Hadjar’s mouth opened slightly. This world kept proving that it could surprise him with its miracles, over and over. The golem opened its mouth, letting out a roar that sounded like an exploding volcano.
It struck, turning half of the enemy squad into a bloody mess in one fell swoop. In a panic, the people scattered everywhere, trying to get away, but they were caught by the living dunes that assumed the form of the same spirits Hadjar and his group had encountered. The spirits cut the people down with sand sabers. Scarlet rivers of blood drenched the golden sand.
Chapter 390
“Five... seven... twelve.” As Karissa counted the sand spirits emerging from the dunes, their faces darkened.
It wasn’t difficult to imagine what this horde of monsters could do to them. Just two sand spirits had been able to nearly end the lives of the seekers from Underworld City.
While the most cowardly of the practitioners were trying to escape and were caught by the sand sabers, some of them dared to fight against the golem. Despite its enormous physical strength and size, it didn’t radiate a strong aura. So, it wasn’t surprising that the rest of the practitioners and cultivators attacked it. However, they’d clearly chosen the wrong target.
Still waist-deep in the sands, the golem waved away the practitioners as if they were annoying insects. Their broken bodies, after flying no less than fifty five yards through the air, landed in the midst of the massacre that the spirits were committing. Their facial expressions were masks of horror and disbelief. The cultivators, upon realizing that, despite its lack of aura, the golem was still very powerful, began to use their best protective Techniques.
“Damn,” Glen swore, “how many are there? Five? ”
“Six,” Ramukhan corrected him, pointing to a Heaven Soldier hiding among the shadows.
Two cultivators who’d combined their powers created something like a pyramid above them. They were surely natives of the Sea of Sand. According to legends, once upon a time, rulers of the Pearl of the Sands had built something similar, and they’d been buried there. The top of the pyramid looked sharp and dangerous. Hadjar doubted that even Glen would’ve been able to break through such a defense without suffering any damage. The golem simply covered both the Technique and the cultivators with its palm. Neither a cry nor a groan of pain came from beneath the giant hand. When it slowly lifted its hand with a pleased hum, two scarlet spots quickly disappeared into its crumbling, sandy outline.
The sorcerers and witches who were standing behind the cultivators tried to give them orders, but the panicked fighters were no longer listening to them. They kept randomly launching their best offensive Techniques at the golem, which, grimacing, shielded itself with its forearm.
The giant’s heavy, slow movements created such powerful wind currents that the grains of sand became deadly. The practitioners who didn’t manage to run away and find their death at hands of the spirits were pulverized by the sand.
Shielding itself with its left hand, the giant clenched its right hand into a fist and struck out slowly. It had such a huge range that even the fastest of the cultivators couldn’t escape. Plunging its hand into the sand up to the elbow, the golem cackled triumphantly. It looked pretty creepy.
Behind it, the spirits were fighting the rest of the squad members, easily overwhelming them with their might. They circled the sorcerers. Several of them, sticking their staves into the sand, chanted something. Energy boiled and metal walls appeared around them, created from the air and compressed sand to serve as a frail, temporary shield. The spirits’ blows left deep cracks and cuts on their surface. However, this was enough to buy some time for the other sorcerers.
Seven people wearing hooded robes crossed their staves, their pommels angled toward the giant. They chanted something in a whistling language and almost died from their own spell. The combined power of seven witches and sorcerers was so great that its echo reached even the dune on which Hadjar and the rest lay. Raging wind currents nearly cut off the crest they were on and were stopped by a wave of Hadjar’s hand. He called forth very light, invisible blades that reflected the echo and directed it down, beneath the slope.
The attack of seven magic users working together was amazing. With a wild roar, a tornado of shimmering, white wind erupted into being. Condensing quickly, it took the shape of a huge spear that could probably harm even the giant golem.
Shooting out at a speed that Hadjar wouldn’t have been able to dodge or even block, the tornado drilled directly into the center of the golem. The attack created whirlwinds of terrifying power. This time, Einen had to erect a protective wall of shadows in front of the squad. The vortex was so strong that it created a real sandstorm. It hid the sorcerers, spirits, and golem from their sight. Everyone grabbed the hilts of their weapons. Being prepared never hurt.
“Do you think they killed it?” Glen asked.
The answer wasn’t long in coming. When the energy dissipated, the storm gradually subsided and rained down on the ground. What the squad members saw then was the best demonstration of what a dangerous place they were in.
Before them was the same deserted plain from before. There were no traces of the battle left, except for the abnormally high dune in the center. They saw no golem, no spirits, and, most horrifyingly, not a single body or drop of blood. No camels, no things left behind by the other group, no broken tents. Even the metal walls erected by the powerful spells had disappeared beneath the hungry sands.
“If you want to, you can go check things out,” Tilis grinned. “You can go and maraud, as barbarians are wont to do. Go, steal things from the dead.”
“If I’d killed them myself, I would definitely take your advice into consideration. After all, it’s the custom of the desert.”
“What are you-”
“That’s enough!” Ramukhan stopped them from bickering any further.
For a moment, silence permeated the crest of the dune. Everyone involuntarily imagined themselves in the place of the people who’d been unlucky enough to either trigger a trap or the come across a golem’s lair. None of them deludes themselves into thinking that they would’ve been able to escape. Even Sunshine Sankesh and his army wouldn’t have been able to handle such a monster, especially while it was being supported by a dozen spirits.
“I suggest we go around this place,” Einen said thoughtfully.
“Yes!”
“Of course!”
“You took the words right out of my mouth.”
Agreeing with the islander, the squad quickly moved away from the awful place. In a minute, they were already a good distance away. About half an hour and four thousands yards later, they stropped gripping their weapons tightly, but it was a full five hours later before Karissa closed her book and put the talisman she’d been holding between her fingers back into it.
“I think I know why Serra gave you that stone.” As usual, Einen emerged from the shadows.
“You figured it out too?”
All this time, Hadjar had been thoughtfully toying with the blackened ring on his finger. He had stored his few valuable belongings — little Serra’s gift, the fairy’s tears, and two imperial coins — inside it. He’d left the wallet with the bracelets on his belt. Maybe it was stupid, but to him, it was something far too precious to risk on an artifact he wasn’t sure he could rely on yet. He still hadn’t gotten used to the fact that, at just his request, things would disappear into nowhere and appear out of nowhere. It seemed far too unnatural.