Chapter 12

Chapter 12

A sand-laden wind blew in.

The wind of the desert was extremely dry, and because it carried sand, even brief exposure could leave deep wounds on the skin.

That had nothing to do with Zeon.

Sand could not wound him.

That was because sand was no different from part of his own body.

His control was still weak, so the area he could command was limited, but even that was enough to protect himself in the desert.

The scorching sun and the chill of night were handled by the robe he wore.

The robe made from the Sand Angler’s belly skin was thin and light, and its ability to retain warmth was excellent.

During the day, it blocked heat and kept him cool, and at night, it prevented his body heat from leaking outside.

Thanks to that, he consumed less stamina.

As Zeon walked after Deioden, he suddenly looked around.

No matter where he looked, there was only sand.

There were no landforms or buildings that could serve as landmarks.

When one stood in the middle of a vast desert, one realized anew just how insignificant a human being was.

Zeon looked at Deioden, who was walking far ahead.

Deioden walked only forward, without resting or looking back even once.

A person wandering the desert without a goal could not walk so straight.

Only someone with a clear goal could advance in such a perfect straight line.

Several days had passed since they began traveling together, but Deioden had never once spoken about his goal or his past.

When the sun set and they rested, he always stuck Crayon in front of him and conversed with it.

At first, Zeon had thought Deioden was a crazy old man.

By Zeon’s common sense, the very act of conversing with a sword made no sense.

He knew Ego Swords existed, but such objects were extremely rare, and as far as he knew, there were hardly any even in Neo Seoul. Because of that, he had not truly believed that Deioden’s sword was a real Ego Sword.

But as the same situation repeated every day, Zeon now felt that Deioden really was conversing with the sword.

Deioden, who was so savage toward desert monsters, softened whenever he conversed with Crayon.

At times, his eyes were even soaked with melancholy. But when the sun rose and he walked through the desert, he returned to that same fierce gaze.

His eyes contained tremendous madness and rage great enough to tear everything in the world apart.

Zeon did not know what had made Deioden that way, but today too, he pushed forward through the desert’s harsh sand-laden wind.

Zeon followed behind Deioden while chewing jerky.

After eating the Sand Angler’s gallbladder and meat, Zeon’s body had undergone a great change.

All useless flesh had vanished, and he had gained a muscular body.

No matter how long he walked, he did not tire, and even a grueling march did not feel difficult.

If not for Deioden, he would not have known of the existence called the Sand Angler, nor would he have known that the Sand Angler’s gallbladder had such an effect.

‘What kind of person is he? What story does he have that he crosses this desert alone? And why is he taking me with him?’

The questions continued endlessly.

The best way to resolve his curiosity was to ask Deioden. But it was safe to say there was almost no chance of that working.

‘There’s nothing clear about any of this.’

Gulp!

Zeon swallowed the jerky he had been chewing for a long while.

His mouth felt dry and stale.

Zeon searched inside his robe and took out a leather waterskin filled with water.

This, too, had been made from the Sand Angler’s skin.

It was light and elastic, so it could hold an extremely large amount of water.

Zeon had filled the leather waterskin with water before the oasis disappeared.

He drank it sparingly, a little at a time, only when truly necessary.

“Ahh!”

Just one sip of water made his thirst disappear.

It was when he was fastening the waterskin to his waist again.

SSSSHHH!

His senses detected a stealthy movement.

Something deep in the sand was approaching in his direction.

Zeon focused on his senses.

There were ten objects caught by his senses.

They were approaching him from every direction.

He detected movement roughly within a ten-meter radius centered on himself.

It was proof that Zeon’s detection range had now extended to ten meters. However, he could not simply be happy that his detection had grown.

Right now was not the time to be pleased, but to prepare.

They were slow, but they steadily narrowed the encirclement. Then they suddenly sprang out.

A glossy titanium-like shell as if armored in plate, powerful mandibles split in two, six legs, and a pair of antennae.

They were ants.

The only difference from ordinary ants was that they were far larger than a person.

Their name was Wolf Ants.

That was because they moved in packs like wolves, and were just as ferocious and rough.

Wolf Ants were the greatest threat to caravans crossing the desert.

Once a single Wolf Ant appeared nearby, one had to assume there was a nest in the area.

What people commonly called an Ant Nest.

An Ant Nest contained at least hundreds of ants and larvae.

Once they caught prey, they dragged it to the Ant Nest and fed it to the queen and larvae.

When Wolf Ants bit their prey, they injected a unique venom.

What made this venom terrifying was that the body could not move, but the mind remained perfectly clear.

Because of that, anyone bitten by a Wolf Ant had to endure the sensation of being eaten alive while fully conscious.

That was why, in the desert, people even said that if one encountered Wolf Ants, it was better to kill oneself.

Zeon, too, had heard stories about Wolf Ants to the point of exhaustion when he was in the slums. Because of that, the moment he saw the Wolf Ants, he realized what they were.

CLACK! CLACK!

The Wolf Ants approached Zeon while clacking their teeth together.

Their inorganic eyes and shells reflected the sunlight, dizzying his vision.

Zeon did not panic and unleashed Sand Blaster.

SHSHSH!

Five streams of Sand Blaster struck the heads of the Wolf Ants.

The Wolf Ants reeled from the great impact. But unlike the Great-Horned Hyenas, holes were not pierced through their heads.

It was thanks to the titanium-like shell protecting them.

One terrifying aspect of Wolf Ants was their defensive power. Most attacks simply bounced off their titanium-like shells.

The defensive power of Wolf Ants was strong enough that attacks from Grade D Awakened did not work at all.

Because of that, when Awakened of Grade D or lower encountered Wolf Ants, they would rather choose to flee.

