The golems were marching in lock-step three wide and four deep, the same as the priests tended to, their movements perfectly coordinated with each other. They were coming down the side of the wagon from the front and I took a moment to assess them.

Tall and blocky they looked like they'd been carved from blue ice in a roughly human shape, though the head was just a blue cube on top of the shoulders, and where their arms would be they had blades that bent at the elbows. Instead of hands the blades of their forearms continued to a point. Their joints moved fluidly, as though they were flesh and bone, and I tentatively marked out areas that could be weak points.

The center of their chest and the head were the best bet for a crippling blow, and the joints after that. If I could remove their blades it would make them significantly less of a threat. I was standing on the ground in the center at the back of the wagon a meter and a half from the edge that the ice golems would be marching around. The floor of the wagon was one meter off of the ground, and the cage rose two meters above that.

The golems finally cleared the edge of the wagon and I prepared to attack them, but they completely ignored me. It took me a few moments to work out that they were going to try to box me in with four of them on three sides and the wagon at my back.

Allowing my enemies to prepare hasn't been working out very well for me. I dropped my perception of time as the first column of four stopped and the other two columns continued around to box me in. My first target was the golem who was stopped at the edge of the wagon. Leaving my ice staff leaning against the wagon I launched myself at the golem at about a quarter of my full strength, extending my right hand to spear in front of me and through his chest right where a humanoids heart would be.

My hand met a solid amount of resistance before breaking out of the back of the golem and my side slammed into it. To absolutely no effect, the golem wasn't even forced off balance. It was bringing one of its arms across its body to cut my arm off at the shoulder, while it brought its other one to swing at my head.

The ice of its chest gripped onto my right arm, trapping me for its blades. I brought my left palm up and hit it solidly in the chest, tearing my arm from its grip and pushing me backwards. The blade from its right arm was still on a path that would take it through my head, so I used the nails on my right hand to block and shear through its blade. The blade flew away, and I saw out of the corner of my eye the golem next to the one I had attacked stepping forward and thrusting one of its bladed arms towards me.

The first golem was redirecting the attack from its left arm to perfectly cover the second one's attack. If I moved to block the second one the first one would hit the arm that did it. They were coordinated to a scary degree, as though they were controlled with one mind.

There was still a narrow margin to counterattack, and that is all I needed. I brought my right hand up to cut the second golem's arm off at the elbow, and at the same time moved my left hand to cut the first golem's remaining arm halfway up its lower arm.

The first golem was now almost completely disarmed, but the second golem was pivoting to bring its right arm blade through where my chest would be. And the third golem in the line was stepping into the space left by the second golem.

I kicked myself backwards off of the first golem getting out of range of the second golem's attack. Both of my arms were at half energy from the speed of the attacks I was forced to do. The golems could move much quicker in close quarters than I was expecting, though they weren't able to land a hit against me.

I reached out with my left hand to grab the bars of the cage as I was still in the air from my kick and brought myself to a stop. The rest of the golems had stopped moving to box me in and were heading directly towards me. Landing back on the ground I kicked off towards the first golem I had targeted, pushing myself against the bars of the cage as well.

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I was moving upwards this time, aiming for its head. As I reached it I used my right hand to cut across and through the base of its head, tearing it off completely.

With my left hand I dug into and gripped its chest to stop my forward momentum. The golem was again completely unaffected, turning to the side and kneeling to line up a strike from the blade of the second golem and raising what was left of its blades to try to slash at me.

The third golem in the line was also thrusting the points from both of its bladed arms towards me. The rest of the golems were getting increasingly closer behind them.

If I had my sword I would have little trouble with this opponent. The best I could do with just my hands was to cut them off at the shoulder, and even that would be a struggle with their coordinated attacks. I cut down through the shoulders of the golem I was on top of and pushed myself towards the three blades of the second and third golems. The blades were aimed to take me in the chest and throat, so I swung at full strength with my left arm just as they were about to hit.

I hit with enough force that I shattered all three blades, two at the elbow for the third golem and the last at the middle of the upper arm for the second golem.

My left arm was completely done and would require a few seconds at least before I was able to use it. I tucked my legs under me, preparing to kick off of the third golem when I noticed... Chanting.

It didn't sound like chanting from my slowed perspective, but it was showing up on my sound sense. I turned my head to the right and saw winter priests standing within the ice wall that was on the other side of the wagon. They were twenty centimeters into the wall, and that portion was completely clear allowing them to see out.

I couldn't immediately see the effect of the spell that they were casting, but as I kicked off of the third golem back towards the cage on the wagon I saw the first golem's arms reattaching. The blades of the second and third golem were also reforming. I landed on the cage and began climbing to its roof, shearing off some ten centimeter lengths of bar to use as ammunition.

The ice golems looked as though they were going to try following me, but I had at least a few seconds to work. I was curious how they were going to climb without hands, but I turned to face the wall that the winter priests were within.

The ice wall extended well past the end of the wagon at the back, and I could see that they'd moved the majority of it along the road rather than grow more wall. There were twenty four priests within the wall in two rows, which accounted for all of the priests remaining in my original escort.

I had ten bars to work with and threw the first one at a priest roughly in the middle of the ice wall, just past the end of the wagon. I wasn't expecting it to go through, and indeed it was stopped a few centimeters away from him. The remaining nine bars I threw in line with the first from the ground to the top of the wall, creating a weakened section.

I then tucked my shoulder and jumped towards the wall at full strength. With my head down and my shoulder tucked I could see the ice golems climbing the cage behind me, they were wedging the blades of their arms into the gaps in the grid of the cage, pulling themselves up. I also saw the wagon lift slightly from the force of my jump.

I hit the ice wall exactly on the same line as the bars of metal I had thrown and there was a few moments to my sped up perception where the pressure built up against my shoulder before the wall split in two.

The now two halves of the wall pushed back slightly on the road, separating. The two priests who had been in line with the split were half in and half out of the wall now, their ice-walking ability seeming to have allowed them to not take any damage. They were both moving to step into the ice wall on my right as my momentum took me through the two halves.

There was no way my charge moved so many tons of ice, some of the priests must have tried to move it backwards to lessen the force of my attack. The walls continued to separate as I landed on the stone of the road in a roll. The first of the ice golems behind me was jumping from the top of the cage after me.

Looking up I saw a wooden door in the building directly across the road from me. The rest of the front of the building was solid stone, and the doorway was only one and a half meters wide and a little over two meters tall. Too small for an ice golem to fit through.

Coming to my feet my legs almost collapsed under me. I recovered from my stumble and ran across the road. I was about to try to smash through the door, though most of my momentum was gone, when I thought to put my hand on the handle and push down just before I got to it. The door unlatched and slammed open as I rushed through it, flicking it closed once I was through. I was in a shop.