The statuesque foe focusing on Kiran sent their spear towards him. It pierced through the air with enough power to easily split a person apart. Thankfully they missed allowing him the chance to attack back.

His arm thrust the tip of his sword forward only for the shaft of their spear to send his trajectory elsewhere. Something hard then slammed up against his back sending him to the ground.

With a quick twist around to face his foe, the tip of the spear came down fast. He moved just a tiny bit away just barely allowing the tip of their spear to hit the ground instead of his flesh.

This thing moves way faster than it ought to be able to.

He quickly stood back up and put some distance between themselves. For a statue, it had a lot of agility and maneuverability that he hadn’t come to expect.

Come on, I can handle this. He let them thrust their spear towards him again this time anticipating it. He avoided the blow and sent his sword down in a vertical arc. Without even thinking, he instinctually sent a swarm of mana to enhance the blade right as it began to slice through them.

Since they were not made of flesh, they likely didn’t feel pain but the statuesque figure didn’t like that he sliced through its lower left abdominal area. Bits of stone flaked off and covered the ground.

His strike against them enraged them.

Their attacks became quicker and they spun the spear around in such a way that it prevented any offensive strategy. All Kiran could do was back away. Eventually the spinning maneuver stopped and their body lunged upward. Their large feet came down towards him so Kiran rolled right as their feet hit the ground where he once stood a moment ago.

As he spun around, the tip of their spear slid off the smoothed-out ground causing it to rupture. The tip of the spear lifted off the ground coming straight at him in an upward motion. His head flew backward just in time to avoid it from slicing it apart.

The queen sure wasn’t messing around by having these things down here. The central pillar was indeed the most important aspect to humanity’s survival in this domain so it was not all that surprising.

He took a deep breath as his foe questioned their next move. Everyone else appeared focused on fighting them one on one for now as well which made the fight even numbers-wise.

These statues though, they were really testing his ability. In some ways it was more difficult than the queen herself although she hadn’t been quite as strong as he had anticipated. These statuesque foes on the other hand didn’t or wouldn’t feel pain theoretically and they were quite large giving them a major advantage in that regard.

So far it liked to utilize its spear as an extension of itself. It did everything in its power to keep him from getting close since it knew that was what Kiran preferred.

There was but one tactic he decided he needed to employ: destroy their spear.

It came for him once more as it normally did. They thrust it forward hoping to hit him. Rather than rush towards them, he instead sent an enormous amount of energy into his summoned blade and sliced the tip of the spear off leaving them just the stone shaft.

They swung the shaft at him. He ducked, rolled, and avoided them from hitting with it. Without the tip, it wouldn’t be able to pierce him so well, but that didn’t mean they were without options. They could easily crush him with the shaft. One wrong hit with that thing, and he’d be out cold and dead a second later.

A being such as this did have weak points just like humans and he meant to exploit it. He got up real close working his way more towards their groin. As he stood almost underneath it, he began trying to cut through their right leg just up above their ankle. His cut didn’t cut it completely, but it caused them to hesitate in using their right leg. They shifted their body around carefully trying to get distance between them.

The shaft slammed wildly against the ground causing dust and debris to fly everywhere. Kiran backed away since its wild tactics would easily get him killed if he stayed nearby it.

In an unexpected maneuver, the statue dropped the shaft and stood up straight. It put its stone hands together in a prayer-like position and began to mutter words in a language he did not understand nor recognize.

“Don’t let it finish the prayer!” Abigail yelled over towards him as she stayed busy fighting her own statuesque foe.

Kiran took advantage of their behavior by jumping in the air. The tip of his sword went for their face, but their hands which were still pressed together lifted up just in time to take the attack instead.

Their prayer in an unknown language continued and Kiran’s blade was stuck in at least one of their stone-like hands. He let go of his sword dropping down to the ground. He quickly unsummoned that stuck sword and summoned another. However, it appeared that whatever power this prayer had for them, was beginning to do its thing. All of the damage he had done to the statue began to heal and a new spear began to manifest in one of their outstretched hands.

Don’t tell me I’ve got to do all of this again. He sighed finding his body being worn down. He had already been worn down a bit after his fight with the queen so he was becoming tired more rapidly than he would’ve preferred. Fortunately for him, someone came to his aid.

Abigail came to assist him leaving behind her own foe to lend him a much-needed hand for a moment.

She moved with grace. In both of her hands, she wielded red-bladed short swords with red aura emanating from them. Power surged in each of them as she sent them into the statuesque foe’s right ankle severing it completely. Before it could even fall over onto its side, she cut off its other leg causing them to fall onto their back completely. They dropped their new spear that managed to fully manifest into existence and cried out in a low tone as she severed their bulky stone neck apart.

She fought with no fear and without hesitation. She smirked noticing his relief having someone to aid him.

Without saying another word, she defended herself as her own foe rushed to attack her.

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With one down, the odds immediately went in their favor. Kiran wasn’t about to let this advantage go to waste.

He assisted Abigail as she kept her foe busy. He went more towards its side while it lost sight of him. However, it knew he was there for it sent its foot backwards nearly managing to hit his skull with it.

Kiran thrust his sword down into its leg. As a low moan erupted from them, they thrust their arm backwards to slice him with the two-handed sword that they wielded.

While it redirected its focus towards Kiran, Abigail took that time to use those powerful short swords of hers to do their work. Perhaps distractions were what Kiran was made for. So far this strategy was working well. He distracted them or at least got it to focus on him primarily, and then Abigail went in for the killing blow.

