Of all the foul creatures populating the desert, sandwyrms were one of the most insidious. Many concerted efforts to hunt them into extinction had failed in the end. They could burrow deep enough into the earth to escape detection from all but the most powerful of Souls, and their hermaphroditic nature allowed them to continue reproducing at an alarming rate as long as a single one survived the purge.

No trace remained of the sense of anticipation Cyril had to test his new powers. His heart went cold, eyelid twitching with hatred. Everyone in the tribe had friends and loved ones who had fallen victim to the sandwyrms. Incredibly stupid and vicious, they would even linger on the outskirts of tribes with inadequate defenses, picking off civilians who ventured a step too far.

Slippers planted firmly in the sand, Cyril rotated his hands around an imaginary orb in front of him, mimicking the rhythm designed for circulating Pressure. At the same time, he flooded the channels in his arms with qi, willing it to escape his palms and gather into the empty space his hands inscribed. Then, he released the gathered force.

A huge pit appeared directly in the wyrm’s path, expelling a wave of sand in all directions. The veil of fine particles obscured most of his vision, but he could vaguely make out the serpentine back-end of the sandwyrm thrashing above ground. The explosive burst of Pressure had pulverized the first three-quarters of its length. Its reflexive squirming after such a devastating result had forced the remnant of his body to breach the surface.

Not even crushing the majority of its body was enough to fully incapacitate a sandwyrm.

The monsters had vestigial brains throughout their entire length, linked through a complex network of nerves. Another reason they continued to infest the desert despite being universally reviled outside of some fringe cults. As long as a significant enough chunk remained, they could regenerate their entire body.

Cyril resisted the urge to move closer. Better to stand your ground against these creatures. Its already limited intelligence would be drastically reduced from the loss of most of its mass. It would have forgotten his position, and motion would trigger the vibration-sensing organs all along its exterior, granting it a refreshed view of the surroundings.

Cyril refocused his attention on the thrashing tail. The shower of sand must have confused it. A young wyrmling, despite being at least a dozen paces long before he crushed it, lacking the experience of a true hunter. Disgusting creature. If not for its flailing about, he would not have been able to pinpoint its location due to the dull tan camouflage of its scaled hide. The irony of turning its method of detecting motion against it was not lost on the prince.

A second pit appeared right behind the other, throwing up another geyser of sand. No more movement, now. A savage grin split Cyril’s face as a trickle of death energy streamed into his Soul. With a thought, he directed it toward the Dominion of Gravity, bringing the First Sphere up to 6/100.

The investment had incrementally increased the power of the Dominion, but he could not exactly feel how much difference it had made.

The fight had been easy enough, and the two attacks had barely drained a quarter of his core’s energy. Already, the Titan’s lifeforce surged to fill in the gaps, like air collapsing back into a vacuum.

Still, it would be best to hurry. Sandwyrms often traveled in packs, and the ones that survived the crucible of the desert had a plethora of tricks that made them dangerous hunters. This one had not even bothered to mask its presence, confident in its ability to swallow a mere human whole.

Cyril glanced back up at the light of the setting sun. The wyrms would grow more inactive as night fell, burrowing deep into their subterranean nests. It would have been better to remain in place until they fell into hibernation--if his little display hadn’t sent tremors a mile in every direction.

Maybe I should have thought this through.

Truthfully, he didn’t mind the idea that he may have attracted the attention of a wyrmhorde. Perhaps it was the power coursing through his body, or maybe it was because his mind still half-believed he was a stone colossus, but he felt indestructible.

He had to resist the urge to just keep putting holes into things. For now, it would be best to make himself as impervious as possible.

Circulating the pattern for Reinforcement was much simpler than Pressure.

He suffused his body with Mass, letting it seep through his muscles, his bones, his joints. A heaviness settled over him, though his physique remained the same. His knowledge regarding the metaphysical concept of Mass was admittedly sparse at the moment. Channeled through the Reinforcement Cantrip, it added a compressed sturdiness to his overall body--what he imagined being made of stone might feel like.

Attempting to add Earth qi may have granted a new aspect to the technique, but blending two different forms of energy required a familiarity with them Cyril had not yet acquired. He considered switching to Earth to see what changes it made, when he felt a faint tremor beneath his feet.

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The next moment, an explosion shattered the ground in front of him. A black chasm of a maw appeared, ringed with yellowed fangs, wide enough to swallow him whole. Pale muscles quivered along its circular length, teeth flexing, the monster ravenous for a hearty meal.

Somewhat in a panic, he flung out a quick Pressure, overloading it with energy. His improper circulation reduced the output slightly, but it was more than enough to thrust the sandwyrm’s mouth aside. A spray of mucus and sickly flesh confirmed he had blasted a hole through the side of its bulbous head.

Unfortunately, this wyrm was twice the size of the previous one. It harnessed its own arrested momentum, flinging the rest of its prodigious body out like a whip. There was something unnatural about its lithe movements, as if it didn’t quite obey the laws of physics.

