No time for author's notes, please let me know what you think of the chapter or story so far in the reviews and through PMing me, and I'm always up to listen to suggestions or ideas.
Without further adieu, please enjoy!
On the third morning of their final day out at sea, Hero was put in charge of lowering the sails and setting anchor near the coast of the uncharted island that Kaguya had called their destination. Deciding to take it upon himself to gather up what they needed from the ship, including food rations and all the sealed items that he used during his terrestrial seven-day trip, Goblin Slayer was loading the small rope-suspended boat along the side of the ship with everything that he could think to bring with them. The small boat they were going to use was meant for them to row through shallow waters where the Mangastar couldn't sail through, thanks to its robust size.
Once Hero was seated inside the dinghy-boat with Kaguya resting on top of her lap, Goblin Slayer looked up to gaze out past the rippling crystal clear waters and toward where the beautiful white-sandy beaches of the hilly-green island awaited him. And through the clouds of thick white-mist that were rolling up along the tops of the distant hills in the horizon, Goblin Slayer was able to make out the sight of what looked to be dark-metal objects, erected from various spots that appeared to be ruined shrines from what he could make out.
'There's… There's something that's beckoning about this island. I know I've never been here before, and yet… It's not a mere feeling of wanderlust that I'm experiencing, no… It's… It's almost like… Like this is where I'm supposed to be,' Goblin Slayer thought to himself, while trying his best to process the enigmatic way that the sight of the seemingly desolate island made him feel. 'How pretentious of me to think that way, but even so…'
Noticing that Goblin Slayer hadn't yet hopped into the dinghy with them, Hero was combing her gloved fingers through Kaguya's white fur as she looked over her shoulder to see what was the matter. Seeing the fully armored adventurer staring out toward the direction of the nearby land mass, the young girl studied him in silence before finally speaking up. "Hey, Eren! Is everything alright? You look kind of… Spaced out," Hero commented with a concerned look on her face. With her having gotten used to him not wearing his helmet over the past three days, it was somewhat difficult for her to know what was going through his mind.
Snapping out of his entrancement, Goblin Slayer's shoulders relaxed as he turned to look back down at where Hero was staring up at him with her apricot-colored gaze. "Yes… Yes, everything is fine. I was just taking a look at the island, that was all," Goblin Slayer replied with a stoic voice, and nodded his head reassuringly at Hero before boarding the dinghy with the rest of his party.
Standing up while keeping his feet firmly planted at the bottom of the boat's small wooden floor, Goblin Slayer grabbed a hold of the crank that was connected to the rope system keeping the dinghy held up, and began to carefully turn its handle to begin lowering them down past the ship's wooden haul, and into the crystal blue waters below. From there, Goblin Slayer lowered the two oars from the inside of the boat into the sea, and used his powerful arms to begin rowing them towards where the rushing waves were rolling onto the shore.
It took Goblin Slayer approximately twenty minutes of steering and rowing to pass through the shallow waters of the crescent-shaped bay that had set anchor in. Once the water got too shallow past the sand bar, to the point that not even their small boat could be rowed through, Goblin Slayer volunteered himself as he hopped out of the dinghy to begin pushing it towards the sands of the beach.
Once the boat had been fully pushed out of the salty water, Hero carefully placed Kaguya down on the wooden bench that she had been sitting on during the duration of the small trip. Standing up at the front of the boat, with one foot raised on top of the wooden haul, Hero placed one hand down on her hip, before unsheathing her light sword so she could triumphantly raise it up toward the island.
"Land-HOOOOOOO!!!" Hero shouted from the top of her lungs; causing Kaguya to cover her sensitive rabbit ears with her fuzzy paws, while Goblin Slayer walked along the wet sand around the side of the boat, so that he could pick up the rope that had been tied to the front of their beached vessel. Smiling proudly to herself as she put her sword back in its scabbard, Hero's smile became childishly smug as she rubbed her knuckles against her breastplate.
"Heh! I've always wanted to say that," Hero admitted with a sassy voice, before finally deciding to hop off the boat to help Goblin Slayer with the task of dragging the boat across the sands of the beach, so as to not have their dinghy fall victim to the eventual high-tide.
