Chapter 788: Desert [GT Ranking Bonus Chapter]
Arianna Haelight opened her eyes to what appeared to be a scorching desert, which seemed to be an endless plain of golden-brown sand stretching beyond the horizon. The heat from the sun was harsh, far too harsh, and around her were sand dunes that rose to the height of hills, their slopes shifting slightly beneath the endless pressure of the desert wind.
Her amber-gold eyes traced everything around her, but all she heard was the howling of the wind and nothing else. After a moment of silence, she decided to look at her bracelet. Within a few quick seconds, she was done with that and began to move. For now, she would run around aimlessly, but if she found a cave or anything of the sort, she would enter it, after all, she was here to gather points.
So, if the Monsters wouldn’t come to her, she would simply go to them.
With that, the sand underneath her feet burst backwards as she shot forward like a thunderbolt, her speed climbing with each passing second as her amber-gold eyes searched for anything and everything. As she moved, she immediately felt vibrations coming from beneath the ground. It was subtle, but she could sense them as clearly as day, almost as though something was stalking her from beneath the sea of sand.
But she didn’t react, she simply kept moving as whatever was beneath the sand matched her speed. But of course, this wasn’t her top speed, merely a fraction of it that any speed-type Monster could match with ease. After all, if she moved at her maximum speed, how was she supposed to find anything to fight?
She hadn’t even been here for up to two minutes, but the attacks had already started. But it seemed things were beginning with weaker Monsters.
As though on cue, two unknown Monsters immediately burst out from the sand as they snarled at Arianna, moving to devour her and rip her to shreds. Arianna’s knees bent slightly as she immediately leaped into the air, dodging both pincer attacks with ease. The moment she dodged, her amber-gold eyes immediately moved to assess what she was facing.
They were sand worms. They possessed no eyes, instead relying on senses capable of detecting vibrations and sounds from above. It was through this ability that they had sensed Arianna, followed her movements, and attacked with pinpoint accuracy despite being blind. Their bodies were massive, thick enough that a single one could easily swallow several people whole in a single bite.
As Arianna dodged, both Monsters slammed headfirst into one another. However, they immediately brushed it off as though both sides understood that this happened often whenever their prey managed to evade them.
Arianna landed on another section of the desert with a deft touch, but the moment she did, a massive mouth filled with countless teeth snapped upwards from beneath her feet as a third sand worm aimed to swallow and consume her whole where she stood.
But Arianna had already dodged with remarkable ease and speed, as she had sensed the Monster before it even burst out from underneath the sand. Just as they could sense her movements above ground, she too could sense their movements below it.
But Arianna didn’t merely dodge, she attacked. Her hands immediately moved to her sides as she unsheathed two black short swords. She was a dual wielder, and this weapon was her specialty, a fighting style she had practiced for years until every motion felt completely natural.
Her left hand blurred across the air, her short sword making contact with the third sand worm she had just evaded. And like scissors through silk, her blade sliced it into two with zero resistance and minimal effort.
The two halves of the worm immediately crashed onto the ground with a thunderous boom, throwing up a massive wall of sand as their bodies were simply too enormous. But the sand never touched Arianna, as she was already on the move, her eyes locked onto her next target.
In a blur, she appeared before her second target, she stabbed her short sword into the back of the sand worm, which immediately screamed in agony. But Arianna didn’t let up, she instantly ran up its back, and as she moved, she dragged her short sword across its body, splitting the Monster open as blood and organs burst outward in all directions.
The third sand worm immediately roared before instantly shooting back into the ground in an attempt to escape, but Arianna neither chased nor hesitated. Instead, she simply threw her second short sword with casual ease.
The air barrier immediately shattered with a booming sound as her short sword pierced through the last sand worm’s head, slicing it open effortlessly.
Arianna didn’t move to retrieve her weapon, she simply willed it, and the short sword immediately returned to her hand.
Her short swords weren’t Soul-Bound Weapons. No, they were merely normal short swords that possessed the ability to return to their owner. They weren’t indestructible or anything similar to a Soul-Bound Weapon. Rather, they were weapons gifted to her by her father, Azazel, specifically crafted for her preferred fighting style.
As Arianna raised her hand to check her bracelet after hearing it beep, six more Monsters shot upwards from the desert sand. But this time, they weren’t sand worms. It seemed the sand worms weren’t the only creatures that thrived within this environment.
She wasn’t surprised, she had sensed them earlier, her eyes simply locked onto her new source of points. They were desert centipedes, their lengths more or less matching those of the sand worms, unlike the sand worms, however, they possessed eyes and could see perfectly well. Their segmented bodies glistened beneath the sunlight, while their countless legs moved with unsettling synchronization.
The moment they appeared, they immediately manipulated the sand from all six directions as they moved to bury Arianna where she stood.
Arianna watched as what appeared to be a tsunami of sand closed in from all sides. Her face remained as calm and expressionless as ever. If there was no path forward, she would simply forcefully create one. It was that simple. Such obstacles were nothing more than inconveniences to her.
She raised her left hand, which held one of her short swords, and without a shred of hesitation, she slashed across the air. Her motion was graceful and perfect in every sense of the word, as there was simply no wasted movement. With that single slash, the sand tsunami that had sought to swallow her whole immediately split in half before collapsing as though it could no longer maintain its form.
Her eyes fell upon the centipedes that had been waiting for her to be crushed beneath the sand. Arianna moved once more, this time her right hand moving as she slashed into the air in another smooth motion. But the moment she did, that singular slashing motion multiplied into six separate attacks. Before the six centipedes could even so much as twitch, they were all split into perfectly equal halves through their midsections, their severed bodies collapsing onto the sand in opposite directions.
And with that, the peace and silence of the desert returned, at least for now. The only thing left behind was the smell of blood and the remains of the Monsters scattered across the golden sands.
She gazed at her bracelet as she saw her nine hundred (900) point balance. Her amber-gold eyes landed on the people ranked above her. She wasn’t particularly familiar with any of them, but she remembered Asher.
Seeing his name in second place didn’t surprise her in the slightest. After all, her father practically praised the Wargraves every day within their house.
She dismissed the ranking panel and continued her journey across the endless desert, her figure quickly disappearing into the sea of sand as she searched for her next source of points.
