Everyone ran to Thanatos's side when the doors began to open. The rumble could be heard across the city. After a whole minute, the doors stopped revealing something inside.
"Is that some kind of golem?" It was a giant stone statue with long and thin limbs. Instead of a head, it had some sort of cylinder with a single eye that looked like some type of gemstone. He looked behind the golem and saw a smaller door behind him.
"How did you open the door?" Andel said as he grabbed his sword, preparing for a fight. Looking at the size of the golem, it was clear he didn’t have a chance to fight this thing. "Should we retreat?"
Before Thanatos could respond, the gemstone inside the golem head began to shine and it became clear. "Run!" a laser shot at them and scorched the sands. The stone was blown to pieces, and the other statues crumbled before the golem’s power.
Everyone managed to evade the attack and ran back to the shelter. "What the hell was that attack?" "Some kind of spell or fire ability?" "It doesn’t matter if we stay close, we are dead. We need to retreat."
It was obvious that fighting this thing was a stupid idea, but they didn’t have much of a choice. He looked back for a moment and saw the golem running at them at a tremendous speed. He was too fast for his size. His stone legs made giant strides, and he was about to catch them.
Sensing the impending battle, Thanatos tried to think of something. "[Ice wall]" he used extra mana to make it enormous. He knew the golem could break it, but he did it to obscure his view and hide. "Now split up and hide!"
Andel was supposed to be the leader, but seeing the golem chasing after them and the laser attack had shaken him. He followed Thanatos's orders because he instinctively knew he was a leader. Everyone scattered among the ruins, and the golem didn’t even stop as he crashed through the ice wall.
The head began to move in all directions, trying to find them. But they weren’t waiting for him; they were making their way back to the shelter, using the ruins as cover. Suddenly, the golem stopped looking and began to sprint again.
Shit, he’s going to the shelter. He must have detected Mansur or Sally. Without them, we can’t go back to Last Drop. This changed the plans. The only thing they could do was fight to buy enough time to escape, but was Sally fast enough to escape this golem?
"Run back. I'll try to buy time with Fatema!" Andel screamed as he jumped from the top of a building. He ran toward the golem, who turned around the moment he heard his voice.
With barely any delay, the head shot another beam at him. It was smaller but much faster. Andel had to use a special ability to increase his speed, and even with that, he lost an arm. He didn’t flinch as he continued running for the golem. It was a futile attempt, but he was a guide, and he had to uphold his part of the deal and protect his clients.
Fatema moved between the shadows and managed to reach the legs of the golem. She covered her daggers in poison and tried to slash him. The daggers broke after one strike. "This is not normal rock, he's completely enchanted!"
The golem didn’t look at her as he kicked her, sending her body flying to the other side. Andel only had to look at her for a moment to see the blood flying and her broken limbs. Fatema was killed with a single kick.
"AAAAAHHHHHHH!!! [Sand stride]" he gained speed and began to accelerate. The golem shot three lasers, but they missed as Andel became a blurry image running across the desert. In the blink of an eye, he closed the distance and jumped at the golem. He hit the arm and felt the impact reverberate in his body. He only made a scratch.
"Then how about this [Double strike]!" He attacked the leg twice, but he barely managed to crack some of the stone. He looked above at the light descending on him. Andel’s body evaporated under the laser without leaving anything behind.
Those sacrifices were useless as the golem managed to catch up with the rest of them in less than a minute. "Guess there is no helping it. [Summon Undead Condor] [Summon Undead Worm]" Thanatos touched the ground and used his power to summon two more sacrifices.
The condor flew above and scratched the golem’s head while the worm burrowed itself in the sand and managed to stop his leg for a moment.
"Wait, you could do that? Why didn’t you use it before? What are those things?" Kamil tried to ask, but they were too busy running to explain.
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The condor was flying around the golem dodging the beams, it shot. The Undead Condor could normally use this ability to cause dizziness, but golems were immune to mental attacks. The only thing he could do was chip away at him slowly.
SLAP, after only three attacks, the golem adjusted his speed and caught the Undead Condor with one hand. It squished him until it turned to dust. Next, he shot another laser at the Undead Worm hiding in the sand and resumed the chase.
They managed to reach the shelter where Mansur and Sally were waiting.
"What happened? I hear rumbling and then more noise?"
"Mansur, we have to escape! A golem is chasing us!" Kamil explained the situation as best he could. "Andel and Fatema tried to buy us time, but..."
"We need to go now." They didn’t have time to put the boxes back inside the shelter, but it didn’t matter; right now they had to escape with their lives.
