The Scorched Desert's Sand Mage (Novel) - Chapter 118

Chapter 118

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Translated by Pratt

Read it only at Novelbyu.com & Utoon.net

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The magic stone mine was the strategic facility Neo Seoul considered most important. If the supply of magic stones from the mine were to stop, every facility in Neo Seoul would immediately grind to a halt. There were also cases where magic stones were obtained from demonic beasts, but that was extremely dangerous, and not every demonic beast carried a magic stone. Even after killing dozens of demonic beasts, only one or two magic stones might come out. The efficiency was far too poor. The only place capable of supplying a large and stable amount on a regular basis was the magic stone mine. That was why Neo Seoul managed the magic stone mine with exceptional care. They sent Awakened to reduce even one danger factor by subjugating the demonic beasts living around the magic stone mine and the dungeons that appeared there unexpectedly. Given that situation, a ridiculous rumor had even spread that, aside from Neo Seoul itself, the magic stone mine was the safest place there was.

“Fuck, it’s ridiculously hot.”

A blond man with a delinquent-looking face complained with a heavy frown. The man’s name was Logan. He was an Awakened dispatched from Neo Seoul. A C-rank martial-type Awakened, and his main weapon was a large greatsword. Behind him could be seen a group of more than ten Awakened split between two buggies. They were all Awakened under Logan’s command.

“You don’t even see a single great-horned hyena today.”

“I heard a rumor that their habitat is shifting farther south.”

“Really?”

“That’s what the other teams were saying.”

The team members’ expressions turned grim. Great-horned hyenas lived and hunted in packs.

The leader of the pack was a female, much larger and stronger than the males.

She even had a mane around her neck like a lion.

From forelegs to shoulder, her height exceeded two meters, and from head to tail, her length reached a monstrous five meters.

They lived in groups numbering at least dozens, at most hundreds.

And a significant portion of them were offspring born from the leader female.

It was a matriarchal bloodline society.

Naturally, every great-horned hyena obeyed the commands of the leader female absolutely.

One by one, they were not all that strong.

But once dozens or hundreds gathered together, it was a different story.

A great-horned hyena pack could exert power dozens or hundreds of times greater under the command of the leader female.

In the past, they had mostly been found quite far from the magic stone mine, but recently one or two had been appearing even near the mine.

They were clearly some sort of scouting party.

“If scouts are showing up, that means the main force is somewhere not too far away. Before long, we might have to suffer through one hell of an ordeal.”

“Ugh. I hate the ones that move in groups, like great-horned hyenas and flame wolves. Dealing with them one by one drains you completely….”

The Awakened were already making tired faces.

Logan smirked at his subordinates.

That was because he felt exactly the same.

It was easier to deal with one strong individual than with creatures like great-horned hyenas that traveled in packs.

When one faced them one by one, one would end up covered in large and small wounds before realizing it.

And if one ever became isolated in the middle of the pack, survival could not be guaranteed.

That was why most Awakened disliked great-horned hyenas.

Logan too had once been isolated in the middle of a great-horned hyena pack and forced into a desperate struggle.

That was why he did not welcome the rumor that great-horned hyena packs were moving south.

“If a real great-horned hyena pack has moved its habitat close to the magic stone mine, then it’ll be hard to deal with them with just us. We’ll have to mobilize every Awakened dispatched to the magic stone mine.”

“Yeah, chief. There’s no reason for just us to shoulder the whole burden.”

“Pain has to be shared. Heh heh.”

At Logan’s words, his subordinates laughed.

At that moment, Logan’s face turned hard.

That was because an enormous cloud of dust had entered his field of vision.

Logan shouted, “Everyone, stop talking and prepare for battle.”

If something was kicking up that much dust, then it either meant a large group or a giant demonic beast was moving.

“Fuck. It’s not really a great-horned hyena pack, is it?”

“No way.”

Tension filled the faces of the Awakened.

