The slithering sand snake rises above ground, grains sliding off its head, forming cascades on each side. Its front and only limbs fall down on the ground to support its chest, casting billowing ochre clouds. Its golden eyes stay locked on Ethan, their pupils narrowing onto him.
The Orc roars at the pack of chimeras, backing further away, uncomfortably close to Ethan.
'If I go all out, I have a minute or two of Ether,' Ethan thinks. He fought bigger creatures with powers giving them inescapable range and unpredictable defense. But for some unknown reason, his instincts tell him… scream at him to be on the defensive.
A cold, electric shiver crawls up Ethan's spine, and the creature's image distends and inflates. It unfolds two dripping fangs from its palate, as long as Ethan is tall. The surroundings darken, and its eyes brighten to an eerie glow that shines upon the desert like spotlights in the night.
Ethan sniffs the hot air, smelling a hint of fruity sweetness replacing the copper smell of blood. Narrowing his eyes, he sees a bending of the light descending from the monster's scales. 'Poison.'
The giant snake's maw widens to reveal rows of serrated teeth. It grows unnaturally, swallowing the sky with its hallucinated size.
Ethan's heart hammers in his chest as he's betrayed by his own senses. He triggers predator's sight, but the ability's output is as distorted and insane as his own sight.
The Orc bellows as he charges forward, his thunderous steps moving away from Ethan. Of all Ethan's senses, it seems hearing is unaffected by the monster's poison.
Ethan closes his eyes to listen to the snake's scales scraping against the sand, the sounds magnified by predator's sight. 'It's no different from a gunfight in the dark; calm yourself.'
The giant monster coils its upper body, its scales displacing sand away from Ethan. It springs forward, snapping its maw open with a hiss.
Ethan leaps to the side, tumbling into the sand as he avoids the attack.
A titanic hand slams into Ethan. It strikes him with the force of a giant sledgehammer, compressing his chest before sending him high into the sky. In the attack's prolongation, Ethan feels three claws cutting through his coat's outer layer, tearing the cloth like paper.
Ethan opens his eyes, but his surroundings spiral in splatters of black, burning white, and ochre. He grits his teeth, spinning through the air as gravity pulls him down. Closing his eyes again, Ethan forces himself to focus on the sounds.
Sand shifts, hissing in a rhythm as a chimera rushes towards Ethan's landing point. Its last impact on the ground is more powerful than the others as it hurls itself into the air to attack Ethan in his fall.
Ethan twists his body to avoid the beast, arching his chest above its maw. He picks up on the rattle of its tail's segments as it springs towards him and swings at it. His blade meets chitin and slashes through; he twists his torso, carving through the chimera's tail and lower body.
A louder hiss of sand comes from where the giant snake was.
Ethan picks up on the approaching breath of the creature and the sounds of its muscles bending its titanic body. As he hears its entire body extending to bite him, he kicks the chimera's corpse downward, propelling himself higher.
The giant snake arches higher to pursue Ethan but slows in the process. Sand scrapes against its countless teeth as it falls into and beside its maw.
Triggering Strengthening, Ethan contracts his torso and legs for an explosive twist. He coats his blade in flames, feeds it Ether, and adds Weapon Aura, covering the sword in crackling fire and buzzing lightning arcs. Ethan swings and hits the monster's unfolding fangs. Stormshard cuts through and unleashes a wave that slices the monster's jaws apart.
The giant serpent's upper maw crashes into Ethan, sending electric pain into his ribs as it propels him further away. Its body falls back down, crashing into the sand, gurgling out blood.
Ethan collides with the ground, bouncing back like a pebble thrown on a lake. He gasps for air as the heated desert burns his skin and dulls his mind.
Three sets of clawed legs rush after him, their owners snarling as they approach.
Hearing the ground approaching, Ethan spins to land feet first and stop himself. His lower left ribs spark with pain until he absorbs the landing's energy. Ethan flutters his eyes open, long enough to confirm his sight is still unusable before closing them back. His ears tune into the three distinct sets of movements converging on him. Each chimera has a different weight, a different rhythm to its charge – one faster, another heavier, the last limping.
The first, to the right, lowers itself and lunges for Ethan's leg. Its stinger rattles as it brings it forward to stab Ethan's chest.
