Frozen Hell (End Part)

After several minutes of wandering, the golem finally found the annoying human after much searching. It appears that this person found his way back to the blocked entrance where they had their first embroil.

The living male who caused so much trouble in this sacred place was simply standing near the left wall, glaring at the golem that he had fought twice against. The sacrificial beastwoman was nowhere to be seen.

Despite having been created with limited emotions and a tendency to ignore meaningless thoughts, the golem could not help but find that this place was quite appropriate for their last encounter. This time it would not allow the human to escape.

Likewise, Leo also appeared to be sharing similar thoughts. Raising his voice, he shouted loudly, "Come on! I'm right here!"

The golem obliged, and sent out two red beams from both its eyes. This was a predictable and standard attack. Had the golem been in perfect condition, it would've had far more options at its disposal. But nevertheless, it was already planning on annihilating this little nuisance once and for all.

When the red beams shone, Leo immediately dashed diagonally up the left wall towards the ceiling, using the standard [Center of Balance] and [Wind Boost] combo that was now becoming his signature move. This time, however, he also activated [Shadow Cascade] to throw off the accuracy of the golem's attacks.

Boom!

Boom!!

BOOM!!!

Large clouds of dust and explosions expanded near the magically shielded entrance. Lasers were slicing through the air with ominous buzzing sounds, chipping away and denting several sections of the walls and ceiling in the interior of the building's entrance.

Unlike their earlier battle, this time both combatants were aiming to achieve a decisive victory. The human and golem each possessed their own separate plans on ending this conflict, and vowed to change the direction this battle was heading towards.

The golem, who was steadily growing familiar with Leo's attack patterns, was now preparing to attempt a new approach. While the human did manage to cause its aims to miss more often than before with that strange shadowy spell, it was only a minor setback.

Gearing up its legs, the golem suddenly sprang itself forward with both arms raised in front to shield its head. A moment later, like an asteroid hitting the earth, it suddenly crashed into one of the walls that the human was standing on!

Fierce vibrations caused the structure to shake momentously, forcing Leo's body to be flung off to midair.

Right after this occurred, the golem forcefully extricated itself out of the wall before turning around and raised its ruby eyes to launch another attack. Previously, it had already understood the general concept of the human's spells. That buff it had never seen before which allowed the human to stand at any elevation could only be used when the latter was in contact with a surface connected to the mausoleum. Furthermore, the spell did not seem to provide the ability to fix the user onto a specific area, thus why the golem attempted this new approach.

This calculated move was intended to surprise the little human before quickly disabling him.

Unfortunately, plans were not always going to go according to one's design.

Despite being caught off guard by the sudden attack, Leo's mind was still unusually calm. Whether this was due to his teacher Gerald's training or his previous battle experiences was a mystery. Regardless, the unexpected situation did not allow panic to affect his quick-thinking.

[Levitating Plate]!

Even if he was currently separated from parts of the mausoleum, the [Center of Balance] spell can allow him to maintain his center of gravity on any type of platform, including those that weren't connected to the ground.

With his back facing the floor, Leo's blurry figure formed a square board of solid mana under his feet that pointed upwards to the ceiling, becoming a fixed surface to stand on that also stopped his descent.

This caused the lasers that the golem sent out to once again miss their target.

Initially, the golem had estimated on the general trajectory and area in which the human would land. This calculation would allow it to ignore the [Shadow Cascade] spell that was obscuring its accuracy. But this unfortunately proved to be a waste of time, as the golem had misjudged on the exact features of its opponent's spell due to not having enough information to derive from. Nonetheless, it was still undeterred in carrying out its extermination.

In the air, Leo quickly summoned more copies of [Levitating Plate], packing them closely together to form a sort of curved ramp to a specific location on the ceiling. This temporarily served to help him swiftly reach upwards using [Wind Boost].

'Although that body slam was a little unexpected, it wasn't unwelcome,' Leo thought about the golem's full-forward charge into the mausoleum's wall.

Just like his opponent below, he too had plans in mind.

The fight continued onwards, extending to the point where both combatants were feeling exhausted.

As a result of the extensive amount of time he spent exploring and battling in the Frozen Hell, Leo's muscles were already starting to ache for rest. And with each passing second, his mana was one step closer to becoming dangerously depleted.

