It took less than a second for the lead golem to fire his eye laser beams at me. Fortunately, I had seen the spell before and knew the beams traveled rather slowly, allowing me to sidestep it.

I sprinted toward them, needing to close the distance for my explosive orb to guarantee a hit.

As their eyes began to glow again, I realized dodging while carrying the orb was nearly impossible. Though I wasn't as close as I wanted to be, the golems weren't known for their agility.

I hurled my explosive orb at the lead golem. It made no attempt to dodge, and the orb struck it squarely in the center. The explosion ripped the golem's chest wide open, mangling its left arm and obliterating its right. The head was damaged but still attached. Curiosity overtook me as I wasted precious moments examining its insides.

A blue crystal was still fixed by multiple wires that seemed to go into the head and arms. Movement from two red beams snapped me out of my reverie, and I tried to dodge. One beam hit my Mana Shield on the shoulder.

Surprisingly, instead of being blown away, nothing happened. It seemed the shield was better suited to magic-based attacks rather than kinetic ones. Two more beams struck me, but again, they were absorbed without issue.

Expecting them to keep firing, I was surprised when they stopped and just stood there, as if waiting for instructions. Realizing this was my chance, I fired a lightning bolt, but it didn't do much; the wiring they had was definitely not electrical, and the kinetic part barely dented the metal plate.

Unfazed, I quicksanded the lead golem's legs and pushed with a Wind Blast. He was big and wide, so the wind pushed him back. One of his legs snapped at the knee when he hit the floor. I fired another quicksand spell, and his whole body was now half-submerged.

A series of loud noises alerted me to the last golem approaching. It seemed to decide that a melee approach might work better, and its size made its approach anything but subtle. It swung its arm at me, yet I had more than enough time to jump to the side and trap its legs in another quicksand. A Wind Blast later, and it was also trapped on its back in the quicksand.

I looked for Alira and found her destroying some pipes at the end of the room. Without much thought, I started blasting pipes as well with my lightning bolt. After only a few seconds, Alira stopped and looked at me.

"Something is coming our way from the lower levels," she said, her voice tense. As I stopped blasting, she sat in silence, concentrating on the sound. "It's the golems, they're coming, and there are a lot of them," she almost shouted.

If they managed to climb up, we were done for—there were hundreds of them below. I ran to the ramp and started focusing on another explosive orb. It didn't need to move, so I tried to speed up its creation. I poured power into it, knowing that even if I lost focus, it would still explode and complete my plan. The sounds were getting louder and louder, so I opened my eyes, hoping it was enough.

I fired a few lightning bolts with my other hand, managing to create a small hole in the support structure of the ramp and placed the explosive orb there. There was no way to put a timer on it, so I waited until I saw the first golem before activating the orb.

The explosion worked better than I had hoped. It threw me clear of the rubble while collapsing the ramp.

As I regained my footing, pain radiated throughout my body. Nothing seemed broken, but I would definitely feel it tomorrow morning. Walking to the edge of the floor, I saw the golems covered in rubble, struggling to free themselves. It would take hours for them to dig out, and not counting potential flying robots, they had no way to reach our floor. We were safe for now.

I turned to help Alira with the sabotage, but I had a feeling this wasn't over. Whoever built this place had surely received some kind of warning. But, as they say, no time like the present. I began firing lightning bolts. Though they didn’t do much damage to the wires, it was having an effect, and as it was a ranged spell it was easy to reach all across the room.

Just a few minutes into our sabotage, the beams hitting the middle started to visibly pulse. Clearly, we were making an impact, albeit a slow one. At this pace, it would take a lot of time.

An echoing voice shook the floor. "STOP," it commanded. I turned around, but there was no visible source for the sound. The voice spoke again at a normal volume. "Who are you?"

I needed to disrupt the machinery, but this could be a chance to gather information. Alira had also stopped wrecking stuff and was looking around for signs of attackers, slowly moving toward me. The builder was clearly immensely powerful, so it was better to assume the worst.

"I thought gods were all-knowing?" I said with slight humor in my voice.

After a slight pause, the voice responded, "You must be from a world where the aether is unstable. It would explain how you were able to get here without my knowledge."

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Dust started rising from the floor and coalesced into a sphere. "How very Interesting. By mere proximity, you are disrupting the aether enough that all I get from your companion are scattered thoughts, and she is clearly from this planet."

"I've been told I am a man of many talents," I said. After all, I did destroy his toys, so another quip wasn’t going to do any more damage.

"Yes, quite. Still, a god must have helped you get here, but I'm guessing you're not going to share that information freely," the voice continued, melodic and almost friendly but with an indescribable creepiness that gave me goosebumps.

"Why don't you ask the other gods? Oh wait... I don't think you want to draw attention to your little clandestine operation." This had to be off the books; the conflict between the gods was just getting started.

"Surprisingly astute... for a lower being," the voice replied. Was he trying to annoy me, or was condescension just his style?