Even though both Kaguya and Hero kept telling Goblin Slayer that they didn't need to pull the boat inland any further, the cautious young man insisted that the dinghy be dragged all the way across the entire beach, until they were finally past the tall sand dunes that overlooked the massive shore.
Needing a moment to stretch her sore arms after having dragged the considerably large-sized boat such a far distance, Hero was letting out small whimpers and groans as she reached high above her shoulders. "HNNGGGHH…! Ahhh," Hero groaned before letting out a satisfied breath of air, as she turned around to watch Goblin Slayer, who was sliding his arms through the straps of the leather backpack he had picked up from the boat. "You know, it's really a shame that we're here on a quest and not on holiday… I'm dying to take a gander around the island and mess around a bit, aren't you?"
Once he made sure the straps of his leather backpack were on tight, Goblin Slayer took the ebony spear from the dinghy before kneeling down to allow Kaguya to hop onto his shoulder. "The allure of this island's mystery is compelling, that I can't deny," Goblin Slayer said agreeingly, while standing up once the horned rabbit was on top of his armored shoulder. "Arc Mage would have a field day if she was here with us… But until we finish what we came here to do, I'm afraid any sort of exploration will have to be put on hold," Goblin Slayer stated, while being sure to carve the same security seal into the the side of the boat's haul that Kaguya had him do for the Mangastar earlier.
Although she knew that what Goblin Slayer had said was indeed the responsible thing to do, that didn't stop her from pouting. "That's lame… Tch, buuuuut… Yeah, I guess you're right. The safety and well-being of everyone back home comes first and foremost," Hero said begrudgingly. However, it wasn't long after she and Goblin Slayer began to make their way down the tall sandy dune and toward the plains of tall grass that were more inland did she immediately see something of great interest to both her, and her two companions.
Laying down before them was the upper-half of what appeared to be a bulky-metal humanoid mecha that had sun-bleached faded armor plating all around its remains; all of which seemed to have once been a royal purple color at one point in time. Stunned and utterly baffled at what she was seeing, Hero's jaw dropped and her eyes lit up as she slowly approached the ancient relic, which upon further inspection had been missing its lower half, as well as most of its left arm and even its head.
Towering above them at ten feet, and that was just whatever remained of the decayed archaism. which had vines and roots growing around its stainless-steel haul, the mecha had its one remaining arm stretched out across the field of wild grass in front of it. Connected to its massive fifteen-foot long pauldrons were rusted thrusters with burn marks at their ends, and had the same sort of rocket propellant system mounted underneath its bulky shoulders that it had on what remained of its back.
From what Goblin Slayer could deduct while Hero was too busy admiring the relic with a childhood sense of wonderment, the mecha at one point had been sliced in half in combat, and had lost part of its arm in the process. Judging by the scattered shards of metal, wires, and other components that were scattered out where the server-motors of its neck had once been, whatever had destroyed the machine had more than likely stomped on its head to finish it off, once the mecha had crashed landed on the grassy plain.
Puzzled just as much as the rest of them were, Kaguya used her byakugan to get a visual on how complex the insides of the destroyed archansim was. "I… I don't ever recall seeing anything remotely as advanced as this contraption. Tell me, how about you? Have you ever stumbled upon this sort of technology before in your life?" Kaguya asked curiously, while watching as Hero climbed on top of the destroyed machine.
Reaching his hand up to grab a hold of his helmet's chin armored plating, Goblin Slayer tried thinking of ever coming across something as intricate as the mecha before them, but found himself drawing blanks. "I'm the wrong person to be asking that kind of question to… Scarlet, you've been around more than I have: do you ever recall ever seeing anything like this machine before in your travels?" Goblin Slayer inquired, as he looked up to see Hero kneeling down on the back of where the mecha's neck once was; keeping herself steady by holding onto its bulky metal collar, as she lowered her head down to gaze into the hole of where the joint of the head was once attached to.
