Fate Alchemist - A Regression Academy LitRPG

"What's the plan?" Irmond asked.

"For one thing, we're not worrying about getting you any rewards. If you do, awesome, but the goal is to win as quickly and efficiently as possible," Wulf replied. He'd landed behind the wild obsidian golem, but it was already turning around.

Being a rogue golem, it was going to go after anything that moved. It'd lost its purpose, and it was just flailing wildly.

They could figure out why it had lost its room later.

"If we take its core, it'll be done for," Wulf said. "Just like all the other golems. I need to expose the back of its neck, and I'll need someone to knock the core out of alignment."

"It's going to be deep," Kalee said. "Wraith's fists won't break away enough obsidian."

While they spoke, Wulf backed away, maintaining his fighting stance. "Yeah. We're going to need something…heavier. Or sharper."

"You're thinking what I'm thinking?" Kalee asked.

"The obsidian blades," Wulf said. "We use its own weapons against it."

"Yeah."

"Can you trap one of its arms?"

"Yeah."

The moment the golem charged, Wulf crouched, as if he was about to intercept the punch. Golems were fighters, and they knew generally how they stacked up against their opponents. It knew it would win with brute strength.

At the last moment, Wulf ducked to the side, tucking his head down. The golem tried to reach its hand out, but it was too slow. One of its blades scraped the wall, penetrating deep into the stone and creating an avalanche of rock. Nothing hit the Wraith, though.

Wulf kicked its knee with both his legs. A couple viridian chunks flew off, and the golem buckled, stumbling forward. Kalee created a runic circle beneath it, catching its arm and tugging it down with all the spell Skill's might, then drove a wedge into its top. Stone cracked, and the golem pulled on its wrist. It shifted, trying to escape the tug of Kalee's force-enhancing ability. It shifted, inching along.

They wouldn't have long.

"Wulf, watch your stomach!" Seith called. "Wraith's leaking mana, and the mountain spirit took a bit of damage! We're going in to make repairs, so don't get us killed!"

"Understood," he replied, charging around the trapped golem, trying to reach its hand. If Kalee had used that spell skill on anything Iron or below, it would've crushed the wrist entirely. "Kalee," he said, "Can you use your new skill and match the angle of my punch? I'm aiming for the blade that's sticking out to the side."

"Got it," she replied. "We'll hit it at once."

Wulf charged in, telegraphing his blow so Kalee could get the timing right, then aimed for a shard of obsidian sticking out the golem's forearm. If it was the scale of a human, it would've been about two feet long. A short sword.

Wraith's fist impacted the blade, along with a surge of invisible force. The blade cracked at its base, snapping off the golem's arm. Wulf caught it in his right hand. Although viridian was much more durable than regular obsidian, he didn't want to test what would happen when it hit the ground. He clenched his fist around the bottom of the blade, letting its sharp edges bite into his hand. They were trying to break Wraith's form, but without a slicing motion, they'd have a hard time of it.

Just as he turned around to strike the back of the golem's neck, it broke free of Kalee's trap. She ended the Skill.

Irmond called, "Watch out. On your left side! It's reaching for your hand!"

Wulf heeded the warning, pushing back toward the wall, and pulling his hand up, but the golem's fingers still snagged his wrist.

Its fist opened just enough to grab Wraith's hand, then it clenched tight and pulled. At first, Wulf thought his shoulder would rip out. His own golem constricted on his wrist, and he shouted in discomfort, but that wasn't the worst of it. The golem kept pulling, and at the same time, drove a knee into Wraith's chin.

The entire Oronith listed backward, except the hand the golem kept hold of. It ripped off with a splatter of mana sparks and shards of stone. Pain and fear poured through the dream link, coming from nowhere in particular, but Wulf shut it down. His own golem's hand sheared off, thankfully only scraping away the surface of Wulf's skin and tugging his bracer away.

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But it pulled off half of Wraith's forearm.

Wulf slid backward along the ground, but if he stayed down, that'd be it. Using Wraith's lighter form, he kicked with his legs, pushing up off the ground, then countered with a swipe, using his stolen viridian blade.

It made a perfect cut down the golem's front, cleaving off black stone and sending the beast stumbling backward. Before it could recover, Wulf ducked between its shoulders and arm. "Irmond, get ready. I'm missing a hand, so I'll need you to knock the golem's core out of alignment!"

"I'm almost there!" Irmond called.

