Episode 11
“Nice!”
Jeon thought as he chewed on the jerky.
It was Great Horned Hyena jerky.
It was a desert where moisture was practically nowhere to be found.
The chunks of meat wrapped in cloth had all their moisture sucked out and shriveled.
They had become jerky fit for eating.
The slight rancid smell was a flaw, but he could endure it enough to eat.
What mattered was that he no longer had to starve.
The jerky was plentiful, and whenever hunger struck, Jeon chewed on it bit by bit.
He couldn’t eat to his heart’s content, but even this much was enough to obtain the nutrients necessary for growth.
The only disappointment was drinking water.
With only the morning dew to sustain him, he couldn’t help but constantly suffer from thirst.
At first, going the whole day without water had been agonizing.
But as time went by, he gradually mastered ways to conserve moisture.
He held it in as much as possible and didn’t open his mouth.
Loath to lose even the moisture expelled through sweat, he restrained his upper body movements to the extreme even when using Sand Steps.
Later, he even reduced the movement of his legs to a minimum.
Because of that, from a distance, it looked as if he were standing still while the sand carried him of its own accord.
Eventually, it got to the point where Deiodeun grumbled.
“You dumb bastard’s picked up quite a useful skill. Here I am walking myself to the bone, while you’re strolling through the desert in comfort.”
In the desert, Jeon’s ability was absolute.
Though his rank was low having Awakened not too long ago, if he continued to unlock his potential one by one like this, he would come to wield absolute might in the desert.
Deiodeun stepped forward, thinking how unfair the world was.
Without knowing that Jeon was looking at him and thinking the very same thing.
Jeon lifted his head and gazed into the air.
‘Moisture? Is there a water source nearby?’
Minuscule though it was, he felt moisture in the air.
Had it been the old him, he never would have noticed.
But after Awakening and following Deiodeun, his senses had grown extremely keen.
His razor-sharp senses didn’t miss the minute humidity of the desert.
Jeon gazed at Deiodeun.
Whether by chance or not, Deiodeun was heading toward where the moisture felt strongest.
Jeon gave a bitter smile.
‘It can’t be a coincidence. There’s no way that monster wouldn’t notice what even I picked up on…’
Deiodeun was not enough to be called merely a monster.
Deiodeun’s strength transcended imagination to the point where one would doubt if he was even the same kind of human.
It occurred to him that perhaps even the abilities Deiodeun had shown until now might be just the tip of the iceberg.
‘I really want to know the extent of that human’s limits.’
He felt that Deiodeun’s limits would likely be the limits of the race called human.
Shortly after, a large sand dune appeared.
The sand on the dune was swept away like waves by the blowing wind.
‘A dune made recently.’
The desert seems eternally unchanging, but in reality, it moves endlessly and changes every moment.
Dunes that existed until yesterday sometimes disappear in an instant, and new dunes are sometimes formed.
Perhaps because he had Awakened as a Sand Sorcerer, Jeon could tell various things just by looking at the sand’s outward appearance.
After strenuously crossing the massive sand dune, an amazing sight unfolded.
A massive pond brimming with water had appeared.
It was unmistakably an oasis.
“Ah!”
Jeon let out an exclamation.
Thinking he could drink his fill of water, he ran toward the oasis without care for what lay before or behind.
He had held his thirst in check until now, but seeing the sight full of water, he lost control.
“Tsk!”
Deiodeun made a pitiful expression watching Jeon rashly dash toward the oasis.
Jeon arrived at the oasis in an instant.
He buried his head in the water and drank like crazy.
The water flooding in and filling his mouth made him happy.
As he drank mindlessly, something with a faint light was visible to his eyes.
Deep in the water, a sphere glowing softly like a lantern.
Jeon forgot that he had his head buried in the water and gazed at the lantern-like sphere.
Jeon stared blankly as the lantern drew closer.
His eyes had lost their focus as if bewitched.
It was when the lantern had finally drawn near his face.
“Get a hold of yourself, you crazy bastard!”
With a curse, Deiodeun grabbed him by the back of his neck and pulled.
Unable to resist Deiodeun’s strength, Jeon rolled backward as is.
It was at that moment.