While the golem was not a living creature, and hence could not physically feel sore, it, like the human, also possessed a limited supply of energy. In a few hours, the golem would eventually have to shut down again in order to slowly recharge the special core in its body. But it was not particularly saddened about this situation.

Granted, the troublesome human was far more stubborn than the golem had initially expected. The little person would constantly race around on the walls and ceiling of this ancient building, and would even occasionally hop onto plates formed of mana suspended randomly in the air. Like an irritating fly, this little creature would restlessly keep evading its body while continuously launching futile attacks that would barely tickle the golem's skin.

It was about time for this troublesome fly to finally stop running and meet his maker.

A moment later, Leo would eventually halt near the entrance of the mausoleum, standing on a single surface formed of mana hovering a few feet off the ground. The spells which he applied on his body had become expended, leaving him utterly defenseless.

The golem, which had been following him throughout the entire battle, also stopped and aimed its eyes to where he stood.

Just when the large construct thought that things were finally about to end, it noticed Leo reaching into his pouch and pulling out a few more arrowheads.

Out of instinct, the golem raised its arms to cover the opening in its chest when it saw the human's enchanted objects flying through the space. But surprisingly, none of them went within an inch near the magic core embedded inside.

A strange sense of confusion flashed across the golem's ruby eyes as it pondered on the meanings behind these senseless-looking actions. Just when it prepared to deliver one final burst of red energy, explosions resounded all across the room.

Suddenly, numerous chunks of the ceiling and walls broke off from the surroundings, with a few relatively large sizes landing directly onto the golem's body! However, the impact was negligible...

With a simple shrug, the golem instantly shook off the debris covering it and turned once again towards the human. Did the latter honestly think such a method would really cause any significant damage?

In truth, the golem had already known that the structure around it was progressively getting weaker as a consequence of their prolonged battle.

It stared down at Leo, who wore an expression that looked both exhausted yet also mysteriously pleased at what transpired.

Just when the golem prepared for the final attack, it shockingly noticed a thick layer of frost forming on its body, causing its movement to become increasingly stiff and immobile. With a slight feeling of panic rushing in, the golem tried to unleash beams of energy from the ruby eyes but found that the lasers would instantly disappear as soon as they were emitted.

A single thought of confusion flashed through the golem's mind before its consciousness rapidly faded away under the effect of the Frozen Hell; it was not even given time to apologize to its master for failing its mission. And like an avalanche tumbling down a mountain, the golem's body instantly froze and shattered apart before trailing onto the mausoleum's floor.

At last, this final guardian has now joined the rest of its companions.

Standing on his [Levitating Plate], Leo slowly lowered his platform onto the floor while calmly taking deep breaths to relax his trembling heart.

"My plan worked!" Leo couldn't help but shout out in relief.

If he wasn't so tired, he would have also raised his hands to cheer at this victory.

Some time before the golem discovered his whereabouts, Leo had been using [Seismic Sense] to send vibrations throughout the infrastructure of the mausoleum's interior to detect any signs of weak impressions. Afterwards, he left a few shallow scratches with his sword to roughly mark these areas before planning his next steps. When the golem would arrive to launch its attacks, Leo would use himself as bait to lead it into shooting out lasers towards these specific locations. The goal was to cause the interior of the mausoleum to become unstable enough for his enchanted arrowheads to break an opening to the outside environment.

Leo actually never intended to use the various parts of the walls and ceiling to crush the golem. As far as he could tell, the structure itself seems to possess some protections that allow the mausoleum to maintain its condition despite residing in the Frozen Hell, making it very difficult to completely collapse. However, if he were careful enough, he could at least open a gap in its design that can allow the cold air to seep through, unleashing the effect of the outside land onto this ancient building.

Afterwards, all that's left is to simply stand by and stay protected by his phoenix feather while his enemy would be forced to endure the terrible magic of the Frozen Hell.

Of the limited advantages Leo thought of, his superior mobility and the feather's protection were the only attributes he could significantly utilize in achieving a complete victory over his opponent.

Of course, this plan posed several risks that could prove quite fatal to Leo if he had made even one slight error in judgement. Particularly the assumption that his opponent would even be vulnerable to the Frozen Hell in the beginning. For all he knew, perhaps whatever magic was preventing this mausoleum from turning to ice would also extend to its residents as well.

