Attempting to store the Necro Golem in the Misty Ring failed, just as Rei had expected.
He had held a faint hope that if it worked, he might be able to manage the situation somehow. But in the end, it failed.
The Misty Ring could not store living creatures.
In that sense, as long as Dailas—who served as the Necro Golem's core—was alive, it was only natural that it couldn't be stored in the Misty Ring.
That said, as Orban had pointed out, since it had absorbed corpse after corpse, there was no doubt that corpses accounted for a greater proportion by volume.
That was why Rei had thought that maybe, just possibly...
"Seto!"
"Gruh!"
Sensing the Necro Golem fire a tentacle from behind, Rei immediately called out to Seto.
Seto reacted swiftly, beating his wings and moving away from the spot.
In the next instant, a tentacle pierced through where Seto had been.
After evading the strike, Seto headed for the shadow of a nearby building.
The tentacles had a long, narrow structure, but even so, they didn't pursue Seto once he moved behind the building.
Whether the tentacles were inherently incapable of such pursuit, or whether it had decided that Rei and Seto hidden behind the building weren't worth dealing with—Rei couldn't tell either way, but the lack of a follow-up attack suited him fine.
Once behind the building, Rei immediately dismounted from Seto's back and retrieved the Paired Orb from his Misty Ring.
"Seto, let me know if the Necro Golem attacks this way."
"Grururu!"
In response to Rei's words, Seto purred as if to say "Leave it to me!" and checked the surroundings.
After glancing at Seto with reliance, Rei immediately activated the Paired Orb.
"Grimm, please. Come out... You're probably focused on the other world, or maybe you're not even nearby to begin with, but... please, come out. I'm begging you."
Rei called out to the Paired Orb as if praying, but unfortunately, no one appeared on Grimm's side.
As Rei had said, Grimm was either focused on something in the other world—the world where the Centaurs lived—or concentrating on creating a Magic Item using materials obtained from that world. Or perhaps a breakthrough had been reached in the method of maintaining the connection between the two worlds, and he was focused on that.
Rei continued calling out to Grimm for several minutes, but upon confirming that Grimm still showed no sign of appearing, he gave up.
If he spent more time, Grimm might eventually appear.
However, given the current situation, he didn't have the luxury of idly waiting for that to happen.
While he was spending time here, there was no telling when the Necro Golem might move.
Given that, action took priority over deliberation right now.
"No good. Seto, we're heading back. If we stay out of sight for too long, Orban and the others will worry."
"Gruruh?"
Are you sure? Seto purred.
Because Seto often acted alongside Rei, he knew full well just how significant a presence Grimm was—the very person Rei had tried to rely on.
He understood that if Grimm were here, the Necro Golem situation would be resolved in no time at all.
Rei understood Seto's thoughts as well, but as long as he couldn't make contact, relying on Grimm wasn't an option.
He often thought about how things would be if he had Grimm's power, but since that was impossible, he had no choice but to manage with the cards currently in his hand.
(Since it's a golem created through necromancy, I thought Grimm—as an Undead—would not only help but also find it genuinely interesting.)
Grimm cherished Rei, whom he could call the successor of the Zephyle he admired, like a grandchild.
Having been saved by Grimm countless times already, there was no doubt about that.
But at the same time, Grimm was also an Undead.
Because of that, the existence of a Necro Golem was undoubtedly something that would intrigue him as well.
...Though, of course, trying to make contact and failing entirely meant there was nothing he could do about it—that was an undeniable fact.
Rather than stubbornly trying to reach Grimm here, what was needed right now was to actually take action.
Rei stored the Paired Orb in his Misty Ring and mounted Seto, heading to where Orban and the others were waiting.
Fortunately, the Necro Golem didn't seem particularly concerned about Rei and Seto hiding behind the building, and had resumed devoting itself to destruction.
(Looking at how it's acting, it really does seem to harbor an intense hatred toward the buildings. What in the world is going on?)
Rei couldn't understand the Necro Golem's behavioral principle.
Since Dailas, who had wished for Egginis's prosperity, served as the Necro Golem's core, it should have been Dailas driving the creature without question.
And yet, for some reason, it was now devoted to destroying buildings as if ignoring Dailas's own wishes entirely.
What was going on and why—Rei couldn't comprehend it at all.
Then again, thanks to that, the surrounding buildings were spared further damage, which was an ironic silver lining.
Eventually, Seto carrying Rei on his back arrived at the location where Orban and the others had been waiting at a distance.
"Rei! You're safe!"
Seeing Rei riding on Seto's back, Orban shouted with delight.
From Orban's perspective, it had taken longer than expected for Rei to return to their position after moving away from the Necro Golem.
That was why he was rejoicing at Rei's safe return.
"Sorry for the delay. I was checking whether any of the Magic Items I have might offer a way to deal with this... but no luck."
It wasn't exactly accurate, but it wasn't a complete lie either.
If he had been able to reach Grimm through the Paired Orb, there was no doubt the Necro Golem situation would have been resolved.
But since that was impossible, Rei had no choice but to deflect with that explanation.
"I see... In that case, the options available to us are indeed few."
The approach of storing the Necro Golem in the Misty Ring had also ended in failure.
