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chapter 63
Lize knew very well that this was madness.
It would be stranger if she didn’t. The steel walls surrounding the city had merged into a colossal golem, yet she was running straight toward it.
Stepping out of the rat hole, Lize had believed she would gain more experience in the outside world—but she never imagined it would be like this, a suicidal act.
“Isabel, are you sure this is what the angel told us to do?”
“Yes! It’s the angel! I didn’t tell you to do this!”
“What, are you scared too?”
“Of course! I’m scared too!”
Hearing Isabel’s cries of fear from her shoulder, Lize muttered to herself, Of course, who wouldn’t be?
Her steps unintentionally slowed. She didn’t want to hesitate—entering now was essentially marching toward death.
The angel’s instructions that Isabel had delivered were undeniably likely to succeed… but that was all. There was no guarantee of safety, nor were the numerous risks along the way addressed.
And yet, she had to follow them. Because the instructions came from the angel.
Lize had never spent much time with clergy, so she had always wondered: in a lawless life where she never knew where her heart should rest, unlike priests who had something to rely on and could live confidently, her life had always been uncertain.
Even now, it was the same. The previous Lize would have dismissed this as someone else’s problem, whether Isabel received the angel’s instructions or even the goddess’s.
So it was natural that this happened. Now that Lize had decided to follow Isabel… helping her meant following that angel she had never even seen once, just like Isabel.
As Isabel’s trembling transferred through her shoulders, Lize muttered inwardly:
If anything goes wrong and either Lize, Denk, or Isabel is killed or injured…
She would unleash the gravest sacrilege upon that angel named Sumihel, whom Isabel adored to death.
Then—
Bang!
“…!”
The future she wanted to deny had arrived.
With the ground-shaking impact, the steel golem began to advance.
They had started running from the city center, so the golem near the walls should have been far away.
Yet the sensation of its enormous bulk approaching was overwhelming.
Only two steps. Slow, heavy steps.
Yet with those steps, even solid brick houses crumbled with a crunch, dust clouds rose every time it lifted its feet, broken bricks flew into other houses’ windows, and the ground shook violently, sending people stumbling or rolling on the floor. Lize nearly fell several times.
Through the dust, she glimpsed the golem’s feet and the roof tiles bouncing up after detaching from the houses. Lize almost turned around and ran.
But it was too early to be afraid. If she panicked now, she wouldn’t even be able to attempt what came next.
Soon, they reached the target point.
A place dangerously close to the steel golem.
It was where the combatants who hadn’t escaped yet were panicking the most.
Lize gritted her teeth. As expected, even those wielding spears and swords were panicking, fleeing from the golem. Some nearly collided with Lize as they ran blindly.
Feeling Isabel’s trembling, Lize grabbed her ankles firmly with both hands.
“It’s okay!”
As Lize’s warmth reached her through her skin, Isabel’s trembling gradually subsided.
Isabel took a deep breath, drew a cross from her chest, and lifted it high.
Then, with all her strength, she shouted:
“The angel said—!”
And that voice… worked in a remarkable way.
Church hymns were divided into two types: one for religious ceremonies, and one for combating the undead.
Even the latter, when sung by a normal person, was far less effective than when sung by a priest, because priests learned to channel their divine power through their voice.
Now, Isabel could use the phenomenon of divine resonance to transmit her divine power through Lize, using her as an antenna, to everyone carrying a cross.
Infusing her voice with divine power, she shouted loudly so all could hear.
Then, the shout reached the minds of everyone carrying a cross:
“The angel said—!”
“…!”
Adventurers from the guild participating in the defense, the Rudger Knights who had forgotten their status as knights, the mercenaries of the city chain panicked and fleeing, all heard Isabel’s clear, ringing voice thunder through their minds.
“The angel said, she will destroy that golem—!”
Had it been an ordinary person shouting, it would have been ignored. But they knew the credibility of Isabel’s words.
She had attended the dawn meeting, acted as the agent of a unique angel like Lister, and ensured no casualties among them—all thanks to Isabel.
So they all clung to this tiny hope sprouting in their despair.
But Isabel’s next words presented another challenge.
“We only need to knock it down once—!”
“…Knock it down?”
“That thing?”
Yes. Isabel was telling them: combine your strength and knock that golem down just once.
After that, the angel would take care of the rest.
It was madness. They might as well have been asked to move a mountain.
Even with decades of experience, no matter how many days they tried pushing the wall-formed golem, it wouldn’t fall.
Moreover, that golem was…
“It’s moving!”
Yes, it was moving.
And the one pointing out this undeniable fact, his face contorted, was Rudger, leader of the Rudger Knights.
“That giant is still approaching! How are we supposed to topple it?”
