I scrambled over stone walls and crumbling edifices, falling softly into the sand with a quiet thud. There was a momentary reprieve from the ever present light of the sun above me, and I took a moment to sit in the shade. Sweat built into my robes. The wind hissed as it crossed the desert around me.

The little bird stopped and chirped, jumping as it walked back and forth on the fallen stone column in front of me.

“We must give you a better name.” I said, looking at the memory of the gale Titan that had followed me to this chamber. “You’re little. And a bird. I’ll call you little bird.”

The bird chirped as if offended, strutting back and forth over the pillar and flapping its wings. It was larger than it had been when I carried it to the creek, but still unmistakably adolescent.

I smiled as I watched it.

The chamber around me was massive. The trek through the hot desert sand had reminded me of Sandgrave all the while. Though the air was hot, it was still the hot, humid air of Spearpoint. The Titanfall dungeon had sucked in the air from the world around it, including the rich power of the qi.

Littlebird chirped a warning to me and pointed its wings.

I leaned forward, pressing my hand into the cool sand in the shade. The sand shifted around me as I squinted.

There was an odd cut in the rubble. All around me, with a perfect width, there was a line where no two pieces of debris touched, stretching for dozens of yards until I lost sight of it in the ruins.

The sand along the cut in the rubble crumbled inward as if someone had dragged a rake across it and left a line behind where it was all displaced.

“Is that dangerous, little bird?” I asked. I plucked a loose stone from the sand and tossed it forward beyond the line.

Nothing happened.

I watched and waited, tense and ready, but nothing happened still. The little bird, too, stared. I relaxed, pushing myself to my feet, but the little bird chirped and flapped its wings at me.

I knelt down and waited, still in the shade.

“This doesn’t look like the remains of a fight.” I said, looking around. The cut was cut through the rubble, including the sideways columns and broken pieces of the roof that rested now on the sand. The true floor of the massive structure must have been half buried by the accumulating sand, sunken down just like the precursor ruin beneath Sandgrave.

The world flashed before my eyes — I threw myself backwards, hitting the rubble behind me with a thud and a grunt, the motion driving the wind from my lungs as a wall of black raced by me, cutting thrrough the ruins.

The qi in the air shifted violently, displaced in a way that I recognized.

“A defense formation?”

I paused and watched. This entire dungeon was composed of the Titan’s memories, but it also seemed to be something more. The Titan wouldn’t remember or even have perceived how the qi in the air shifted. It was like an imprint of the history of the Titan itself was stored in this room.

The thin pillar of opaque black raced in the distance before dissipating into motes of black light that faded in the air like smoke. The world smelled like burnt ozone.

Now that I was paying attention, I could feel the soft buzz in the air, the way the qi moved quietly, sorting out the elements the array absorbed and discarding the others. It was recharging to activate again.

I stood up, brushing sand from my robe, then leapt over the gouge in the sand.

I wasn’t risking it.

But I moved much slower now, pausing and listening every so often.

“Any more defense formations here?” I asked the little bird.

I grunted when it chirped at me, staying in the shade whenever I could. The wind almost felt nice when it reached me, whistling through the ruins.

Occasionally I found still open doorways and stretches of uncovered floor. Even more rare were the holes leading down into the remains of the ruin below. I could see piles of sand slowly filling the hollow chambers of the buried ruin. And as I neared its heart, I saw signs of battle.

Chunks of stone were melted to rough slag that piled deep beneath the sand. Elsewhere, cuts and craters marred the corpse of the structure. I stepped around a pile of debris that stretched beneath the sand — a crater where the entire building had crumbled or been blown apart — and as I did, I wondered how much of this ruin still existed today. How many years did it take for the gale Titan to reach level 300?

How many years would it take me?

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Even now, sand piled in the corners and shade. One day this entire place would be beneath the dunes.

Just like the ruin beneath Sandgrave.

The signs of battle only grew more intense, and the amount of rubble and piled ruins only grew denser. I rested my hand on a gouge in the stone. The gouge left behind by the blade grew wider the farther it stretched from the origin of the technique.

“These look like slashes from a wind technique.” I said, speaking to the little bird. He was chirping with more intensity and frequency the nearer I got to the ruin’s heart. “Were the precursors cultivators? Or are there skills that look the same?”

I looked at little bird. He flapped his wings at me, chirping louder and louder. I frowned, looking forward.

There were no scars in the ruins that could indicate another defensive formation. The sand beneath me trembled. I frowned, shifting my footing as the sand beneath me began to move.

Then I sensed earth-qi stirring beneath me and threw myself out of the way.

A monster a foot wide and a half dozen feet long tore its way out of the ground, half way between a worm and a snake, its body black armor, segmented carapace of chitin reflecting the harsh light of the sun. There was a bird — an exact copy of the little bird — half trapped in its mouth, chirping and screaming in the way that only a bird could.

It flapped its wings. One was damaged, smaller and stunted. I spammed [Identify.]

[Sandshear Warrior, Level 19]

[Memory of the Gale Titan, Level 17]

The bird flicked a claw in outright, releasing a blade of glowing white light that flew away and downward, carving through the carapace armor of the Sandshear.