"Uh…?! I, uh… I think that the dwarves have those big metal automatrons that look vaguely similar to whatever this thing is, but, like… They're NOTHING like how freakin' cool THIS thing is!" Hero gloated with an astoundingly high-pitched voice, as she continued to marvel at all the wires and motors inside the decayed metal husk, before finally hopping down onto the grassy field. "Hey Eren, what do you think this thing was used for, anyhow? Do you think it was used to fight monsters and demons, or maybe even used to protect treasure?"
Amused by all the plausible theories that Hero was throwing out, Goblin Slayer smiled as he studied the mecha from where he was standing. "It's… Hard to say what this machine's purpose was, just quite yet. Once we defeat the Ancient Wyvern, we might stumble across its purpose," Goblin Slayer replied, while lowering his hand down from his chin, as he craned his neck to look over to where Kaguya was. "What do you think?" He asked, while finding himself unable to resist getting soaked up in the mystery of it all.
Using her x-ray vision to get a full view of their surroundings, Kaguya had already mentally envisioned the path they needed to take, only after using her ability to sense chakra to detect the trail left behind from where the Ancient Wyvern had already been. "I think… I think there's a lot more of those contraptions around here than just this one," Kaguya relayed, as she showed Goblin Slayer a mental map of their far off surroundings from a bird's eye view; making sure to zoom in at all the similar mechas and other strange ruins that were scattered across the area.
Unlike Goblin Slayer, Hero wasn't connected to Kaguya's consciousness, and thus had no idea of what the two were doing as they stood silently across from them. "What?! What is she saying, Eren?!" Hero asked with an excited tone, while impatiently waiting for an answer.
Looking away from the small white horned rabbit resting on his shoulder, Goblin Slayer turned his attention toward Hero, who was hopping up and down in place. "… She showed me around the area… And told me that this isn't the only strange relic that we're going to come across," Goblin Slayer explained, before beginning to cross through the field of tall grass. Following behind Goblin Slayer, while feeling somewhat disappointed with the vague response she got from him, Hero's burning curiosity didn't have to wait long before it was satiated by all the breath-taking sights that they were soon passing by.
From the countless destroyed remains of mechas that each sustained different levels of damage, to massive metallic-shrines that had tall monoliths with singular empty-concave openings inside the front of each one, the only thing that was more astounding for them to look at while traversing across the vast field of grass was all the floating ruins of what looked to have once been a part of an ancient highway.
Commenting on all the overwhelmingly powerful chakra that she could sense was radiating from some of the more intact structures that they were passing by, even Kaguya was at a loss for words because of how all the ancient relics were too mystifying for herself to wrap her head around.
Being persuaded by Kaguya's curiosity enough to take a detour off of the trail they had been on for about an hour, Goblin Slayer decided to investigate one particular mass area of grass that held exactly eight pillars, each of them made up of intricate pieces of metallic panels; appearing to be more like active beacons than just outdoor structures.
Standing beside one of the five-meter tall pillars, Goblin Slayer had his hand raised up to feel it's cold-sleek metal surface, while squinting his eyes to focus on all the circuitry and nodes underneath the cyan-glowing edge of the structure; a sight that seemed unlike anything he had ever fathomed to be possible. "I can't even begin to imagine what any of these things were once used for… They're all so sophisticated in their design alone… I wonder what the light indicates," Goblin Slayer mused with an astounded look hidden behind his helmet's visor.
Observing Hero from Goblin Slayer's armored shoulder, who was acting like the free-spirited girl that she deep down inside was, Kaguya watched as the young auburn-haired girl was running past one particular pillar. Seeing the cyan-light within the pillar's veins defying the logics of physics each time Hero ran past it, Kaguya was intrigued by how the cyan light would bend as it chased behind wherever the young girl was running off to, while she was frolicking through the field of tall grass; the light dissipating into square cyan-particles that faded away into nothingness, the moment whenever Hero would either stop running, or run around to collide her body through the already existing ethereal trail.