“Don’t say that before trying…”
One of the mercenaries shouted, but he barked back fiercely:
“You try! And you, priest! Go ahead! Only crazy fools would attempt this reckless act!”
His words carried weight. Without madness, such a feat would be impossible.
But…
“…”
Faith is often mistaken for fanaticism. Undoubtedly, there is a link between faith and the kind of madness only believers can possess.
Hearing Isabel’s voice, Lister Leme, the angel’s agent fleeing the battlefield with his Zeronis unit,
“Kraaaah!”
He slammed the ground in heavy armor, shouting, and leapt toward the golem.
On his final leap, he etched a deep, spider-web-like crack into the ground, launching himself unprecedentedly high.
Just with the jump, he rose as high as the height of the colossal golem itself.
Yet that only brought him to the golem’s chest.
But Lister didn’t falter.
I was about to give up!
If his heart had a voice, that cry would have been as thunderous as the golem’s roar.
I was going to abandon everything and run!
But now, that child—Isabel, who seemed so pitiful and foolish—was running into the battlefield that even Lister wanted to flee, calling on everyone to unite their strength and topple the golem.
The flames in Lister’s heart blazed more fiercely than ever.
Divine power stems from faith, faith stems from the heart.
The fire in Lister’s heart resembled the sacred flames of the Archangel Michael purifying the earth.
“Hghhh!”
Lister soared into the air, aiming at the steel golem’s chest, arms stretched back. Over his raised mace, divine power of house-sized scale was overlaid.
Once again, he forged it: a massive divine hammer capable of shattering even a colossal golem in one strike.
Lister swung it, alongside his shameful self that could only compare himself to Isabel.
He struck the steel golem’s chest with all his strength.
Bang!
“Ahh!”
Everyone on the ground saw clearly.
Lister’s strike pushed the 60-meter-tall steel golem back half a step.
What did it mean?
What did it mean!
“It’s moving back.”
“It’s moving back!”
“We can push it!”
At that moment, everyone realized.
That golem, despite its absurd size, weight, and danger, was not just a “disaster”—it was an entity. A being that could break if struck, be pushed if forced.
Rudger was speechless. Lize’s mouth hung open. Isabel smiled subtly. Hechil lowered the chains on his arms. Various adventurers grinned, drew arrows or swords, even at the ridiculousness of it all.
They didn’t have Lister’s strength. They didn’t have Isabel’s divine power.
But what could they do?
They were combatants, here to fight.
Their enemy was right in front of them!
“Everyone—! The angel said—!”
At that moment, Isabel’s cheerful, spirited voice carried through.
Through divine resonance, the shout burned clearly into the minds of all combatants carrying a cross:
“Don’t get hurt—!”
Lister, kneeling and crying, was thrilled to rise again upon hearing it, and Isabel’s personal concern bled into the message.
Through the combination of the blessings of protection and physical enhancement, unprecedented power coursed through them all.
Their bodies surged with energy. They felt invincible, capable of anything.
Even if it was madness, even if it was like striking a rock with an egg…
They weren’t asked to do anything grand. Not even to destroy it.
Just knock it down once.
So—
“City Chain mercenaries—!”
Hechil’s splitting shout. The mercenaries drew their chains.
“Go, you freest of the free!”
Adventurers, primed by long-standing guild titles, prepared themselves.
“Zeronis, deploy.”
Lister landed, raised his mace again. His troops, encouraged by Isabel’s voice ringing in their heads, prepared themselves.
And—
Though painfully aware of their own ugliness, knowing they’d be ridiculed,
At this moment, hesitating would erase any trace of knightly honor. So they forced their voices out:
“The knights—”
The pitiful Rudger.
“Stand with the weak, raise your swords—!”
A fledgling knight order cannot excuse cowardice. Cowards are just cowards. The moment he chose flight over duty, he ceased to be a knight.
Where others had companions or subordinates, only four or so Rudger knights remained.
Some among them resolved: if they were to fight the golem, they’d become adventurers rather than stay as Rudger’s subordinates.
Rudger’s voice faltered, growing softer.
“Raise your swords… our eyes… see evil….”
Then, a low, hoarse voice passed by him.
“Our eyes exist to gaze directly upon evil.”
And finally—he stepped onto the battlefield.
One who knew the mindset of a cowardly knight better than anyone.
After a long exile, one who finally dared to leave his small room.
Reciting the phrase he had spoken daily since being knighted in the city of knights, he uttered it aloud for the first time in years:
“Never take your eyes off evil.”
Kaltan, the Wall-Facing Knight.
The knight, after a long escape, entered through the dust clouds with his spear.
To fight alongside them, never averting his gaze from the golem.
Truly, like a knight.