Wulf pushed Wraith up to its full height, then slashed through the back of the obsidian golem's neck. The beast's head lolled forward, exposing a perfect, four-foot-wide sphere of black stone and glowing green runes.

"Irmond, now!" Wulf called.

An arrow blasted off Wraith's shoulder, and in the blink of an eye, it smashed into the golem's core. It knocked it out of alignment, then sent it tumbling down to the ground far below. It didn't shatter, but the golem itself collapsed, falling into a heap of blackish-green rocks and unmoving but still-formed extremities. Rocks and debris shot up, and a cloud of dust washed over them. Wulf turned away, protecting his passengers from the worst of it, but he didn't have as much warning as before.

Rocks raced across the sides of the Wraith, scraping its armour. Seith shouted something incomprehensible, and Athllas grunted, then gasped.

Then the cloud fell away. Wulf felt a tingle across his flesh, a sign that the Field had registered a new Mark, but he didn't have his Bracer to check it. Panting, Wulf asked, "Is everyone alright?"

"I'm good!" Irmond called.

"I'm fine!" Seith replied.

Athllas said nothing for a few seconds, then replied, "I'll live."

Wulf leaned over the carnage. The golem still held onto Wraith's left hand. He considered picking it up again to save it, but there was no point. It had been crushed from the wrist down, and the fingers were all out of alignment. They wouldn't bend properly again, not without a lot of work. They'd be better off using a ready-made hand.

Or…

First Wulf tucked his newly earned sword into the bear-pelt pouch, then walked back over to the golem. He found another couple blades, which would be good candidates for a second sword, then with Kalee's help, snapped them off as well and saved them.

Finally, he picked up one of the golem's black hands. It was about the right size for Wraith, and if they could get it attached, it would be a powerful addition.

"Are you…actually planning on doing that?" Seith asked. "Do you expect me to attach that?"

"Not here," he replied. "But it's strong. A Low-Gold hand. It's an upgrade. And besides, you "

"You just lost a hand, and you're already thinking of upgrades?" Irmond exclaimed.

"It's the best way to cope with losing a hand," Athllas said. "I would know."

"How did the crown prince lose a hand?" Seith asked.

"I'll tell you later. What did you say about the Wraith's integrity?"

"Twenty percent," Seith said. "We're close to falling apart, and the mountain spirit is really suffering. If we don't get back to the hangar soon, there isn't going to be much of the Wraith left."

"We're on our way," Wulf said. Lastly, he picked up the golem's core and tucked it into his pouch, then hoisted the pouch back over his shoulder.

With his loot safely stored, he took off down the hallway at a sprint.

"So…is anyone going to point out that that was a rogue golem?" Prince Athllas asked. He raised his voice, shouting over the thundering booms of Wraith's feet in the hallway.

"I noticed," Wulf said. "It came from somewhere deep in the dungeon, considering it was a Low-Gold."

Kalee glanced over at him. "Something would've had to have destroyed what it was protecting without destroying it."

"Something stronger than it," Wulf added.

"Which is not a good sign," Seith stressed.

"I'm aware, but—"

Wulf cut himself off when he reached the end of the hallway. They arrived at a wide stone chamber, with rough walls, just like the dungeon's entrance, except it led deeper—to the second layer of the dungeon. Instead of pure darkness, a warm glow seeped up from below, like there was fire burning.

Wulf knelt down and leaned over the edge. At the very bottom was a hallway, much like the one they were in now, but the stone was paler, and a flickering orange light washed across it.

He watched for a few seconds. He couldn't go down. For one thing, he wasn't sure if Wraith's joints could handle the stress of the impact, but for another, if there was something down there, they couldn't handle another fight.

As he watched, a cloud of smoke washed across the opening, and a shadow slithered past, then disappeared.

"Was that…?" Kalee whispered.

"A fiend…" Wulf breathed. "What else could it have been? We need to get back to the Academy, and now."

He broke into a sprint again, winding through the hallways of the dungeon, not concerned about the growing well of pain in his gut, and only slightly more concerned about Wraith's overall integrity.

They ascended stairways and passed through rooms they'd already cleared, until finally, hours later, they drew close to the entrance room. He could see it through the next doorway.

There was a glassy thud, and Wulf skidded to a halt. The noise was louder than when he hit a glowing bulb.

A humanoid silhouette clung to the viewscreen glass. It carried a hammer on its back, and a heavy briefcase in its hands.

Dr. Arnau had found them.