"No—"
Yellow sand blotted out the sky, rolling in from the far end of the Sand Dune Plains.
The few crops left in the village were ripped up and flung away, and the blood-colored human figure was torn into several pieces, swallowed by this natural disaster.
Bang!
A stone slab was pushed aside, and a boy poked his head out.
After the disaster, the remnants of the storm still howled on, scraping across his face until it stung.
Yellow sand slapped against his face, grinding at the membranes of his eyes until they ached. The boy stood amid the remains of the storm, and all he saw was desolation. Far away, the last glow of dusk fell, yet there were no orange clouds—only a dim, oppressive gray, the color of death.
"Wind..."
"Sand..."
The boy stood silent for who knew how long. Then brilliant starlight lit up in his eyes, and in that instant, he actually saw through the true essence of the changes of wind and sand.
"Mm, mm!"
Not far away, from atop a broken wall, an earthen-yellow scepter rolled down. Hanging from it was half a dried corpse that had been baking in the sun for who knew how long, and it suddenly gave a hoarse sound.
Elder Xia...
The boy lifted his eyes and looked over. The old man was already taking in more air than he breathed out, with only a last thread of Profound Python Power inside him keeping him alive.
Even Elder Xia, the strongest in the tribe, had ended up like this. Everyone else was probably already dead, right?
"Axin..."
"Elder Xia!"
The boy hurried forward to meet him.
The half body on the broken wall still had withered intestines dangling outside, but that shriveled hand suddenly reached out and cupped his