*Splash!*
Something enormous burst through the water and shot upward.
A gigantic body that seemed capable of devouring even a Great Horned Hyena in one gulp, and a massive mouth that occupied more than half of it.
And on the antenna-like spine attached to its forehead, there was a round, massive lump of flesh.
What Jeon had mistaken for a lantern was precisely that round lump of flesh.
A faint light hovered over the lump of flesh.
Deiodeun spoke.
“It’s a Sand Angler. It tempts prey with the lantern on its forehead and snatches them up.”
“Ah!”
Jeon, having barely escaped with his life by a hair’s breadth, gazed at the Sand Angler falling back into the water with a dazed expression.
Had Deiodeun not saved him, he would have been swallowed whole.
Deiodeun took out his Keureion and said.
“Bastards like you who get cocky after adapting a bit are the ones who die early. Got that? You dumb fuck!”
“…….”
“Answer!”
“Yes!”
Deiodeun wasn’t listening to Jeon’s answer.
His body had already shot out over the water’s surface.
He swung his Keureion toward the Sand Angler trying to submerge below the water surface.
*BOOM!*
When Keureion detonated, a column of water shot up as though a bomb had gone off.
Feeling fear, the Sand Angler tried to escape into the deep water.
But Deiodeun didn’t let it get away.
“HAAH!”
Deiodeun advanced into the water with his Keureion leading.
*SWOOSH!*
Deiodeun surged forward at a terrifying speed like a torpedo.
In that instant, the Sand Angler, giving up on escape, turned its body to devour Deiodeun.
But that was the Sand Angler’s mistake.
*THWACK!*
Deiodeun and his Keureion had penetrated straight through the Sand Angler.
The massive Sand Angler died and floated up to the water’s surface.
Deiodeun grabbed that Sand Angler’s tail and walked out of the oasis.
*THUD!*
Deiodeun threw the Sand Angler’s gigantic body at Jeon’s feet.
“Hup!”
Jeon recoiled in surprise.
Because it seemed the Sand Angler might attack him at any moment.
Even dead, the Sand Angler’s imposing presence did not disappear.
He couldn’t believe that such a massive creature had been living in the oasis.
Deiodeun sheathed his Keureion and spoke.
“Think of it this way—every oasis occasionally found in the desert is home to one of these. It lures dimwits like you with its lantern and devours them in one bite. So don’t you dare recklessly dunk your head in just because you see an oasis in the desert, you empty-headed little shit!”
“Yes!”
Having committed an offense, Jeon answered weakly.
“Skin it.”
“Huh?”
“Are you deaf? I said skin it. The Sand Angler is a C-grade demonic beast. Its belly leather is soft and highly elastic, so if you make a robe with it, it’ll display the best performance. So cut it up and make a robe.”
“Do you perhaps need a robe?”
“Not for me, yours, you dumb bastard! How the hell are you getting stupider by the day? It’s not like you’ve got petrification magic on your skull.”
“Ah!”
Only then understanding what Deiodeun meant, Jeon hurriedly flipped the Sand Angler over.
The back was dark brown with countless bumpy protrusions, but the belly leather was black and smooth.
But it was so tough that the dagger hardly penetrated.
Eventually, Jeon managed to cut out the belly leather by infusing his dagger with mana.
“Hah! Hah!”
Having finally cut out all the belly leather, Jeon’s whole body was soaked in sweat.
But the work was not yet done.
He had to make it into the shape of a robe.
There was no needle to speak of.
Even if there had been, it couldn’t possibly penetrate the belly leather of a massive demonic beast like the Sand Angler.
Jeon, having pondered for a while, took out one of the Sand Angler’s bones and honed it into the shape of a needle.
For thread, he thinly sliced the Sand Angler’s dorsal shell and used that instead.
Fortunately, Jeon was quite good with his hands.
It was his first time making a robe, but after struggling and straining for half a day, he was able to make something roughly similar.
While Jeon was making the robe, Deiodeun dismantled the Sand Angler’s corpse.
There wasn’t a single part of the Sand Angler’s meat that needed to be thrown away.
The toxicity usually present in demonic beast meat was almost nonexistent, and the flavor was rather good as well.