Green blood hit the sand and smoked, boiling as the Sandshear thrashed in pain.

I drew my blade as the Titan memory freed itself from the grasp of the Sandshear. It fell to the sand and rolled over, limping away even as it cried out in defiance. The Sandshear writhed, each flick of its head sending arcs of boiling blood to sizzle against the sand.

I looked between the bird Memory and the Sandshear. Neither seemed to acknowledge me yet.

“This is you, isn’t it?” I said, speaking to little bird as I maintained a death grip on the handle of my sword. “This is the memory of you in this chamber.”

The bird hadn’t healed completely, but it took off from the ground nonetheless. It flew in a constant spiral, struggling twice to move itself back upwards and land atop the pillar resting in the sand.

The sand shifted beneath my feet as the Sandshear pulled more of its body free from the earth, writhing as it lifted itself up to orient on me. Its head leaned down, a maw of dozens of teeth embedded in insect flesh pointing at me. It had no eyes or nose I could see.

And yet it clearly readied to attack me.

I freed my sword and swung in the same motion, swinging with all my strength.

My sword bit into chitin, but didn’t carve its way into flesh. A gouge chipped off the Sandshear's armor.

The monster slammed into me. Chitin fangs sunk into my flesh with ease. I bit back a scream as my skin tore, stabbing again into the weak spot between its plates and finding flesh. The monster screamed horribly as it whipped back. Acidic blood landed on my flesh, sizzling with acrid smell.

The monster smashed into my side, diving beneath the sand, its chitin burning as it ground against me on its path into the earth. I staggered forward in the sand, my sword dripping green. Then I threw myself up, leaping multiple feet onto a nearby sideways column.

The sun glinted in my eyes as I stared down at the sand the monster had occupied. It couldn’t dig its way through stone.

I had leapt out of the way just in time. Two more Sandshears ripped out of the sound, tearing their way out of the earth with insectoid hisses before diving back own. I shaped the path of the Anti-Lightning Herald, black lightning dancing on my blade. The qi inside me ignited, burning away even as I drank the power from the air.

Earth-qi overwhelmingly filled the air, as if the defensive formation had been drinking almost everything else.

The monsters hadn’t re-emerged. The memory of the Titan made mocking chirps toward the sand. The wound on my arm leaked hot wet blood, dripping onto the stone beneath me.

Memory or not, these monsters hurt.

The Sandshears rose out of the sand again before diving down. My eyes widened as I realized they couldn’t see me. Of course they couldn’t. They lacked eyes. They had only attacked me while I stood in the sand.

That left sand or some kind of qi sensing. It wasn’t uncommon for spirit-beasts to possess that.

Little bird joined the memory in casting derogatory chirps toward the sand. The Sandshears shot up toward the chirps, unable to find the source. I spammed [Identify.]

[Sandshear Warrior, Level 21]

[Sandshear Striker, Level 16]

The memory of the gale Titan dove in a headspin. Its claws lit up white, carving a path through the air. It became a whirling drill, stabbing downward and carving through the chitin of the Sandshear Striker.

The Sandshear drove itself up, and the memory of the Titan drove itself down. The result was immediate — the chitin plates of the Sandshear fell apart, falling onto the ground with a woosh of smoke and heat as the acid ate at the sand.

The monster fell limp.

“I — my levels!” I said, offended that the memory of little bird could steal the power I came here to steal myself.

The memory of the Titan chirped in pain, hopping in the sand as acidic blood smoked on its back. The top of its right wing looked like a sharpened blade. Its left was missing most of its feathers, stunted and undeveloped. It must have been injured when it fell from its cliff in its youth.

Perhaps each chamber was a pivotal moment in the path of the Titan.

On the Bloodstone continent, spirit-beasts evolved out of animals that consumed vast quantities of homogeneous qi. Here, the very animals themselves seemed to hunt and level, little different than the Traiblazers.

I couldn’t let the memory have anymore of my potential kills.

When the Sandshear I had already cut once shot out of the sand, I dove forward the same way the memory had, now enhanced by the power of the Anti-Lightning herald and the momentum of the Sandshear’s own upward movement as I dove through the air.

Lightning crackled as insect flesh popped and cooked, releasing a bitter smell over the sand.

[New Skill: Death’s Descent(Strength +1)]

[Death’s Descent — Do or die. Enhanced attack that can only be inflicted while falling.]

I grunted and looked over at the memory of the Titan. It didn’t acknowledge me, instead flapping its wings and kicking up sand. It cawed triumphantly, no longer smoking.

“I wonder what else I can learn from you, little bird.” I spun the sword in my hand. A bad habit, Wen would say.

This time, when the Sandshear shot up, I was ready. I pulled on the System like a well tuned instrument, plucking a string. [Death’s Descent] refused to activate, but [One Cut, One Kill] activated just fine, carving a gouge in the monster’s chitin. The first of the Sandshears had already been injured, preventing the skill from activating, while the second had activated a new skill.

I cleaved the monster in two, sending a gush of green acid blood smoking on the ground.