At some point Ratface had fallen asleep. A new day greeted her. So too did her throbbing ankle.

The thing had swelled up like a cabbage. She gave it an experimental poke and hissed at the pain. She wouldn’t be able to walk on that, she’d have to find a stick or get good at hopping.

She reached into her bag to pull out a sandwich and came back with a rat. It wiggled in her hand. The usual grace it had was lost now it had been captured.

Ratface grinned. A nice wriggly meal to start her day. She brought it up to her mouth but paused as the thing squeaked desperately at her.

She sighed and put the rat down, where it scrambled to the other part of the tree and began grooming itself. She reached into her bag and grabbed a sandwich which she ripped a quarter off and split that for her and the rat. The two munched as they watched each other.

The rat must’ve found its way into her bag when she wasn’t looking. She snorted. It must’ve been in there as she’d fought the golem. It would’ve been a rude awakening from its impromptu caravan service.

The thought of caravans brought her back to her current problem. She needed to get passed that golem. The village of Pinewood only had one road in or out and it was through the golems stomping grounds. Emphasis on stomping. There might be another village in another direction, but she needed to find a reliable source of food quickly and her best bet was another village to stock up at until she found more goblins. What was currently considered stealing would just be sharing in a goblin village. At least it had been in hers.

The swamp was noisy in the way a place filled with life was noisy. The swamp attempted to swallow the noises but between the frogs and the insects it was a losing battle.

“I wonder how edible frog is,” mused Ratface. She eyed the different pools of water throughout the swamp dubiously. The issue with a swamp is that it’s a dangerous place. It wasn’t that every log in the water was an alligator waiting to get her. It was that she didn’t know which was which.

All of this could be avoided if she could just get closer to the road but that would put her in the way of the golem again!

She was between a living rock and an alligator place. It wasn’t a fun feeling.

Her best bet was to get closer to the golem. All her problems lead to there so she might as well scout it out. Ratface crawled towards where she’d last seen it. The rat soon joining her on her travels. They kept to the trees where they could which was slow going but a lot better than becoming alligator food. When Ratface had first come to Pinewood she’d crept along the outskirts and watched as one of the alligators pulled another creature into the water and thrashed it around. She wasn’t keen on joining the poor thing.

Ratface crawled closer and closer to the golems lair. She kept her eyes open and more importantly her ears. The closer she got the less noise she heard until the steady hum of the swamp had hushed to barely a whisper. She stopped there and looked for a spot with a better vantage point.

A few minutes of climbing and hopping later and she found herself a safe spot to watch from.

The cleared area stretched out before her and evidence of her battle was still there. There were rents in the ground where the golem had shot at her and thick furrows where its limbs had dug into the ground. She looked for the golem itself as it had gotten itself free. If she looked where they’d fought there were new lines of water. It looked like the golem had given up trying to pull its way out and simply dragged its limbs through the mud until it got back into the deeper water. There it sat in the middle once more. It looked just like a hill again, covered in vegetation and dirt. If it wasn’t for the water around it faintly steaming, she wouldn’t have been able to reliably find it even knowing it was there. Had it been steaming the first time she came in too? She didn’t know golems ran that hot.

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The other things Ratface could see from her vantage point was where the road got close to the area. It lightly intruded in the golems space which was unlucky for the travellers bound for Pinewood. She could already see a few broken caravans, all bearing telltale burn marks. Hopefully the people had made it out and only lost their valuables.

There was the faint glint of metal from the road and Ratface spied the granny adventurer making her way towards the golem. The woman kept walking until she was just on the edge of the golems area then set her travel bag down. She didn’t put on her helmet, instead electing to continue wearing the straw hat. A helmet probably wasn’t going to stop anything the golem did anyway.

Ratface’s breath caught as she spied something in the side of the bag. The telltale deep red of health potion glinted out there. With that her mobility problems would be solved. She settled in to watch the battle as the granny drew her sword and walked towards the golem. Her sword was huge. A giant thing that would have looked out of place on anyone who wasn’t as imposing as the grandma. She walked towards it at a leisurely pace.

The moment she crossed the invisible line the golem reacted. Its eye began to glow, and it shot a beam out. Unlike Ratface, the granny didn’t dodge to the side. Instead, she whipped the flat of her blade towards the beam. It blasted into the blade threatening to topple the woman, but she planted her feet. The beam deflected away from her and into the golem itself. It stumbled at the hit and immediately stopped shooting the beam.

The golem paused for a moment as the granny got closer. Ratface could feel its annoyance from here. It must’ve decided against the beam again because it began to wade through the water towards her. The moment the two got close it swung down at her. The granny stepped to the side almost casually, like she was out for a midday stroll rather than fighting a thing twice her size. The arm slammed into the ground, and she raised her sword and swung it down on the arm. Once. Twice. A third time! With a crack that echoed across the swamp the arm dislocated from the golem. The golem turned to look at its useless arm then back to the old woman. It began raising its leg to stomp on her. The runes on the granny’s armour glowed blue for a moment and she dashed forward, dropping her sword and grabbing the golems leg as it was still raising it. Her armour shone blue for again and with a groan she pushed the leg up. The golem wobbled for a moment before it fell to the ground, a huge splash announcing its fall. It tried to stand up and began to thrash when it found it couldn’t.

The old woman walked back to her sword. She fished it out of the mud and flicked some dirt off it before making her way back to the golem. She walked onto its thrashing body. Her feet sure as she walked towards its centre. Ratface thought she’d stab it in the head but instead she grabbed her sword by the blade and began to slam the pommel into its chest. There was another crack as she did so and suddenly a bright blue light shone out from the golem. The grandma reached into its chest and pulled out the source of the light. Ratface mouth gaped open. That was a mana core. It looked intact from where she sat in the trees. The golem stilled the moment the core was taken out. The old lady shook her head then dunked the core into the water where it erupted in steam. She pulled it out and made her way back to her gear. Wrapping the core in a silvery cloth, the woman popped it into her travel bag. A quick clean of her sword and then she was off, walking away from Pinewood into the world at large.

Ratface looked at the road. Thanks to the adventurer, her path was clear.

Now she just had to steal from a woman than singlehandedly killed a golem and she’d be good to go.

She gulped. Grabbed the rat and put it on her shoulder, then hopped after the adventurer.