Sadly, none of the remaining weapons were foereaver.
"Can you go look again?" Erak asked the rockman. "Look for a blue one."
"'Look for a blue one'? In a volcano?" Ginya mutters and tries to translate for the Erithrean, who looks glum and goes back in.
The rest of the day passes and eventually Ginya lets the Erithrean go, and says to Erak, "Sorry. It appears to be 'lost to the deeps'. Only the gods can help you, now."
Suddenly, a loub bubbling comes from the caldera, and Erak freezes. He turns to the caldera, slowly drawing his axe.
"Looks like the gods have decided to help after all..."
Ginya looks nonplussed. "Katyn protects us. This 'vent' is hers more than any other. We are not impressed."
The Katytans, likewise, draw their weapons, training them on the Hrun and the caldera itself.
"Don't blame me diplomat for the will of the gods! Talk to Wotan about it."
Oici jumps down to the floor near Erak, landing heavily on her hands and knees due to her armour. She quickly stands upright beside him with her sword drawn. She gives Erak a sly glance and speaks, as Ginya translates. "I hope you don't mind if I butt in. The Crimson Volcano is no playground."
After Oici's sudden move, the others, including Ginya maneauver for the lock but are interuppted by something emerging from the caldera. A large 3 fingered hand. Made of dark, rough looking rock. It slams down onto the 'shore' of the caldera and a couple of seconds later a boulder rises from the magma, away from the 'shore'. Two red lights appear inside carerns in the boulder, like they were made by poking a pencil into clay, and a larger cavern opens beneath them. A immense roar sounds out through the cavern as it comes from the boulder!
"COME CLOSER CREATURE, SO I MAY KILL YOU EASIER!" Erak roars back at the rock monster.
"Well, it's... Big," Oici ponders, as she circles to the side. The Katytan crossbows behind it are useless, and they search for other methods to counter the threat. Oici sighs as she dodges away from it's rocky fist, and slams her sword into one of the fingers, unable to do much damage. "Crushing rocks might be a workout, but it gets old fast."
The creature slowly starts to pull itself form the magma, taking quite a while to do so. Once out of the magma, it stands up straight and everyone see's how big it truely is. Its MASSIVE! It stands at least 10 stories high and has a vaguely humanoid shape. It's legs and arms are thicker than a full grown tree, and it's covered in magma 'veins' that are all over it's body, except for the lower right arm and hand for some reason. Those area's are just dark rock, even darker than the rest of the rock, and it's right hand is in the form of a fist.
Oici flashes Erak a salute and disappears from sight at this and Erak is left alone in the caldera floor. The creature bends over to him, so it can get a closer look at this insignificant being. It's free hand grabs Erak with suprising speed and it straightens a bit, bringing Erak closer to it's face. It holds him there effortlessly.
"So this is what I was charged to kill by the god of battle? Not much of a challenge if you ask me."
It looks around the caldera and see's the scrambling Katytan.
"Perhaps I shall have fun destroying all these fleshbeings as well? Not that it concerns me at all though."
It's head turns back to the captive Hrun in it's hand.
"Prepare to die fleshbeing!"
Erak suddenly wrenches his axe free and slams it down between the thumb and forefinger of the golem's hand. It drops him with a howl and holds it's hand for a bit.
"So rock can feel pain, eh? Interesting."
Once again, the golem exerts suprising speed and kicks Erak into a wall, winding him only due to him rolling with the mighty blow. The golem turns its attention to the Katytan after laughing for a bit. It see's Oici and it rips away a large hunk of masonry from the balcony that Ginya was on, and promptly hurls it at her.
Oici has no trouble dodging a large, tumbling object flung from so far away.
She's still in her guard stance, and surprisingly agile despite her armour, but is watching Erak. After all, this battle is his--his quest, his fault, his punishment. There are multiple places she can go which are too small for the monster to attack, and she is slowly sidestepping her way toward one of them while watching the show.
Everyone else retreats from the balcony over the entrance tunnel, and Ginya orders them to stand down and return to civil duties, assuring the few who need to be assured that Katyn will protect the fortress if things get out of hand.
The golem pulls another bit of masonry from the balcony and places it infront of the tunnel that Oici is nearby in an attempt to stop her from running, but to no avail. She runs under it's legs, causing it to fall over as it tries to go after her, and dissapears into a gap in the wall with a cheery "Bye!"
The golem is not impressed. It stands up and begins to climb out of the caldera. Before it leaves, it looks down on Erak, who is just now standing up, and states:
"Don't go anywhere half-giant. I'll be back soon enough to deal with you."
It climbs out of the caldera and begins it's downward journey to the Katytan village, hurling boulders all the way. Luckly, the village is mostly empty and noone is hurt. It takes several minutes to get down and in this time, Ginya opens the blast doors for Erak and waves him through regally.
"Once again, don't blame me for the will of the gods diplomat." he states as he passes through. He begins to run down the hill after the golem.
