to their arm, decreasing the range and movement. All they had going for them at this moment in time was the fact that they had more numbers than him.

Something he was going to deal with rather quickly. He navigated even more paths and this time, instead of launching a strike, he tried something different. He used the same method of attack as the one he did against the horse monster earlier.

All the four soldiers found themselves rushing forward, but not towards him. No, they were all coming at each other and without any chance of resisting. They tried to move and fight against the call, but there was no way for them to do so effectively. The lances all found themselves striking their target, which so happened to be another one of the soldiers.

They all fell down unceremoniously, dead for the time being. The flesh was already starting to regenerate rather fast, and their spikes were crawling back towards them at a snail’s pace. Far too slow for them to recover in time to deal with him anymore.

He dashed forward and struck. His spear stabbed forward over and over again into three of the soldiers’, ripping apart their legs and destroying all the flesh protrusions within. They all turned to dust and bone unceremoniously, leaving behind a single soldier on the block.

By that point, it had fully regenerated its spike arm and its wounds. At that moment, it realized everything that had happened and frantically tried to pivot its spike arm to shoot at him, but to no avail.

With the divinity active, the Spartan was far too knowledgeable of every single action that the soldier might take. He knew that the warrior was going to try to shoot at him, and he was able to act accordingly. He held his breath as he reared his arm back, twisting his waist while keeping an eye on the warrior. Then, at that exact moment, he threw his spear directly at the shoulder of the warrior with one clear goal in mind: dismembering the limb and preventing it from shooting.

His aim landed true. The spear hit directly in the shoulder bone and shattered it completely. Bits of flesh and sinew with bone fragments scattered across the tiled stone floor as the warrior shrieked in pain and tried to get up. Whether its goal was to run away or attempt to charge at the Spartan, it mattered not. What was important was that it was disabled for the time being, and there was no reliable way for it to get back up.

The Spartan then used his divinity to bring his spear back to him, before dashing forward once more. Another strike was lashed out and this time the soldier’s other arm was dismembered. Once more, the warrior screamed in pain, before its stomach got stabbed by the Spartan and was pinned to the ground. At the same time, he slammed his left foot into the approaching spike arm, preventing it from reconnecting with the soldier’s body and thus disabling the warrior from attacking.

He had successfully imprisoned the warrior, at least for now. He ripped the spear right out of the stomach and breathed in as the flesh began to knit itself together. However, he then went on to slam his weapon into the right leg, puncturing through all the flesh protrusions all at once.

This time he knew that the soldier was on its last legs. He had effectively crippled it entirely. There was no way for it to use its regenerating lance arm to attack him, especially with the awkward angle of the limb. The spike arm was being held down with his foot and if he so desired, he could easily finish off this warrior here and now without much effort.

But that was not what he did. While that may have been the wiser move, there was information he needed to gather. These soldiers were intricately knowledgeable of all the ins and outs of the tower, and they were far more aware of how many of their regiment remained. He needed to know how to destroy the tower, release the curse of the fog from this city, and destroy every last monster that remained within.

He had a feeling that the answer to all of his questions lay with these warriors. They were sentient beings with an understanding of language, which meant he could talk to them. Interrogate them and get all the knowledge necessary to continue onwards to the necessary goal in mind.

So, he glared down at the warrior underneath his foot and spoke.

“Tell me. Who are you? What is this place? What can you tell me? If you give me the truth, then I will give you a merciful death worthy of a warrior. Deny me my desire, and I can make you regret the day you were ever born.”

The soldier froze at his words. Slowly, it seemed to shake, though this action wasn’t born of fear. Rather, this was from a single emotion that made the Spartan a bit annoyed.

Amusement.