Chapter 47

The movements of the magic puppet knights were surprisingly agile for their massive bodies. The rapid approach accompanied by the clattering noise, the weapons and the light from their eyes, all exuded a terrifying presence. It was as if the walls were closing in from all sides, creating an illusion.

Aichi made the first move against those magic knights. He gripped two electromagnetic cannons in each hand and fired at the magic puppet knights. Although the power was less than half of his usual, it still had several times the power of a regular rifle.

Do Bang! Do Bang!

Two flashes of light hit the heads of two magic puppet knights with perfect accuracy, striking their eyes. The impact caused the knights to fall backward. The subsequent knights leaped over their fallen comrades and approached Aichi. Aichi fired again in rapid succession, aiming to disrupt their formation and break the deadly encirclement.

In response to Aichi's storm of gunfire, the knights used their shields, great swords, or the bodies of their comrades for cover as they advanced. Eventually, several knights reached Aichi.

At that moment, Sia Horia, with her white hair tinged with blue, leaped forward like a frontline soldier, raising her ultra-heavy hammer over her shoulder. She unleashed a powerful blow, using her enhanced physical abilities to the limit.

"Smashaaaaaah!"

Kaboom!

The hammer, infused with her momentum, struck the ground with a violent impact, crushing one of the magic puppet knights. The knight had raised its shield to protect itself, but it was crushed along with the shield.

The impact created cracks in the ground. After delivering the powerful blow, Sia judged that the knight was now a dead body. The knight beside it raised its shield to block the shockwave and then swung its great sword to try to cut Sia in half.

Sia glanced at this with a side look. She twisted the handle, adjusted the angle of the hammer's head, and pulled the trigger on the handle.

Do Gang!

At the sound of the cracking noise, the hammer, which had been embedded in the ground, jumped up. The flying debris from the ground, like petals, danced around Sia. The hammer, still in motion, did not stop. Sia spun in mid-air, delivering a powerful centrifugal blow to the side of the knight's abdomen, which was just about to swing its great sword.

"Yaaaaah!"

With such a powerful strike, the hammer hit the knight, causing its body to bend into a "K" shape, as if it had been hit by a speeding truck. The knight flew backward, taking down the other knights that were approaching from behind. The knight's body was flattened and rendered immobile.

Swoosh, swoosh

The sound of the wind slicing through the air reached Sia's rabbit ears. She glanced upward and saw the great sword of the magic puppet knight that had been thrown in the air when Sia had knocked it away. Sia leaped up and caught the falling great sword, then threw it with all her might at the approaching magic puppet knights.

The high-speed flying great sword collided with the shield of one of the knights, knocking it aside. Sia did not miss this opportunity and swung her hammer, Doryugen, upward from below. The knight's massive body was lifted into the air due to the impact on its abdomen, and it was forced to swing its great sword. Sia used the upward momentum of Doryugen to suddenly spin and dodge the great sword, then struck the knight, which was still in the air, with a near-vertical blow.

Like the previous magic puppet knight, the knight that was launched like a projectile took down the other knights that were following, and its flattened body lay on the ground.

A smile appeared on Sia's lips. It was not because she found the battle enjoyable, but because she was happy to be able to fight well. She felt a sense of reality that she could indeed travel with Aichi and the others. For a moment, she was slightly distracted.

In battle, such a moment of relaxation can be fatal. When she noticed, her field of vision was already blocked by a knight's shield. The magic puppet knight had thrown its shield at Sia. As expected of a magic puppet, the shield flew with an unusually powerful momentum. Although Sia, with her enhanced body, would not suffer a fatal injury, the impact was enough to cause a concussion. It was easy to imagine that the shield would knock Sia to the ground in one go.

Oh no! There was no time to think. She at least braced herself to withstand the impending impact. Just as the shield was about to hit Sia, a laser-like stream of water flew in and collided with the shield, altering its trajectory. The shield passed by Sia's head and struck the magic puppet knight behind her, knocking it down.

"...Careless. Triple punishment."

"Huh!? Was that Miss Tsuki? S-Sorry, thank you very much! Really, triple punishment!?"

"Um... Daydreaming is not allowed."

"Ugh, Yes! I'll try my best!"

Tsuki scolded Sia as if she were a teacher, and Sia was aware that she had been careless due to a moment of happiness. Reflecting on her mistake, she tightened her nerves and prepared to fight the approaching magic puppet knights again. Two magic puppet knights quietly approached Sia from behind, but a fine stream of water, like a laser, flew from behind and cut them in half.

Sia realized that Tsuki was protecting her back, and she felt a warm sensation in her heart. She was determined not to show her clumsiness in front of her mentor, and this made her even more motivated.

After that, the knights who tried to flank Sia from the blind spots were also cut down by the streams of water. The water blades were sharper than the knights' swords. Tsuki was using the intermediate water magic [Break], which originally involved shooting high-pressure water jets by compressing moisture from the air. Now, Tsuki held two large metal water tanks in her hands, with two more hanging from her shoulders. These were items that Aichi had taken from the [Treasure Vault]. Each time Tsuki raised a water tank and muttered the magic name, a high-pressure water jet shot out and cut through the enemies.

