Chapter 24: Chapter 24 – Tar Golem
There was a gigantic "blob" of tar surrounded by withering trees.
However, calling it a blob did not do it justice.
The blob itself was around three meters in diameter, but there were countless long and black tendrils coming out of it.
The black tendrils stretched for almost five meters, and they split into smaller tendrils at the end.
The smaller tendrils took hold of the trees in the surroundings, and Kyle could see the trees becoming black and brittle.
From time to time, some of the tendrils grabbed leafy branches and shoved them into holes that opened in the blob.
The grass in the surroundings was also withering at a visible rate.
'The fuck is that thing?! I'm not eating that!' Kyle thought.
Samson and Nervon were charging at the gigantic ball of tar.
Nervon had already taken out his shield.
"Come here, you disgusting piece of shit!" Nervon shouted as he rammed his shield into the gigantic blob.
Kyle's eyes widened when he saw the blob rolling over.
'Did that guy just tip that thing over with his charge?!' he thought.
The next moment, all the tendrils shot at Nervon, but they were cut apart in an instant.
Samson had taken out his polearm, and he stood behind Nervon, cutting the tendrils going past the big shield.
BANG!
Nervon rammed the thing again, pushing it further away.
The Tar Golem was surprisingly viscous. One would think that Nervon would just sink into the tar, but that wasn't the case, apparently.
The next moment, Kyle saw an arrow piercing the blob.
BOOOM!
Kyle watched with widened eyes as the arrow exploded, tar scattering across the surroundings.
Naturally, it was Lancel who had shot the arrow.
Then, the young Fennek appeared beside the parts, two rapiers in his hands.
The rapiers started to burn, and Fennek rammed them into the blobs of tar.
'They're turning into stone!' Kyle thought as he saw the blobs hardening. 'Wait, this is tar, right? I think it is. Does tar even solidify when burned?'
Kyle shook his head. 'Stop trying to assign real-world physics to fantasy land!'
At the same time, he noticed the tentacles, which had been cut off by Samson, turning into smaller blobs before slowly slithering back to the big ball.
'Ah! You can only kill this thing if you denature its composition! Otherwise, it just gathers again!'
Sadly, Kyle missed the next part of the battle since he had to heave due to the horrible smell.
He only heard the sounds of battle while he was vomiting and coughing.
After around two minutes, the smell became a bit weaker, and Kyle managed to look at the battle again.
'There's still so much left?!' he thought in shock.
The ground was littered with black stones, but the ball of tar had barely shrunk.
The intensity of the fight hadn't diminished at all!
Nervon kept ramming the Tar Golem with his shield, keeping its attention on him.
Samson kept defending Nervon's back.
Lancel kept shooting explosive arrows.
Fennek was busy burning the individual blobs.
Tarren attacked the blob from time to time, cutting parts off, which Fennek turned to stone.
Everyone had their job.
'How can they keep fighting in this horrible stench?!' Kyle thought, resisting the urge to vomit again.
The battle raged on.
After ten minutes, Lancel ran out of explosive arrows and joined Tarren with his sword.
30 minutes after the start of the battle, Kyle could tell that the Tar Golem had shrunk by quite a bit.
After 60 minutes, it was only about a meter in diameter, and the hunters grew more aggressive.
At that point, Fennek was the one having trouble keeping up.
It seemed like he was running out of energy.
'Being a lighter probably uses up a lot of energy,' Kyle thought as he looked around.
He saw a couple of branches that were left over from the Tar Golem's rampage.
The stench was no longer as bad, and Kyle gathered a couple of them.
He made a pile of wood several meters away from the battle.
"Fennek!" Kyle shouted.
Fennek looked over and saw Kyle pointing at a pile of sticks.
His eyes widened in surprise and ran to Kyle.
He activated his fire again and put the pile of sticks on fire.
The Tar Golem had sucked all of the energy out of the sticks, and they burned very well.
The other hunters noticed.
Splash!
A blob of tar landed beside Kyle, and his hair stood on end as he smelled it.
Kyle held his breath and grabbed the blob before holding it over the fire.
The blob squirmed in Kyle's hands, making him heave a couple of times.
After some seconds, it completely solidified.
Splash!
A new blob landed beside Kyle.
Five minutes later, Tarren and Samson joined Kyle with their own blobs.
By now, Nervon was essentially beating the shit out of the Tar Golem on his own.
His mace was constantly spreading the Tar Golem over the surroundings, keeping it helpless and small.
About ten minutes later, the sound of fighting ended, and only the sound of solidifying tar remained.
Kyle could finally breathe again.
"Fucking hell," he cursed in English.
The others looked at him in interest.
How did he know about the last part of their plan?
Making a fire to deal with the Tar Golem was standard procedure, but it happened way later since they didn't have the manpower to dedicate one person to gather firewood.
All of them were busy with the Tar Golem.
All in all, the battle almost took 90 minutes, and everyone was exhausted.
"Good job, Kyle," Samson said with an exhausted smile. "You saved us a good two to four hours with your smell, and you also saved us about ten minutes by gathering firewood and burning the tar."
"Thank you," Kyle answered.
"Good job, Kyle. Not bad for your first mission," Nervon said with a smile.
Earlier, Nervon had been all serious, but now, he seemed a bit relaxed.
All the tar solidified a couple of minutes later, and the hunters put out the fire.
Samson gave a couple of orders to the others, who dispersed in all directions.
Then, he turned to Kyle.
"You, come with me!"