With an idea formulating inside of her head, Kaguya turned her focus away from where Hero was being easily entertained by the ancient relic in question, and instead gazed inquisitively at her armored champion. "… Young man, how fast can you run?" Kaguya asked with a methodical voice, confusing Goblin Slayer, as he wasn't expecting to be asked such a seemingly out-of-nowhere question to begin with.
Taking a look over to where he saw the agile young woman sprinting around-and-around the same pillar at breakneck speeds, Goblin Slayer let out a soft chuckle as he turned his head around to face towards where Kaguya was looking back at him from. "Are you trying to compare me to her? Hmph… She's a platinum ranked adventurer for a reason, you know… It's… Inconceivable to think that I would be capable of achieving that kind of speed, at least as of now," Goblin Slayer replied with open honesty about his physical limits, which wasn't the answer that Kaguya's curiosity was satisfied to hear at all. "Why do you ask?"
Tightening her grip by digging her small claws deeper beneath the rings of his chainmail shirt, Kaguya flattened her long ears back while beginning to transfer her chakra into Goblin Slayer's body. "Hmph! Inconceivable you say? Nothing is impossible, young man, not when you have the "Rabbit Goddess" on your side!" Kaguya declared proudly, as both her and Goblin Slayer's bodies began to glow in a gentle white-aura. "Now go! Run! Run like the wind, and experience the power that is- NO, W-WAIT— NO, NOT LIKE THAT!!!"
Unlike Kaguya, Goblin Slayer was inexperienced with how sensitive the body's movement became once it was endowed with chakra. So the moment when Goblin Slayer tried running like he usually would, was the moment he immediately tripped on his own feet and was sent flying forward at mach speed. Being unprepared from being suddenly capable of running faster than the speed of sound, Goblin Slayer didn't have enough time to catch Kaguya, who flew forward and was sent tumbling along the tall grass that luckily was able to break her fall for the most part.
Unfortunately, the truth was that Goblin Slayer weighed a lot more than Kaguya did in her horned rabbit form, and his fall wasn't as graceful or painless as hers. Skidding across the grassy fields like a flat rock being skipped across the surface of a flat body of water, the only thing keeping Goblin Slayer alive and not ending up as a bloody stain across the plain was the fading chakra inside of him that was fortifying his body.
By the time that Goblin Slayer's sixty-meter long tumble had ended, he was laying on his side in a small sideways crater that had formed in the mound of mud and grass that his impact had created.
Breathless, sore all over, and dazed to the point of experiencing the worst case of vertigo he had ever felt before in his life, Goblin Slayer needed a moment to process what had just happened, so he just laid there groaning while letting his eyes try to readjust themselves. Attempting to pick himself up too soon resulted in Goblin Slayer immediately becoming dizzy, and it wasn't long until the armored man came tumbling backwards and landing flat down on his back.
Letting out another painful groan while feeling extremely light headed, Goblin Slayer remained laying face-up on the grass until Hero and Kaguya finally reached where he had landed; staring up at the glassy sky above, Goblin Slayer was perplexed when he saw the glowing cyan lights that looked like shattered glass beneath the overcast clouds. 'Three… There's three vectors within that spider-web formation; three main points in which the pattern connects to… All of them look as though they're positioned directly above where the pillars were… I wonder what will happen if-'
"-Eren! H-Hey, are you alright?!" Hero called out in a worried voice, while also sounding distracted as she approached closer to where Goblin Slayer was still laying down at. Although he couldn't verbally give her a response just yet, Goblin Slayer was able to reassure Hero that he was fine by raising a hand up to make an "okay" symbol with his fingers and thumb, before letting his arm fall down limbly down to his side.
Letting out a sigh of relief once she knew he was okay, Hero was standing hunched over with her hands clamped down on her knees, as she gasped for breath. Taking a few moments to regulate her own breathing, Hero slowly straightened her spine and placed her hands behind her lower back; popping her back as she stretched her arms high above her shoulders. "Ahhhh… Just when I'm starting to think that you've grown incapable of throwing me off with anymore surprises, you always just end up proving me wrong somehow," Hero muttered sarcastically with a half-cocked smirk, as she dropped her arms to her side while turning around to marvel at how much distance Goblin Slayer had covered within less than a few seconds.
