“■■■! ■■■■!”

When the giant captain shouted something, the surviving soldiers all threw away the weapons in their hands.

It was an attack with terrifying power, but unlike the giant captain, their accuracy was poor.

Their attacks only turned their former comrade into a porcupine.

You felt puzzled, but that puzzle was soon solved.

The soldiers threw stones or kicked up sand with their feet.

In some ways, it was the most effective attack.

Once again, countless scratches appeared on your body, and your leg that was hit by a large stone was even crushed.

You circulated mana through your body again.

Leaving aside parts that weren’t immediately important, you only recovered your legs to the point of regaining mobility.

Checking your shield, you saw that one of the three jewels had lost its light during the fight with the Witch of the West, but the other two still contained intense mana.

While staggering from the sand throws, you quietly looked for a gap.

This stone was too big, this stone was too small, and this stone lacked hardness.

As you selected among the flying stones, when stones meeting your desired conditions flew in, you released the mana contained in the shield.

Boom! Patter!

The stones flying towards you returned to sender with even fiercer momentum.

The soldiers’ heads all burst open at once.

The sole survivor was the giant captain.

Instead of fleeing or cowering, he swung his sword at you in anger.

The size and weight were violence in themselves.

Even though you were only grazed by the side of the sword, your body was greatly crushed.

If it were an ordinary person, they would have been immobilized by compound fractures.

But it didn’t matter.

You had no concept of pain.

Although a fairly long fight continued, your body was ignorant to fatigue.

Any injury could be recovered as long as you had mana.

You cut the giant captain’s ankle.

Although it was much tougher and stronger muscles and bones compared to other giants, it was still soft compared to the feel the Tin Knight’s body remembered.

As the giant captain’s body tilted to one side, you jumped using his knee and moved to the opposite side.

You briefly considered releasing the last jewel of the three on the shield, but decided to save it as a trump card in case something happened later.

Instead of giving a shock to the opponent’s liver with a body blow, you climbed up the opponent’s back.

The giant captain seemed to notice what you were trying to do and quickly threw his body to the ground to shake you off, but you were faster in reaching the captain’s neck.

You crawled into the gap between the armor and helmet and deeply stabbed the back of his neck.

The giant captain struggled for a moment, but soon shuddered and fell forward.

Standing on top of the giant captain’s head, you looked around.

The corpses of dead giants littered the street.

The surviving giants fled from you with terrified faces.

Only blood and death remained where you stood.

You looked at this scene for a moment, then hopped down from the captain’s head.

You looked at the golden thread bracelet.

The once brilliant golden color had long since turned dark red.

No, not just the bracelet, but your entire body was like that.

If you had a sense of touch, you might have felt the warm and sticky sensation of blood.

If you had a sense of smell, you might have smelled the terrible stench of blood and entrails.

Of course, that didn’t happen. Your body was that of a cold metal doll.

Without feeling any particular emotion about that fact, you moved in one of the several directions the bracelet was pointing.

After that, several more giants appeared, but upon seeing you, they all fled frantically, as if they had seen something terrifying.

How long did you advance like that?

You arrived at the shore.

You blankly stared at the sight of the undulating waves.

Although you knew this was inside the witch’s workshop, the word to describe the vast puddle of water spread out before your eyes could only be “sea”, no matter how you thought about it.

And that was a very troublesome thing.

You couldn’t swim. You couldn’t float on water.

There was no boat you could use here, and you had already done battle with the locals, meaning no one could assist you.

In other words, you were trapped on this island.

You were silent for a moment, then looked around.

And you approached a nearby tree and cut it down.

Cutting, splitting, assembling.

The tree that went through your hands… did not transform into a nice boat.

Looking at the failure that seemed like it couldn’t float even a dog, let alone a person, on water, your worries deepened.

It was even strange that while you could cut and slice things infinitely precisely, when you tried to use that in a creative direction, it turned out like this.

Leaving the failure behind, you decided to walk along the shore.

Come to think of it, the thread was pointing in several directions, so there was no guarantee that all of them led to the sea.

There might be a companion you could meet by walking on two feet.

You walked, and walked, and kept walking.

The time spent walking or trying to make a boat was much longer than the time it took to subdue the giants.

The remaining mana was about one-third.

