Sam, Zutiria, and Meri all look up at the fifteen-foot tall statue in surprise as it lifts its leg over the fountain and takes a step towards them. The ground rumbles under its weight, making the impressive sight of the stone woman all the more menacing to behold. The party readies their weapons, and Meri transforms her shield back to its tower form, knowing full well she will need it.

“By the looks of things, it appears to be an ordinary Stone Golem, aside from the alcoholic lactation,” I warn the group. “This shouldn’t be too difficult for you three.”

“Any weaknesses, Boss?” Sam asks as she begins strafing closer, ready to dodge at the slightest warning.

“Think about it. What is stone typically weak to?”

“...Uh.”

‘Sir is saying we just need to break the statue, Sammy.’

“I KNEW THAT!” Sam snaps at the little Mage hiding in the back row. “Still, that makes shit a lot easier...”

“WATCH OUT!” Meri shouts as the female golem raises its mighty fist into the air, gathering power before launching it at the Princess. The attack is slow but powerful-looking. Thankfully, Sam has more than enough time to leap out of the way before the golem can make contact and damage her.

“Meri, tackle its leg!” I suggest, as my audience of kitties and I watch the battle unfold with great interest.

“A-Alright!!” Meri begins gathering energy in her shield. The Shield Maiden positions it out in front of her body to fully barricade herself from any frontal harm. After a few more seconds of the power being built up, Meri unleashes her Shield Bash Art. She is suddenly flung ten feet forward at high speed, crashing into the living statue’s right leg with a hefty impact. While watching her Taskmaster screen, I see Meri’s stamina meter trickle down a little bit. Shield Bash doesn’t take much out of her stamina to use, good to know.

Despite the sheer momentum, the Art Assault does little damage. A few chips of stone fly off from the nude woman’s leg during the impact, but it holds its ground. I was hoping it would stagger and topple the monster... no such luck, it seems.

Sensing a chance to play to her role and draw in even more aggro, Meri begins badgering the golem by banging her shield against it and yelling. “C-C’mon, you big-boobied blockhead! Hit me! Right in the shield! C’mon! C’MON!”

The golem doesn’t appreciate the distraction, and it turns its head down to glare at Meri pointedly. The added attention makes the Shield Maiden much more nervous, though she does her best to continue banging her shield against the monster to give us more time to strategize.

‘Do you think it would help if I made the ground at its feet icy, or...’

“I don’t think so. The stony texture of the golem’s feet would likely prevent it from slipping around.”

‘I thought so too, just wanted a second opinion, Sir. Any ideas?’

Before I can offer anything, Sam interrupts. “Can’t you change the shape of the stone or some shit?”

“Golems are often magic resistant, being enchanted themselves.” I instruct the Princess with my knowledge, causing her to make an audible ‘Tch’.

‘I could do it if I had access to my higher-level spells, but alas...’ Zutiria sighs, depressed about her physical disability. I look to her mana meter and feel her pain, seeing how much of it is permanently gray.

“Screw this, I’m just gonna see how tough it is,” Sam rears her great blade behind her as she runs towards the golem, preparing to make a horizontal slash. I don’t stop her, as the monster is too focused on Meri right now for Sam’s assault to carry much of a downside.

Right when the golem reaches out with both hands to try and grab Meri, the Princess swings her weapon using all of her absurd strength. It rends the air as she grunts, smashing the blade into the feminine golem’s stony kneecap. While Meri’s attack was powerful in its own right, Sam’s is focused on a singular point. The mighty sword strike causes a ripple of cracks to erupt outwards from the point of impact.

“Hah! Fuck you, bitch!” Sam taunts without much creativity behind her words. This attack did evident damage, but it wasn’t enough to break the knee fully. As such, the golem isn’t all that worse for wear and can respond to the Princess’s attack right away.

It looks straight at the young girl before reaching one of its titanic hands to its equally titanic stone breasts. Aiming it directly at Sam’s face, the champagne stream changes from being a peaceful fountain’s trickle into a mighty jetstream. It blasts right onto Sam’s face, getting in her eyes and making her scream with pain. 

“GAH, FUCKIN’ STONE SLUT GOT ME WITH HER TITTY BOOZE-” She howls, reflexively pulling back and un-wedging her sword from the golem’s knee.

“SAM!” Peri cries from behind me.

“Shit, that has to hurt!” Cherry remarks. 

“This looks bad, nyaa...” Snow clasps her cheeks with her paws, her eyes opening wide with fear.

“This is just the first room,” I remind the audience with a knowing smile. “Have some faith in my Guild, please. Sam? Get back in there. You don’t need to be able to see to hit a big stone target.”

“Don’t have to tell me twice, Boss,” Sam grunts her words, reaching into the pits of her anger to power the next strike of her sword. And then another, and another. The ferocious Princess begins repeatedly hammering her weapon into the same kneecap she just attacked, hoping to crumble it under her power through repetition and force of will. The cracks do deepen, but none of these strikes are enough to make the limb give. Since her first attack had a running start, she had even more momentum behind her.

I predicted that it wouldn’t be enough. My real goal is to get it to try and attack Sam so that I can guide the girls into performing an impromptu air attack. Not long after the Princess begins her assault, the golem falls into my trap. It begins to slowly raise its fist, preparing yet another one of its slow but unquestionably powerful punches.

