It was rather funny watching this thing circle me in confusion as I literally stood at the bottom of the lake watching it back. It clearly understood I wasn't the same species as itself but the problem it was having trouble understanding was that I was also not struggling like anything drowning should.
"Are they usually so... timid?" Adam asked curiously.
"Oh it's not. It's confused. As far as it knows I should be trying to make for the surface to breathe. Instead i'm just chilling down here staring at it. It's usual tactic of trying to drown anyone in the water won't work and it's sonic scream is just as dangerous to itself down here as it is to me. It's stuck in a situation it doesn't understand how to deal with." I explained with a chuckle.
"Are we not also in such a situation?" Adam asked.
"Nope. Even if I can't use any of my guns down here without risking damage to them I can still use my fists thanks to this suit." I say as I press towards the Lakelurk.
The creature also clearly came to a similar outcome and began it's swim towards me with a snarl on it's eerie face.
It swiped at me with it's claws as I cocked back my arm and straightened my fingers to cut drag as I threw my hand forward and only curled them into a fist right before impact. Our attacks landed at the same time but had very different outcomes. It's claws raked across the chest of my armor without leaving even a scratch and my fist impacted it's face to devastating effect. Even with the water slowing my movements the armor gave me a punch with literal tons of force behind it. -
My fist crashed into it's face and kept going as it's skull shattered on impact like a grape bursting. Red filled the water immediately and I wasted no time at all dropping into a push up position and continuing my frogwalk across the lake bed to put as much distance between me and that corpse as possible. It's friends will no doubt quickly pick up the scent of it's blood in the water and come investigating and I would rather not be here when they do. Not because I am in danger but because it would slow me down too much and I am on a tight deadline.-
Eventually I reach the bottom of the overlooking cliff the Caesars camp was built on top of with it's foot down here in the water.
"Welp, time to climb." I muttered and began to grind hand holds into the stone with my fingers.
"I hadn't considered using the fact the armor was harder and more durable than the stone to carve griping places. How clever." Adam said as I did.
"It's a tad tedious but I am nothing if not adaptable." I said as I slowly started to haul myself up from the lake bead and then up the face of the cliff.
Thanks to the fact I was grinding my fingers into the stone rather than using overwhelming force my rise was fairly quiet. That said the intense periodic sound of gunfire and screaming coming from overhead told me what Caesar had chosen to do about the little "gift" I gave him. Ironically it was perhaps the most foolishly prideful. He evacuated the camp but kept sending his warriors to harass the Dawn elemental before it could leave like I had ordered.-
He was effectively stalling it's return by sending people into the camp periodically to harass it. This meant in the simple order based logic of the summoned creature there were more people in the camp it had to kill before returning.
"Oh this is going to be awkward for Caesar when Jess reaches him. Assuming she hasn't already. He'll have to receive her from outside his throne." I said with a chuckle.
"His show of power will be weakened considerably." Adam agreed.
"Yep, Things will get much more awkward when he receives word the elemental is gone. I'll slip into the shack that holds the bunker before storing the elemental in my inventory. As far as he'll know it just vanished. If I time it right he may even assume one of his soldiers finally managed to kill it." I said with a grin.
"Won't he know that something is off?" Adam asked.
"Maybe but he's already committed to fighting the elemental so he must think it killable. That or he's too proud to understand there was no winning. If I had to guess he probably thinks the thing would eventually falter under long engagement so when it finally vanishes he'll believe it was this that caused it." I said casually.
"I see." Adam said.
I continued up the cliff face and a good thirty minutes later finally reached the top. As I pulled my head over the edge of the cliff I was met with a sight that made me pause. The camp looked intact. No destroyed equipment, tents or anything like that. The problem was there were dozens of corpses all over the ground. Some had slash wounds and others were charred like a flamethrower had roasted them. The camp itself was a weird mix of scrap and roman esque. Like the encampments defensive fence was heavy scrap welded together and there were scrap poles and tools but the design was distinctly roman in appearance.-
I could see the bright glowing form of my summon wandering the camp in search of anyone hiding only for a squad of legionnaires to charge through the gate of the camp with machetes and guns. The moment they crossed the threshold to "inside" the camp my elemental went from passive search to destroy like a switch had been flipped. It was fast. Understandably so given it was mostly comprised of energy as far as I could tell. That body shot towards these people with bladed "arms" raised with lethal intent.-
Unlike what you'd expect the legionnaires didn't get diced to ribbons but blocked the swings with their melee weapons while the ones with guns unloaded into the elemental. Then they fought a retreating fight back out the gate where they clearly knew the thing wouldn't follow.-
"Well that answers that. That man definitely thinks he can tire it to death." I said with a chuckle.
AN: I'm back in business folks! Got my internet back yesterday!