But now that this battle has officially concluded, Leo hurriedly made his way to the chieftain's daughter. Previously, to protect her from his plan, he had hidden her away in some other remote area of the mausoleum, though if he didn't hurry now, the cold air from outside would likely reach her as well.

Before he left, Leo unexpectedly heard a cracking sound echo from just a step beside him. Turning his head around, he noticed that the golem's magic core was no longer embedded in the latter's body anymore. Right now, it was currently developing frost across its formerly red surface that was now clear as a crystal, appearing like it would break apart in a few more minutes. Nevertheless, the core actually seemed quite resilient to this cold temperature.

'Hmm, is it made of some kind of magically durable material? No, a better explanation could be that this mausoleum is still somewhat resisting the effects of the Frozen Hell,' Leo surmised.

Based on what happened to the golem, the construct only shattered into several large pieces rather than becoming completely unrecognizable in the form of a million ice shaves. It stands to reason that there is some kind of mysterious protection that's still active within this building. Either that or not enough of the cold air has yet to reach inside.

At this moment, Leo was quite tempted to bring something back after all the trouble he had went through. Although the magic core was quite big compared to the usual ones supplied in golems, being around one and a half the size of Leo's torso, it was still spherical in shape and he could use the [Levitating Plate] to push the object from behind to roll it alongside him.

'I wouldn't really be wasting time by using this method,' Leo reasoned with a tired expression. 'And moving the [Levitating Plate] hardly requires much mana anyway, so using it for this purpose shouldn't be a problem.'

Plus, with his mana severely drained right now, he won't be able to cast other spells to increase his body's mobility, so there isn't any burden if he chooses to bring the core with him or leave it behind.

After taking the initiative to carry out this idea, Leo suddenly noticed that the magic core wasn't actually as heavy as he thought it would be, as if the inside was completely hollowed out. If needed, a toddler could probably take this thing as a souvenir. This gave Leo some further inspiration.

When he steadily jogged back to a random chamber where he had hidden the beastwoman away, Leo decided to place the latter's body on top of the hovering platform made of mana, while simultaneously having one side of the platform's edge push against the magic core to make it roll alongside him, essentially accomplishing two tasks at once.

After spending ten whole minutes of searching in the dark depths of the mausoleum, Leo finally located a circle of magic markings that strongly resembled the one he uncovered back at the Frozen Plains. The only differences was that some of the symbols possessed slightly distorted details in their designs, and were also noticeably more pronounced than the symbols adjacent to them.

Using his understanding of particular magic formations taught at Halo Academy, Leo came to the conclusion that this circle was indeed connected to the one outside the Frozen Hell. Upon a longer inspection where he compared them through memory, he noted that both of these circles act as a two-way portal where one end can only remain active when the other has recently been used. This explains why Walter and the chieftain's mages were so helpless earlier.

Feeling grateful for this discovery, Leo then quickly stepped inside, bringing along both the chieftain's daughter, who was beginning to slightly shiver, and the magic core he took as a spoil of war.

In a flash of light, silence finally returned again in the mausoleum.

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At the edge of the periphery, Walter suddenly felt his magic communicator being contacted by another person. Having an idea on who they are, he swiftly brought it out of his pocket and pressed the communicator directly to his ear.

"Yes?" he answered in anticipation.

"Head to the magic circle," Leo's voice came out on the other end, sounding drained of energy. "I've found her."

Then, the connection ceased.

No matter how many times Walter tried contacting back, he received no further responses. Driven by his wild hopes, he immediately went back to the carriage.

"Adventurers!" Walter shouted as he opened the door. "Your friend has returned!"

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Some time passed, and the carriage guided by Walter at the front end finally arrived near Leo's location.

When all the passengers jumped off, they witnessed the sight of Leo covered in falling snow while collapsed out of exhaustion. Beside him were the body of a beastwoman in tattered clothing and a huge magic core.

It didn't take long before Alex and the others heard Walter scream out in delight upon finding the daughter of his lord still breathing, albeit shivering against the cold. As for the rest, they quickly gathered over Leo's body out of concern for his current state.

"How did he end up like this?" Judy worriedly asked Sarah, who was the one among them with the most authority regarding matters of injuries.

"He's not in any danger," Sarah said after checking Leo's body. "His muscles are merely tired and he seems to be dangerously low on mana."

After everyone else breathed a sigh of relief, they all decided to head back and break the good news to Chieftain Namur.

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