Chapter 51

Chapter 51

There were people crossing the scorching desert, where not a single patch of shade could be seen.

They were riding Bactrian Camels with two humps, looking around their surroundings.

“Hah! It’s fucking hot.”

“Damn it!”

Thick beads of sweat flowed endlessly down their faces.

There were six people riding the Bactrian Camels.

Four men and two women.

Not a single one of them looked ordinary.

In reality, they were not ordinary people either.

They were a party made up entirely of Awakened.

Their official name was Pathfinder Team 7.

They had been dispatched from Neo Seoul with the mission of developing the southern frontier.

The distance from Neo Seoul to this place was well over a thousand kilometers. It was the first time they had ever been deployed this far.

There were seven Pathfinder teams that had been dispatched.

They had built a shelter one hundred kilometers from here and were searching the area.

The leader of Pathfinder Team 7 was Zahar.

As befitted a man of Russian blood, he was more than two meters tall and wore tremendous muscles over his body like armor.

He did not simply look strong on the outside.

He was a Grade C martial-type Awakened who led the team with outstanding skill and powerful leadership.

He had four team members.

Felix, a Curse Caster; Anika, a Magic Type Awakened; Darren, who had replaced both arms and both legs with machines; and Seido, a martial-type Awakened who used a sword as his main weapon.

Lastly, with Mandy, a woman dispatched from Neo Seoul as a Supervisor to receive reports on the progress of the work, there were six of them in all.

Mandy was a beautiful woman with long, wavy blond hair. With blue eyes that looked as though sapphires had been set into them and a fresh smile on top of that, she received the full attention of the men.

At that, Anika, the only female team member, glared daggers at her.

Mandy fanned herself with her hand and chattered.

“Oh, my! It’s so hot. All of you are truly amazing, working in such a harsh environment.”

“This is nothing, really. Once you enter a dungeon, this is truly nothing at all.”

Felix, the Curse Caster, answered as if he had been waiting for the chance.

The look Felix gave Mandy was lecherous.

Felix’s appearance was quite ugly. He was short, his skin was rough, and most of all, his eyes were murky. That was why women disliked him.

Mandy, on the other hand, was an extraordinary beauty any man would want to hold in his arms. It was Felix’s first time seeing such a beauty up close. That was why he circled around her like a satellite.

Zahar clicked his tongue as he watched Felix.

“Tch!”

His face was clearly displeased.

She was a Supervisor dispatched from Neo Seoul.

There was no way they would send an ordinary woman to a harsh place like this.

He did not yet know what her ability was, but she must have a blade hidden somewhere.

Most of all, there was no way a beauty like Mandy would give her heart to an ugly man like Felix. Yet Felix kept circling around her without end.

That was when Darren, the machine man, approached Zahar.

“Is it all right to leave that stunted bastard like that?”

“Leave him.”

“But......”

“He hasn’t interfered with the mission yet, so leave him alone.”

“Tch! Understood.”

“More importantly, is your body all right?”

“It’s already creaking. I can hold out for now, but it’ll be hard for long.”

“I thought so.”

Zahar furrowed his brow slightly.

Darren’s arms and legs were made of machines.

By fusing with machines, he could display powerful strength. But desert sand was the natural enemy of machines.

That was because it shortened their lifespan by wearing down their driving parts.

They had applied a special coating to prevent sand from entering, but there was no guarantee how long it would last.

This was the same reason they had chosen to ride Bactrian Camels instead of vehicles.

Vehicles and machinery could not endure long in the desert.

At least, thanks to recent rapid technological development, they had been able to advance this far, but this was the limit.

At the shelter built nearby, they were busy repairing the vehicles that had broken down on the way here. That was why they were moving on Bactrian Camels instead.

WHOOOSH!

The sand-laden wind blew again.

“This really is fucking awful.”

The sand-laden wind was humanity’s greatest enemy when it came to surviving in the desert.

If heated sand entered the respiratory tract, the airway and lungs would immediately suffer burns.

That was why it was difficult for ordinary humans to survive in the desert.

That was when it happened.

“Team Leader!”

Seido, who had been riding ahead of the group, suddenly called Zahar.

Zahar drove his Bactrian Camel over to him.

Seido had already dismounted from his Bactrian Camel and was examining the ground.

“What is it?”

“Look here. The sand melted.”

Zahar looked at the place Seido was pointing to.

Only that exact part of the sand had melted and crystallized like glass.

“What is this?”

“It’s a trace of Flame Magic.”

“Flame Magic in the middle of the desert? What are the chances another team did it?”

“None! As far as I know, no one among the Pathfinder teams dispatched here uses Flame Magic.”

Seido shook his head.

Zahar’s eyes sharpened.

Seido possessed an exceptional memory. Once he saw something, he remembered it perfectly. There was no chance his memory was wrong.

Zahar called Mandy over and showed her the traces of Flame Magic.

Mandy looked interested.

“This is certainly worth investigating.”

“Are we investigating it?”

“Our mission is to investigate every threat near the shelter. Naturally, the being who used Flame Magic is also a subject of investigation.”

“Understood. Then we’ll begin tracking.”

Zahar nodded to Seido. Seido immediately began tracking.

The group followed after him.

Zahar and Mandy drove their Bactrian Camels side by side.

Zahar asked carefully,

“What are the higher-ups thinking? Suddenly building a shelter in a remote place like this and ordering us to investigate the area? This is the first mission of its kind.”

From the moment he had first received this mission, there had been more than one or two strange points.

It was not unusual for Neo Seoul to dispatch Pathfinder teams, but sending them this far away was extremely rare.

In particular, this place had once been the sea, so human feet had almost never touched it. Because of that, they had no idea what threats or what monsters existed here.

