Volume 9 Chapter 14 (1/2)

After clearing the [Transfer Labyrinth], we were progressing at a good pace once again.

However, given that half a day had already passed since the [War] began, our dungeon conquest was simply taking too much time.

I hadn't imagined that beating a dungeon that focused on stalling would be this difficult.

This should serve as a good lesson, at the very least.

Compared to the Marcho-rescue campaign, we were facing significantly fewer enemy troops. Maybe not even a tenth of what we faced back then.

But through the skillful use of dungeon rooms that were hard to traverse as well as dungeon rooms that had many traps, we had spent more time now than back then. And that wasn't yet factoring the dungeon rooms that remained.

The [Pig] Demon Lord's methods were a valuable lesson indeed.

At the moment, we were resting in one of the hard-to-traverse rooms.

My monsters had begun to show signs of fatigue, so I decided to call for a respite before proceeding to the next room. They took recovery potions to enhance their magic power and stamina recovery.

And, to make better use of this downtime, the Abyss Howls made a Transfer array and went back to Avalon together with the broken golems and the heavily wounded monsters. A few moments later, they returned with a Mithril Golem that carried as much ammunitions and potions as it could.

So long as one had monsters that could use Transfer as well as the opportunity to make Transfer arrays, going home and then back to the frontlines was possible, meaning fighting force reorganization was relatively simple.

While at it, I also made an Ocean Singer go back to Avalon to check on the status back there. That Ocean Singer then relayed to me the report that Duke gave.

”Duke's really amazing. Ever so dependable.”

It seemed like Duke and Ruhe were doing well.

They had destroyed the attacking force sent their way. Duke then used his [Enhanced Resurrection] on noteworthy enemy monsters and converted them to our side.

Duke's [Enhanced Resurrection] had limited uses per day, and he had used all but two instances of it. These two instances were being reserved for when other, more noteworthy monsters show up. But in the case no more reinforcements came or no better ones at least, he did have candidates prepared that were preserved before they turned into blue particles.

But then again, if we broke the crystal too soon, those preserved monsters would vanish as well.

As such, Duke decided that if no better monsters arrive within three hours, he would just make use of the preserved monsters.

This was a chance to gain units that rivaled A rank monsters.

Curation of which ones to resurrect was critically important and Duke was wise to recognize that.

”The end is in sight, everyone! Let's go!”

Revitalized by the rest, my monsters enthusiastically replied to me.

This time as well, we're going to win without losing anybody.

After always being in the front and acting as our shield, half of the Avalon-Ritters were broken, but they could simply be repaired later on. As for my monsters, many were wounded, but no deaths. They should recover completely given time.

◇

Another three hours had passed since we took that break.

It was plain to see that the [Pig] Demon Lord's forces were acting strangely.

It was as if all chain of command had vanished. It was just monster after monster charging at us recklessly. It was almost as if they attacking more out of fear of something than anything else.

If they were going to attack without any sort of plan, then the outcome would be decided by the quality of the monsters involved, which our side definitely had the upper hand in.

”I see.”

The more Avalon-Ritters were damaged, the more the three knights were seeing deployment.

And of particular note was the black knight.

According to Rorono, the black knight was rather plain compared to the other two.

Compared to the heavily-armored red knight that also had an extraordinarily large right arm and the wings-for-limbs white knight, yeah, the black knight's appearance was indeed on the tamer side of things.

The black knight had a slender form and an elegantly designed humanoid body.

The idea was for it to have a skeletal frame that could do more varied movements than a human's could, artificial muscles that offered excellent flexibility, and multiple, powerful boosters that provided mobility and attitude control.

With those concepts in mind, I thought it was going to be relatively normal, but after seeing it fight, I could say for certain that the black knight was another weird golem.

Its battle style involved two swords and two guns.

The Avalon-Ritters could barely wield their new heavy machineguns, but the black knight was wielding two of them. The two large swords it wielded were blade-forming ones.

It wielded those weapons all at once. And yet, despite that, it displayed such refined movements.

Not only that, in each fight, in each passing second, its movements became better and better.

It was learning.

”Rorono, what happened to being multi-purpose and generic? In the end, it's just another flashy golem, isn't it?”

”It's more useful this way”

The reason it was able to wield two swords and two guns at once was simple enough: it had four arms.

If you think about it, it's quite obvious. The more arms a golem had, the more useful it was.

”But master, it actually has more than four arms.”

Previously hidden arms then appeared and changed the magazines of the black knight's guns.

That was in the midst of battle and without skipping a beat.

The ability to make the golems into whatever form the maker wanted it to be could be said to be one of the golems' greatest strengths. There was no sense in limiting it to have only two arms, or four for that matter.

When on standby, the black knight hid its two unused arms and sub-arms in its back.

”Mhm, this marks the completion of the experiment to test the three knights' abilities. Master, it'd be kind of sad if we continue to call them as just red knight, white knight, and black knight. Please consider giving each one a name. Unlike monsters, naming them wouldn't have any adverse effects on you or your powers.”

”I understand. I'll think on it. Considering their abilities, their strengths, and that they would serve as one of Avalon's trump cards, a bit of special treatment for them should be alright.”

I'll have to think up of good names for them. Names that will easily give an idea of what each did best.

But now that trying them out in the battlefield was over, what I was looking forward to next was their mass production. And if only one could be mass produced, it would most likely be the black knight. The red knight and the white knight were strong, but their uses seemed somewhat more situational.

At any rate, having finished the current dungeon room and the enemies within it, it was time to move to the next.

◇

The next dungeon room was a lot like a party hall.

Red carpets were laid down, the whole place was filled with first-class furnishings, and there were even chandeliers in the ceiling. The [Pig] Demon Lord's ostentatious tastes were well represented in this room.

Excluding the place where the [Pig] Demon Lord's crystal was in, this could possibly be the last area in his dungeon.