Then the Golem King raised its obsidian foot.
"Run!" Zael shouted.
His warning came too late.
Bam!
The giant foot slammed into the ground with full force. A shockwave swept across the training field like an invisible wall, tearing through the dirt from the center of the impact and spreading in every direction. Arad, who stood closest, was thrown backward and hit the ground with a heavy crash. Zael tried to hold his position, but the force dragged him off his feet and sent him rolling several steps across the dirt.
At the edge of the field, the villagers collapsed in a scattered mess. Some screamed and covered their heads. Others wrapped their arms around children, trying to keep them from being thrown harder against the ground. Dust rose high into the air, swallowing the field in a choking gray cloud.
Fragha braced one hand against the ground to keep himself from falling completely. His breathing had already become unstable. Each inhale felt like swallowing a heated stone, heavy and painful inside his chest.
A transparent system panel appeared before his blurred eyes, trembling faintly in the air.
«[SYSTEM WARNING]
User's physical condition is below the safe threshold.
Internal energy: critically low.
Risk: loss of consciousness, physical collapse, failure to maintain further commands.»
Fragha read the warning without changing his expression.
I know.
He lifted his head. Through the drifting dust, Arad was trying to rise. One of his hands pressed into the ground, but his shoulder trembled under his own weight. Hana stood not far from him, though her knees looked ready to give out. The mana around her body had become so thin that it was barely visible.
"Hana…" Arad said in a rough voice. "Can you still move?"
Hana forced a faint smile. "If it's just falling down, I can still do that anytime."
"That is not a comforting answer."
"It was not meant to be."
Fragha heard their conversation faintly through the ringing in his ears. He knew they were still trying to endure, but their bodies had reached their limit. Arad and Hana were nearly spent. Zael was injured. The workers and the Knights of Constantia had already been exhausted from the earlier fight, and the villagers who had gathered at the field were never prepared to face a monster of this size.
If the Golem King was allowed to move freely, Constantia would be flattened.
The Golem King stepped forward.
The ground trembled again.
But Fragha noticed something through the dust.
Its movement was slow.
Not slow like a stupid creature, but slow like something too heavy for its own body. Each time it raised a leg, its knee and hip followed a fraction too late. Its obsidian body was hard, powerful, and almost impossible to destroy from the outside, but that same weight made its balance terrible.
Fragha gritted his teeth.
"So that's the opening."
The system panel pulsed again.
«[SYSTEM NOTICE]
Skill: Emperor's Command is available for emergency enhancement.
Cost: all remaining system points.
Effect: increases command resonance range and mass coordination.
Additional risk: physical collapse.»
Another panel appeared before the first one had fully faded.
«[CRITICAL WARNING]
Emergency enhancement is not recommended.
Chance of unconsciousness will increase drastically.
User's body has failed to maintain stable energy circulation.»
Fragha let out a quiet laugh, almost without sound.
"If I wait for my body to stabilize, there won't be any Constantia left."
He raised his hand and pressed the option.
«[CONFIRMED]
Emperor's Command has undergone temporary enhancement.
Remaining system points: 0.
Beginning resonance synchronization.»
Pain struck his head immediately.
Fragha held his breath. His vision turned white for one second, and his heart felt as if it had been punched from the inside. When the pain eased just enough for him to think, something spread from his body. It was not a normal voice, nor was it ordinary magic. It was a pressure of will that reached every person still standing on the field.
The trembling villagers suddenly turned toward him.
Zael, who had just forced himself upright with dust covering his face, widened his eyes. "Lord Fragha…?"
Albert pressed a hand against his chest, as if he had heard something that did not enter through his ears. "This… is this a command?"
Fragha drew in a deep breath. His voice was not loud, yet everyone heard it.
"Listen to me."
The chaotic field slowly fell silent.
"That monster is too heavy. We do not need to defeat it with strength. We only need to bring it down."
Zael looked at the Golem King, then back at Fragha. "Bring down something that tall? With what?"
Fragha pointed toward the equipment warehouse at the side of the field. "Thick ropes. Take all of them. Workers, knights, anyone who can still move—wrap them around its legs."
Several villagers hesitated.
"How are we supposed to get close?" one worker shouted. "If that thing steps on us, we're finished!"
Fragha turned toward Arad and Zael. "Because it will not be looking at them."
Arad understood first. He forced himself to stand and wiped a thin line of blood from the corner of his mouth. "I'll draw it from the front."
Zael rolled his injured shoulder and grimaced. "I'll take the side. As long as that thing moves like a stiff statue, I can make it chase shadows."
Fragha faced the villagers again. "You are not being asked to fight it directly. Trust the timing of my command. Do not pull until I give the signal."
From among the crowd, Bredt stepped forward. His face was pale, but his eyes did not waver.
"I'll join the rope team."
Albert turned to him. "Bredt, are you sure?"
Bredt nodded. "If my hands can still grip, then I can still pull."
Fragha gave a short nod. "Bredt, lead the left side. Albert, organize the villagers behind him. Ivan, gather every knight who can still move. Stella, make sure those who cannot fight retreat from the path where the golem will fall."
They moved.
It was not neat, and it was far from perfect, but they moved.
