The Scorched Desert's Sand Mage (Novel) - Chapter 2

Chapter 2

===================

Translated by Pratt

Read it only at Novelbyu.com & Utoon.net

===================

Craaack!

Under the impact of that immense mass, the bus, layered thick with heavy armor plating, crumpled like paper.

“Khng!”

“Urk!”

People screamed as they were flung around inside the bus.

Since no one had even bothered with seat belts, they bounced all over the place like game stones.

The same went for Zeon.

“Ghk!”

After tumbling around in a daze, Zeon finally managed to get his bearings and stand.

Blood was running from his split forehead, but he did not even have the leisure to wipe it away.

Because of the unbelievable sight outside the window.

Ssssss!

Everything he could see was red sand.

The massive armored bus had been swallowed whole by the sand desert.

“Goddammit! The sandworm is dragging the bus under the sand.”

“We’re all going to die.”

“Fuck! Is there no Awakened here?”

The bus fell into utter chaos.

Rumble, rumble, rumble!

Even at that very moment, the bus’s armor was peeling away like scraps of cloth.

If just a little more time passed, all the armor would be torn away, and the people inside would become the sandworm’s food.

They might even suffocate in the sand before then. That might have been the less painful way to die.

That was when it happened.

“You filthy worm bastard…”

One of the miners shouted and swung his hand toward the window.

Swoooosh!

At that instant, a blade of wind rose from the miner’s hand and flew outside.

Zeon’s eyes widened.

‘An Awakened.’

Judging from the blade wind, he was definitely a magic-type Awakened.

But its power was pathetic.

Thunk!

The blade wind failed to pierce through the sand pressing down on the bus and dissipated.

It did not damage the sandworm’s main body at all.

Disappointment appeared on the faces of those who had briefly felt hope.

“It’s only F-rank.”

“Goddammit! Of course it is. Why would a real Awakened come mine magic stones?”

Even among Awakened, the gap in ability was as wide as heaven and earth depending on rank.

F-ranks were like pebbles lying at the very bottom of the Awakened ecosystem.

They were far stronger than ordinary people, but no match for a giant demonic beast like a sandworm.

No matter what reason had put him on a bus bound for the magic stone mine, his blade wind could not injure the sandworm.

More than anything, the affinity was bad.

It was impossible for blade wind to break through the sand wrapped around the sandworm’s body.

“Die! Just die!”

The Awakened lost his reason and kept throwing blade winds. But they could not pierce the sand, and he only exhausted his mana instead.

That was when it happened.

The armor where the Awakened stood was torn away completely, and suddenly a huge tongue appeared.

It was the sandworm’s tongue.

Like a whip, it snatched up the Awakened and vanished into the sand in an instant.

“Aaaagh!”

The Awakened’s scream came through the sand.

The scream soon vanished, but no one needed to see with their own eyes what had happened to him.

“We’re all going to die. We’re going to die.”

“What do we do?”

“Sob…”

Sand poured into the bus like a tidal wave. Then someone disappeared again.

“Tch!”

Zeon bit his lip hard.

Blood flowed, but he did not even have the room to feel the pain.

The sand had already reached his waist.

Would he suffocate in the sand, or be eaten by the sandworm?

He wanted neither.

The mind that usually spun so quickly had frozen like it had been struck by petrification magic, and he could think of nothing.

Bang!

At that moment, a tremendous shock hit, and the bus split in two.

“Aagh!”

“Ugh!”

Many of the passengers vanished into the sand.

“Fuck!”

Zeon cursed and looked around.

The sand had already reached his shoulders, so he could not even make out the people nearby.

Zeon made his decision.

‘If I stay like this, I’ll die.’

Riiip!

He hurriedly tore his clothes to make a long strip of cloth. Then he tightly wrapped that cloth around his eyes, nose, ears, and mouth.

It was an emergency measure to keep out the sand.

The moment his preparations were complete, Zeon hurled himself straight into the sand.

‘Hk!’

The desert sand pressed down on him with a crushing force, like seawater in the deepest abyss.

He could barely move even a hand or foot, much less breathe.

Zeon did not resist the pressure and instead entrusted his body to the sand.

Crunch!

The faint sound of metal crumpling reached him.

It was the armored bus’s final scream.

He did not need to see with his own eyes what end had befallen the people inside.

Ssssss!

The sand was churning like waves.

Something enormous was swimming through the sand and closing in.

Its movement felt strangely clear to him.

‘It’s coming.’

Zeon flailed his limbs, trying to move away from where he was. But escaping the immense pressure of the sand pressing on his whole body was impossible.

Even then, the sandworm kept drawing closer.

‘I don’t want to die. I still can’t die.’

His heart pounded.

It felt as if his heart would burst before the sandworm could eat him.

He could feel the blood racing wildly through his body.

That torrent of blood rushed toward his head like a runaway train.

Boom!

At that instant, something exploded inside Zeon’s head.

It was an explosion only Zeon could feel.

At the same time, seven lines appeared on his wrist.

The bottom of the lines, etched like a tattoo, was dyed orange.

His eyes were covered by cloth, so Zeon could not see the sight. But instinctively, he understood what had happened to him.

‘Awakening.’

The Awakening that came like a blessing to only a tiny few had clearly come to him as well.

He still did not know what level his ability was.

Because he had not been able to check the insignia that had appeared on his wrist.

The seven lines that appeared on an Awakened person’s wrist looked just like military stripes.

The difference from ordinary insignia was that there were seven lines. That was why people called the mark of the Awakened an insignia.

The moment he Awakened, breathing became easy, and the crushing pressure bearing down on his body disappeared.

The sand that had been crushing him now felt as comfortable as amniotic fluid in a mother’s womb.

