"Hm…."

"Good." – said the elderly elf who was sitting on top of the box, staring at the forest in the distance.

"?"

"…You are wondering what I'm talking about?" – asked the elderly guild master.

"!?"

"Em…. Yea?" – said curios soldier who was standing behind the elderly man.

"Well, I wasn't really a combatant specialist when I was active adventurer." – replied elderly elf.

"My main profession was scout."

"And to do my job, I'm using a bird familiars to gather information." – said the man as he owl suddenly landed on his shoulders.

"Familiar magic and taming specialty."

"I can use these guys to see what is going on inside the forest and observe how our people are fighting the golems…. So far? They are easily winning it." – said the elderly elf as he used the owl inside of the forest, that was hiding amongst the tree branches and observing the war between the adventurers and golems, relaying its vision to the guild master who was peacefully sitting on top of the box.

"?"

"Wait. Sorry if I'm disrespectful or anything… But if you had ability to send in familiars which you share vision with, why didn't you did it before? Instead of waiting for the scouts to go in?" – asked confused soldier.

"I've already tried sending few familiars beforehand, but these golems were able to find them since there was straight up no space to move around…. I can't exactly see anything from above, since the sea of trees are blocking the view." – replied the elderly elf as he scratched his pet owl.

"It seems these bastards hunt down anything that is in the forest."

"Be it a animal or person."

"…"

(Still, thanks to the adventurers now distracting the golems, my familiars can now move much easier and now have a proper look of the situation.) – thought the elven guild master as he was using his two owl familiars to infiltrate the forest and go around the frontlines where the two armies are fighting.

(First thing first, I need to…. Wait.)

"…"

"Shit." – said the elderly guild master as he started sweating profusely.

"…Raise the alarm!"

"?"

"Sorry?" – asked confused soldier.

"RAISE THE FUCKING ALARM AND ORDER TROPS TO PREPARE TO MOVE OUT!" – shouted the guild master.

"We need to help these bastards now!"

[Meanwhile: Forest]

"COMMON! KEEP PUSHING!" – shouted the heavily armored adventurer as he swung his hammer, hitting the giant knight golem in the back of its knee, stopping it in the tracks for a split moment and giving Adam a chance to launch his spiked ball at the golem and smash it against its face.

"…"

(Weird.) – thought nervous Adam.

(We are winning…. But…. No. I can't shake off the feeling that something isn't right.)

(The fight is going way too easy in our favor…. And there was also….)

"…"

"Hey. I don't think we should be fighting." – said Adam as he suddenly stopped attacking.

"Wait… What?! What the hell are you talking about?! We are winning!" – said the heavily armored adventurer.

"YES! WE ARE WINNING AWAY TOO EASILY! AND WAY TOO MUCH COMPARE TO THE LAST TIME!" – shouted nervous Adam.

"SOMETHING IS FUCKING WRONG!"

"THIS WHOLE THING SMELLS LIKE A FUCKING TRAP!"

"BACK OFF! NOW!" – shouted Adam in panic, confusing the nearby adventurers.

"Hey! The hell are you talking about!? We are about to kill two more of these fuckers!" – shouted pissed off the heavily armored man, confusing the adventures around who didn't knew what to do.

"DON'T YOU GET IT?! SOMETHING IS OFF ABOUT THE SITUATION! WE ARE WINNING WAY TOO EASILY! – shouted Adam.

"These things are not mindless animals! Something is commanding them and giving them orders!"

"And there is also the fact regarding the bombs! There was nothing!"

"I don't know what the hell is going on, but we need to get out of here now!" – said Adam, now confusing the heavily armored adventurers who was looking between the warrior in front of him and the already heavily damaged giant golems.

"I-"

*HOOF*

"!"

However, right before the adventurer in charge could spoke up, the duo was suddenly interrupted by an owl.

*HOOF* *HOOF* *HOOF*

"?"

"Owl?" – said Adam as the owl was hoofing aggressively and loudly, instantly getting of everybody nearby attention.

"!"

"Retreat order?!" – said the heavily armored adventurer, recognizing the owl.

"EVERBODY! RETREAT NOW! GUILD MASTER'S ORDERS!" – shouted now panicking heavily armored adventurer, alarming the nearby adventurers who instantly started spreading order around while the owl flew above the army, hooting aggressively, trying to signal all adventurers to retreat.

Obviously, people started getting confused.

They were dominating the entire fight and before long all the golems would end up getting exterminated.

They were about to win the fight easily without suffering any real casualties.

So why was the retreat order being issued so suddenly?

