Lord Of Puppets Chapter 74 – Sabotage

"And... There!" – a mage unleashed a sphere of water that broke apart a blade golem.

"Ha! Told you there was no need to worry about !" – said the mage soldier with a smug look.

"..."

"Dude.... How many tis you had fired off your spells to kill it?" – said annoyed human soldier.

"I’ve told you, either fire or earth. If not, just pick up so weapon instead."

"Oh, piss off!" – said the mage.

"Water magic is my life! A family tradition!"

"And how long it took for you to deal with this thing?" – said the human soldier as he started gathering golems remains.

"If you only know how to use water magic, why are you even here?"

"Hey! I can handle these bastards!" – said pissed off mage.

"Uhu." – replied soldier as he finished packing the golem remains.

"And what happens if you face the big golem guy?"

"Just at least learn how to use axe or maybe get one of those new crossbows."

"Apparently the crossbows produced from these golems are pretty good once they adjust them for the human use."

"Well, he is right on this one mate." – said the female cat beastman, who stood right behind the mage.

"!$&*@"

"Stop sneaking up on like that, woman!" – shouted scared mage.

"HAHAHAH! Sorry! But you are really way too easy to sneak up on." – said the female beastman as second beastman soldier approached the group while dragging the remains of the blade golems.

"Hey. Is there still room in the card?" – asked the beastman soldier.

"Yeb. Anymore?" – asked the human soldier as he helped the beastman toss the golem remains into the cart.

"Nope. This was the last one for today. We can head back." – replied the beastman as the group started heading back alongside the cart filled with golem remains.

"Hey.... Do you always deal with golems like these?" – asked the mage.

"I’m still new here."

"Well, it depends." – said the female beastman.

"Sotis there are ones with crossbow, sotis weird bug like ones."

"There is also one with bit heavy armor and hamrs."

"And there is big bad boss, the big guy..... He is..... Well, big."

"Sotis small amount of monsters leave the dungeon, but sotis a large number of them co out all at once."

"Oh, there are also sotis bandits coming here."

"!?"

"Wait, bandits?!" – asked surprised mage.

"Yea.... About those, we really don’t know." – said female beastman.

"So people say they were hired by the noble faction, according to the rumors."

"And there is also fact that the people have restricted access to this place.... So maybe the rumors were really true."

"Welp, we are just soldiers."

"Screw political stuff and just focus on the stuff they are paying us to do." – said female beastman as the group managed to leave the forest unhard.

"So anyway, how about we- "

As the female beastman was about to ask sothing, her chest was suddenly pierced by the arrow.

"...."

"Eh?"

Before the group could even react, a barrage of arrows suddenly ca flying, hitting soldiers left and right, killing the soldiers and knocking down the mage.

".... W-wait! S- "

The mage tried to beg, but before he could even do anything, he was stabbed right in the neck with a sword, finishing off the young man.

"We done here." – said the man in the hood.

"What about the camp?"

"Taken over..... But we had so loses sir." – said the second hooded man as the group of the hooded figure were looking around the camp that was now filled with corpse of the kingdom soldiers alongside few hooded figure corpse.

"The people stationing here had so stronger bastards mixed in."

"Burn them." – said the leader of the hooded group.

"We don’t have ti to take our own n corpse from here and finish the mission at the sa ti."

"Burn all corpse."

"And don’t waste ti."

"Even though we had slain everybody in the camp, it is just a matter of ti before we are discovered."

"There may also be other soldiers still in the forest."

"Eliminate everybody you find."

A large group of the hooded figure began setting fire on the camp that was filled to the brim with corpse, before monts later the entire group entered the forest.

"Rember. Our goal is to eliminate the dungeon as soon as possible and then ran away before the royal factions sends their forces here." – said the leader of the hooded figures.

"Your orders are simple." – said the voice from the past.

"You are to eliminate the dungeon and all soldiers of the kingdom in and near the forest surrounding the said dungeon."

"And then get out before the royal factions gets there. Got it?"