The golem's misssiles don't do much damage to Kara's architecture, but Masi's designs are defaced somewhat more. As the golem descends on the town and Erak manages to go out to meet it, a revelation occurs. Elna speaks in a sing-song voice. "Mistaaaake~"
Ballista arrows and hard boulders are fired from the Katytan siege gallery concealed in the mountainside. Most shots go wide, but those that hit enrage the creature, sending fragments soaring away. It charges toward the battlements, preparing to smash them just in time to recieve a second heavy barrage of fire, shattering its right index finger backwards, damaging its left shoulder, and with one arrow driving messily into its right eye socket.
It rears backward, screeching, stumbles, and falls onto its butt, crushing a pair of partially constructed houses. Ryou & Company take this opportunity to run outside, and the Katytans reload, but hold their fire awaiting further reaction from Erak and the golem. The Katytan see Erak running downhill at full speed, and see him raise his hand to his mouth breifly.
Ballista bolts pepper the golem, one slamming into one of it's eye cavern, and at this it lets loose a loud roar of rage and pain, rips up a house and hurls it at the ballista. The house breaks apart however, as it's not meant to be used like this, and has no effect on the Katytan. Seeing this, the golem stands up quickly and sweeps it's arm along the wall, crushing siege engines and forcing Katytan to jump off the wall.
However, this consumes more time and a long range volley forces the golem to fall on it's butt again. The golem's throat is pulverized, its shoulder is further damaged to the point where it begins to lose use of its arm, and a chunk falls off it's side.
"Grah--! Grah.. Groh?"
It begins losing the strength required to both hit hard and accurately, damaging rocks but causing relatively little harm to the now siege gallery, which is no longer actively manned.
The golem, pulls out the ballista bolts from it's body, but is suprised attacked by Erak! He smashes his axe down upon the golem's head, its shoulder, its arms, its legs, everywhere! He suddenly focuses on the golem's right arm for some reason, hacking away at it like a madman!
Thomp-thomp-thomp-thomp...
Oici finally emerges from the fortress at a full run and begins patterning her sword as she zigs and zags toward the monster, slashing left and right at its feet and legs as she dashes through, quickly disappearing again into what's left of Mimikozga. The damage is again minor, but the golem is put off-balance even more by its attempts to defend itself.
Erak slams his axe down onto the golem's right wrist and suprisingly, the entire right hand flies off! The golem makes no sound at this though and is more concerned with making as much destruction as possible. It flails around wildly, causing a rockslide to tumble down towards the village! The golem's eyes flash red momentarily and it breaks apart into boulders, joining the rockslide. Erak is clear from this though and he is hacking at the hand's fingers, like a man possessed.
The rockslide is impeded by the drainage system and doesn't cause much significant damage to the completed structures, but a few more of the partially-constructed ones are swept away, and the entire place is partially buried. Ginya leaps her way down the slope from the siege gallery toward Erak.
He doesn't notice Ginya approaching until she is close, and she realises that he has completely blunted his axe, smashed away another finger from the rock hand and is currently trying to pry something out from it's grasp.
"Need help?" Ginya brings her hammer to bear. She'll break the stone open if that's the idea, here. Oici comes out of the rubble, already resharpening the edge of her sword with a whetstone.
She takes a step forward and Erak draws back, something in his hands. Its foereaver, and a big grin is across Erak's face.
"Not anymore, diplomat. Not anymore..."
He turns toward the village and rushes down the slope, much faster and agile than before. Running up a protruding rock from the rock slide, he leaps an incredible distance and lands on the wall of the village. He then calmly turns and looks at the rockslide reminants, which are twitching strangely.
The siege weapons are trained, and Ginya is ready to hit something. She sighs. "What now?"
The rockslide slowly begins to move, rocks piling on others repeatedly until a vague humanoid shape is seen. A familiar head is on top of the reformed golem.
"You cannot kill me, fleshbeings. I am of the immortal rock, and I am more than all of you put together!
It pulls back, completely unhindered by it's previous wounds, and prepares to stricke the wall. Erak fearlessly leaps onto it's torso however and he begins to climb up speedily, the golem thrashing around, trying to dislodge him. He mount's it's shoulders and leaps into the air vertically, foereaver drawn back!
SHINK!
Erak lands on the shoulder he jumped from and ran down its arm, casually stepping off onto the wall just as the entire golem crumbles into small pebbles. Dead.
"Well that was fun, wasn't it? Good try though."
Oici shouts at some of the others who were up at the siege gallery, directing them. Ginya looks around, then turns to Erak. "I trust you'll be paying reparations for this ludicrous scene? For at least he next few years," she spasms momentarily. "...Forget it. Leave, now.
"Your people are no longer welcome here. If you return, you will be shot on sight. We will negotiate in Hitengu lands within a year's time." She departs without waiting for a response, calling out to Oici, who stops what she's doing and turns to watch Erak with her sword ready.
Erak snorts back at Ginya, and replies curtly: "I would be happy to leave, I don't even know why I came here in the first place. Tell the little rockman that I appreciate his efforts, unless that is below you that is."
He hops down from the wall and begins to leave immediately, sheathing forreaver on his back with a bit of rope.
A glove hits Erak in the back of the head as he's leaving. It was one of Oici's smithing gloves. She beckons him with a finger, mockingly. The glove hits her in the face with enough force to floor her. As soon as she picks herself up and looks around, Erak is gone.
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Topic: Battle of the Gods IV (Read 71463 times)