“Meri, get ready. Zutiria, get her into the air using as little mana as possible. Make sure she lands safe, too.”

“O-OK!”

“Lift...” Zutiria says in a hushed tone, straining her eyes as she points her staff at the Shield Maiden. Her mana meter lowers a few notches. Not too much, mind, but I was certainly hoping it would be less.

Meri picks up on the plan right away, and as she begins rising into the air, she turtles up behind her shield. “Stand firm... stand firm...!!” She mutters to herself, no one having the heart to tell her she’s not currently standing on anything.

Zutiria successfully lifts her shielded Guildmate into a collision course with the golem’s punch, protecting Sam from any chance of damage. As her shield is smashed with the golem’s powerful right hook, Meri has only a fraction of a second to react before the punch’s impact sends her flying backward. By the skin of her teeth, Meri seizes onto the opportunity and shouts, “REFLECT!” while her gratitude crystal glows bright red.

Sure, it’s nowhere near the devastating retaliation she inflicted upon the Murdermoth last week. We all wrote that off as a special one-time thing, but Meri managed to fire off an impressively powerful Reflect as it is. No doubt it’s such a powerful counter simply because of how much brute strength the feminine golem has.

It scares me to even think what sort of damage one of its punches might do if it were to land...

Meri’s Art sends out a triumphant blast of kinetic force trumpeting from her shield. It takes in all of the power behind the golem’s massive punch, processes it, and returns the absorbed energy along with some of Meri’s own packed in as an extra bonus.

The statue’s arm shatters into countless rocky shards from the recoil, and the resounding shockwave pushes the figure backward onto the floor.

Meri, who typically has to dig her feet into the ground to avoid the blowback from her own Reflect, is sent flying in reverse from the burst. She hurtles toward the wall, screaming out and huddling her body into a ball.

However, our resident Black Mage has no plans to let Meri come to harm from her own attack. “Cloutress,” She chants, her staff whirring with the wind. Right where the Shield Maiden is set to collide with the golden wall forms a rectangular cloud that catches Meri, absorbing the impact and bouncing her peacefully to the floor.

It doesn’t appear to have a real cloud’s properties, acting almost as if it were a weightless pillow instead of a floating mass of liquid droplets. I’m happy to notice that the mana cost for this spell was relatively minimal.

“WAH-” Meri yelps after landing on her back. “I-I’m ok!”

“Good. All that’s left is for you to wrap things up, Sam.”

“Can do,” The Princess smirks, bringing her sword down onto the golem’s knee one final time. The stone can’t last any longer, and it breaks, leaving the statue down to only half of its limbs. As hard as it tries to stand and fight, it just can’t manage to do so and falls to the golden floor every single time.

Sam, now able to do as she wishes without the golem threatening to counterattack, raises her sword and begins pooling her energy into it. The weapon begins to glow as her Art builds tremendous power. After waiting in place for ten seconds, the Great Blader releases a downward sword strike straight into the womanly golem’s head.

Right in that instant, the enemy becomes totally inert and what’s left of it reverts back to simple stone. The battle has been won, and everyone made it through without a scratch on them.

I look to my left side and see Snow staring at the screens, her yellow eyes full of hope and her mouth opened from shock. “They did it... the girls made that look monster look downright easy!”

“Told you not to worry about them.” Giving her a cocky smile, I turn back to the three displays and speak, “Good word, team. How are your eyes, Sam?”

“Itchy, but it should fade soon. Don’t worry about me... I don’t wanna have to drink a health potion over this. Besides that, I gotta say... damn, does Biding Blade feel good when I can pull it off!” Sam smiles triumphantly and holsters her blade over her shoulder, wiping a small bit of sweat off her brow.

“Just keep practicing, and I’m sure you’ll be able to use it in actual combat. Meri, how about are you doing?”

“Fine! No problems here!” 

‘I’m good, too. Even if I feel like I could have contributed more... Lift used more mana than I wanted it to, as well.’ The little Mage sighs an annoyed sigh.

“I-I’m sorry, Zutiria! It... it’s not me, it’s my armor... a-and my shield, and, um...” Meri begins sweating, her cheeks growing red from the implication behind the Mage’s statement.

‘It wasn’t a fat joke, sweetie. Everyone thinks you look stunning with a few extra pounds.’

“...O-Oh. Um. I see.” Meri hangs her head as her blush becomes even more robust.

“All of you did wonderfully, even you, Zutiria. Is everyone ready to move on? I want to settle things with our enemy as fast and efficiently as we can.”

“Ready, Boss. I’m all fired up after listening to that son of a bitch’s stupid monologue...”

“Y-Yeah, me too... I wanna get a move on.”

‘Agreed. You don’t need to stop and compliment us every time we take out a monster. Let’s hustle.’

The team gives me the go-ahead, and I think about our next course of action for a moment. There are three doors in this chamber we haven’t been through. The northern door, the locked western door on the balcony, and the southern door. Since we can’t access the balcony’s chamber yet on account of the large lock, that only leaves us with two doors, two options.

What to do, what to do?