Cyril’s eyes widened as the sinuous body crashed into him. He kept his arms crossed in front of him. The sheer force behind the wyrm’s body sent a shock through his bones, teeth chattering as he bit through the tip of his tongue. Despite the impact, he did not budge, except for his own arms smacking him in the head. His Reinforced Mass held against the sandwyrm as its slick, scaled body wrapped around him.

Cursing, he wrapped his arms around it, but they only reached halfway around. For a moment they were locked in a stalemate, but the Dominion of Mass did little to increase his overall strength. The wyrm undulated, bursting free from his grasp. In a blur of movement, it dove back into the sand, leaving behind a series of ripples like a stone dropped into water.

This particular one must have developed some affinity for the earth itself, allowing it to swim through it as easily as a sea serpent in the ocean. At least he had managed to injure it, though having part of its face blown off was a minor inconvenience at best.

He poured more qi into Reinforcement, and his body greedily absorbed it. Before he could improve his defenses much, the ground beneath him trembled once more. The wyrm surfaced right beneath him, and to his surprise it was able to overcome his enhanced weight, flinging him upward into the air.

It wasn’t until a second serpentine form burst out through the sand from another angle that he realized the one who lifted him was a newcomer. It was even larger than its companion, though not as nimble, since it had struck him with the side of its mouth instead of swallowing him like it intended.

It had managed to fling him about ten paces into the air, and waited below patiently, maw stretched wide to swallow him. He suspected he would have fallen straight down like a boulder tossed into a well until he reached its bottom. Then the other sandwyrm leapt in from the side, its lamprey-like mouth fastening around his entire torso. The impact flung him off course and he smashed into the ground.

The world around him rippled, and darkness rushed in from all around him. He realized after a couple seconds that the wyrm was carrying him downwards, deep into the desert, the weight of the sand crushing him. Its magical ability to move through the earth like water was at least partially conferred to him, because he was not torn to shreds as the wyrm bore him down into the depths below.

Still, the darkness around him felt oppressive, and his chest could barely move. His lungs burned as he resisted the urge to take a breath and inhale a mouthful of sand. He considered adding Earth to his Reinforcement Cantrip despite his misgivings, but that might just make things worse. Perhaps he would fuse with the ground and be stuck a hundred feet below the surface, only to suffocate.

Helpless, he held onto the monster, forcing himself not to cry out as its many small teeth gnawed on his body. His Pressure attack from earlier had taken a decent-sized chunk of the side of its mouth, but enough remained intact to take a much larger bite out of him.

Without his enchanted clothing and the Mass suffusing his body, it would’ve no doubt chewed straight through him in seconds. Their tips managed to pierce his skin, though not too deep, rivulets of blood coursing down his side.

After about ten seconds of movement, they burst through the earth into a subterranean cavern. He rolled as they plummeted through the ceiling, forcing the sandwyrm beneath him. The walls shook from the force of their impact.

The wyrm's mouth was pulped, along with the upper quarter of its body that had ended up pinned between him and the ground. The rest of it spasmed helplessly as the shock traveled along its length.

Cyril laid on a bed of its viscera, groaning.

Pale flames blossomed into being overhead as he poured qi into the Flicker Cantrip. The walls of the Caven around him were unnaturally smooth, and the entire clearing had an unerring symmetry to it. It may have been intentionally created by a forgotten civilization long ago, but something about it made him suspect a colossal sandwyrm had created this space.

The air in the cavern was stale, but otherwise breathable. His magical flames fed on his mana, not the oxygen around him, so it posed little risk of depriving him of his ability to breathe. A useful tip learned from adventurers of the Wandering Phoenix tribe who had experimented to gain this Knowledge. He had to admit they were more useful than he liked to tease them about.

He returned his attention to the sandwyrm. Fortunately, this one was not the smartest, dragging him down into its lair only to end up crushed beneath him. It still was not properly dealt with, and would recover soon enough

Cyril hauled himself to his feet. The pale fire drifted over and slipped through into the wyrm’s exposed insides. Flesh sizzled. Sickly radiance seeped through the gaps in its bronze, scaled hide, growing fainter as the all-consuming heat traveled down its length. A disturbingly appetizing aroma filled the cavern as he internally cooked the monster.

By the time Flicker reached the end of its tail, the sandwyrm had stopped moving. Still, it had not yet expelled any of its death energy for him to absorb.

He remedied that with a judicious application of Pressure, crushing it in the middle where its main core should be. Finally, its energy surged out, and Prince Cyril seized it.

The main question was, where to direct the energy? Keep working towards the Second Sphere of Gravity? The Dominion was rare, though not unheard of. His particular Knowledge of it was lacking, but he knew it was fundamentally based on attraction between objects. The improvements gained from reaching the Second Sphere may be his best bet to reach the surface again, though Earth may have been useful as well.

Deciding he may as well complete what he had started, he invested the death energy into Gravity, bringing it up to 20/100. Not a small improvement, but not worth being dragged deep into the earth.

The pale fire drifted back toward him as he wondered once again why the sandwyrm had brought him down here. He directed Flicker higher, illuminating more of the area under its pallid glow. And discovered exactly why: dozens, if not hundreds, of wyrmlings squirmed and tunneled throughout the cavern.