The blazing sun was a furnace, roasting the rolling golden dunes.
Xiao Yan led his slightly weary camel onward. Fine beads of sweat seeped from his forehead and slid down his cheeks, gathering into droplets at the tip of his chin before the dry, hot wind instantly evaporated them. Gazing at the boundless sea of sand ahead, he swallowed the dryness in his mouth and cursed under his breath. "This damned place could bake a man into jerky."
The camel snorted impatiently. Its hooves slipped on the sand, leaving shallow prints that were promptly buried beneath windblown sand.
"Stop complaining. The Tagor Desert has always been like this." Yao Lao's voice rang out in his mind, carrying a hint of laziness. "When I accompanied your master here back then, it was far more dangerous."
Xiao Yan curled his lips and deliberately slowed his steps, making his movements appear clumsy, as though even walking across the sand took tremendous effort. His coarse clothes were already soaked with sweat, clinging to his back and outlining his less-than-muscular frame—exactly the appearance he carefully maintained as someone at the "third stage of Dou Qi."
"Dangerous? It's already deadly enough, if you ask me." Panting, he poured barely half a mouthful of water from the waterskin at his waist, took a cautious sip, then hurriedly tucked it away again. "If I'd known the desert would be this miserable, I should've brought a few more skins of water."
Yao Lao chuckled. "Relax. With your luck, you might stumble across a pool after just a few steps."
The words sounded like teasing, but Xiao Yan inwardly stiffened. He knew that although Yao Lao remained unaware of his true strength, he had vaguely noticed that Xiao Yan always managed to find a way out of desperate situations. This "luck" was precisely the disguise he needed to keep reinforcing.
Just then, a sudden clatter of hooves came from behind a distant dune, accompanied by several rough shouts. Xiao Yan's gaze sharpened slightly before he immediately put on a panicked expression. As though acting on instinct, he pulled the camel into the dune's shadow and crouched down to hide.
"Sand Thieves!" he whispered, his voice carrying just the right amount of fear. "They say the Sand Thieves in Tagor are the most vicious of all. Running into them means certain death!"
"They're only a few small fry at the Dou Zhe level," Yao Lao said indifferently. "If you..."
"If I what?" Xiao Yan hastily interrupted, his tone fierce on the outside but weak within. "I'm only at the third stage of Dou Qi! Going out there would be serving myself up on a platter! Stay hidden!"
As he spoke, he deliberately curled up even tighter and softened his breathing. Peering over the edge of the dune, he saw five or six Sand Thieves riding Desert Lizards sweep past. Every one of them wore ragged clothes, with hideous knife scars on their faces and bloodstained scimitars hanging at their waists. Their leader had the strongest aura, but even he was only a Five-Star Dou Zhe.
The Sand Thieves never spotted Xiao Yan hiding in the shadows and soon vanished beyond the dunes.
Only after the hoofbeats had completely faded did Xiao Yan let out a long breath. Patting his chest in "lingering fright," he said, "That scared me to death. Good thing they didn't see us."
Yao Lao said nothing more, seemingly somewhat resigned to his "cowardice."
At that moment, however, Xiao Yan quietly activated his Emperor Realm Soul and spread his perception outward. When the Sand Thieves had passed, he had caught a trace of a peculiar aura lingering on them—a rank, musky smell similar to that of some underground creature, accompanied by a faint, elusive energy fluctuation. It was certainly not something ordinary Sand Thieves should possess.
Looks like this Tagor Desert really is simple, he thought. His face still wore that shaken expression as he took hold of the camel's reins again and continued trudging forward.
After roughly an hour, the dunes ahead suddenly grew steeper, with black rocks faintly visible in the gaps between them. Xiao Yan stopped, rummaged through his pack for a crumpled map, and spread it on the sand. Pointing haphazardly at it, he muttered, "It should be somewhere around here... Why doesn't this look right?"
He had bought the map from the Mercenary Guild in the Jia Ma Empire. It marked several areas in the Tagor Desert where medicinal herbs might grow, but most of the markings were vague. He deliberately pretended he could not make sense of the map, dawdling for quite a while before "barely" managing to establish his direction and heading toward a canyon of exposed rock.