They drove the buggies toward the direction where the dust cloud was rising and prepared for battle.

The closer the dust cloud came, the more the Awakened’s tension rose to its peak.

Then, at the moment the dust cloud finally came close, a voice let out a limp remark.

“What… is that?”

“What the….”

Expressions of blank astonishment appeared on their faces.

The owner of the dust cloud was a demonic beast.

It was a giant mammoth, a colossal demonic beast standing over five meters tall.

The problem was the cargo wagons trailing behind it one after another like candies on a string.

They were wagons with only wheels and no engine, each one as massive as a warehouse.

And there were dozens of such wagons attached behind the mammoth.

Without realizing it, Logan muttered, “A… caravan?”

“A caravan?”

“I’ve heard plenty about them, but… this is my first time seeing one.”

Caravans visited without warning.

They did not come regularly, so ordinary people almost never had a chance to see one.

Even among Awakened, there were not many who had actually seen a caravan in person.

Recently, caravans had stopped coming entirely.

That was why there had been no contact with other colonies.

Caravans did not merely engage in trade, they also served as messengers who conveyed news between colonies.

Since no caravans had come, it had become impossible to know the situation of the other colonies.

After years without a caravan’s arrival, people came to think that the colonies nearest Neo Seoul had all been annihilated.

Even so, it was not easy for Neo Seoul to dispatch people and confirm whether the colonies had survived.

To travel between colonies, one needed an excellent navigator, and unfortunately Neo Seoul had no such person.

And there was no real reason to pour manpower into checking whether other colonies had survived.

Even without the other colonies, Neo Seoul had no problem surviving.

Logan stared at the caravan appearing after such a long time in shock.

“A caravan. Then does that mean there’s a surviving colony?”

His voice trembled of its own accord.

The fact that there existed another fully functioning colony besides Neo Seoul in this cursed world gave him a strange sense of relief.

That he was not alone.

The fact that other human communities existed somewhere in this world filled him with a strange sense of fullness.

The caravan, having spotted Logan and the Awakened, slowly came to a stop.

Warriors who looked like Awakened appeared one after another atop the roofs of the cargo wagons.

They were wearing protective gear and clothes clearly different from the attire of Neo Seoul Colony.

Logan shouted, “I am Logan, dispatched from Neo Seoul. Let the person in charge of the caravan step forward and identify who you are and where you’ve come from.”

At that moment, a man wearing a black robe appeared atop the mammoth’s head.

The man opened his mouth.

“We are the White Bear Caravan from Akutsk Colony. Is this Neo Seoul’s territory? If so, then we’ve found the right place.”

* * *

“Zeon! Zeon!”

Brielle came crashing into the house and called for Zeon.

Zeon, who had been sitting on the sofa enjoying his leisure, only turned his head to look at Brielle.

“I’m not deaf. Call more quietly.”

“Zeon, did you hear the news?”

“What news?”

“So you haven’t heard it yet.”

“What is it that’s got you making such a fuss?”

“A caravan is coming.”

“A caravan?”

Only then did an interested expression appear on Zeon’s face.

“Yeah. A caravan entered the magic stone mine the day before yesterday. They say it’ll come into Neo Seoul this afternoon.”

“Where did you hear that information?”

“Uh, at the Goblin Market.”

“Really? Then it must be true.”

Zeon rose from his seat.

Caravans were not all that unfamiliar to him.

That was because he had encountered one in the desert seven years ago.

But most people were not like that.

People knew that other colonies existed, but since they had never come into contact with them directly, they had no way of knowing how they built, defended, and developed their cities.

When caravans stopped coming, even that fragile exchange had been cut off completely.

People thought the reason was that the colonies had been trampled by demonic beasts.

Unlike Neo Seoul, which was protected by anti-demonic force, the other colonies had to defend themselves with human strength alone, and that was an extremely difficult thing.

Because of that, they had not rebuilt modern civilization like Neo Seoul had, and their civilizations had stopped somewhere between the medieval and early modern era.