There was one jewel left on the shield, but that was mana that could only be used for combat rather than repurposed as fuel.

You felt anxious about whether you could meet another companion before your mana ran dry.

Although you typically relished confronting formidable foes without fear, you found yourself at a loss in this situation where brute force was ineffective.

How long did you walk like that?

Suddenly, you noticed a golden flash in the sky.

Gleaming in the sunlight, they were flying over the sea with two wings.

Having seen this sight several times already, you immediately realized they were the Witch of the West’s familiars.

They didn’t seem to have noticed you were here yet, but judging by how they looked like they were searching for something, it was only a matter of time.

It was then, as you were preparing for battle.

The golden monkeys flying in the sky suddenly hesitated, then stopped their search and started flying urgently somewhere.

You tilted your head, but the departed monkeys didn’t return.

Feeling an emotion that might be regret or relief, you hurried your steps again.

Clank. Clank. Clank.

Leaving footprints on the sandy beach, you dragged your heavy body.

The blood had dried and become black scabs, and the sun was close to the horizon.

After confirming that even the third golden thread was pointing towards the sea, not land, you slumped down on the ground.

If there was a giant-sized boat on the shore, you would have used it to somehow move forward, but no matter how much you walked, you couldn’t see even anything similar to a boat, let alone an actual one.

Now all you could do was wait for companions who might never come, while preserving what little mana you had left.

Time passed like that again.

“—Found you.”

A familiar voice tickled your ears.

A girl with black hair braided and draped over one of her shoulders, and white skin wrapped in black clothing, got off a boat and approached you.

The blue eyes were, as always, far from gentle, and her expression was grumpy.

But you were glad to see such a sight.

Perhaps because you didn’t say anything.

The girl said with a suspicious face, “What’s with that look?”

[The ‘Tin Knight’ claims to be distinguishing between real and fake!]

The words popped out before you could think.

The girl—Dorothea’s face turned grim.

“Wait, fake? Don’t tell me the witch has familiars that can change their appearance?”

[The ‘Tin Knight’ says there weren’t particularly such ones!]

[The ‘Tin Knight’ says if there were multiple Dorotheas, that would be a terrifying sight!]

“Hey!!” Dorothea screamed.

You laughed heartily with your voiceless throat.

Dorothea glared at you like that, but soon sighed.

“Haa, fine. Now’s not the time to play around. Are you okay? Looks like you’ve been through quite a bit.”

[The ‘Tin Knight’ says he was frustrated in front of a formidable enemy known as a restricted area!]

“Seems like everything else is fine. Get on the boat for now… No, wash your body first.”

[The ‘Tin Knight’ wonders if blood isn’t familiar given the profession!]

“You think being familiar with something and liking it are the same? Anyway, just hurry and wash up.”

You washed your body as Dorothea instructed.

Originally, washing metal with seawater wasn’t a good thing, but if you had enough mana, it wasn’t a big problem.

After pouring in mana like pouring oil on a rusty doll, your ragged and unsightly body became clean.

When you put mana into the shield as well, the jewels that had lost their light began to shine brilliantly again.

[The ‘Tin Knight’ asks about their other companions!]

“I don’t know. You’re the first one I’ve regrouped with. I’m worried since one of the threads has disappeared, but there’s no way to confirm that right now either.”

As a bizarre skeleton that was hard to tell whether it was human or horse rowed, the boat carrying you and Dorothea began to move forward.

Dorothea asked, “Have you encountered the monkeys by any chance?”

[The ‘Tin Knight’ says they were searching nearby but suddenly left as if they had urgent business!]

“Urgent business…? Did they discover the others and call for reinforcements? There’s no need for multiple people to catch Sophia, so it might be Adel or Franka.”

[The ‘Tin Knight’ claims that Sophia might have unexpectedly done something!]

“As if she would. Anyway, be prepared. Even if they retreated for a moment, we don’t know when they might swarm us again.”

[The ‘Tin Knight’ guarantees that while he can’t fight on a boat, he’ll show a special booster instead!]

[The ‘Tin Knight’ claims there will be thrilling excitement and fun together!]

“That’s enough, just row the oar!”

You and Dorothea moved forward, making jokes and grumbling complaints respectively.

The gloominess had long since disappeared without you realizing it.

***

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