At dusk, a wisp of turbid air rose over the desert.
The cyclone caused by the alternating heat and cold swept sand and dust into the sky, completely blotting out what little sunlight remained.
The dunes shifted under the wind's push. They had just been here, yet moments later had piled up elsewhere. The endless dunes rose and fell like ocean waves, while the sand patterns carved by the wind curved like ripples.
Grains of sand pattered onto the dunes like droplets swept up by waves, and a "drizzle" began to fall over the dunes.
The "raindrops" buried Mo Ling's shoes, forcing him to keep leaping out of the "puddles" and running toward the crests of the sand waves.
At last, it was no longer so hot. Though the sand grains still held some warmth, the wind carried a faint chill. His lower body remained trapped in the heatwave, while his upper body was already beginning to shiver. As day and night changed over, the rules of the Disordered Sand Dune were quietly changing as well.
Mo Ling wrapped his clothes tighter around himself, put on the jacket he had taken off during the day, and tightened his mask.
With the sunlight no longer beating down on him, Mo Ling's mind cleared considerably.
"Lu Youqi, there doesn't seem to be any vegetation in this desert."
"Mm." Lu Youqi crouched down and grabbed a handful of yellow sand. It quickly slipped away through his fingers.
"The sand here is too fine and loose, and there's hardly any moisture. Plant root systems can't take hold."
"Are we really going to just keep walking like this? This desert is so vast—when will we ever reach the end?" Mo Ling looked at the yellow sand filling his field of vision, and pessimism began spreading