The statue's serene, benevolent mask shattered into a grimace of pure malice. It lunged, swinging its heavy metallic arms in perfect, lethal synchronisation.
Adrien was too quick. He ducked, dodged, and weaved through the flurry of iron thrusts, throwing himself backwards to gain breathing room. He levelled his rifle, aimed squarely at the creature's face, and squeezed the trigger.
The heavy round struck with a deafening clang, but it barely left a scratch. The bullet ricocheted violently off the alloy skin, whistling past Adrien's ear closely enough to singe his hair.
'Damn it,' he thought, scrambling back as a metal fist smashed the ground where he had stood a second before. 'The head is too thick.'
The machine drove forward, forcing Adrien to jump and twist mid-air to avoid being skewered by a thrusting forearm. As he spun, his eyes caught a flash of vulnerability: a narrow gap in the armour plate where the shoulder joint met the torso, exposed just as the arm extended.
Without wasting a heartbeat, Adrien fired the moment his feet hit the ground.
The bullet slipped clean through the gap, burying itself deep into the internal machinery.
The creature froze. Its elegant fluidity vanished, replaced by violent, erratic shuddering as if a seizure had taken hold of its metal frame. Thick black oil and scalding steam hissed from the wound. Yet, it didn't fall. With a heavy, grinding groan, the machine forced itself forward again—clumsier now, its movements halting and slow.
A grim grin flashed across Adrien's face.
'Got you.'
He dashed inside its slowed guard, jammed the barrel directly into the smoking shoulder gap, and pulled the trigger twice more. A high-pitched metal screech echoed through the chamber. Sparks erupted alongside a thick cloud of acrid smoke, and the machine finally collapsed into a motionless heap, pooling dark oil across the stone floor.
The distant echo of grinding metal and Vera's strained grunts broke Adrien's focus. He didn't waste a second, as he snatched up one of the heavy, broken limbs from the machine he had just shattered, glancing down as his system interface flashed a summary of his kill.
━━━━━━━━━━━🔱[CREATURE DEFEATED ]🔱━━━━━━━━━━━
Name: Alloy-Gilded Guardian
Level: 10
Type: Automaton
Rarity: Uncommon
--
Attributes:
Primary Resource: Refined Coagulant Oil & False-Gold Alloy Shell.
Senses: High.
--
Warning:
* Six double-jointed limbs grant a 360-degree attack radius.
* High physical damage resistance against non-magical kinetic attacks.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Adrien rounded the corner and saw Vera driven into a dead end, her back pressed against the stone wall as another guardian pressed its assault. He sprinted forward, using the momentum to plunge the jagged, broken arm of the dead machine directly into the exposed shoulder seam of Vera's attacker.
The automaton bucked violently, spewing a hiss of white-hot sparks and black smoke. Adrien didn't give it a chance to recover. Gracing the metal limb with both hands, he drove it deeper into the internal gears. With a final, agonising crunch, the machine went entirely limp, slumping over as a dark pool of oil spread across the floor.
Vera leaned against the wall, catching her breath. "What are these things? And how did you put it down so fast?"
"The system calls them Alloy-Gilded Guardians," Adrien said, wiping a splash of oil from his helmet.
"They're Level 10 Uncommon automatons. Apparently, they drop Refined Coagulant Oil and False-Gold Alloy Shells."
Vera frowned, nudging a shattered gold-mimicking plate with her boot. "We don't even know what those materials are used for."
"True. And we don't have containers for the oil anyway," Adrien replied, kneeling to pry loose a few choice armour plates. "But we can definitely carry the alloy."
"Fine, but if we find better loot later and our packs are full, we're dumping the metal. Agreed?"
"Of course," Adrien grinned.
"Then let's keep moving."
"Wait a second, Vera." Adrien gestured to the pile of heavy, pointed limbs scattered around them. "You saw how useless bullets are against their armour. Let's harvest a few of these broken arms, and we can use them as heavy spears to pierce their weak spots if we run into more.
"Vera looked at the wicked, metallic points, a sharp nod confirming her approval. "A fine idea."
Thus, the duo created a strategy to deal with the Alloy-Gilded Guardians. Vera would act as the bait and tank, while Adrien would act as the main damage-dealing rogue, and surprisingly, their teamwork and killing rate were phenomenal.
