The Paladin in the Abyss-Chapter 772 - 783: Start the Fight

The flesh golem’s arm was as heavy as a battering ram, landing a solid blow on Bruto’s body. The dwarf spun violently in the air like a kicked ball before finally crashing into the wall at the other end of the room with a boom.

It wasn’t just him who was hit; Alamir was also unable to dodge in time. Unlike Bruto, the Elf Priest managed to raise his shield at the last moment, but the protection it offered was limited in the face of pure strength—he, too, was sent flying backwards and couldn’t maintain his stance upon landing, tumbling several times before coming to a stop.

The only companion to emerge unscathed was young Elisha, a cautious Wanderer who had prepared to retreat while attacking. Sensing something amiss through the feedback from her weapon, she didn’t hesitate to let go, naturally avoiding the counterattack that followed.

When the flesh golem swung its rock-like arm at Lancelot, he knew there was no way he could take the hit head-on. He adopted a parrying stance, but angled his sword in a specific way to deflect the opponent’s strike. The maneuver worked fairly well; although he was pushed back rapidly, he managed to stay on his feet.

After a few exchanges, Lancelot had a rough estimate of the strange flesh golem’s strength—it had the might of a giant, yet its size was equivalent to an average humanoid creature. Its body seemed to be assembled from different corpses, but it exhibited an odd petrification that made it as hard as metal and also fire-resistant, perhaps a so-called ’improvement.’

But an enemy of this magnitude was not beyond his capacity to handle.

Lancelot reached into the Dimensional Bag and pulled out the Giant Sword Glacier.

’Why don’t you use me?’ a somewhat dissatisfied female voice echoed in his consciousness, ’With my sharpness, I could definitely breach that monster’s defenses...’

’Because what he’s about to do doesn’t quite match your noble temperament,’ another elegant male voice responded, ’Watch closely. Whenever he takes out that great sword, it means he’s ready to get rough...’

The corners of the Human Knight’s mouth curled involuntarily. He quietly circulated his mental method, and pure True Yuan gushed forth from his Dantian like floodwaters through the gates. It coursed through special routes in his meridians and finally converged on the great sword in his hand. The blade of Glacier lit up with a dazzling blue-white glow, indicating the pinnacle of resonance between the Qingyuan Sword Technique and the sword’s Flame Enchantment. Moreover, two sword shadows identical to the great sword appeared by his side, moving in sync with Glacier’s original form.

Lancelot took a deep breath, then suddenly vanished from the spot. The golem’s face clearly showed surprise, and it attempted to turn around abruptly, but it was too late.

The Human Knight materialized behind the golem, the impressively sized Giant Sword raised above his head and brought down with the force of a farmer plowing the field. The tip of Glacier cleaved into the golem’s skull top all the way to near the throat before halting, splitting the stone sphere-like head open like a winter melon, while the two sword shadows landed on the enemy’s shoulders, each creating a terrifying gash about three fingers wide and inches deep.

Lancelot focused his gaze and saw that the brain matter, which should have been gelatinous, had a grey-white, stone-like texture, still entangled within the split skull like a spider web. Furthermore, such a wound, which would be fatal to most creatures, failed to kill it; the bizarre golem had completed its turn and raised its fist towards Lancelot, as if the damage inflicted was merely to an ordinary limb.

However, Lancelot had anticipated this situation. He withdrew his right foot, stepping just outside of his opponent’s attack range, and his Great Sword simultaneously swung around like a windmill, slashing diagonally across the enemy’s body once again.

The destruction from this sword strike was considerable, nearly severing the golem’s right arm at the base. But it was like an undead monster, still striving to attack Lancelot. He stepped back again, his weapon spinning in the opposite direction through the air before hitting the golem’s body from the other side.

Lancelot’s three strikes were all-out attacks without reservation, combined with the synchronized assault of two sword shadows. In an instant, he had struck the enemy nine times in succession. Even the peculiar golem’s resilience reached a critical point.

The enemy stopped in its tracks, its body convulsing strangely as if it were a malfunctioning machine. Lancelot wasn’t going to gamble on whether it had the ability to self-repair or not. His movements not only continued; they even sped up by a third, and within a few breaths, he completely dismembered the bizarre golem, its stone-like body parts scattered everywhere.

After there was nothing standing higher than a foot in front of him, Lancelot finally stopped. He planted the Great Sword into the ground and turned his head to check on his companions—they were all too accustomed to his burst of power and had positioned themselves as far away from him as possible in the corners of the room.

If they were caught by his sword wind, the consequences would be no joke.

"This guy should be completely dead now, right?" Bruto approached cautiously, the Elf Priest having already healed his wounds with Divine Arts, "What exactly is this? Why didn’t it work when Kalalin set it on fire just now?"

"Look at this..." the Scholar picked up half an arm from the ground, "This is strange. It’s clearly shaped like a human, yet it’s actually made of stone. But if you’re making a golem out of stone, there’s no need to carve it to such a realistic extent..."

"Eh? But I really felt like I was stabbing into flesh just now..." said little Isha, puzzled, picking up her short sword from the ground, "Wait a second, something smells off... Kalalin, brother, feel the elbow section, is that also made of stone?"

"What?" the Scholar did as suggested unconsciously, "This is also... wait, no! This texture... this is flesh!"

Kalalin rubbed forcefully at the joint of the dismembered limb, and his fingers immediately became coated in a grey-white pigment, and the area he was rubbing turned reddish-brown—the color of the ’normal’ flesh golem they had encountered before. The Scholar exchanged a look of astonishment with his companions and then uttered a simple spell, lightly touching the severed limb.

A pale blue shimmer of Transformation System magic flashed by, removing the grime on its surface and revealing the limb’s original color—there was normal flesh at the junction of the upper and lower arm (obviously from two different bodies), which turned grayish-white about an inch later. Kalalin pressed on it to confirm it was indeed real stone.

"The paint seems to have been applied at the joints, making one mistake it for stone," Kalalin announced his speculation to the others, "But how was this achieved?"