Zahar could not understand why they had gone out of their way to send Pathfinders into such a region.

Mandy looked at Zahar for a moment, then opened her mouth.

“Do you remember what happened seven years ago?”

“Seven years ago...... You mean that mana explosion?”

“That’s right. Exactly seven years ago, a gigantic explosion occurred in the middle of a distant desert.”

The explosion had been so enormous that an ultra-powerful mana storm had struck even Neo Seoul.

Fortunately, Neo Seoul suffered no damage thanks to its defensive Magic, but the slums outside collapsed and broke apart, killing many people.

The mana storm, tremendous enough to evoke the Sixth Great Extinction, was absolutely not a natural occurrence.

Neo Seoul dispatched Pathfinder teams to determine the cause of the explosion. But the Pathfinder teams discovered nothing.

That was because the explosion had occurred outside the Pathfinders’ observation range.

Even if they wanted to approach the source of the explosion, their abilities could not reach it.

In the end, Neo Seoul gave up on trying to determine the cause of the mana storm.

Seven years passed after that.

Mandy continued.

“After that incident, the desert ecosystem changed completely.”

“Mm!”

“As the monsters began a great migration, all the data accumulated until then became useless.”

When one Grade A monster moved, the aftermath reached even Grade B and Grade C monsters. That caused a chain migration, greatly changing the ecosystem.

Neo Seoul had identified every monster and dungeon nearby, but because of the incident seven years ago, all the data they had struggled to accumulate until then became useless.

Because of that, Neo Seoul had no choice but to send countless Awakened outside to obtain new data.

In that process, monsters that had never been seen before, unknown dungeons, and labyrinths were discovered.

It took no less than seven years to stabilize them.

“Recently, monsters coming up from the south have been spotted. They’re new types of monsters that don’t exist in our data.”

“Then perhaps?”

“Yes! The higher-ups suspect that a boss-level monster may have appeared. That may be what caused the chain migration.”

“Surely they’re not telling just us to stop a Grade A monster?”

“Of course not. Our mission is to find out whether such a monster really exists.”

A monster at the level of Grade A or boss level was bound to possess a special Skill.

To subjugate such monsters, detailed information had to be obtained in advance.

“To reduce damage, we need to gather information as quickly as possible and get out.”

“Exactly.”

“Hmm!”

Zahar stroked his chin with his large hand.

He understood why they had been dispatched all the way to this faraway place. Even so, a strangely uncomfortable feeling remained.

Mandy looked at her reddened forearm and said,

“Now, let’s hurry up, get the information, and go back to the shelter. Desert sand and sun are enemies of the skin. Look how damaged it already is. How upsetting!”

“Is a little skin damage really the issue when we’re trying to gather information on a Grade A monster?”

Anika, who had been waiting for a chance, cut in. But Mandy replied calmly, without showing the slightest sign of fluster.

“Of course it is. For a woman, skin is life. Anika, you should pay a little attention to your skin too. If you wander around the desert without taking any measures like that, one day rapid aging will hit you. Don’t regret it then......”

“What? You little......”

Anika flared up at Mandy’s venomous words and tried to use her hand. But Zahar stopped her attempt.

“Enough! Now is not the time for us to fight among ourselves.”

“But that bitch started it first, didn’t she?”

“Do not forget that she is the Supervisor.”

“What’s so special about some damn Supervisor?”

Anika’s face twisted fiercely. But before Zahar’s cold expression, she could not flare up any further.

In the end, she quietly turned her head and avoided Zahar’s eyes.

Mandy watched the sight with a faint smile.

That was when it happened.

“Team Leader!”

Seido called Zahar.

“What is it?”

“It seems the situation is turning serious.”

“What do you mean?”

“This is our equipment.”

Where Seido pointed, a breastplate, a shield, and other items lay scattered.

Though half-buried in sand, they were clearly equipment mainly used by Neo Seoul’s Awakened.

Zahar’s face stiffened.

“Are you sure it’s our side’s equipment?”

“It definitely belongs to the people from Team 2. I remember it clearly.”

At Seido’s words, all of Team 7 grew tense.

Team 2 was a group they knew as well.

Their strength was absolutely not beneath Team 7’s.

If people like that had been defeated, then they were in danger too.

“Who did this to them?”

“Why don’t we see any corpses?”

No matter how much they looked around, they could not see the corpses of Team 2’s members.

Just in case, they dug through the nearby sand, but there was nothing.

“Then were they abducted?”

“A monster abducts people? Then does that mean it has intelligence?”

The faces of Team 7’s members were clearly bewildered.

“Can you tell who attacked Team 2 and abducted them?”

“The sand has covered everything, so I can’t tell.”

“Can you track them?”

“I’ll try.”

“Hurry.”

“Yes!”

Seido began tracking again.

They crossed more than ten enormous sand dunes.

By the time the continued tracking had made all of Team 7 slightly tired, Seido, who was ahead, said,

“I found them.”

“You did?”

Zahar brightened and went to Seido’s side.

But Seido’s expression was strange.

His pupils were widened greatly, as if he had seen something he should not have.

“What is it?”

“That’s......”

Zahar’s gaze turned toward the place Seido was looking at.

At that instant, Zahar’s expression became similar to Seido’s.

What they saw was a huge village.

A vast village large enough for well over a thousand people to stay.

“A...... Goblin settlement?”

There was only one kind of monster that lived in the desert while forming such a huge settlement.

They were Goblins, lower-ranked monsters.

Indeed, Goblin corpses could be seen all over the village.

The Goblin settlement had been thoroughly destroyed. But most of the destroyed houses had been buried beneath an enormous amount of sand.

The Goblin corpses were the same.

“What is this? Did a sandstorm pass through?”