It Changes
Things were different.
Automatons charged at explorers like mad bulls, making it easy to exploit that trait and strike their weaknesses—but humans didn't move as expected.
Even if their strength wasn't all that different, the mere advantage of being able to think completely flipped the difficulty.
In the lower layers of the labyrinth, where physical superhumans were rare, they favored gear like guns and EBI that enabled ranged firepower battles.
Keep your distance and unleash a barrage, and groups lacking firepower would inevitably be pushed back. Once their barrier shattered under the pressure, a one-sided massacre awaited.
As the footsteps approaching grew louder, Allen reached for the broken barrier generator and ducked behind the cart. He even positioned the panther in front as a shield.
Who the hell are they?
Even as he wondered, the hand gripping the rune pen didn't stop moving. [Reinforcement] and [Hardening] runes filled the surface, and the panther's distinctive patterns reemerged where the explosion had erased them.
Dennis stopped their own cart and crouched behind it as well. He glanced regretfully at the red-painted wall for a moment, but the pressing issue now was the approaching group.
The good don't come, and those who come aren't good.
Few places suited that saying better than the labyrinth. They'd clearly heard the sounds of battle with the automaton—why head this way?
Dennis's eyes, fixed on the black mist, flicked briefly toward Allen.
"That group from earlier?"
"High probability... no, it's definitely them."
Those guys had summoned a 10th-layer gatekeeper automaton with a whistle. No way they'd let a party of explorers who'd witnessed that live.
There were other oddities too. First, the gatekeeper shrouded in black currents; second, its appearance when over ten hours still remained until the 48-hour mark.
Having roughly finished repairing the panther, Allen reached for the barrier generator. No time to waste—he yanked out a pair of pliers from his tool belt and tore off the outer casing in one go.
"Gonna fix it? Is that okay?"
"What they just broke was just the shell's function. The real guts are the mana circuits and soul stone components."
While he performed emergency repairs, one of the vanguards pulled Karkda's EBI and slipped it on. The EBI itself was a magitech tool that cast spells, so it didn't matter who used it.
There'd be a huge gap in activation speed, but now wasn't the time to quibble over minor inconveniences.
As the footsteps grew clearer, Dennis's breathing deepened. They'd held back from a preemptive strike on the slim chance it wasn't hostile, but there was no need.
The headlamp illuminated the skinhead leading the group, his bald scalp gleaming especially bright. He scowled and shifted slightly to dodge the light.
"Survived a reinforced gatekeeper? This is unexpected."
His voice dripped with leisure. The densely interwoven hexagonal barrier was the source of his confidence.
The skinhead whistled as he scanned them. Seeing the carts instead of barriers, he grinned disgustingly and pointed back at his group.
"Whoa, that graffiti looks real pretty. The dark red's super striking. Mind telling me what brand of spray paint you used?"
His followers burst into malicious laughter at the joke. Yet they kept their gun barrels trained, and flickers of light sparked from the EBIs worn by their spellcasters.
Allen's side maintained silence. Having jury-rigged the barrier generator, Allen pretended to face forward while nudging Dennis with his staff.
No other options at this point. The moment Dennis's head tilted slightly, Allen hit the button.
A hemispherical shield snapped into place. Compared to theirs, its color was murky, and the hexagonal grid wasn't as tight.
The instant the barrier deployed, Allen flung forward the card he'd been fiddling with. Three cards spun through the air, igniting tiny sparks.
They had no intention of letting them live anyway—and even if taken prisoner, no good end awaited. The best solution was a preemptive strike: eliminate the enemies and walk out on their own feet.
The card sparks suddenly swelled and spread wide. Flames from the fused [Flame] and [Wind] card rode air currents, billowing outward.
Not enough to melt barriers, but plenty to block the enemies' vision.
"Group up."
At Allen's call, the two vanguards positioned the gatekeeper's bulk as a shield. The rune pen slid swiftly from within the outer armor.
[Reinforcement][Reinforcement][Reinforcement] ...
Incredible speed. It looked like he was just scribbling, yet the runes glowed faintly and activated properly, leaving the party wide-eyed.
Then impacts rained down, making the barrier ripple. The enemies attempted ranged attacks despite the lingering flames.
The maze passages were straight lines anyway—fire blindly and you'd hit something. Sound judgment.
The hastily revived barrier didn't hold long. Shattered fragments sparkled and dissolved into the air, and the skinhead bared his teeth in a grin from within his intact shield.
Under the hail of bullets and spells, all they could do was endure for now. Step even a foot from the gatekeeper-and-cart barricade, and they wouldn't last.
Dennis knew it well—he bit his lip until it bled. Having reached some resolve, he spoke.
"I'll be the decoy. You guys escape down the rear passage while—"
"Hold on."
Allen's calm voice cut off the grim declaration.
Dennis's eyebrow twitched. More anger at his own inadequacy forcing him to hold back than outright resentment.
His fists trembled as he glared at Allen, who stared straight ahead with his usual impassive expression.
"What're you gonna do?"
"..."
Allen didn't answer. His left eye fixed on the front, while his right hand, plunged into the panther's torso, gripped the mana furnace.