"Whew! You went really, really fast! It's a shame that you messed it up though, because it would have been pretty cool if you ran the entire way instead of tumbling it," Hero mused playfully, before becoming distracted the moment she saw how cute Kaguya looked while hopping around in the grass below her. Kneeling down to where Kaguya was, Hero smiled sweetly at the white rabbit as she scooped her up in her hands. Standing back up with Kaguya raised up to her eye level, Hero asked in a cutesy voice "Daaaawww! Did somebody make that clusmy-wumsy Eren have a tumble-wumble~?! Oh yes you did baby, oh yes you did!"
Staring back patiently at the young girl who was being infatuated with her current form, Kaguya turned her small head away from Hero to look down to where Goblin Slayer was beginning to sit up from the ground. "… She knows by now that I'm not an actual rabbit, yes?" Kaguya asked with an unamused tone, before holding back her pride as Hero leaned in to rub her nose against the top of the goddess' forehead.
"Ugh… M-More or less," Goblin Slayer muttered half-playfully, as he slowly stood back up on his own. "Hey Scarlet, when I ran past though pillars-"
"-Tripped. When you tripped past those pillars, you mean?" Hero corrected with a playful look in her apricot-colored eyes, before leaning her lips down to plant an affectionate kiss on Kaguya's small forehead; much to the prideful goddess' annoyance, who could only get flustered of how Hero's saliva was getting her immaculate fur wet.
Rolling his scarlet eyes at Hero's sassy response, Goblin Slayer let out a throaty chuckle as his lips curled into an amused smirk. "… When I tripped past those pillars, did anything happen?" Goblin Slayer asked, as he raised his arms up to save Kaguya, by taking her away from Hero's reluctant hands.
Slightly bummed that Goblin Slayer took the white horned rabbit away from her, Hero reached around to rub the back of her shirt-covered neck, while looking up to gesture toward the sky as she thought about what she saw. "Well… When you went by the first pillar, its blue light kept following behind you, and everytime you went past another pillar, a beam of light shot out of its tip, and it would go up into the air. By the end of it, you made three orbs of light go off, and there was this shattered-glass thing that started to form up in the sky," Hero explained as best as she could, while frowning a bit as she nodded up to where the strange phenomenon of illuminance had once been.
"… Obviously, it's not there right anymore; it sort of just faded away shortly after you stopped moving so quickly," Hero followed up with a thoughtful look in her eyes, before suddenly coming up with an idea. "Hey! Maybe this whole thing is like a big puzzle?! I've seen a bunch of weird stuff like this in dungeons before! None of them were as fancy as whatever these things are, but hey, maybe it's kind of like the same concept?" Hero suggested while shrugging her shoulders, before raising her hand up to point her finger at the nearest pillar.
"What if those things aren't actually decorations, but are more like functional rods? You know, stuff that holds energy and can be harnessed for something else entirely?" Hero messily hypothesized, as she closed one eye lid to begin trying to trace out where Goblin Slayer would need to run, in order to guide the cyan-light to each pillar. "If you just connected all the blue light to all the big metal things, then maybe we can unlock something that could be of use to us? Fighting that Ancient Wyvern ain't going to be a walk in the park, that's for sure."
Although she appreciated the enthusiasm and thought process behind Hero's hypothesis, Kaguya had concerns of going through with testing the young girl's theory; the once seemingly harmless phenomenon that had originally drawn her in now seemed more akin to "Pandora's Box" than anything else to her.
"None of us know what consequence will occur if we were to link the monoliths together with that blue light surging connecting them together… It could be a trap, or perhaps it would break a seal that's perhaps holding some otherworldly horror that could put us in a bind?" Kaguya theorized cautiously, to which she had Goblin Slayer relay her words over to Hero, so that the young girl could understand her concerns.