The best part of all was the gallbladder currently in Deiodeun’s hand.
He tossed Jeon the torso-sized gallbladder.
“Eat it!”
“Huh? You mean eat it raw?”
Jeon made a dumbfounded expression.
“Yeah! It’s the best damn thing for a weakling like you. So eat all of it without leaving a single piece.”
“…….”
“If you don’t eat it, you’ll die at my hands.”
“I’ll eat it. I’ll eat it, I said.”
Jeon knew that Deiodeun always meant business.
With his face scrunched up deeply, he ripped into the Sand Angler’s gallbladder.
As if to prove it was indeed a gallbladder, it was terribly bitter.
‘Damn it!’
Jeon made all sorts of faces.
The saving grace was that he didn’t need to chew the gallbladder into small pieces.
When he bit off a piece and put it in his mouth, it melted and went down his esophagus.
And he didn’t feel any sense of fullness either.
Even after devouring the entire torso-sized gallbladder, Jeon’s stomach was as flat as before.
“Amazing! Keuk!”
Jeon, who had been muttering, suddenly scrunched up his face.
Because a tremendous heat was suddenly felt in his belly.
“Gaaah!”
Jeon collapsed and writhed on the floor from the immense pain he couldn’t have imagined.
“Hmph!”
Deiodeun paid him no heed and cut up the Sand Angler’s meat.
*Fwoosh!*
Flames erupted from his hands and instantly cooked the meat thoroughly.
Deiodeun chewed on the well-cooked Sand Angler meat as he gazed at the oasis.
“This too will disappear soon.”
Desert oases are like mirages.
They appear suddenly one day and then vanish.
They don’t disappear completely but move to random places by riding the desert’s flow.
Humans cannot predict this change.
Though the Sand Angler, master of the oasis, is dead, another Sand Angler will appear.
Sand Anglers always lay eggs in the oasis they live in.
When the ruler of the oasis dies, a baby Sand Angler hatches from the egg on its own.
In this way, the cycle of life is absolutely unbroken.
However, to grow as large as the Sand Angler Deiodeun had caught now, one would have to wait at least over a hundred years.
“Gaaah!”
Even now, beside him, Jeon was shrieking and rolling across the ground.
Deiodeun muttered with a look of pity.
“Stupid bastard!”
***
It was the next morning when Jeon regained consciousness.
“Huh?”
Jeon was shocked when he opened his eyes.
This was because vitality he had never felt before was surging through his entire body.
Not only that.
Muscles were packed all over his body.
They weren’t muscles swollen like balloons.
Jeon’s original body type had been rather skinny.
Yet his whole skinny body had been transformed into muscle.
Each individual muscle fiber was distinct and tough, as if steel wires had been woven together.
Jeon was too surprised at his change to speak.
Looking to the side, he saw Deiodeun sitting and eating the Sand Angler meat.
Jeon asked.
“What happened to me?”
“Seems your body took the medicinal effects well.”
“Then the Sand Angler’s gallbladder is medicine?”
“It’s a precious medicine you won’t find twice under heaven. There’s nothing better for reinforcing the bones and muscles.”
“Thank you. For giving me something so precious.”
“Hmph! What can I do when I’m dragging around a weakling like you? Eat this and prepare to leave.”
Deiodeun tossed a chunk of meat to Jeon.
Jeon first put on the robe he had made yesterday.
The moment he donned the robe, a cool chill was felt.
The Sand Angler leather perfectly blocked the desert heat and radiated cold energy.
“Ah!”
Astonished by the efficacy he had never imagined, Jeon let out an exclamation.
Deiodeun spoke.
“We will stay here for the time being and eat Sand Angler meat.”
“You mean all of it?”
“Meat with this level of nutrition is hard to find in the desert. So we must eat every last bit.”
“Understood.”
Jeon nodded.
Now he felt he could believe Deiodeun even if he lied that bean trees grew in the desert.
Jeon ate the Sand Angler together with Deiodeun.
It took merely four days for the giant Sand Angler to vanish, leaving only bones behind.
They truly ate everything without leaving a single thing behind, leaving only bones.
At that very moment, the oasis disappeared as if it were a lie.
The two left the oasis without lingering attachment.