Not knowing that, Zeon attacked the Wolf Ants.

Enraged by Zeon’s attack, the Wolf Ants charged in with an even more savage momentum.

“Haaah!”

Zeon retreated and unleashed Sand Blaster in rapid succession.

BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!

Sand Blaster struck the Wolf Ants’ heads one after another.

They reeled from the heavy impacts, but they were still unharmed.

Zeon felt that there was no chance of victory like this.

He hurriedly used Sand Walk and retreated, while at the same time targeting only one of them with Sand Blaster.

BOOM!

Only then did the head of the targeted Wolf Ant burst apart.

“Good!”

Zeon clenched his fist and unleashed Sand Blaster in succession.

BOOM!

BOOM!

Each time Sand Blaster struck, a Wolf Ant’s head burst like a firework.

While traveling with Deioden, Sand Blaster’s power had grown exponentially.

It had grown strong enough to overcome the difference in grade and deal damage.

Zeon gained confidence in Sand Blaster’s power.

That was when it happened.

SCREEEE!

Suddenly, one Wolf Ant emitted a bizarre high-frequency sound.

It looked exactly as though it were screaming because it feared Zeon.

“Shut up!”

Zeon fired Sand Blaster at the head of the Wolf Ant emitting the high-frequency sound.

BOOM!

This time as well, the Wolf Ant’s head shattered to pieces.

Now only three Wolf Ants remained.

Zeon thought he should deal with them quickly and follow Deioden.

The incident happened then.

SSSSHHH!

Suddenly, Zeon’s senses detected countless living creatures approaching.

“What the?”

While Zeon was startled, Wolf Ants pushed through the sand and stuck out their heads.

There were more than a hundred of them.

“Insane!”

Zeon was shocked by the number, which exceeded imagination.

Only then did he realize that the high-frequency sound the Wolf Ant had emitted moments ago had been a call to summon its companions.

The Wolf Ants approached after perfectly surrounding Zeon.

CHITTER-CLACK!

The Wolf Ants made a grotesque sound.

It was the sound they made when their ferocity erupted.

The Wolf Ants charged at Zeon at high speed.

“Fuck!”

Zeon used Sand Walk and dodged the Wolf Ants’ attacks.

CLACK! CLACK!

Zeon escaped the Wolf Ants’ mandibles by a hair’s breadth and unleashed Sand Blaster, bursting their heads apart.

Zeon was covered in pieces of Wolf Ant flesh and blood.

Seeing that sight, the other Wolf Ants charged even more terrifyingly.

“Yaaaaah!”

Zeon let out a strange roar and fought the Wolf Ants.

Then, in his field of vision, he suddenly saw a huge old man sitting atop a high sand dune.

It was Deioden.

He was watching Zeon’s desperate struggle against the Wolf Ants with Crayon stuck in the ground beside him.

“Wolf Ants have the habit of all swarming together when one of their kind is attacked.”

One should not think that the Wolf Ants currently attacking were all of them.

Even now, as they died, they were emitting that distinctive high-frequency sound to call their companions.

Soon the rest would swarm here as well.

In fact, Deioden’s senses had detected a swarm of Wolf Ants approaching this way at great speed.

There was probably an Ant Nest nearby.

BOOM! BOOM!

Zeon used Sand Blaster with all his might.

Each time, a Wolf Ant’s head burst apart.

“It is still not enough. That much is nowhere near enough.”

Deioden wore a dissatisfied expression.

Zeon had awakened a remarkable trait with no equal in the world.

In a world where most of the land was desert, awakening an authority to control sand was an incomparable blessing. But Zeon had not yet grasped how great his potential was, or how many ways it could be used.

Such things had to be learned by throwing one’s body against reality directly.

The world judged an Awakened’s strength only by looking at their Rank Insignia.

The martial type was this, the Magic Type was that, Grade F was weaker than Grade D...... Grade S was the best.

It determined hierarchy only by what was visible, and defined potential that way.

When an Awakened learned a Skill, instead of making them realize on their own how to use it and in what direction to develop it, it guided their development only through standardized, safe methods.

That way, they could not use one hundred percent of their potential.

One had to throw one’s body against reality, cross the boundary between life and death, realize one’s own shortcomings, and then agonize over how to fill them.

That was what Deioden considered the proper growth of an Awakened. But the rulers of Neo Seoul thought differently from him.

That was because Deioden’s method took too much time, and its efficiency was not very high. So the rulers of Neo Seoul kept Deioden at a respectful distance.

“Cripples with stiff heads! They do not even know why the world became like this, and they are mad only for power struggles.”

A hundred years had passed since the Sixth Mass Extinction occurred.

Most of the survivors from that time had died, and only a few remained.

Deioden was one of the few survivors who remembered the horrors of that time.

He had seen clearly with his own two eyes how the Sixth Mass Extinction began, and how countless people died horribly and emptily.

Civilization collapsed overnight, and transferred monsters trampled Earth.

No one knew how great his rage toward his powerless self had been as he watched family and acquaintances disappear as mere food for monsters.

Fortunately, he had awakened and survived until this day, but not for a single day had Deioden forgotten the horror of that time.

Some had even told Deioden to forgive himself.

Bullshit.

How could he forgive himself?

Even now, a hundred years later, he could not forgive himself for having watched his wife’s death helplessly.

He called everyone cripple, but in truth, the greatest cripple was himself.

With madness-filled eyes, Deioden watched Zeon.

Zeon was locked in a desperate struggle, tangled among the Wolf Ants.

He dodged with Sand Walk and attacked with Sand Blaster.

It was a standardized method.

Zeon probably thought that was his best, but it was still far short of Deioden’s expectations.

“Survive on your own and prove that you have some use. Cripple!”