Smiling confidently while raising an arm up to wave her gloved hand at Kaguya, Hero let out a dismissive chuckle at the rabbit's fears. "Oh, that's just paranoid nonsense! I've never, and I mean NEVER, had anything like that happen to me while I was crawling through a dungeon before," Hero reassured, while thinking back fondly to all the legendary loot she had gotten in the past, from having had Sage and Sword Saint assist her with solving ancient puzzles. "Besides, I mean, who would really make a trap that's practically impossible for most people to set off? If someone went through the trouble of making this sort of thing this hard to set off, then it means that they were hiding something valuable in it!"
With a feeling of uncertainty in her soul, Kaguya lowered her eyes toward the tall blades of grass beneath Goblin Slayer, watching as the flora danced in the gently blowing wind. "I… I suppose you two would be more familiar with the way this world operates than myself… If she thinks it would be beneficial, then perhaps…" Kaguya trailed off, while twitching her rabbit nose as her Rinne-Sharingan activated itself on its own the moment she noticed the sheer amount of chakra that was radiating from underneath the Earth's surface.
"Hmm… There is an extraordinary amount of energy buried deep within the surface; one that I didn't take notice of initially… Perhaps it made itself apparent from when you ran by those monoliths… Yes, I believe that a further investigation is in order, after all," Kaguya declared, while craning her neck to the side, so she could look over where the front of Goblin Slayer's helmet was facing toward her. "After all, I am the one who originally wanted to explore this area in the first place, and my own inquisitiveness is what made this discovery possible… Maybe we should see this through to the end? Besides, this will serve as an opportunity for you to get used to using your body with chakra inside of you, as well as satiate my burning curiosity: an ideal "killing two birds with one stone" scenario, if you will."
Not understanding the idiom that Kaguya used, Goblin Slayer let out a low groan as he rolled his neck to pop his bones. "… I don't see what any of this has to do with killing two birds with a single stone alone, but I do agree that having that kind of speed with more refinement could prove useful for our upcoming battle," Goblin Slayer said agreeingly, while envisioning himself being able to fight the Ancient Wyvern head on with Kaguya's gifted chakra at his fingertips. "Very well… I'm ready," Goblin Slayer said with determination in his voice, while Hero watched as the white aura from Kaguya's body began to envelop itself around the armored adventurer.
Just like being taught how to walk along the surface of the moon, Goblin Slayer made sure to heed every word that came directly from Kaguya's meticulous instructions. With the rabbit goddess stressing to him to lean forward and keep his arms held out behind him to prevent himself from getting knocked over by the natural air resistance around him, the goal of him looking silly in front of Hero was to master the art of aerodynamics while catching himself from falling with his legs.
Even though he had gotten the fundamentals down of how to run like a shinobi, Goblin Slayer still experienced plenty of messy falls during the entire first hour of him just attempting to take off with the chakra inside of him to enhance his movements; often times going airborne just from the get go.
Needing to give Hero his leather backpack, as to not damage any of the equipment or scrolls in there that he already messed up during the first twenty times that he tripped, including handing her his ebony spear as well, Goblin Slayer spent time-and-time again getting covered in a thick coat of mud and uprooted grass, as he practiced patiently with Kaguya continuously critiquing him each time he got up to brush himself off.
No matter how hard the falls were, no matter how many times Goblin Slayer would experience painful moments of failure, the determined young man would always keep picking himself up; taking a breath in to compose himself, before learning from his mistakes so he could keep on trying unrelentlessly to learn a skill that usually took weeks for a genshi to finally get down. If Kaguya didn't have as much faith in Goblin Slayer as she did, then she might have toned her chakra levels down, so that he wouldn't have such a hard time controlling her given speed that not even most experienced S-rank shinobi could handle on a good day.
And unlike most of the young men his age who she had watched from afar train vigorously to perfect their physical abilities, Kaguya never once got the feeling that Goblin Slayer was being headstrong or stubborn each time that he would try to connect the lights between each metallic pillar. With how Hero was cheering him on from the sides, even Kaguya herself was growing motivated to break past her usually calm attitude to begin rooting for Goblin Slayer, as he grew closer and closer into being able to completely finish connecting the light between the eight pillars together, each time that he attempted it.
