66 A New Threat in the Sand

Far away from any vegetation or lush forests, far away from any farms or garden, in the middle of a desert, a fairly small bird was flying at full speed. His pure and shiny white feathers were reflecting the light of the sun, creating a disturbance in the eyes of many monsters. But even after noticing that strange little bird, not even one was capable of even approaching it, because its speed was far too huge. A gigantic fowl, at least 2 meters tall without his wings opened eyed this new prey with increasing interest.

But even that king of the sky wasn't even able to begin to fly toward it before that white spark disappeared in the horizon. Staying far above the ground, the monster reluctantly had to let it go, searching for an easier target. Like the dark shadows of death, its body was blocking the light of the sun for whoever was stupid enough to look at it directly. The same routine was applied for every monstrosity the small white swallow met. A sudden interest followed by a bit of a disappointment caused by the extreme speed.

Finally, that beacon stopped on one of the few stones present inside the desert. If one could gather all of them, that person would still notice a huge quantity of rocks. But the problem was that the desert was not that small, so that huge amount meant nothing. After landing on that small mound, the bird jumped on its feet and looked everywhere else, like he was trying to see if he had any neighbors.

A minute or so later, that volatile appeared pleased and began to produce loud and weird noises. Like his bones were being fractured, his skin was inflating and its entire body was suffering terrifying torture. From the original very small form of a bird, something else was appearing, something longer, slim.

The small legs were progressively disappearing, letting place to scales. The feathers were dropping one by one, not needed anymore. The beck was long gone, and a maw filled with sharp teeth replaced it. The tongue was not a normal one either, turning more purple, and even being separated on its tip. From a small thing barely less than 50 centimeters tall, a huge snake at least 20 times its size was being formed.

"Exccccccellent!" An ominous voice managed to speak with that deformed maw, and while saying this, wiggled a bit his body. From his tail to his head, everything was responding without any issues, confirming that nothing wrong happened. Opening his mouth in an angle that could be considered impossible, two mandibles violently rammed in each other, leaving the buccal cavity. Contrarily to most snakes, the mouth of that creature didn't have two fangs for the poison, but those deadly mandibles. The rest was filled with teeth, capable of even piercing metallic armors.

Effortlessly piercing the sand without any effort, the strange snake's head plunged head-on in the underground. Provoking the less perturbations possible in it, he soon found his first prey, a huge scorpion preparing a trap. If someone dared to walk in front of it without knowing about the threat, what would await that person was a huge sting in his stomach, followed by two claws tearing about the main body.

That monster had the size of a human, or maybe a bit more. Its heavy and sturdy skeleton made it avoid death many times since its aggressor had to have the ability to pierce it. And except those pesky things flying above it, not a lot of thing was capable of threatening it. The monster was calmly resting a bit since he knew he had some times before having to actively hunt. If something came, that was good, but otherwise, it was not bothering it too much.

Whether it was his innate instincts or the ones he developed after many years of harsh battle, but the scorpion suddenly felt unsettled. Not moving at all, fearing that it will be detected, he tried to look around it. He was at the limit between the sand and the air, and with his multiples eyes all around its head, he saw nothing in front of him. His only dead angle was its back, and as the pressure increased, the arachnidan was getting more inclined to suddenly jumped at the threat and breaking its camouflage.

At the breaking point, the monster jumped in the open and turned itself to face that danger.But to its surprise, there was nothing around him, neither in front or behind him. Trying his best to make its body look above it, there was no sign of those dangerous vultures. His meager knowledge of its natural enemies denied the possibility of a worm or a snake attacking it since they were not capable of harming it. Since it was still feeling the dangerous predator near it, the scorpion had no choice but to run away.

The monster ran for a few minutes, before barging into the territory of another scorpion, an older one. Normally, they wouldn't even approach each other, except when it was time to mate, but the scorpion had his mind nearly broken. It had never felt so in danger than at this very moment, and it didn't react until the other member of its species probed it with a light attack.

Finally stopping for a moment, the two monsters were in a deadlock, one so agitated that its movements were erratic while the other was puzzled by the behavior of the other one. It could have continued for a while, but when a hole suddenly appeared under the first arachnidan, it was over in an instant.

Two sharp blades pierced the scorpion in the middle, wreaking havoc in its organs. The monster was then pulled into the sand, not letting it fight back for even a second. After that, the calm was back again, and only a slight hole in the location where the prey previously stood showed that something happened.