Several workers ran to the equipment warehouse and dragged out thick coils of rope usually used for hauling timber and stone. Their hands trembled, but Fragha's command kept their panic from taking complete control. Ivan shouted for the knights to split into two groups. Albert helped the villagers tie large knots as quickly as possible. Stella pushed the wounded away from the widening cracks in the ground.
Meanwhile, Arad advanced first.
"Hey, big rock!" he shouted.
The Golem King turned slowly.
Arad slammed his foot against the ground, then leapt aside as an obsidian fist came down and crushed the place where he had stood. Dirt exploded upward. Zael used that moment to rush toward the opposite side, moving quickly enough that the Golem King began shifting its body after him.
"Over here, you slow damn statue!" Zael yelled with a bitter grin.
The Golem King swung its left arm. Zael ducked just in time. The wind from the strike alone nearly knocked him off balance, but he kept running around the giant's leg.
"Now!" Fragha shouted.
The rope teams moved.
Bredt and his group ran low, carrying the end of a rope behind the Golem King's left leg. On the other side, Ivan and the knights did the same around its right leg. They did not wrap it once. They circled it several times, following the command that continued to echo clearly in their minds.
"Lower right. Through the gap near the knee. Do not pull yet."
Fragha fought to remain conscious. The system panel flickered faster in front of his eyes.
«[CRITICAL WARNING]
User's energy is approaching zero.
Skill activity must be stopped.
Physical collapse cannot be avoided if usage continues.»
Fragha ignored it.
"Zael, make it raise its right foot!"
Zael moved at once. He rushed toward the Golem King's right leg and struck the obsidian surface with his short dagger. The attack barely left a mark, but it was enough to draw the monster's attention.
The Golem King lifted its right foot.
Fragha saw the moment clearly.
"Pull left! Hold right! Now!"
Dozens of hands pulled the ropes at the same time. Bredt screamed the loudest, veins standing out on his neck as he held on with everything he had. Albert and the workers pulled behind him. On the other side, Ivan ordered the right group to lock their position.
The Golem King lost its balance.
Its lifted right foot failed to return to the ground. Its massive torso leaned backward, too heavy and too stiff to correct itself in time.
"Everyone, pull!" Fragha shouted.
The ropes stretched until they looked ready to snap. The Golem King tried to force its weight forward again, but the rope teams held its legs apart while Arad struck the front of its knee with one last blow. The impact was not enough to break the obsidian, but it was enough to ruin the giant's balance completely.
For the first time, the Golem King fell.
Dum!
The obsidian giant crashed onto its back with a thunderous impact, its chest facing the sky and its enormous limbs sprawled across the battlefield. Dust surged upward. The villagers holding the ropes were knocked down as well, but none of them let go until the giant's body had fully struck the ground.
"Hana!" Fragha called.
Hana was already waiting.
With a pale face, she raised both hands. The last of her mana gathered between her fingers like a dim blue light.
"If this fails," she whispered, "I really have nothing left."
Ice magic burst from her hands, spreading across the Golem King's joints, chest, and neck. The obsidian surface, heated from the friction of battle, was quickly covered in frost. Hana nearly fell, but she forced her arms to stay raised.
Then she changed the flow of her mana.
Fire ignited.
Flames struck the Golem King immediately after the ice covered it. The sudden change in temperature created small cracking sounds across the obsidian surface. The cracks were thin and almost invisible, but Fragha saw them.
"Arad!"
Arad was already moving before his name had fully left Fragha's mouth.
With the last of his strength, he ran along the fallen Golem King's arm and climbed over its cracked chest. Because the giant had fallen on its back, the dark core beneath the fractured obsidian was exposed just enough to be reached. It pulsed weakly, buried behind layers of black stone.
Arad pulled his fist back.
"Break!"
His fist slammed into the Golem King's chest.
Cracks spread from the point of impact. The core inside trembled, then shattered into fragments of dark light. The Golem King's body began to crumble, pieces of obsidian falling away from its form.
But before it fully died, its right arm moved.
It was not a deliberate punch. The shattered core released one final surge of unstable magic, and the giant's arm jerked upward like a dying beast's reflex. The massive fist scraped across the ground as it swung sideways toward Hana, who stood near the upper part of its body after using the last of her magic.
"Hana!" Arad shouted.
Hana turned her head, but her body did not move. Her mana and strength were completely spent.
Fragha saw everything.
His body should not have been able to run. The system had already warned him. His legs were almost numb, and his breath came in broken pieces. But when he saw the obsidian fist sweeping toward Hana, every calculation vanished from his mind.
He moved.
Fragha threw himself forward and shoved Hana with all the strength he had left.
Hana's body was thrown to the side, out of the path of the dying blow. In the next moment, the Golem King's fist struck Fragha instead.
The world went silent.
Fragha was sent flying, his body sliding across the ground before stopping near the center of the field. Behind him, the Golem King finally collapsed completely, turning into a lifeless heap of obsidian stone.
There were no more tremors.
There was no more threat.
But no one cheered.
"Fragha!" Hana crawled toward him, panic spreading across her face.
Arad climbed down from the golem's remains and ran, though his steps nearly failed beneath him. Zael reached Fragha first and dropped to his knees beside his body.
"Lord Fragha…? Hey, answer me."
A final system panel appeared above Fragha's body, its light dim and flickering.
«[SYSTEM ALERT]
User energy: 0.
Neural activity declining.
Status: coma.
Recovery cannot be predicted.»