Ethan dives, feeling the wind as the chimera's stringer slams into the spot where he stood. He thrusts his blade downward, feeling it scrape against the creature's bones as it passes through its skull and throat.
The second chimera propels itself forward, aiming to bite Ethan's throat.
Ethan pivots, but his blade refuses to come out, moved at an odd angle by a spasm of the first chimera's corpse. He shields himself with his left forearm at the last moment.
The chimera's jaws tighten around Ethan's arm, sparking electrifying pain in his bones as its teeth fail to bite through Ethan's coat. Its stinger writhes from above, but Ethan twists from side to side to avoid its thrusts. Its right paw slashes Ethan's neck with stinging pain.
A stinger stabs Ethan's lower back, but his coat absorbs the blow, stopping it from piercing flesh. The last, wounded chimera prowled around him, moving silently compared to its brethren.
Ethan wrenches his blade from the first chimera's corpse and stabs it through the neck of the one holding his arm.
It convulses and lets go, blood spraying out of its wound as Ethan pulls out his blade. Its stinger writhes aimlessly but falls short as it collapses, the connections to its legs severed by Ethan's blow.
The last chimera prowls back, hissing at Ethan like a scared cat. Its stinger stabs the air above its head as it tries to appear threatening.
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The cuts on Ethan's neck spread a burning pain in his flesh; more poison to be worried about. Behind his back, Ethan hears the giant snake rising from the ground, blood cascading out from its maw and onto the desert sand.
'Of course I'm not the one you're afraid of. But why weren't you afraid before?' Ethan ponders. A shroud takes over Ethan's mind, caused by heat and poison. He shakes his head to dispel the sensation and refocus on the fight.
The giant snake falls back down to the ground and slithers towards Ethan, its lower jaw scraping and parting the sand as it hangs uncontrollably.
'I can't keep fighting. Let's hope you’re the biggest one he planned to throw at me,' Ethan thinks. He shakes the pain out of his left hand and aims his palm at the giant beast. He summons his life force and conjures a fireball into his hand, bathing his skin in blazing heat.
The Orc bellows, running towards Ethan from the left, his steps heavy and staggering. He falls to one knee and rises again, clawing at the sand to propel himself towards Ethan.
'My spell must be the only thing he sees if his sight is as bad as mine,' Ethan theorizes. He doesn't shield himself against the charging giant and throws his spell at the monster. It ionizes the air as it turns into a beam of radiant blue light that peers through Ethan's eyelids.
The Orc follows the light, turning in his reckless charge to lunge at the giant serpent. His blade falls on the monster, but it is useless; Ethan's spell carved a hole through the beast's head.
The stench of cooking blood rises in the air from the corpses littering the sands. Silence falls upon them as the only thing Ethan hears is the Orc's heavy breathing and his own.
Ethan lets himself fall to sit on one of the chimeras he killed. Languidly, he opens his eyes to see the setting suns. It shouldn’t be that late; it must mean the challenge is over. Rarely in his life has Ethan been so physically tired; his entire body screams its sufferings in heated throbs. He passes his hand on the claw wounds of his neck, causing them to sting.
Only one chimera remains. It digs itself into the ground far away from Ethan and the Orc. Its brethren lie dead in the sand, most killed by the brutal blows of the Orc, their corpses mangled and broken.
The Orc approaches, his blade to the side, and places himself between Ethan and the puddle of water. It is clouded by sand and doesn't even contain a third of what he did earlier. He grunts and rolls his shoulders before spitting blood onto the ground. His flesh is marred by claw wounds, causing the muscles beneath to spasm uncontrollably.
"I don't need it anymore," Ethan says. He extends his left hand and releases parts of his Ether to summon a water bottle. He opens it and gulps half of its contents in seconds.
"Your mastery of Ether, even for someone it likes, is remarkable," the man's voice says from the ground. Smoke rises from the sand and forms into the shape of the man commanding this realm. He snaps his book shut and looks over the horizon to observe the last seconds of sunlight. "I underestimated how insane and skilled you are. Not even Orcs would fully reject their sight, no matter how affected, to fight a Lindworm."
"There are ways to see in darkness in my world, tools that enhance the weakest of light. But sometimes I had to hide and kill from the shadows without one. It's not the first time I have had to do everything by sound, though I couldn't have moved like that before the system," Ethan says. He looks back at the Orc but finds him gone alongside the monsters' corpses; only the one beneath him remains.
