Tay's feet fell In an unsteady rhythm against the hot sand, the sound of his boots muffled. He wiped sweat from his brow and brought his covering farther over his head. It was late afternoon, and the sun was beating down as hard as ever. Tay took a drink of his water flask, feeling that it was already half empty.

He was quickly learning that the desert was unlike anything he had ever experienced. The sun was unrelenting, and the dunes nearly impossible to travers. When he had first gotten close to the big mounds of sand, he had compared them to hills rolling across the countryside. But when he tried to climb them,

he realized just how different they were.

The dunes almost seemed to have a mind of their own. The sand beneath his feet resisted his climb, pulling him back down, slowing his progress to a crawl. It took over a half hour to climb the first, and the second he didn't bother with. He found that going around not only took the same time, but made him less thirsty.

He had been hiking through the lake for somewhere near a day and a half. He couldn't really remember. He hadn't even been trying to. All that was ever in his mind was to keep going forward.

Al-Hadun was a place really only talked about. Many believed it did exist, but exact records on it lack detail. The only thing that was certain, was that it was at the center of the desert.

As for what it looked like…that was unknown. It was ddd; even though many people claimed they saw it, and many say they feel the same power from it, none seem to remember exactly what it was. It was obvious to most that, in some capacity, it was a place. And if Orby, a Fire Spirit, said to go there, Tay could assume it had deep roots in magic.

The issue, he was finding, was getting there. He had no doubt that he would find it, but he needed to stay alive. And he had underestimated just how hostile that place was.

Luckily for him, his body was unique in that his skin, at least the parts exposed to the sun, wouldn't burn. Something else had already gotten to them.

He soon found the end of another great dune. It leveled before him for maybe ten feet, and then, like a wave in the ocean, began to rise up into another. Tay had learned quickly that that was the only reasonable way to travel, the mounds were simply too high.

Before him, spread out like a great field, was the nearly endlessness of “The lake.” He was high, the rest of the desert was below him at least a few hundred feet. Then he saw something. His eyes tried to adjust, the sun making everything bright and glaring.

On one of the sand dunes, near its peak, was what looked like a dried and shriveled plant. On its only limb was a muted fruit. It had shades of gray and brown, but also hints of bright red. He looked into his spacial bag and saw how painfully sparse his food was. He wasn't exactly worried about it, not like his water, but the thought of fruit, even desert fruit, was mouth watering.

He slid down the mound of sand, his feet digging a whole foot into the soft, giving ground. The stuff got everywhere, and he had given up trying to keep it out of his boots. He transitioned into a run when the ground leveled off, letting momentum die away.

He slowly approached, cautiously approached. He knew of creatures that buried themselves in the ground as a form of ambush, but they often left signs. He saw none of such things. The mound of sand looked undisturbed. He drew closer, seeing the fruit in detail now. He studied it.

It looked like the planet had given everything it had to bear it. An odd way to survive, he thought. He gently pulled on it, the shell hard, but gave just enough.

Then the ground rolled. Tay stumbled back, his feet Struggling for grip as he slid down the dune. A claw came out from nowhere and clamped down. Tay Evaded, dropping his body just low enough. Another claw came out of the dune below him and he used it to push off of.

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His body slowly flipped in the air, sending him yards away. He landed on his feet, but fell on his back when they went into the ground. He felt vibrations through the sand as something ran towards him. He scrambled to his feet, digging himself out with plums of sand.

The animal was covered In thick sections of red carapace. It had six legs, two crab-like claws were open, and a long twisting tail hung over its head, a stinger dripping with liquid. He saw the planet on top of its head, attached to the creature and it lowered it to be flush with its body, the fruit out of sight.

It moved with deadly speed for its carriage-sized body. Its dozens of hollow black eyes seemed to focus on him with a predatory composure.

Its tail flashed before him and he barely parried it off with the edge of his sword. The strike sent shocks of pain through his arm. He leapt up, propelled by magic through his legs and tried to cut between the seams of the creature's armor. But his blade bounced off harmlessly.

It spun around, its legs a blur of movement beneath it. Sand shot up in the air as it charged at him, its legs sliding wildly in the sand.

Tay sent waves of his magic into his spells, his blade glowing like the heart of a fire. He crouched low and surged forward, transitioning into a slide as he did. The monster's massive form hurtled over him and his blade found the softer underside of the creature.

It wasn't enough.

It turned again, but it did not charge. Tay stood, his body still low and ready, and his sword forming a ball of flame at its tip. The creature moved its body back and forth as if testing the damage he had caused.

“Why do animals have to be as hard to deal with as monsters?” He asked. No reply. The crab hybrid began to move sideways, its front staying perfectly in line with him. He decided to make the next move.

He shot the ball of fire out, throwing his sword with all his strength without it leaving his grip. It arched at the monster too fast for it to react. Tay ran towards it as the smoke of the blast blinded it. It hadn't done much damage, but it didn't have to.

He jumped on its back and plunged his glowing sword between its carapace, not missing this time. Then he felt a sting in his back and he was launched forward. He tumbled to the ground, his body rolling. He prayed none of his supplies were damaged.

The creature was letting out a pained howl and Tay was relieved he couldn't feel his own injuries through his adrenaline. The animal turned wildly, blood spurting from the wound on its back.

It smashed its head into the sand, rubbing and scraping as if it were trying to shake off whatever was hurting it.

Then it saw him, and it charged. Tay scrambled up, feeling his legs go numb. He put every ounce of energy he could into his legs and brought his sword up. It implied itself on his sword, its mouth hanging open and the tip of the blade showing through the top of it's head.

Tay fell to the ground, his body shaking, his eyes grew blurry and dark. He saw that his water flasks had fallen off him, one completely torn apart, and the other was leaking through a tiny hole.

Then he saw a shine. It was far off at the top of the dune he had come down when he saw the fruit. He couldn't see what it was, but if he had to guess, it looked like a blade.

Tay groaned in pain. He rolled and rolled, or tried to, but his body was tied down. He tried To open his eyes but found them blurry to the point of blindness. A stinging cold was crawling from his back, spreading through his body. It was excruciating.

Hands grasped his arms and legs as he thrashed. The feeling of pin pricks came from his shoulders and knees, some hitting bone, sending waves of nausea through him. Something opened his mouth, clamping it like a vice. He tried to fight it, but it was too much. A liquid like molten metal was poured down his throat. It burned almost as badly as those on his arms had.

“You must stay awake.” a foreign voice said. He fought against it, trying to keep his eyes closed in hopes he would fall into blissful unawareness, far from this pain. But the voice came again, loud.

“Stay awake if you want to live!”

That caught his attention, though only barely. He fought with the desire to give up, thrashed it in his mind, and then threw it away, back into the desert where he found it. He clenched his teeth as the vice was gone. He bit his tongue, dug the nails of his hands into his palms, feeling warm liquid drip from them.

He took rapid breaths trying anything and everything to keep his body awake.

Voices scrambled all around him, the sounds of footsteps on something soft shuffled in between words he did not know. The voice came again.

“Not long now. Soon, you may sleep.” a tear dropped from his eye, clearing some of the blurriness away. He saw dark figures in what could have been a tent. Sun beamed through holes like waterfalls. Then he slipped into darkness, and the pain was gone.