"Vera, I think we should drop all these False-Gold Alloy Shells; they weigh a lot, and on top of that, my backpack is at its limit because of them."
"Mine too, Adrien, and carrying these alloys is making us slower and thereby vulnerable to attacks."
"By the way, how long is this dungeon?" Vera asked, leaning on her improvised spear.
Adrien sighed, "It's a long one, and—" He cut himself off, his eyes locking onto the bizarre floor pattern stretching out ahead of them. A slow smirk crossed his face, "Well, it seems we've stumbled upon a trap. A refreshing change for an otherwise boring crawl."
Ever since they had figured out the trick to breaking the automatons, the dungeon had become a cakewalk. Adrien was honestly getting bored.
The obstacle blocking their path was a long, narrow tunnel. Its floor was completely lined with massive square tiles, forming a grid exactly five tiles wide and thirteen tiles long.
"A guessing game?" Vera asked, crossing her arms as she eyed the grid.
"Pick the right tile or die trying?"Adrien turned to her. "Did we pass anything earlier that might be a clue for this?"
"Unfortunately, no," Vera sighed. "It looks like we might have to do this the old-fashioned way. Trial and error."
"Actually, I think we have the perfect tools for the job."
Adrien fished a heavy piece of False-Gold Alloy Shell from his pack. Weighing it in his hand for a second, he tossed it casually onto the nearest tile.
The moment the heavy metal struck the stone, a deafening whoosh echoed through the corridor, and the tunnel walls erupted into a roaring sheet of flame.
"Damn, that is some intense heat," Adrien muttered, instinctively raising an arm to shield his face from the lingering glare. "I seriously doubt we would survive a direct blast of that. It would roast us alive in seconds."
"Agreed," Vera replied, her eyes narrowing as she studied the shimmering heat distortion in the air. "But I have a plan to get us through. Can you help me run a few tests first?"
"Sure, Vera. What do you need me to do?"
"Our biggest problem right now is inventory management. We simply don't have enough Alloy Shells in our packs to test every single tile across this entire tunnel," she explained, gesturing to the massive grid ahead. "So, before we take another step, our priority is finding out if we can safely retrieve an alloy piece after it lands on a trap tile, or if the flames reset instantly."Adrien nodded, his expression turning serious as he understood the stakes.
Vera continued, "We'll treat the floor as a tactical grid with columns and rows. I want you to throw a shell onto each of the remaining tiles in the very first row, one by one. But wait for my specific signal each time so I can record the exact reaction."
As Adrien got into a stable throwing stance, Vera dropped to one knee and pulled a thick piece of white chalk from her pouch. Before entering the dungeon, they had wisely bought a few chalk sticks to map out their route in case they stumbled into a labyrinth. It was already proving to be the best investment they had made.
She quickly sketched a miniature version of the floor grid on the smooth stone beside her. With a swift, sharp stroke, she crossed out the second tile of the first row—the one Adrien had already triggered.
"Alright," Vera said, looking up from her sketch. "The row closest to us is row one. The second tile is already confirmed as a trap. I'm going to call out the remaining column numbers. Throw a shell onto that specific tile, and we'll map out the rest of the layout. Start with column one."
Adrien flicked his wrist, tossing a shell onto the first tile. A deafening whoosh echoed through the corridor as a blast of fire instantly erupted, singeing the air.
The third and fifth tiles yielded the same explosive result, sending roaring sheets of orange flames toward the low ceiling. However, when the alloy struck the fourth tile, a dull metallic clink echoed. Nothing else happened. It was completely safe. Vera meticulously logged each explosive failure and the single safe zone on her chalk map.
"Now for the dangerous part," Vera said, her voice dropping to a tense whisper. "We need to see if you can step onto that safe fourth tile, reach over, and retrieve the alloys from the trap tiles without setting them off again. It's going to rely entirely on your footwork and reflexes. Just… don't get burned. We don't have any healing salves to spare."
Adrien rolled his shoulders, loosening his muscles, and offered her a confident, reassuring grin. "Don't worry, Vera. You can trust me. I've always been fast on my feet."