Everyone got inside, and Sally started to sprint away from this place. A light came from behind and disintegrated one of Sally’s legs. "UUUHHOOO!" she made a noise from the pain as the stone hand grabbed her other leg and threw her at the building.
The golem charged another beam and...
"[Strengthening]!" Thanatos came forward and blocked the beam with his hands. He could feel his hands burning, first the fingers, then the palm of his hands, but he managed to hold on until the laser stopped. His hands were gone, and only burned stumps remained.
"[Claw of Fox]" Kit leaped and slashed at the golem's leg. He hit the same spot that Fatema and Andel had attacked. His claws pierced the stone, making the crack bigger, but it wasn’t enough. He watched as the hand was about to crush him.
"UUUGGGGAAA!" Sally charged at the golem and, with all her weight, she broke the leg. The golem tried to grab her, but Sally used her jaws to bite the hand. Using all her strength until her mouth broke, she managed to surpass the magic defense and break the stone. This was the last act of defiance of Sally, but the golem used its other hand to punch through her shell. Instant death.
Arrows flew and bounced off the stone. Mansur tried to save Sally, but his arrows were useless. Another beam evaporated his body. But it was okay; he acted as the decoy while Kamil healed Thanatos’s hands with a potion.
The golem was about to shoot them, but someone was falling on top of him. "Where are you looking, Sally still isn’t done with you!" Neo used her mana to summon an apparition of Sally, crashing on top of the golem and biting off the other hand.
The weight managed to break the torso of the golem, but he shot the beam anyway. The ghostly Sally disappeared, and Neo lost her leg.
The moment Thanatos's hands healed, he ran forward and used [Fireball] on both hands. The balls exploded against the laser, raising a curtain of smoke. The golem watched, trying to see anything, but only a small handkerchief flew by his side. At that moment, it turned yellow, and Thanatos teleported.
The handkerchief turned violet, and thanks to his property to bypass magic barriers, he cut the gem stone inside the head.
BOOM... The explosion sent everyone away. The stone body blew into pieces and the golem was destroyed. From the cloud of sand and the ruins, Thanatos stood back up and went to Neo's side.
"Neo, are you okay?" She was bleeding from the leg and unconscious. "[Heal]" he put his hands on and closed the wound with mana. Finding the original limb in this sand was foolish, so he regenerated it.
"Cof... cof, you did it, you killed that golem." Kit came from the side, and Kamil was behind him.
"We... we are done. Sally and Mansur are dead. We can’t go back. Most of the provisions were destroyed too. We won, but we’re still going to die." He felt on the sand, he lost all hope. He was the only one who knew this desert. They couldn’t make it back on their own.
"Kamil, is there a way to contact another guide team or someone who can come rescue us?"
"No, it is over. The only thing we can do is ration the food and water. We pray that another team comes here and saves us before it is too late. Also, how did you regrow an entire limb? You summoned those creatures and fought the golem. I saw how you blocked the beam with your naked hands and magic. Who are you?"
"It's a long story you don’t want to know."
"Don’t give me that crap! My friends are dead! You know how to open the door. I had to use my best potion to heal your hands and you just regrew a whole leg like nothing!" He was emotional and confused, but he knew fighting him was impossible, so the only thing he could do was plead.
"Please, at least tell me before we die of thirst."
"I don’t want to interrupt, but is that a sandstorm in the distance?" Kit called their attention to the west, where a giant sand sandstorm was making its way here.
"Without Sally, we could hide in the ruins, but we don’t know how long it is going to last or maybe it has predators inside. The food and water are going to be ruined. We have to take some with us and hide somewhere." Kamil tried to think, but Thanatos knew exactly where to go.
"Follow me, take all the supplies you can. We are going to hide inside the temple." He carried Neo in one hand and two boxes in the other. They ran back to the temple. This time, he could see the smaller door in more detail. It had a mirror with some glyphs on the side.
"You who pass the test... behold the truth of Rabase... Let my knowledge flow across this land..." He walked closer to the mirror, and once his image was reflected, the door opened.
A dark hallway extended. For a moment, they almost thought about running away and hiding since they couldn’t possibly fight another golem. Luckily, nothing else happened.
"Let’s go stay behind me." He led the group and passed the unconscious Neo to Kit. He could see something in the dark at the end of the hallway. It was a large room made of metal with a lever in the center. He felt the familiarity and pushed the level.
"Are you crazy? What if it’s a trap?"
"No, this is an elevator." They heard the door outside close and the room begin to descend. "I knew it. The symbols here are the floors, up and down."
They descended for almost two minutes until the tunnel opened and a huge city stretched below the earth. This was the real capital of Rabase.