"An opening will come. I'll make sure of it."
His steady tone and unshaken expression instilled faith in the group. Even Dennis fell silent and poured mana into the shield.
Allen's breathing grew ragged bit by bit. There was a way out of this. His eyes and the gatekeeper's single eye attached to the panther.
He'd planned to upgrade the weak points once back on the surface, but he hadn't expected to push it this hard so soon.
Firing the beam required time, at least. The single eye greedily devoured mana, and preheating took longer than anticipated.
Brrr!
"Ngh!"
Enemy spells stripped away their mana, and simple, potent projectiles pierced the shield's weak spots.
The man with a bullet through his thigh gritted his teeth and jammed a combat stimulant syringe near his heart. The spirit befitting a labyrinth explorer.
Holes multiplied in the shield, widening Allen's view of the enemies inside.
Mana surged into his left eye. His body screamed to stop, eyelids trying to close on their own, but he endured.
Hacking was tougher than expected. Automatons had weak magic resistance and fell easily, but corporate magitechwear was no pushover.
Still, success was the only escape. Allen couldn't think of anything else.
A stream started from his left eye, trickling down his cheek. With his free hand, he forced his drooping eyelid open.
His left vision tinted red. Just burst vessels around the eye— the hacking orb itself was fine.
A light startling enough to make Dennis and the vanguards flinch erupted from Allen's eyeball.
And Allen's eye observed countless galaxies. All the soul stones embedded in the enemies' magitech gear.
The skinhead watched with arms crossed, savoring the foes' collapse.
"This'll be over quick. Too boring."
"No way they came out unscathed from the gatekeeper. But boss."
"Spit it out."
"Mind if I ask where you got the whistle?"
"Shut up. Pretend you don't know if you wanna live. And you lot—don't even breathe a word..."
Sensing something off, the skinhead trailed off. His minions attacking the enemy were murmuring among themselves.
The gatekeeper bulk they'd propped as a shield was already ragged. A bit more pressure and it'd give—why stop?
The skinhead bellowed at them.
"What the hell are you doing? Who told you to stop?"
"Boss, my arms won't move."
The subordinate with prosthetic arms hung limp at his sides.
"My legs aren't listening."
Another slumped to the ground, clueless.
At the sight, the skinhead whipped his head forward.
"A hacker?"
Hackers came in two types: mages who'd honed magic for the ability, or those borrowing it via special devices.
No real-deal mage among the enemies. Surviving modern mages were the elite of elites—they'd be the ones melting.
No special devices in sight either. True hacking would've seized the minions' magitechwear and turned it against them.
Amid the chaos, the skinhead assessed. The glitching magitechwear on his men reactivated, and crimson liquid seeped from under the enemy shield.
"Looks like they can't touch brain-linked magitechwear. Intact ones, follow me."
The skinhead's chosen followers hadn't replaced limbs, so they moved fine. They deployed reverse-field barriers and advanced slowly.
The enemy's hidden trump card resolved with laughable ease.
"A momentary glitch? Embarrassing to even call it a trick."
"Right."
Compared to brain hacks or magitechwear explosions, it was child's play. Victory seemed certain. No one doubted.
As the enemies slyly shifted their shield aside, the skinhead shouted.
"If you wanna surrender, you should've from the—"
It wasn't surrender. Where the shield had been stood a feline predator automaton.
The automaton gaped its jaws. In its throat sat the gatekeeper's single eye. The iris snapped open—and light flashed.
The red beam was the skinhead's end.
Thud. The panther collapsed. Allen, drained of strength, nearly followed but gripped the cart at the sight of remaining foes and held on.
Having burned all his mana felt refreshing instead—but that sensation was fleeting. Like a parched river flooding, fluid burst from his mana heart and mana circuits, soaking his body. The violent motion brought faint pain.
Allen stared ahead. The red beam swept the enemies in one stroke; the survivors lost all will to fight.
Dennis plunged into the sheep like a wolf, and the leg-impaired foes offered no resistance.
Finishing cleanup swiftly, Dennis retrieved the beam-untouched whistle. Once shaped from black mist, it now looked bone-carved—pure white and rough.
Intrigued though he was, Allen focused on emergency treatment for the downed vanguard. Sprinkling hemostatic herb seeds on the wound sprouted vines that stanched the bleeding.
"You okay?"
"Organs seem fine. The problem's Karkda. And..."
Allen's gaze shifted to the red-painted wall. Nothing left to identify the man. That trace would vanish soon after Allen left.
"If you'd fired the beam from the start, could those two have survived?"
"Same outcome. The gatekeeper dropped the hammer the moment it judged its combat ability dropped from the ice spears. Even if the body was wrecked by the beam, or maybe it sensed the strong mana leaking before you fired and chucked it at you right away."
Labyrinth exploration was perilous. Death struck abruptly, and there was no one to blame. Dennis knew it well—Allen wasn't the culprit but their savior.
Dennis clapped his shoulder encouragingly and loaded the relatively intact corpses onto the cart. Captured prisoners were bound and dragged.
They encountered more automatons on the ascent, but after the gatekeeper and grubs, they felt ridiculously easy.
Allen captured the automatons as intact as possible for the cart