"First you tell us to not do it and go back, and now you are telling us do it anyway?" – asked the leader from the past.

"You have your orders." – said the voice from the past.

"Do your job and you get the promised money."

(I guess sobody our employ or one of his idiotic "buddies" screwed up big ti if they had decided to suddenly call us back, right after recalling us.) – thought the leader of the hooded group, as the mbers of the said group were ambushing and killing any soldiers they had encountered.

(Welp, they are paying us good amount of money for this, but we should probably ran the hell away from this country as soon as possible.)

(I wouldn’t be surprised if they were to try and pin bla on us when all of this is over.)

(They want us to pretend and act like "terrorists" for crying out loud.)

"Hey, how far?" – asked leader of the hooded group.

"Not far. The dungeon is located near the center of the forest – Oh, there." – said the hooded person as the entire group managed to arrive at the area surrounded by sign and few soldiers.

"Hm?"

"!?"

"HEY! WHO ARE YOU!?" – shouted the soldier near dungeon entrance before then getting shot with arrows and then getting stabbed with a sword.

In a single mont, all of the soldiers guarding the dungeon were swiftly dealt with by the hooded figures.

"..."

"Okay. We dealt with them, but there maybe more." – said the leader of the hooded group.

"But we don’t have ti to deal with all of them."

"All of you."

"We are going into the dungeon."

"This dungeon was intentionally left in the break state for all this ti, aning that there will be definitely a lot of monsters inside."

"And we will also have to deal with dungeon master on top of it all."

"Don’t hold back anything and just go for it."

"Yes sir!" – replied the entire group, before monts later every single one of the hooded figures began pouring into dungeon entrance.

"!"

"Sir! Sothing is ahead of us!" – said one of the hooded figure.

And it did not took long for the group to already encounter golems.

However, these ones weren’t so normal golems made out of wood and iron, they were reinforced version of the golems, which were made out of mostly tal.

"Take them down."

But the hooded figures were aware of this and they ca prepared.

Blunt weapons and mages specialized in either earth or ice magic.

The hooded figures have already posed ans of dealing with the golems.

Not only that, but each of the hooded figure aid for the specific parts of the golems, breaking their joints, disarming them or making them lose their legs or weaponized arms, resulting in the golems easy defeat.

These people knew exactly how to deal with golems; they knew their weak and strong points.

(Good. The info still seem useful.) – thought the leader of the group as he just finished off a hamr golem.

(But... I can hear it..... There is more golems coming this way!)

The leader of the saboteur group was right.

There was more golems coming.

And not in so small numbers either.

A small army of the dungeon monsters had started running towards the group of hooded figures.

"Stick to the strategy!"

"If you don’t, then you fucking die!"

"Simple as that?!"

"EXTERMINATE EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THESE BASTARDS!"

"..."

(...)

(What the hell is going on?) – thought Thauma as it approached the dungeon core and used it to gaze at the hooded figures engaging in large scale battle with the golems.

(It better be good. I was just about to.....)

"?"

(Hey. Who the hell are they?)

(....)

(I don’t recognize this clothes or people... Not only that..... The corpse of the soldiers are right outside the dungeon.)

(...)

(Oh great.... The mont I don’t look, everything.... What was it..... "Everything went to hell", I think this was this one, it was this one, right?)

(Anyway..... This is off.)

(One thing I would understand if it was about "dungeon taming", since I’ve started producing higher quality golems soti ago.... But that does not explain one bit the dead soldiers outside the dungeon.)

(....)

(...)

(Scenario D is it?)

(The other kingdom doesn’t want the Garmfon kingdom to profit off , so they want to get rid off .)

"..."

(Honestly, I wasn’t expecting this scenario to happened.... Like at all.)

(I an, considering that these people are letting grow freely and stuff, I thought everybody would want to own ..... But I guess I was wrong?)

(Maybe this isn’t about "money" stuff?)

"..."

(No. Never mind what is the reason is.)

(What I do know is that these people are not here to ta the dungeon.)

(They are here to destroy the dungeon.)

(....)