Nobody knew…. But the adventurers that were in charge were ordered to retreat instantly took action and started leading the army out of the forest, while the remaining golems gave chase.

(Shit! What the hell is going on here?!) – thought heavily armored adventurer as he ran.

(A sudden retreat order like this?! Is it something related to what this guy was speaking about?!)

(I mean, we did knew we are walking right into the trap, so why the hell are they giving us a retreat order?!)

(Unless something ba-)

"WAIT!" – shouted Adam as he suddenly stopped in tracks.

"What now?" – asked annoyed heavy armored adventurer before then spotting something coming from both sides.

"Fuck! They didn't get out in time!" – said nervous guild master as he observed through his familiars a large number of figures coming from two different sides.

The adventurers observed as two new waves of hostiles golems made their appearance from their left and right side, while the first previous wave was still running after them from behind.

"!"

"Pincer attack?!" – said Adam.

"Shit! The first wave was distraction! They were just buying time for the golems to go around us!"

"We need to run."

"There must be more than one reason why guild master gave order to retreat."

"…Yea…" – replied heavily armored adventurer.

"BREAK THROUGH! DON'T LET THE ENEMY STOP YOU!" – shouted the leader, ordering everybody to continue running through as the 3 different waves of golems were closing in on them.

"…"

(Hm…. This isn't good.) – thought Thauma as it started observed the adventurers running away.

(Why did they started retreating before my golems got to them? I've made sure that they wouldn't notice them…. Unless…. Did the enemy predicted my movement? Or maybe they had more scouts without me realizing?)

(God dammit.) – thought Thauma as the two waves of golems coming from the side started reaching the adventurers before then opening fire, unleashing a barrage of crossbow bolts.

"Shields!" – shouted the armored adventurer as mages and party tanks raised up their defenses to defend against incoming projectiles.

And like before, they blocked off the enemy attacks…. But something was different.

"!?"

"H-hey! Is it me or…. Is there way too many attacks?!" – said nervous tank as he realized that the amount of projectiles that was coming the defender's way was abnormal high.

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!" – shouted the heavy armored adventurer as he noticed that something was off and instantly rushed to assist the defenders by getting right in front of them and raising up his own shield, taking on the hail of projectiles himself

"!"

(The hell?!) – the man quickly came to the same realized as the other adventurers, about the volume of attacks.

(What the fuck?!) – the man tried peeking through his shield, trying to understand why there was so many crossbow bolts coming his way…. And before long, he found out why.

It was the shell number of golems that was approaching their location wasn't something just some small group, but instead a massive one…. And it wasn't just from one side.

The other side was also dealing with equally large number of enemies.

"HEY! WE HAVE FUCKING PROBLEM! HERE!" – shouted the adventurer protecting the rear as he noticed that the number of the golems that was originally chasing the army has now somehow increased in numbers.

(Shit! The hell is going on?! Why is there so many golems here?!) – thought alarmed heavily armored adventurer

"{Shield Art: Wall Shield}"! – the heavily armored adventured smashed down his shield, unleashing a burst of energy from it as it formed a wall that blocked off incoming projectiles and giving the defenders bit of a room to breathe.

"Shit! Mages! Use any big spells you can still cast!" – shouted the heavily armored adventurer.

"Create opening for us to retreat! We need to-"

"Em…. What is that?!" – said the elven archer as he pointed at something past the heavily armored adventurer, alarming the man as he looked towards the enemies and spotted something new.

A new golem model has made its appearance.

A four-legged golem, with a giant crossbow sticking out from its front.

"?!"

(WAIT! IS THAT A FUCKING BALISTA?!) – thought the alarmed heavily armored adventurer, as he realized that the weapon that the golem was wielding wasn't just a crossbow, but a straight up ballista…. And as for its power? Well, the golem aimed and fired it straight at the man, hitting him right head on and shattering his barrier, which even ended up piercing his iron shield as well as push the man backwards.

"?!"

"B-boss?! You alright!?" – scared mage.

"I'm…. I'm fine….No…. On the second thought… No…. Medic…" – said the heavily armored man as he tried standing up, only to then instantly fell onto his knee while panicking mdci quickly ran to the party leader, instantly noticing his shaking hand as well as the ballista arrow that pierced through the shield and partially wrecked the man arm that held onto the shield.

(Well…. I don't know how they managed to learn about approaching golems…. But it partially doesn't matter.) – thought Thauma.

(Even if they manage to raise their retreat order much earlier than before, it doesn't mean that most of them will manage to escape this place alive.)

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