After living so long in the desert, not a single inhabitant was truly stupid, and the older scorpion soon realized what was the cause of the abnormal behavior of the other one. Looking left and right, he saw a small batch of stones nearby and immediately ran toward it. Normally, doing such a foolish action would only attract the giant birds lurking in the sky, awaiting an opportunity. Only the flesh creatures with strange limbs were capable of preventing that to happen.

Like the other, the monster soon felt the presence of a terrifying threat slowly turning around it, patiently waiting for an opening. Because it was on solid ground, it feared nothing about that unknown predator. In a frontal assault, nothing was able to bypass its mighty claws and even those fowls had to retreat in front of it. But the longer the scorpion waited with that increasing pressure, the more he realized that it was too dangerous.

One time, it was on the left, the next second it was behind it. All of its senses were sending mixed signals, perturbing, even more, the sturdy creature. Until finally, its adversary showed himself. "Sssss" That small sound made the scorpion turned, to face a snake he never saw before. Maybe that snake was not very long, but he was abnormally large, and not thin like the rest. Seeing the maw wide open, the monster felt that it would only take two times for its entire body to be eaten.

"Do you undersssssstand me?" The same weird noises reverberated, but the scorpion heard nothing more but some threats. Its intelligence was not developed enough to understand that the flesh creatures were humans, and the strange limbs were not some real body parts. Making its claws smacking each other, it got in a real battle stance, prepared for anything.

Seeing this, Kardel internally sneered. The only reason why he hadn't killed it was to see if they were some sentient species, and not just some dumb monsters. But apparently, they were not. As for the previous chase, why prevent a duvodiad to feel the thrill of a hunt? At the same time, he truly needed some time to digest the previous scorpion, so, he had no choice but to wait a bit before eating the second one.

Facing the unwilling monster, he used the back of his body to have his head getting higher and higher, ready to pounce on the small creature. When his mouth was two times higher than the sting of the scorpion, his opponent was having a real hard time to move its body to see him. The vision of a creature like that was not made to truly see above it because its neck was too rigid. When the eyes of the arachnidan couldn't follow anymore his head, Kardel suddenly fell on top of the scorpion.

Using his two mandibles, he easily pierced the skull of the monster, killing him in an instant. After that, he leisurely took his time to eat everything carefully, still watching for the venomous tail. He was not certain how dangerous it was, and had no intention of testing. He was far away from any help, and to be poisoned for nothing would be a shame. After getting those two kills, he was feeling a lot better.

Pondering for a moment whether he should make a ritual to absorb the form of those scorpions, he denied the idea. They were far too weak, and he had already a few forms that could accomplish the same purpose. Looking toward the sky, he saw one of those giant things circling around him, but not approaching. He was a perfect target, in the open, on a rock, so to not attack him was weird. But now, it was too late to turn into anything else with a presence like that watching him.

Sliding into the hot sand once again, he kept searching for more living things. It was then that he met a group of humans that were walking slowly in the uneven terrain, visibly on their guard. Because he had flown without any real direction except that North-East was the Synnade Empire, Kardel had no idea where he was truly located. And he couldn't just extract information from their souls like Leilade or even seduce and controlling them like Meridiana.

So, he followed that group three meters under them, hearing a little of their conversations. It was mostly silent, only some warnings about a potential threat or talking to get some supplies, like food and water. Confronted at that situation, the duvodiad was slowly losing patience and wondering if he shouldn't just kill them all. Trying to think what Leilade wanted and would not make him killed by her when she finally recovered her powers, he was getting a headache. He was not trained to think about such a thing, only tasked to kill or hunt.

But that group of humans clearly knew what they were up to. They dodged nearly everything that prepared a trap, from scorpions to snake, from sandworms of half the size of Kardel to birds that were immediately repelled by some arrows the moment they began their descent. Only right before dusk did they had to face something quite unexpected.

Using the vibrations of the ground, the duvodiad couldn't help but feel that something was weird. He was getting the same thing that he received when he encountered a scorpion, but there were a lot of other things that weren't making any sense. Because he couldn't understand how the sand could move and be displaced without being stomped on, he got away from the group of humans and only let his head leave the ground.

From afar, he could see five or so sand silhouettes fighting a scorpion, with weapons comparable to the one that the humans had. However, their defensive equipment was clearly lacking, since it was only covering the chest of those sand people. Trying to remember a thing about the djinns and how they were behaving with the humans, it soon turned useless. Because even while they were fighting the monster, some djinns were already pointing their weapons against the foreigners.