No one had taught him, but Zeon understood that his power had something to do with sand.

Zeon hurriedly swept out his hand. Then his body, which had been unable to move until now, slid forward.

Splash!

An unbelievably huge mouth appeared where he had just been.

It was the sandworm’s maw, lined with countless teeth spinning like saw blades. He could see that the teeth were stained red.

It was the blood of the victims it had just devoured.

Kwoooaah!

The sandworm’s maw swallowed the spot where Zeon had been only moments earlier.

If he had been even slightly slower in dodging, Zeon too would have become a lump of flesh and been digested in the sandworm’s belly, just like the other victims.

‘Crazy…’

Goosebumps rose all over his body.

Thanks to Awakening by sheer luck, he had managed to evade the sandworm’s attack, but that did not solve the underlying problem.

It was impossible for a power he had only just Awakened to kill a desert tyrant like a sandworm.

He had just seen an F-rank Awakened become the sandworm’s prey.

‘Right now, the priority is to use my ability to escape the sand.’

Zeon thrust both hands forward.

At once, his body wriggled like a fish and swam through the sand.

Tens of millions, hundreds of millions of grains of sand seemed to push Zeon’s body of their own accord.

At high speed, Zeon cut through the sand and headed for the surface.

Then he felt a strong vibration behind him.

The sandworm was chasing him.

Zeon was moving fast, but the sandworm was even faster.

At this rate, it would definitely catch up with him soon.

‘Goddammit, besides swimming through sand, is there any other ability?’

Desperately, Zeon thought about what he could do.

That was when it happened.

A chill ran up his back.

The sandworm had come very close.

He could feel it opening its mouth wide.

Suddenly, he thought how nice it would be to shove a heap of sand into the sandworm’s mouth after it had swallowed so many people.

At that moment, the flow of sand around Zeon’s body changed strangely.

Part of the sand gathered in front of him and compressed.

Looking at the tightly compressed sand, Zeon murmured.

‘Sand Blaster.’

No one had taught him that.

The name had simply come to him.

Most skills were like that.

As if they had been engraved in his head from the start, they came to mind once the conditions for accessing them were met.

Psshk!

In an instant, the compressed sand shot out like a jet of water.

The stream of sand, fired under immense pressure, drove straight into the sandworm’s mouth.

Sand Blaster punched a small hole into the roof of the sandworm’s mouth.

From the outside, it might have looked like a trivial wound, but Sand Blaster had shredded the inside of the sandworm’s palate like a rag.

Feeling such terrible pain for the first time in its life, the sandworm let out a shriek.

Kwoooar!

As the gigantic sandworm writhed, the sand all around them heaved like there had been an earthquake.

Zeon used that opening to increase his speed.

Thanks to that, he managed to leave the sandworm far behind and burst out onto the sand’s surface.

“Puhah!”

Zeon exhaled the breath he had been holding all this time.

As fresh air entered his lungs, he felt like he could live again.

That was when it happened.

“A survivor. There’s a survivor over there.”

“It really was a sandworm. Everyone, get ready.”

Suddenly, he heard people’s voices.

Zeon lifted his head and saw a small car.

The small vehicle, layered in armor plating, had large wheels suited to moving through the desert.

Even so, if a sandworm attacked it, it would be dragged into the sand in an instant. Yet the people in the car showed no sign of fear.

Men with an unusual air stepped out of the car and approached Zeon.

‘They’re Awakened.’

Zeon recognized at a glance that they were Awakened.

The fact that they could walk so boldly across the desert despite knowing a sandworm was there meant they were that confident in their own strength.

That was when it happened.

Kuuuuh!

The gigantic sandworm that had chased Zeon through the sand revealed itself.

A middle-aged man who looked to be the leader shouted.

“Hold it so the thing can’t flee back under the sand.”

“Okay, boss.”

The blue-haired woman, whose hair reminded one of a clear sky, answered brightly and stretched her hand toward the sandworm.

At once, cold air spread rapidly, and the sand where the sandworm had emerged froze. Because of that, the sandworm could not dive back under the sand and struggled for a moment.

The blue-haired woman said, “It’s too big. I can only hold it for a few seconds.”

“That’s more than enough.”

The leader smiled coldly.

He drew a huge greatsword, a claymore, and ran at the sandworm. His subordinates followed behind him.

“Haaat!”

The claymore fell toward the sandworm’s body like a guillotine.

Slash!

The sandworm’s tough hide tore apart like paper, exposing raw red flesh.

The sandworm writhed in pain.

Then one of the leader’s subordinates approached and placed his palm against the sandworm’s body.

“A sandworm that has come up onto the surface. That’s truly rare.”

It was extremely uncommon for a sandworm to rise above the sand. That was why they were so hard to hunt.

Buzzz!

The man’s palm vibrated at a speed too fast for the eye to follow.

His name was Aiden, and his Awakened ability was super vibration.

Boom!

The part of the sandworm’s body touched by his palm exploded like fireworks.

The finishing blow came from the giant who arrived last.

The giant, who stood two heads taller than an ordinary man, leaped into the air and came crashing down toward the sandworm’s head.

Boom!

With a thunderous blast, the sandworm’s head burst apart.

“Heh heh!”

Covered in the sandworm’s blood and flesh, the giant let out a laugh.

Zeon’s mouth fell open at the sight.

‘These crazy bastards!’

The sandworm that had devoured so many people had been reduced to a lump of meat in only a few seconds.

It was the kind of scene he would never have believed if he had not seen it with his own eyes.

Shing!

The leader slid the claymore back into its sheath and looked at Zeon.

At that instant, a chill ran down Zeon’s spine.

It was because the leader’s cold, sunken gaze was frightening.

“Then out of everyone who was on the bus, you’re the only one who survived?”