Betraying her usual stone-faced demeanor towards the end of Goblin Slayer's relentless training, Kaguya was calling out his name with the same level of thrilling excitement in her voice that was being radiated by Hero's cheers as well. Pillar by pillar, making use of Kaguya's foresight to calculate each next step while simultaneously being hyper-aware of his environment, Goblin Slayer's heart was racing in his chest, and his muscles were screaming out with pain as he pushed past the exhausting agony that his body was going through.
Just as he was about to lose his footing toward the end of his attempt, Goblin Slayer was able to correct himself at the last minute just in time to buy himself an additional few seconds of running, before finally over-correcting himself at the final moment. Twisting his foot and tripping over a mound of dirt, Goblin Slayer's helmet finally fell apart into detached pieces of broken metal, the moment when he fell face first against the grassy plain.
By then, Goblin Slayer was a professional when it came to reaching up to grab a hold of Kaguya at the last second, so that she wouldn't fly off and get injured. So, that's what he did while tucking in his head and limbs closer to his body, as he rolled and skidded across the ground for about seventy meters, before coming to an eventual stop.
Letting out a groan as he slowly uncurled his arms and legs and had them splayed out against the grassy field, Goblin Slayer laid down with his back against the Earth while Kaguya stood up on his chest with her hindquarters. "Give me a moment… That one actually kind of hurt," Goblin Slayer said while seething in pain, as he felt his forehead throbbing from when his helmet busted off of his head.
Staring up into the heavens with her byakugan eyes, Kaguya was beyond speechless as she felt mystified at the sight of what she saw carved into the cloudy sky above her. With the eight vectors of blue light shining brilliantly like stars high up in the air, the once chaotic-fragmented lines that were caused by the sheer power of the cyan-lights had aligned itself into a concentrated beam that formed into the shape of a large symbol in the sky; a symbol that bore an exact resemblance to that used by the Ōtsutsuki clan.
Unable to process what she was truly seeing that was hanging far above her head, before Kaguya could even think to tell Goblin Slayer about what the cyan-blue symbol in the sky meant, the Earth beneath them suddenly began to violently shake, just as it did when the celestial being first interfered with its dimensional life force, nine days ago.
Looking down to see an enormous metallic apparatus in the shape of a half-dome breaking through the center of the field of pillars, Hero immediately sprung into action. With her light sword sheathed inside of her secured leather scabbard, Hero made sure that Goblin Slayer's leather backpack was strapped on tightly as she sprinted toward where he and Kaguya were at; using her own mach-speed agility to cross the field of tall grass.
Having been watching Goblin Slayer practice with learning how to run like a shinobi, Hero was able to implement the same mobile technique as him just from observation alone, and thus was able to reach them just in time to grab the young man by his white-fur collar.
"Move, move, move, MOVE!!!" Hero shouted with a frantic voice, as she dragged Goblin Slayer behind her while Kaguya held onto his chest armor. Using her own inhumane ability to remain dexterous and quick on her feet, Hero was barely able to pull the two of them out of harm's way and into a safe area away from the enormous structure that was growing deep from inside the ground.
Falling underneath the shadow of the fifty-meter tall cylinder-shaped tower that was made up of the same shiny-sleek metal material that was found within the crumbling pillars themselves, once the trio had gotten far enough to avoid being caught by the sharp edges of the unearth structure behind them, it was finally then that they realized that the puzzle they had solved had been the cause behind the uncovering of what looked to be a massive observatory. Looking from afar towards the peak of the tower, Hero and Kaguya took note of the massive half-dom top that was connected to a powerful telescope-device that was made up of a dark-metal material, and glowing-cyan light radiating from its exposed circuitry.
Amazed but mostly just relieved that she had been fast enough to save Goblin Slayer and Kaguya, Hero was taking deep breaths in and out with a wide smile across her face that radiated with confidence. "Ah, ah… Ah…! S-See?! What did I tell you…! Ah, ah…! P-Puzzles ALWAYS lead to hidden secre-," as if though fate itself had been tempted by Hero's borderline arrogant boasting, the young girl immediately swallowed up her words the moment she saw what appeared to be around one-hundred black geometric-shaped rifts open up about five meters above area that was surrounding the base of the ebony-black observatory tower.
