Chapter 73

Eminira Dungeon Again (1)
This is our second time in the dungeon.
The members are the same as last time. Since we brought swords this time, after going to the 4th floor, we planned to head to the 7th floor.
On the 4th floor, Canal, Hamilton, and Kamuela took turns casting Earth Needle, and Allie used Ice Needle. The others repeatedly defeated the Armed with swords and proceeded to the boss room.
The boss room had life-sized Ant Musts. This time, everyone attacked together and finished them quickly.
Since we had already cleared this floor before, we proceeded without taking much time.

We arrived at the 7th floor. It looked like a cave.
Here, there were bronze mini-golems about 50 cm in size. Their bodies were not entirely made of bronze—only their torso was bronze, while their heads and limbs were made of earth.
It seems that if you aim for the head and limbs to immobilize them first, and then destroy the magic stone in the chest, they will turn into loot.
Since these golems only move around quickly, it's fine to aim for the chest magic stone from the beginning, but it often misses, so it’s faster to break the head and limbs first.

From here on, we were told that saving mana would become important since the number of enemies we had to defeat would increase.
I wonder if that means there will be as many as on the 6th floor. On the 6th floor, we could choose how many we fought, but starting from the 7th floor, apparently, we have to defeat them all.

If we want to proceed quickly, we’ll need an all-out attack.
If we want to test how far we can go on our own, since the number starts at about 30 for the first couple of rounds, we were asked if we wanted to try the first two or three rounds ourselves.
We decided to first try one round with me, Canal, Atre, and Ripka to see how many we could defeat.

Within less than five minutes of walking through the cave, a Bronze Golem appeared.
I tried using water magic, but it dodged quickly. It really moves swiftly.
Would close combat with swords be better here? But since our team mainly uses magic, what should we do?

Maybe it would be faster to capture the bronze golems?
Could I make a net out of water?
I pictured it like a fisherman casting a net in my previous life, though with bigger mesh.
Alright, I’ve got the image. I unleashed water magic.

Ohh—it formed a net-like shape!
Now the key is whether the bronze golems can stay trapped without slipping through the net.
About ten of them got caught in the water net, flailing and struggling, but they couldn’t escape.

I called Atre, and he fired rapid Ice Shots through the gaps in the net, hitting the bronze golems and breaking their heads and limbs.
Sometimes she even hit the chest magic stones directly.
Thanks to Atre, we managed to break their heads and limbs, so I released the water net, but even after falling to the ground, they didn’t move.
From there, we destroyed the chest magic stones of each one with swords, one by one.
Canal and Ripka each took down two more bronze golems, and the rest were apparently defeated by Brother Gerald and Meyer with wind magic.
The loot was bronze plates measuring 20 cm long × 5 cm wide × 5 cm thick, and we got 28 pieces.

"Young master Reinhardt, do you think I could make a net with ice too?" Allie asked after we finished defeating them all.
I suggested it might be faster for Allie to make a cage instead.

"If the cage is big, the bronze golems will just run around inside. If it's small, I might catch only a few or maybe even none.” She said.

That's true... Maybe make a cage within a cage, gradually shrinking it down?
But it would be hard against these fast-moving bronze golems. Gradually shrinking, huh...

"Rinka, could you create a barrier that gradually narrows down?"

The idea was to first enclose the bronze golems inside a large barrier and then gradually shrink it.
Once it becomes small enough, Allie would create an ice cage around them, and then we could defeat them from outside the cage with magic or swords.
If it’s at close range, even weak magic should be able to deal damage to the bronze golems.

Everyone in Golden Wings got motivated.
They asked, "Please let us handle the next round ourselves."
We agreed to watch.

"Can't you make barriers too, Hardt?" Canal asked me.

Not yet. I can make walls, but I can't create enclosures yet.
My healing magic level is still too low, probably.

While I was talking with Canal, a battle started up ahead—Golden Wings versus the bronze golems.
Rinka enclosed all the bronze golems inside a large barrier and kept shrinking the barrier until there was almost no space between the golems.
Then, Allie created a cage just large enough to fit snugly around the barrier from the outside, and Rinka released the barrier.

The bronze golems tried hitting the cage to get out, but it didn’t break.
Then, the three men (Salem, Gregory, and Will) approached the cage and fired magic at close range, targeting the heads, arms, and legs of the bronze golems inside, gradually weakening them.
Starting from the weakened golems, they destroyed the chest magic stones with swords.
Each time the number of golems decreased, they created another cage inside the original to further restrain them, repeating the process until all were defeated.

"We’re amazed at how safely and quickly we managed to defeat them." Golden Wings said happily.

Since they’ve taken care of us, I was glad to see them happy.
I really want to master barrier magic soon...

Hamilton and Kamuela also said they wanted to create cages using earth magic,
so with Rinka’s help using barrier magic, after the cages were formed with earth magic,
me, Canal, Brother Gerald, Atre, and Ripka proceeded to defeat the bronze golems.

What do you think about this chapter?