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[img]https://i.imgur.com/C7nwoGY.png[/img]
[b][color=ea590c]wordcount:[/color][/b]  801 (+2 exp)
[b][color=ea590c]Edward Portsmith: Level 6 (16 cells) [/color][/b][color=ea590c]////////////////////////////////////////////////////[/color]////////// (52/60)
[b]Location[/b] Frozen highlands - Krat Zoo
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As they waited for the door to open, Edward formed and sent out copper golem squads to salvage enough scrap materials to form a rudimentary barrel into which the fat was piled, producing an incredibly rudimentary fire bomb which he then dedicated a squad to carry around. It was debatable how effective this would be, but if he pumped a smiting bishop round into it when the squad had gotten into melee with some big mutant monster it would probably be more effective than the squad itself.

Just about when he’d sorted that all out, the doors swung open, and it was time to get a move on. The man mounted up, got the Reindrix up and moved outward and onwards at a steady pace, with his copper golems forming a perimeter around them now that they were moving slowly enough for the foot troops to keep up.

Not that they were needed. Blazermate had apparently been busy, and her big ol meat ball made quick work of another mandril ambush. Of course, it was causing issues of its own, the Reindrix unable to be told that it wasn’t going to turn around and eat them too. Which he could hardly blame them for. Undead becoming too powerful for their summoner and turning on them was one of the classic cautionary tales when it came to the arrogance of necromancers.

[color=ea590c]”Perhapse send it much, much further ahead?”[/color] Edward suggested, as that would give them more time to react to it getting off of its leash, and would trip any more ambushes while it was at it.

Once it was out of the way, he got them moving again.

Speaking of the arrogance of necromancers, apparently this zoo had one of its own, who announced herself with plenty of bombastic flair through some sort of technological communication system. 

[color=ea590c]”Puppeteer of Death? Not the worst title I’ve heard a shadow mage give themselves, I’ll give her that, but I would hardly call it particularly intimidating either”[/color] Edward commented nonchalantly once the announcement ended, before flicking the reins and getting them moving once more (having paused their advance briefly in case this was the heralding of some ambush or long ranged sorcery).

He did wonder how they’d been spotted however, and so rather than having his scouts spread out (given that the seekers were already doing so) had them look for the woman’s vantage point, scouting minion or one of those ‘camera’ devices, but he came up empty handed, much to his frustration. Perhaps, he thought, she had simply finally noticed someone was slaughtering her thralls in large numbers.

More of those were coming up soon, and even if some of them were caged in, that was not necessarily going to make it safe to ride on by them, as the mandrills and rat’s ability to ranged attack had demonstrated. Plus, the odds of them staying caged and not eventually smashing out was low, to say the least.

Which is why he sent the copper golems forward to deal with those problems while the living dealt with the threats out of them. When the seekers clearing the way advanced, he lined his construct up in front of the cages and had them jab the spears into them to skewer the carcasses within as they bit and clawed at the bars to no avail. It was pretty grizzly work, but then that was what golems were for, doing things it was best not to put people through. The fact that he had a front row seat through two dozen monocular eyes was a sacrifice he was willing to make.

Still, it was almost a relief when one of the cages contained something that could fight back, namely a pack of [url=https://i.imgur.com/Vkaex5N.png]chameleons[/url] that leapt around erratically while lashing their tongues out at the golems which had trouble catching the nimble foes.

A Smiting Bishop round took care of that, the largely elemental round hammering into the enclosure’s ceiling, and raining down arcfire upon the foes, igniting the ground beneath them and shock-roasting them to death.

That, of course, took his aim off of the other foes, but that wasn’t much of a problem. The man had parked well back from the actual bend in the road, and had been taking out threats from afar with his scoped rifle before they even got close. Even then, he still wasn't moving them forwards before the road was clear, and certainly not before someone worked out what the deal with the ‘totally normal’ giraffe was.

[color=ea590c]”There is not a single world in all the astral sea where that is not some kind of a trap or mimic waiting for an opportune target to get close. So if someone who’s confident they can survive the process could spring said trap before our transport gets into range, I’d greatly appreciate it”[/color] was his opinion on the matter.