Investing in My Crippled Wife: My Duchess Makes me Overpowered

He was breathing raggedly now, his ribs aching with every inhale.

The cut on his forearm throbbed with his pulse.

Facing of against two monsters no weapon was definitely a bad idea. Why did he think he could do this alone.

His mind was racing but he didn’t have time to dwell in the past.

He was making it out of here alive.

He stared at the golem, observing the whole body. He could see the core but the centipede was a different story.

He needed to find a weakness. He needed some form of a plan. He got his answer to that a moment later.

The golem swung at him and for the first time, a plan formed.

There were black shards of glass molded from the sand and the scorching heat. He could use that as a weapon.

No sooner than the thought formed in his head did he spot a sharp pointed edged piece of black glass. He quickly rushed forward, grabbing the glass in his left arm.

He didn’t have the luxury of planning further than that. The centipede came around for a third pass, faster now, clearly agitated by the earlier hit.

He made himself hold his ground half a second longer than instinct wanted, waiting for the perfect moment to strike.

His legs were trembling now. He had cuts all over his body and although he was healing, he was sustaining injuries faster than he could heal them.

He needed to wait for the exposed part he had seen earlier. The gapped plating at the base of its skull.

The centipede dashed at him and with a quick movement, he side stepped the attack, planting the glass shard into the fleshy part of the creature as it dragged on.

He swung to the side, planting the glass knife in the side of the creature and began to run in the opposite direction, running the glass across the newly formed flesh in the middle of the lateral line on the creature’s side.

He had figured that would be easy to get through.

He was panting now, unable to catch his breath.

The attack had exposed the insides of the creature, showing him a green like core in the center.

Suddenly the flesh was healing at a rapid rate.

Emeric was on his heels without missing a moment. He dashed for the creature, plunging his hands that had the knife in the general direction that he had spotted the core.

He winced from the pain of the glass hurting his own hand.

It was just his hands and raw glass and he dug deeper with all his strength. He could not let this thing heal. The golem was not sitting by idly to let that happen.

Suddenly, he heard a crack.

[CORE FRACTURED — GLASSBACK CENTIPEDE]

The massive body stopped at once, twice, dissolving into sand to expose his bloodied hand stuck abnormally in mind air.

[HOSTILE ELIMINATED]

[EXPERIENCE GAINED]

One down. He didn’t have time to celebrate.

His hands were shaking from the impact of the glass on his palms. The glass was surprisingly sturdy for its size. But he didn’t have time to question his luck. The golem was already turning toward him, slower than the centipede had been but heavier. Every footfall felt like driving a small shockwave through the ground he could feel all through his body.

It was slower. He could do this.

He had one visible weak point and that was the core in its chest.

Emeric had no illusions about how much time it would take to actually exploit it before that fist eventually found him. He was not waiting around to find out.

He circled instead of charging, keeping his distance, forcing the golem to commit to swings that overextended it.

He needed a different plan that was not just waiting.

He dodged another swing.

His mind went to his family.

He wondered what they would think of him.

Well, he could gloat later. First, he just had to survive this behemoth of a creature first.

He needed an opening. Maybe it could tire out or overextend or something. Anything would be good right now. The next blow came slower than he expected on the next turn, and he used that, darting on the outside of a missed swing and drove a strike into the fractured shoulder before it could reset its stance.

The crack split wider. It was not enough. The golem’s other arm came around in a backhand he only half-avoided, catching him across the shoulder and throwing him a full body-length across the sand.

He hit hard, rolled through it, and came up slower than he wanted to, his arm and ribs both screaming now. Sand caked into the split skin on his forearm. The golem was already closing again, like a dutiful soldier that had only one mission.

The shoulder was healing but not as fast as the centipede. Besides, there was barely anything he could do about it even if it was.

He could see the inside of the core from the exposed shoulder. He needed to somehow wedge it all the way out from that exposed spot. It was his only plan.

The glass shard was a couple of feet away from him. It had left his arm when he was sent flying. The shard had chipped at a corner but it would have to do.

The golem was already closing in in him. He dashed for the glass. He didn’t have a better plan than that. He waited for the swing, ducked under it instead of dodging wide, and drove everything he had left into the same fractured point, wedging the core as best he could.

The shoulder gave, exposing the core in the same way it had done the centipede.

He didn’t think about it. He stabbed the core with as much force as he could muster.

[CORE FRACTURED — SAND-WROUGHT COLOSSUS]

[HOSTILE ELIMINATED]

[EXPERIENCE GAINED]

The colossus came apart mid-motion, the shape holding it together as tons of sand collapsed into a dune.