(The preparations are really not there yet.... And the new research I have been doing is.... Well, I’ve just started it.)

(Damn.)

(Why now of all the tis?)

"..."

(But by the looks of things, I don’t have to worry about anything.) – thought Thauma as it observed the hooded people fighting with golems.

(True, they are winning right now..... But if this is really the best they got?)

(If that is the case..... No.)

(...)

(Honestly.... I really don’t want to fight.... I was hoping to wait as long as possible until the kingdom tries to ta .... But I guess I was too hopeful.)

(...)

(But that doesn’t an I’m not ready to fight.)

(True, I may have not finished the new experint yet.)

(But that doesn’t an I didn’t finished few of my other research beforehand.)

(But..... No.)

(They are not as strong as bear beastman.)

(Nor they are stronger than soldiers from outside.)

(In terms of strength they are sowhat sa as soldiers above, maybe so of them are bit stronger, but overall? I don’t see even a single person as strong as that bear beastman amongst these people.)

"..."

(Honestly, there will be definitely limit of how much I can deceive the outside world over and over again, sooner or later they would realize that.)

(Even beast can learn things or two and humans as well as beings similar to them are not dumb, if anything they are smart.)

(They will realize that I’m deceiving them..... This is like what?)

(1....2....3.... Yea, I think this will be the third ti I’ve had deceived them.)

(Would they really let themselves be fooled by for the fourth ti?)

(Chances are unlikely.)

"..."

(And that ans I won’t be ever likely be able to use the sa tactics as before.)

(This ti for real the world will see real .)

(And.... There won’t be any more seconds chances coming my way.)

(Even I can predict that.)

(Dammit....)

"..."

(No.....No. I’m idiot.)

(Why the hell I’ve thought they would give more ti?)

(Hell, I’m lucky already because they see as source of "money" stuff.)

(If it wasn’t for it, they would had destroyed ages ago.)

(...)

(Honestly, I don’t know if this will work out or not.)

(Each ti I’ve thought I’ve got it and thought that I would break "free" and be untastable, I would win.)

(AND THIS HAPPENED ALREADY 2 TIS ALREADY!)

(2 freaking tis!)

(I’ve deceived and I’ve hid!)

(And then when they exposed , I went all out!)

(I’ve killed the ones that expose and had my golems hunt down anybody outside.)

(I’ve wanted to slaughter all of them.)

"..."

(But then.... The story played out twice in exactly sa way.)

(New soldiers/adventures arrived.)

(They destroyed my forces and then made their way to dungeon, claiming their victory.)

(I’ve lost twice.)

(Twice in exactly two sa stories.)

(Two tis.)

(Two exact sa stories played out, with each one ending up the sa. With my defeat.)

(I’ve thought I was better, stronger and smart during the second try.... But before I’ve realized it, I’ve just repeated my sa mistakes.)

(Before I’ve realized, the story had already repeated itself.)

(I was "overconfident".)

(In both of those tis.... I’ve thought I was ready.)

(I’ve thought I would break free and nobody will stop .)

(But instead I’ve failed twice.)

(And now?)

(The story is repeating itself to the third ti.)

(My third lie is about to get exposed.)

(And this will cause the story to start repeating itself once again.)

(The event line up is already forming itself as well.)

(...)

(But I won’t look down on them.)

(No.)

(I’ve learned my lessons.)

(I was foolish idiot.)

(A fool that thought everything would go according to my plan.)

(I’ve won’t make the sa mistakes for the third ti.)

(This third chance maybe my last chance as well.)

(And I don’t plan to waste it.)

(...)

(Honestly, I’m scared.)

(Twice I’ve thought I’ve got it.)

(And twice I’ve failed.)

(Not only that, I’ve got lucky because they looked down on .)

(And now there is problem.)

(If the story repeats itself for the third ti, then this won’t end up the sa way.)

(They will realize I can "lie" and they will make sure I won’t lie ever again.)

(...)

(So, this ti I can’t fail.)

(This is the last chance I’ve got.)

(And if I waste it?)

(Then it will be really over this ti.)