The guardian knelt before him and its stone head fell off its head as her red blade sliced through its neck just like the previous one did.

It hit the ground hard leaving a dent in the floor. It still surprised him how these statuesque guardians could move so fast considering how heavy they were. Despite their size and agility, they weren’t incapable of being defeated. They had proven that twice now and now they just had to deal with two more of them.

Frederek looked tired and relieved as he noticed the two of them coming to help him out. This guardian carried a large hammer-like weapon that caused the ground itself to weep as it hit against it.

While it remained focused on Frederek, it began backing away as it noticed their arrival. Rather than pay them much mind however it appeared distracted as the sound of the other yet alive guardian crumbled away and died.

Noreko’s hands and fingers contorted in a frightening manner. Black flames moved around the entirety of the guardian they fought and the black flames began to melt stone. The low tone emanating from their stone mouth sent chills down his spine. Maybe I was wrong. Maybe these things do in fact feel pain.

While that statuesque figure Noreko fought melted away even more, the last of them appeared hesitant. It looked towards the melting statuesque figure who kept crying aloud in misery and appearing fearful even though its stone face couldn’t technically express any emotion. The tiny shifts in its arms and feet made him think that they were in fact intelligent and not just merely devoid of life as he might’ve assumed.

“Just one more to go,” Abigail said with a smirk.

She was right of course and the first to charge forward. The last of them backed away focusing more on a defensive approach. Noreko approached from behind and the guardian took notice of this. Kiran charged towards its side as it strangely dropped the large hammer it wielded and embraced his strike. His mana-enhanced blade pierced through their bulky chest. They fell to their knees accepting—no—allowing Frederek and Abigail to take apart their head.

It was like the guardian had given up. With the other losses, it saw no way to succeed. It wanted to just get it over with and accept its death without any further fight.

The dead stone guardian simply remained there on its knees completely still and unmoving. “Phew,” Abigail said. “They really put up a good fight.”

Frederek eyed Abigail. “Are you pleased to have finally gotten to experience some action?”

“Oh yes.” She wiped the sweat away from her brow and took a deep breath right after. “I think I’ll be good for a while. I only ever need a little bit of fighting every now and then to satiate these rather invigorated violent desires of mine.”

Noreko had his back turned to them instead focusing his attention towards the newly warded altar. After they had removed those three other barriers, several more were there requiring them to be broken.

Abigail came up and slapped him on the back. “Good job Noreko. I didn’t think you had it in you to kill one just by yourself. And heck, you made that thing squeal like a pig which is rather strange. What the heck of kind of flames were those anyways to make even a golem cry?”

“It’s an advanced form of magic,” he simply stated firmly. “Now that they are all dead, we should focus once more on removing these wards from the altar.”

They weren’t the same colors as before. There were also at least four of them this time in the colors of green, purple, yellow, and turquoise.

“Should we worry about more of those golems appearing?” Frederek asked.

“I don’t think so. Beings such as them are a rarity. I doubt our deceased queen has any more of them around. She kept them here likely knowing of how important it was to keep this altar secured. She was undoubtedly clever by using a ward to activate spells that not only replaced the previous wards but also activated these golems at the same time. Unfortunately for her, it was not enough to stop us.”

It did make him wonder though that if the queen had just died one day and not necessarily due to anyone such as them, what was her plan for powering the pillar in her absence? It made sense that she had planned for such an instance. He just merely didn’t know what that plan was.

Whatever the case, they were to assume control and power it themselves.

Noreko broke apart each of the wards taking several minutes to break each one. When the last one broke, the geometrical wards that appeared over the altar and the nearby surrounding floor disappeared leaving it bare and ready for manipulation.

“Frederek, can you pull the altar’s lid off?” Noreko asked. “Do be gentle of course. We’ll need to put it back on right after I replace the crystals within it.

As he took it off, Kiran stepped up close. Within the circular enclosure, three crystal-like objects were carefully positioned in three individual spots. Noreko pulled the slender crystals out one by one. After laying them on the ground, he then pulled out his own specifically tuned crystals and placed them in each of the spots. After that, Frederek picked the slab up and slid it back in place.

“Now I need only return to my laboratory, and form the link from there.”

“So that’s it?” Frederek asked.

“Yes. We’ll be able to power it ourselves. As for whether we can maintain control over this altar, that is another story.”

“Temos has already suggested that he and his faction will focus on guarding it,” Abigail said.

Whoever controlled this altar had immense power within Liall. The Human Familiar Coalition by seizing control of this altar had thus lifted up their overall power, influence, and ability to make change. And that was without having to necessarily be rulers themselves.

“Before we leave,” Noreko said, “let me put up a slew of wards of my own. I’ll also heavily ward the entrances to this main chamber so that if anyone tries to break in, we’ll know about it, and slow down their attempt to get in leaving us time to come here if we need to.”

Abigail sighed. “Just try not to take too long. I’m really itching to eat something now after all of that fighting.”

“Did you not eat before coming here?” Frederek asked.

“Heck no. I don’t like fighting with a full stomach.”

After a lengthy period of time, Noreko finished sealing the altar with his wards and for the several entrances leading into the main chamber. They headed out the same way they came through the many halls, through the caves, and eventually, they made it back to underground depths beneath Liall where darkness ruled and Kiran couldn’t help but feel eager to see the light above ground after having accomplished another great feat within the same day.

Now they just had to wait for Noreko to form a link to those crystals of his and they would have control of the central pillar.

Celebrations shall be in order now with these accomplishments of ours.