I leaned Diguardia forward, tearing through the city at a breakneck pace, when a house up ahead suddenly collapsed.
A small child was visible amidst the falling debris.
"Master Lloyd, a kid’s falling!" Grimo shouted.
"Yeah, I see him."
I swung Diguardia into a sharp, rapid turn and caught the child before he hit the ground.
"That was a close one, Master Lloyd. It seems there are others who failed to evacuate in time..." Jiriel noted.
"Yeah. I won’t be able to focus on the fight if I’m worried about this."
I gently set the child down, stood the golem back up, and performed a Magic Focus. I could feel the presence of people scattered all around.
If they stayed here, they’d just be in the way. I’d have to have them move.
"Sensing, Range Expansion, Coordinate Designation... 'Flight'."
I restructured the Spell Formula for the Wind System Magic 'Flight,' modifying it to act upon living beings other than myself.
Several thousand citizens of Bertram, along with their dogs, cats, and livestock, were enveloped in shrouds of wind and began to float gently into the air.
I sent the entire lot flying toward the outskirts of the city.
"Softhearted as always, ain’t ya? ...Still, there were surprisingly few people for a city of this scale," Grimo remarked.
"Ido probably evacuated the people in the center just like I did."
When I used 'Flight' to lift the citizens just now, I noticed there were no people at all near the central plaza. Normally, you’d expect a few stragglers, so their absence meant Ido must have cleared them out already.
"I see. If he is Master Lloyd’s homunculus, such a feat would be a simple task for him," Jiriel added.
"Yeah. Anyway, this means I can use the whole city as a battlefield. To my heart’s content."
A smile played across my lips as I threw the lever forward, heading for the plaza at full speed.
Before I knew it, Tartarus had grown so massive that it was visible even from our current position.
"We’re almost at the plaza, Master Lloyd!"
"Please, prepare yourself!"
I nodded at their voices and kept Diguardia running.
The plaza lay just beyond the clock tower ahead of us.
I crushed rubble underfoot, leaped over ruins, and entered the final straightaway. It was then—
BOOM!
With a violent roar, the tower in front of me split vertically.
Giant tentacles swept away the falling debris and rising dust.
Beyond them stood Tartarus, which had grown to a truly extraordinary size.
Its massive body was perhaps twenty times larger than Diguardia. The tentacles covering its form had multiplied and lengthened, blanketing the ground.
In fact, Tartarus’s body was almost entirely composed of tentacles; it looked like a giant sea anemone.
Looking up, I could see what looked like a golem head perched at the very top.
"It’s huge...!"
"I can’t even see the golem's face from down here," Jiriel remarked.
It was an incredible size. At this rate, I wouldn't even know where to aim.
"Oh! Diguardia! Is that you, Lloyd?!"
"Lugol!"
Turning toward the voice, I saw Magicamillia emerge from the clouds of dust.
"Thank goodness! You came!"
"Yeah. What’s the situation?"
"It’s not the worst, now that you’re here. ...Though, obviously, it’s not good, either. Every golem except Magicamillia has been absorbed by that thing."
I could hear the sound of him gnashing his teeth even through his golem’s exterior.
When I checked with Magic Focus, I found no Magic Reactor responses in the vicinity. Instead, they were all concentrated inside Tartarus.
It grew this large by absorbing other golems, huh? Good. That makes it worth crushing.
I did forcibly take this golem from Zerof, after all; I have to make sure I enjoy myself.
"Let’s do this, Lloyd! The two of us together!"
"No, Lugol, you should pull back."
"Wh-What...?"
As Lugol spoke in a voice of disbelief, I continued.
"Aren't you almost out of fuel? Your joints look damaged, your armor is in tatters... I think you’ve reached your limit. Leave this to me and retreat to the rear."
It would be a bother if someone interrupted a one-on-one fight I’d been looking forward to.
"B-But..."
"You treasure that golem, don't you?"
Furthermore, an almost wasteful amount of effort had been poured into Magicamillia’s exterior. There was no reason to design a golem in the image of a woman without specific formulas or constraints unless it was driven by pure devotion.
It would be truly painful to see such a golem get caught in the crossfire.
I must have hit a nerve. Lugol caught his breath before answering.
"...Yeah, you're right. Magicamillia was modeled after the hero who once protected our country, the woman revered as a War Goddess. Our feelings are poured into this machine. That’s why I didn't push it too far. I couldn't. ...But, you see, as a fellow alchemist, I can’t just let that thing run wild. Many people are involved in the creation of a golem. Vast amounts of money and time are spent on them. If word gets out that a golem went out of control and destroyed a city, we’ll never be allowed to make golems again."
Just as Lugol said, humans have created various technologies from the distant past to the present day.
Throughout that history, dangerous technologies that could not be controlled by human power were labeled as Forbidden Arts and buried in darkness.
Once one field is targeted, eyes are turned toward similar technologies; if that happened, alchemy itself might be banned.
To prevent that, Lugol and the other alchemists hadn't run away.
They had to stop that golem with their own hands to prove to everyone that golems themselves were not an evil Forbidden Art.
There were many things in the history of magic that had been deemed Forbidden Arts in the same way.
I understood his feelings. If all magic were about to be banned because of some villainous mage's rampage, I’d fight with my life on the line too. Yes, indeed.
"If anything, Master Lloyd’s usually the one on the causing-mayhem side, isn't he?" Grimo muttered.
"In fact, I feel like he's already done quite a lot of it..." Jiriel added.
The two of them were mumbling something.
In the meantime, the smoke cleared, and my eyes met those of Titania on the other side.
"I have been waiting, Lloyd! You’ve finally come!"
"Ido...!"
"Heh, to think the day would come when I could look down on you. It was worth building Titania. Heh, ahahaha!"
Ido laughed loudly and triumphantly.
However, he stopped laughing immediately and faced me.
"The difference in power is clear. That said, my opponent is you. I don't believe you’re someone I can beat while holding back. I’m going all out from the start."
Titania took one step, then another, toward us.
Each time, the ground shook and houses crumbled.
The pressure was immense, as if the very atmosphere were trembling.
To respond to the challenge, I gripped the levers of Diguardia.