"A condescending god, a little cliché if you ask me," I retorted.

"It may be a bit trite, still would you speak with respect to a bacterium?"

"Oh, please. You may be powerful, there's no denying that, but where I come from, gods snap their fingers and universes are born," I replied, letting a hint of condescension creep into my voice. "A golem factory is not that impressive sorry" I added after a slight pause.

If he was angry, he didn’t show it. Though the pause that followed was longer than any before.

Alira whispered, “I’m going back to sabotage. Keep him talking.”

A laugh filled the room, "I can't read your thoughts, but I can still hear whispers"

Alira ignored him and started dismantling some pipes.

"No god knew of my little clandestine operation as you say so you must have stumbled upon it by accident maybe we can reach a deal, that damage is kind of hard to repair" it said.

"Really, you want to deal with a bacterium?" I almost laughed.

"I'm a generous god." he seemed to imitate my humorous tone.

"I'd consider negotiating, though there's the minor issue of your genocide against the ursine," I retorted.

"An idealist" he said, yet it seemed more like a question.

"Definitely not an idealist, but I draw the line at genocide." I said.

"Then what if I promise to leave them alone, and you can leave here unharmed" he couldn't really be serious, maybe he was keeping me talking.

"Even if I believe you and you actually keep your word, even gods build armies with one purpose in mind." I said.

He laughed again "Tough negotiating it is then, pity it isn't quite ready some testing was still needed but alas it will do."

I immediately looked around, expecting some kind of portal, yet nothing came. After a minute or so, I thought he might be bluffing.

"Maybe you were right, and it really needs more testing" I said, although no reply came.

A few seconds later, I saw something climbing the outer wall with incredible speed. After it reached our height, it somersaulted to the edge of the level.

Now that it was closer I could see it was still some kind of robot but built with agility in mind instead of strength. His skin was not metal but some sort of shinny plastic stuff, it looked almost liquid. He turned to me, and its face had the same massive eyes.

It fired his eye beam and I didn't manage to dodge it in time as it was twice as fast. The impact also staggered me backwards meaning it also had more juice.

I cast my lighting bolt, but it dodge it like a damn agent from the Matrix just by moving his torso. It immediately darted towards me and jumped exactly when my quicksand spell reached the floor under his feet. Even without his feet stuck I nevertheless hit him with my wind blast, but he immediately turned to the side and with his already lithe body it did almost nothing.

He fired his eye beams at me and at the moment I was staggered he jumped over me and transforming his hands into hammers started to hit me from all angles.

I didn't even have enough time to properly be surprised at the T-1000 like move as I was in the defensive as the hits also had enough power in them to stagger me. Trying to get my bearings, I activated my slow time and managed to dodge the next three hits with just enough time at the end to trap one of his legs with a quicksand.

He shifted his leg like his hand, and it became free almost immediately before I could react and cast any spell. The attacks started again, I couldn't use the slow time without a plan as I had limited uses of them before it exhausted me.

I fired a black hole randomly, and thankfully I did seem to have an effect on him, as he immediately used the ground to keep himself from sliding towards it. It didn't last long though, by the fourth black hole it started avoiding them like a gymnast and continued his pressure on me.

I could feel the Mana Shield started to weaken, I still had time, but at this rate my gut was telling me I had minutes left under such stress to the shield.

Panic was starting to take hold as I couldn't think of anything to help me. Suddenly the attacks stopped.

Alira was now fighting with the upgraded golem. Steel met whatever the hammers were made from, and sparks flew from each strike. Alira was just a tad faster and managed to score a hit.

It immediately switched from hammer to swords and went on the offensive. It's rapier like sword weaved through the air faster than with the hammers, and they were now matched in speed. I wanted to help, though their speed made any spell I could cast hit either of them.

Deciding to trust her with the duel, I started to focus my attention on the machinery and hurled spells on them with increasing frequency, but I realized there was no way to do enough damage in a short time. Plus, I couldn't help watch over my shoulder at the duel from time to time, slowing me even further.

I started to charge an Explosive blast while peering over my shoulder. They circled, each anticipating the other's moves. A swift feint and parry, then the rapier found an opening striking a decisive blow into Alira's shoulder.

Her scream shattered my concentration. I quickly fired a Lightning Bolt, hitting the golem's back. It didn’t slow it much but gave me time to reach Alira.

Realizing I couldn’t stop it, my only choice was to buy us more time. I used slow time and cast quicksand at its feet. Pouring more power into the spell, it engulfed the golem, sinking it through the floor.

"We have a minute until that thing gets back" Alira said, using her other hand to stuff the wound to stop the bleeding.

"I have nothing to stop that thing" panic was beginning to grip me again.

"Maybe you shouldn't have rejected my offer"the gods voice could be head again. He even had an evil laugh this time.

There was no time for that. I needed something, and I needed it quickly.