However, risks also came with rewards. The Magician's Association would pay as much as 1 gold coin for a metal puppet that was less than 20% damaged. Some mages who liked to study golems might even offer a higher price. Besides, even if the metal puppets were more seriously damaged, they could be sold to the Dwarven blacksmiths to be melted down to make equipment. They were also very interested in this special metal.
However, Lolo's exploration team didn't enter the inner city to kill monsters this time. Their goal was the hidden treasure in the southwest area.
Along the way, in order to avoid unnecessary trouble, the team avoided the metal puppets wandering around the city as much as possible.
It wasn't easy to do this, but the team now had two thieves, and their alert range had expanded compared to before.
The detection range of the metal puppets was about 50 meters. Beyond this range, there wouldn't be any reaction even if they were face to face. This was very similar to the golems. They would only enter combat mode when they detected a living being.
If it was in a flat area, these metal puppets would not be of any use. This was because the distance that humans could see with their naked eyes was more than 50 meters. However, in the city, due to the obstruction of the surrounding buildings, it was not easy to completely avoid these metal puppets.
Especially in places like crossroads or street corners, it was very likely that they would have an intimate face-to-face encounter if they were unlucky.
In such a situation, a battle was inevitable.
Not long ago, the exploration team had just finished their first battle in the inner city.
In five minutes, the five adventurers killed a metal puppet with the ability [Sharpening]. [Sharpening] was a relatively common ability among the metal puppets. Simply put, it was an ability that allowed one's weapon to become indestructible for a certain period of time.
In the absence of prior knowledge, this ability could easily cause some melee professions to suffer losses. For example, Captain Hansen's greatsword was broken in two in the first round of confrontation with the enemy, and even a piece of his scalp was almost cut off. However, once they figured out the ability of the puppet in front of them, the subsequent battle became easier.
In the face of a strong opponent's attack, as long as they switched their combat mode to focus on dodging and avoiding direct contact, they could minimize the threat of the [Sharpening] ability.
Hansen threw away the broken sword in his hand and took the spare longsword thrown to him by his follower, assuming the role of the team's main tank. The reaction speed and flexibility of a grade two profession were better than that of a metal puppet. Even if it was a one-on-one, Hansen was confident that he could take down the metal puppet in front of him, not to mention that the others were attacking crazily under Hansen's control.
In the end, everyone killed the enemy in one go, simply packed up the loot, and hurriedly left the place before the second metal puppet arrived.
In the next two days, similar battles occurred a total of three times. In one of them, due to bad luck, they encountered a metal puppet with the ability [Reinforced Iron Bones]. Due to the opponent's abnormal defense, the battle lasted for half an hour and attracted the attention of another metal puppet nearby.
Fortunately, the attack power of a metal puppet with the ability [Reinforced Iron Bones] was relatively average. Hansen decisively single-handedly dealt with the puppet, then directed the others to focus their fire on the other metal puppet. After quickly getting rid of the metal puppet with the ability [Rapid], they spent more than ten minutes to destroy the unbelievably hard metal puppet.
After doing all this, everyone was unbearably tired. Even Hilton cast three recovery spells, which was almost the limit of a grade one cleric. Grimm, who had just defected, was also very active in this battle, and his grasp of timing was remarkable.
As for Rob, the future Supreme Magister Your Honor, as usual, continued to play the role of a bystander.
"Thinking about it, we're almost at the area you mentioned. The next step is to find the tunnel mentioned in the clue."
On the third day after entering the inner city, everyone finally reached the end of their journey. Thinking that they would soon be able to see the legendary heirloom, the party members were a little excited. Even the cool elf brother Beck had a slight smile on his face.
Apart from the future Supreme Magister Your Honor, the others had never seen any heirloom in their lives.
However, as adventurers, they had more or less heard of some stories related to heirlooms, such as the magical abilities of heirlooms. In a sense, when those annoying metal puppets were created, they seemed to have used some technology related to heirlooms. The strange abilities they had were very similar to the simplified version of heirlooms.
After all, they were products of the same civilization, so it was normal for technology to have similarities.
If that was the case, did it mean that the metal puppets also had something similar to a heirloom in their bodies?
As everyone knew, heirlooms were extremely rare even in the Underground City. However, these metal puppets could be seen everywhere in the inner city.
However, when the first group of adventurers had this idea, they spent a lot of effort to dissect the iron lumps, but they couldn't find anything of value in them.
Everyone was naturally depressed, but this also proved the value of heirlooms. Even the civilization that invented them ten thousand years ago couldn't reach the level of mass production, so the value of heirlooms was self-evident.
Apart from that, almost every adventurer knew that heirlooms usually had guardians around them!
As the name suggested, the so-called guardians existed to protect the heirloom, and they were usually powerful magical beasts in the same layer.
Of course, tens of thousands of years had passed since the construction of the Underground City. The first batch of magical beasts that acted as guardians must have died long ago, but the position of guardian had been passed down from generation to generation.
Rob speculated that the civilization that built the Underground City was likely to have reached something similar to a soul contract with the magical beasts in the outer city. Because only such a contract could survive through the long river of time and still be in effect today.
If there was really a lake at the end of the tunnel, then the guardian of this heirloom was likely to be a water-type magical beast.
Of course, this was all for later. At present, the most immediate problem in front of the team was to find that artifact.
"Didn't the guy who found the clue say that the tunnel was behind the domed building? Didn't he also say that the building should be a church? So our next goal is to find a church?" Hansen said.
Unexpectedly, Luo Bu shook his head. "No, it's not a church. I've been paying attention to the surroundings along the way. There are no churches in this city at all. No, to be more precise, not only are there no churches, but there are also no statues, monasteries, shrines, or anything related to the gods."
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