Compared to using magic to collect moisture from the air, compressing pre-existing water required less magic power, which was Tsuki's reasoning. Additionally, the water tanks allowed her to aim precisely, and the high-pressure water jets did not contain magic, so they did not dissipate due to decomposition.

Sia's close combat attacks were explosive, and Tsuki's water blades compensated for her blind spots. The knights could not break through their combination and were continuously driven back.

Tsuki and Sia displayed such excellent teamwork that Aichi, watching them from the side, smiled wryly.

"Hey, hey, they're pretty capable, aren't they? If I don't show them my true strength, they might get annoyed, right?"

He joked to himself and then engaged in close combat, swinging Dona Shuraku with great agility.

Using the gun barrel of Shuraku in his left hand to deflect the great sword of a knight, he used the right hand to fire Dona at point-blank range into the knight's helmet. Without even looking at the knight that was knocked away, he swung Shuraku backward to shoot another knight behind him. The great sword swung with a horizontal wind, and Aichi dodged by spinning, then crossed his arms to shoot the knights on both sides.

When firing, he did not use [Lightning Wrap], so the bullets that ricocheted off the knights' shields hit the knee joints of the knights beside them, causing them to lose balance. Aichi performed a backflip over them and, in the inverted view, destroyed the knight directly below and the one beside it. The knight swung its great sword at Aichi's landing point, but Aichi shot the sword and used the momentum to perform another backflip, firing in four directions simultaneously and destroying the heads of four knights. As he landed, he instantly reloaded from the [Treasure Vault] and fired again, sending the surrounding knights flying in a radial pattern.

He did this to avoid unintentionally damaging the room while continuously slaughtering the magic puppet knights.

However...

"...?"

While countering the attacks of the magic puppet knights, Aichi furrowed his brow in surprise. He had already destroyed many magic puppet knights, but their density had not decreased at all.

This question was also felt by Tsuki and Sia. Upon closer inspection of the battlefield, they noticed that there were no remains of the magic puppet knights they had initially defeated.

"...Regenerated?"

"Seems so."

"How can this be!? This is never-ending!"

Indeed, after being destroyed, the magic puppet knights emitted a light similar to that of their eyes and instantly regenerated, rejoining the battle.

Sia, seeing the previously defeated magic puppet knights approaching again, let out a flustered cry. Knowing that defeating them was futile, anyone would have wanted to complain. However, unlike Sia, Aichi and Tsuki remained calm and did not show any particular agitation. They thought of countermeasures while kicking the magic puppet knights away. This was the difference in experience. They had faced such adversity countless times in the depths of the Nether, and the current situation was relatively more manageable.

"...Aichi, magic puppets usually have a core, right?"

As Tsuki said, magic puppets typically have a core, which serves as their power source. The core is made from processed monster magic stones. This was also mentioned in the design documents of Oscar's cleaning robots. Tsuki's suggestion was to destroy this core.

However, Aichi's expression turned bitter after hearing Tsuki's proposal.

"Those things don't have a core."

"...Are you sure?"

"Yes, I confirmed with the [Mineral Identification] ability. There was no such reaction. Instead, I detected a faint magical presence from the magic puppets themselves..."

"Then, what do we do? We're going to be in trouble if this continues!"

Sia finally let out an anxious cry. Ignoring her, Aichi used [Mineral Identification]. Magic puppets that could operate without a core might be made from some special mineral, he thought.

This turned out to be correct.

---

Sensory Stone

A mineral with the property of [Fixed Magic]. When the same type of magic is fixed in two or more sensory stones, touching one can remotely control the others.

---

These magic puppet knights were made from sensory stones and were being remotely controlled by someone. The regeneration Aichi and the others observed was actually the direct manipulation and reshaping of the stones, or the replenishment of missing parts. It was more like reconstruction than regeneration. Upon closer inspection, the floor was also made of sensory stones, and there were many places where parts had been removed, likely to repair the magic puppets. Without directly defeating the controller, this would never end.

"Aichi, Tsuki. Someone is controlling these things. If we continue like this, it will never end. We need to break through!"

"Understood."

"Break through? Got it!"

After Aichi gave the signal, Tsuki and Sia suddenly turned and charged toward the altar. Aichi used Dona Shuraku to shoot the knights in their path, creating a gap in their formation. He then threw two grenades at the magic puppet knights pursuing from behind. The explosion behind them caused a shockwave and a blast of wind, knocking the knights down.

Sia leaped into the gap Aichi had created, spinning with Doryugen to knock down the surrounding magic puppet knights. The knights who tried to throw their shields or great swords at Sia, who was in a state of post-attack rigidity, were cut down by Tsuki's [Break].

Aichi covered the rear, using the electromagnetic cannons to shoot the knights approaching from behind. Sia used the time Aichi bought to break through the encirclement and secure a position in front of the altar. Tsuki then leaped over the altar and reached the door.

"Miss Tsuki! The door is...?"

"Um... It's sealed, as expected."

"Ah, as expected!"

The seal was expected from the moment they saw the strange altar and door. This was why they initially chose the difficult route of eliminating the knights to calmly break the seal