Immediately recognizing the color and shape of the horizontal rifts as the same sort of chakra used in her clan's "Amenominaka" ability, Kaguya came to the conclusion that her seeing the Ōtsutsuki clan's symbol in the sky could no longer could be written off as just a coincidence, and that the island they had landed on was somehow tied to her. Climbing on top of Goblin Slayer's armored shoulder as Hero helped him up to his feet, Kaguya watched as three-meter tall humanoid machines fell out of the black portals, before they closed up from above them.
Each "Soldier" had a glowing triangular red mark where its face would be, and their bodies appeared to be relatively lanky yet top-heavy, with large and sharp shoulders and prongs serving as their arms. The soldiers didn't have anything that resembled a neck, and their wide hips and short-lanky prongs that they used to carry themselves gave off the false impression that they were essentially walking targets.
Once all one-hundred soldiers had been teleported on top of the grassy field around the observation tower, they all raised their blades arms up to take on a battle stance; each of their glowing red triangles humming with chakra that gave Kaguya the impression that they weren't supposed to have unearth have unearthed that massive structure. The soldiers deemed Goblin Slayer, Hero, and Kaguya to be nothing more than enemies who were trespassing on protected grounds, and thus perceived them to be deserving of an immediate execution.
Letting out a long sigh as she handed Goblin Slayer his ebony spear, Hero unsheathed her light sword from her leather scabbard, as she got ready to answer the call of duty. "Well, would you look at that: your little bunny was half-right about this whole thing being a trap after all! Huh, who would have guessed?" Hero mused with an unbothered look in her apricot-colored eyes, as she stretched her dominant shoulder before beginning to build up an immense amount of magic in her light sword.
"Don't worry guys, I got this!" Hero said with a cocky grin spreading across her lips, as she zoomed forward before leaping high above the air with her blade becoming enveloped in a blinding yellow light. With all red-triangular opticals of the soldiers focused on her, Hero's eyes lit with an intense look of zealousness in them, as she watched them raising their blade-like arms up to form a diagonal cross in front of them to defend themselves.
"SUN BURST!!!" Hero shouted with the might of a warrior, as she swung her blade down while performing a variety of aerial front flips, while launching a giant orb of blinding light yellow down upon her foes. Once it impacted the Earth, the concentrated projectile of pure volatile-light sent chunks of rock and dirt high above the air, as it exploded in a fifty-meter radius. Making sure to keep her guard up after the last time she had gotten shot with a ballista, Hero was confident that she had slayed the army of three-meter tall automatrons in one blow once she descended closer back down to the field of grass below her.
Landing gracefully on her feet, Hero's smug smile slowly fell as a confused and horrified gasp escaped out of her agaped jaw. All around her, each and every soldier remained perfectly intact and safe; all one-hundred mechanized guardians had protected themselves behind the red-chakra barrier-shields that they were projecting out from their triangular optic-faces. Once it became apparent that Hero's area-of-effect spell had worn off, every soldier in unison lowered their arms and stopped using their chakra to project shields in front of them.
Surrounded from all sides by an army of automatrons, all of which had proved themselves capable of possessing lightning fast reflexes and combat strategy, Hero felt adrenaline coursing through her veins as she was both feeling terrified and enthralled with how much danger she was in. "Heh… Guess that trick isn't going to work this time, is it?" Hero mused more so to herself than to the army of soldiers who were splitting their attention between her and where Goblin Slayer was standing.
"Alright… Guess we're doing this the old fashioned way, then," Hero said quietly, while raising her light sword up in front of her. Feeling a rush of dopamine coursing inside of her hyperactive brain, Hero's smile found its way back to her lips; being more daring and adventurous than it ever had before.
"COME AND GET IT," Hero shouted from the top of her lungs, as she immediately made a beeline toward the first of many soldiers who sprinted toward her and Goblin Slayer; their triangular faces radiating menacingly, as their razor-sharp arms swung down at the two adventurers with the precision of a cold-heartless machine.