Given that, the remaining options were few.
Just as Rei had said, the only method left was to somehow lure the Necro Golem outside the city and dispose of it there.
If this were Gilm, they could have also considered luring it to the expansion construction site.
At the expansion construction site, the number of people wouldn't be that large.
...Of course, if that happened, the expansion construction at the destroyed site would have to start over from scratch.
"Speaking of which... that might actually be a problem."
Those words slipped from Rei's mouth—the very person who had proposed the idea of luring it outside the city.
Normally, Rei didn't want to say something like this.
After all, what he was about to say concerned additional negative factors piled on top of the already bad strategy of luring it outside.
Sensing something in Rei's demeanor, Orban asked cautiously.
"What's a problem?"
"It's about the Necro Golem. I saw it up close twice—once when I first fought it, and again when I tried to store it in the Misty Ring. It seemed larger the second time than the first."
"...What?"
It was Orban who voiced that reaction, but the others were equally startled.
They had probably assumed that the Necro Golem's current size was its maximum and that it wouldn't grow any larger.
The reason they thought so was likely because while it had grown rapidly when Dailas absorbed corpses, its size hadn't appeared to change since then.
"A-are you certain?"
Among those rendered speechless, Robel was the first to recover, asking Rei to confirm.
For Robel, it was only natural to hope it was some kind of misobservation.
But Rei nodded honestly at Robel's words.
"Yeah, slightly... and I mean only slightly relative to the Necro Golem's overall size, so in reality it's probably growing at a considerable rate, but it's definitely getting bigger. We were told it grows by absorbing corpses, but is there a possibility it can also grow from things other than corpses?"
"I-I... I don't know. The fact that it grew from corpses was... only what we observed at the time."
"Figured as much. In the end, we don't understand the Necro Golem's biology. If something happens, we just have to recognize it as that kind of entity and act accordingly. So, in short... the Necro Golem's current size isn't its maximum—it can grow even larger. During the time it takes to move it outside the city, it may have been absorbing the corpses of those who died, or even building rubble. If that happens, we can't really call it a Necro Golem anymore, though."
Rei tried to lighten the impact on Robel and the others by delivering the last part in a joking manner, but unfortunately, the atmosphere did not brighten.
"Since Dailas absorbed corpses and became a golem of corpses, we thought it could only absorb corpses. But... that assumption was completely wrong, huh."
It was Dwanda's bitter voice, but no one could blame him for shallow thinking.
To begin with, since it was a fact that Dailas had initially absorbed corpses to become a golem, thinking it could only absorb corpses wasn't an unreasonable conclusion.
"In other words, even luring it outside the city will result in greater damage than initially expected. If that's the case, since it becomes more troublesome with each passing moment, we should act as quickly as possible."
Rei nodded at Orban's words.
After nodding, he opened his mouth again.
"Going by the flow of our conversation, it sounds like no one could come up with any method other than luring the Necro Golem outside the city and defeating it there. Hey, I'm not blaming anyone, so don't worry about it. Given the situation we're in, expecting someone to immediately think of an alternative would be unreasonable."
To begin with, Rei himself hadn't been able to come up with any other method, so he was in no position to blame them for that.
The one idea he had come up with—storing it in the Misty Ring, which would have been a comeback move if successful—had ultimately failed as well.
"B-but, it's not like we're just leaving it as is... A proposal has been made to have the various workshops cooperate."
"Other workshops? Well, as long as they live in Egginis, the workshop folks would be equally troubled if this place is destroyed, but... if their golems are destroyed in the process, they'll lose their merchandise, you know?"
"As for that, while I can't say it'll be fully sufficient, we'll likely compensate them. And we're not just asking workshops—we've also arranged to borrow the help of golem owners."
"...That was fast. I suppose I should be impressed."
It seemed that while Rei was fighting the Necro Golem and subsequently trying to contact Grimm, they had already made arrangements that far.
Looking around again, Rei noticed that the number of guards had been reduced to three.
The rest were likely out delivering Robel's and Orban's instructions.
"At worst, Egginis could be annihilated. Given that, moving swiftly is only natural."
"...It's because there are people who can't do what should be natural that things get so troublesome. Anyway, the Necro Golem's core was Dailas, and he wished to develop Egginis... no, he was obsessed with it, so why is it rampaging through the city?"
"If you're going to say that, the fact that it's destroying that building in the first place is already strange."
When Orban muttered this, half in exasperation, Rei nodded in agreement.
"In that case, it seems certain that while Dailas is indeed the Necro Golem's core, any semblance of ego he had is probably gone."
None of those listening likely had any objection to those words.
To begin with, why would someone trying to bring prosperity to Egginis destroy the building where the Holy Four Assembly convened?
Thinking about it that way, it was fundamentally nothing but a sense of wrongness.
"Anyway, having golems help out would be appreciated. The problem is how we get them to help. We can't just recklessly attack it, after all."
Since the Necro Golem had its muscles exposed, an ordinary golem attacking it might deal a corresponding amount of damage.
But if they did, rot fluid would be scattered and poison smoke would drift through the surroundings.
In other words, the very act of attacking was lethal.
At Rei's words conveying this, everyone fell into troubled thought.