The canyon entrance was narrow, flanked by towering rock walls. Sunlight could only slant into a small patch, finally offering a little shade. Xiao Yan led the camel inside, but after only a few steps, a faint tremor suddenly passed beneath his feet. Immediately afterward, grains of sand and gravel came showering down the walls.
"What was that sound?" He looked up in feigned alarm, his hand unconsciously pressing against the dagger at his waist—a low-grade weapon he had specifically prepared to fit his "good-for-nothing" identity.
The tremors grew increasingly pronounced, as though some enormous creature were moving underground. Xiao Yan's gaze sharpened, and his Emperor Realm Soul instantly probed beneath the earth. Dozens of yards below the canyon, a giant snake covered in blue-black scales was winding its way along. Its aura had actually reached Peak Dou Master. It was clearly a magical beast that had dwelled here for years.
The giant snake seemed to sense the movement above and abruptly stopped. Its head shifted slightly underground, as though locating its prey.
Xiao Yan sneered inwardly, but his face grew even more panicked. Pulling the camel, he started retreating toward the canyon entrance. "This is bad! A magical beast! Hurry!"
The instant he turned, a fissure suddenly split the ground. A blue-black snake's head burst up from below, opening its blood-red maw to bite down on Xiao Yan and the camel. A foul wind struck his face, carrying an overwhelming pressure.
"Ah!" Xiao Yan screamed and threw himself sideways. His movement was ungainly, yet it narrowly avoided the giant snake's lunge. The camel was not so lucky. Caught in the snake's jaws, it let out a piercing, mournful cry before being dragged into the underground fissure.
"My camel!" Xiao Yan shouted in "grief and fury," scrambling on his hands and knees toward the canyon entrance as though terror had turned his legs to jelly.
After swallowing the camel, the giant snake seemed unsatisfied. It emerged from underground again, flicking its foul-smelling tongue as it fixed on the crawling Xiao Yan.
Catching the pursuing snake out of the corner of his eye, Xiao Yan acted on a thought. His Emperor Realm Soul quietly released an almost imperceptible trace of pressure. Rather than targeting the snake's body, this pressure struck its Soul Origin. Like a pebble dropped into a still lake, it was faint, yet enough to make a low-level magical beast freeze for an instant.
Sure enough, the giant snake's movements briefly faltered, and a trace of confusion flashed through its eyes.
In that fleeting instant, Xiao Yan had already tumbled and crawled out of the canyon. He collapsed onto the sand, gasping for breath, his face covered in dirt and sweat. He looked utterly bedraggled.
He glanced back toward the canyon entrance and saw the giant snake circle a few times along its edge. Seemingly wary of the sunlight outside, it finally withdrew underground in reluctant defeat. The fissure in the ground slowly closed as well, as though nothing had happened.
"That was close... I almost ended up as snake dung." Xiao Yan wiped the sweat from his face and spoke with lingering dread, the fear in his voice sounding anything but feigned.
Yao Lao's voice sounded again, carrying a hint of gravity. "That was a Sand-Walking Snake. It excels at traveling underground, and it isn't weak. It seems even the outskirts of the Tagor Desert are already troubled."
Xiao Yan nodded and slowly rose, brushing the sand and dirt from his clothes. He looked at his empty wrist, where the camel's reins had originally been tied. Sighing, he put on a helpless expression. "Without the camel, I'll have to rely on my own two legs from now on. I hope I find a clue to the green lotus core flame soon, or I'll die of thirst out here."
Though he complained, his feet never stopped as he headed deeper into the desert. The blazing sun remained merciless, and the yellow sand shifted constantly beneath his feet, as though seeking to swallow every living thing.
Yet deep in Xiao Yan's eyes, there was neither fatigue nor fear, only stillness. His Emperor Realm Soul remained constantly alert to his surroundings; not even the faintest stir escaped his perception. He knew the true trials of the Tagor Desert had only just begun. And he had to keep playing the role of "Xiao Yan," struggling to survive in the open while secretly arranging the pieces on a chessboard of his own.
The sun sank in the west, stretching his shadow long across the rolling dunes, making him appear lonely and insignificant. But no one knew what power lay hidden behind that tiny figure—power capable of overturning rivers and seas.
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