It was not strange that colonies barely enduring like that would be destroyed by demonic beast attacks.

If a caravan had really come from another colony, then it meant making contact with another civilization for the first time in years.

It was no wonder people were excited.

“This afternoon? Then if we go out now, we should be able to see it.”

“Yeah. Let’s go watch.”

“Where’s Levin?”

“He went out earlier. If a caravan comes in, he’ll show up on his own.”

“Probably.”

Zeon nodded and put on his robe.

The two went out into the street together.

Not many people seemed to know yet that the caravan had made contact at the magic stone mine, because the streets were still quiet.

Zeon and Brielle took a seat in a high place with a good view near the entrance to the slum.

As Brielle sat beside Zeon, swinging her feet, something suddenly seemed to occur to her, and she took out a piece of dried meat from her coat.

“Here, eat this. I bought it at the Goblin Market.”

“Jerky?”

“Yeah.”

Zeon accepted the jerky and put it in his mouth.

He could not tell whether it was dried rat meat or dried demonic beast meat.

But he felt no aversion to it.

After all, in the slum, the sources of edible food were almost always predictable anyway.

Of course, it would be a different story once inside Neo Seoul.

He had been chewing the jerky for quite a while when a sand-laden wind blew in.

“Ugh. This damn wind.”

Brielle grumbled while holding down her pointed hat so it would not be blown away.

Watching Brielle, Zeon thought, ‘Still, she’s brightened up a lot.’

There were still times when the aftereffects of the drugs made her eyes lose focus, but even so, compared to before, she had improved greatly.

Along with that, her personality had brightened somewhat as well.

It was a positive sign.

For better or worse, they would be staying together for the time being, so there was nothing bad about Brielle growing brighter.

It was then.

“Ah, over there.”

Brielle suddenly pointed to the middle of the desert.

Zeon’s head naturally turned toward the place she was pointing at.

There, far away, a cloud of dust could be seen rising.

To Zeon’s eyes, what was approaching while kicking up that dust cloud was a giant mammoth.

Just seeing the mammoth, whose height exceeded five meters, was intimidating enough.

The cargo wagons trailing behind it one after another called to mind an old train.

“Waaah.”

Brielle let out a cry of amazement.

“What is that?”

“A mammoth. It’s the caravan.”

“The caravan came?”

Only then did the people realize the existence of the caravan and start making noise.

A mammoth was not a demonic beast one could easily see.

At the very least, it had never been found near Neo Seoul.

The appearance of such a giant demonic beast was enough to shock people.

But what was even more astonishing were the cargo wagons strung out behind the mammoth.

From that, people realized that the mammoth was a demonic beast being used by the caravan.

“The caravan came.”

“It’s really a caravan.”

“Woooah.”

People gathered toward the entrance of the slum.

It was a spectacle they had not seen in a very long time.

The road leading into Neo Seoul quickly filled with people.

The people eagerly awaited the arrival of the mammoth-drawn caravan.

But for some reason, the mammoth stopped with Neo Seoul still several kilometers away.

“Why isn’t it coming?”

“Did something happen?”

People murmured.

Brielle was just as puzzled.

“Why did the mammoth stop moving?”

“Because of Neo Seoul’s anti-demonic force.”

“Anti-demonic force? What’s that?”

“It’s an energy that stands in direct opposition to demonic beasts. Because of it, demonic beasts dislike approaching Neo Seoul. Like that mammoth.”

“Something like that existed? I didn’t know.”

Brielle blinked her big eyes.

When the mammoth stopped, the caravan naturally stopped as well.

Instead, the one who appeared to be the caravan’s leader and a few Awakened walked toward Neo Seoul under buggy escort.

At last, they entered the slum’s main road leading into Neo Seoul.

It was a meeting with the unknown after many years.

“Waaaah!”

The cheers of the people rang loudly through the street.