"Remarkable creatures, truly," the man comments.
"Which ones?" Ethan asks. He breathes heavily, still trying to dispel the oppressive heat despite the vanishing sunlight.
"All of them. Those species, deprived of Ether, endured in a world that had no mercy for them. A shame those who now live beyond their world lost so much of their natural grandeur. If a human from your world, one who spent their entire life in your deserts, were to come here before the alignment, how long would they survive?" the man asks.
"I've found I don't feel heat as I used to," Ethan prefaces. "But if the heat didn't cause them to collapse, those predators would slaughter them."
"I wondered if you had realized," the man quips. A flicker of smoke appears in his hand, forming a mercury thermometer he sends towards Ethan. For once he didn't use his book to summon something; perhaps it is only for showmanship. The thermometer rises to indicate seventy-five degrees Celsius. "Without going above your human potential, you would have collapsed in minutes."
"Are you referring to the fact I exceeded twenty points of constitution? Since then, any additional point seems to cause Ether to reinforce my body through unrealistic means."
"Unrealistic," the man whispers, as if amused by the word. He opens his book, and smoke spews out to swallow the desert. It turns to the inside of a marble room with a large bath in the center. Clay jars line one of the walls, smelling of soaps made from olive oils. "It is a way to describe the process. Once you reach the full potential of your genetics, your soul creates structures that mimic and support your biology. The thresholds aren't the same for different species or even individuals. A truly wonderful and fascinating process."
"Wait. It's not some creation of the system?" Ethan asks. Looking around, he notes the absence of any exits or windows in the room. He senses his surroundings filling with threads of Ether and refills his heart. "When upgrading a characteristic, I sense Ether forming from nowhere to create those… structures."
"Because you use the system's points to do it. In that case, the system accelerates the process. But if you were to train as you used to in an environment rich in Ether, it would happen over time," the man answers.
"If I understand you, the system isn't what allows us to go beyond our limits. How can humans be capable of that when we have been alien to Ether for millions of years? We couldn't have evolved that feature," Ethan asks. He once pondered if there was a genetic factor to the ease with which he manipulates Ether; it might be related.
"I've told you enough for now," the man denies. He motions towards the bath. "We have put your body to the test, and you've shown your mastery over it despite the short time you had to accustom yourself. Take some time to rest, relax, and mend your body; more challenges await you."
"I'll ask again when you come back," Ethan comments. Looking around, he notices that his coat is intact, free from the marks of claws, fangs, and stinger attacks it suffered.
"And I shall answer your questions; I have no binds keeping me from sharing that knowledge," the man answers. He turns to smoke and seeps into the ground.
'I hope he'll keep his word,' Ethan thinks. This knowledge might be present in the other world, but finding someone willing to speak could be a time-consuming endeavor.
Ethan sends his clothes to his Inventory and enters the water. Vapor forms from the water at the contact of his skin. The searing heat of the desert leaves him; it's replaced by a tightness, as if it was cooling sunburns.
Ethan leans back and closes his eyes. In his darkened sight, he sees the threads of Ether surrounding him, and specks of it fused with the water like in metals. These aquatic shards drift towards his skin and seep into it, vanishing as they mend his muscles, soothe his aches, and relax his skin.
Ethan exhales deeply, his breath rippling across the water's surface. Passing his hand on his neck, he senses the cut knitted into long-healed scars.
Russ forms from Ethan's shadow on the pool's edge, his tail wagging against the marble ground. He whines, nudging Ethan's head with his own.
"I don't see a sign forbidding anything," Ethan quips. He raises his hand out of the water and motions forward. "Ok."
Russ leaps into the large bath, moving his paws to swim in circles and wagging his tail to spread water everywhere.
Ethan chuckles as Russ paddles through the water, his thick black fur now soaked. He leans back, letting the warmth of the water work deeper into his bones as he lowers his head underwater. His body still aches from the blows he suffered, but the pain is dull now.
Russ paddles closer, resting his large paws on Ethan's chest with a chuff.
'You better not be thinking about using me as a raft,' Ethan thinks, still underwater. He reaches for a pumice stone on the bath's edge and flicks it at the other end, where it sinks. 'Fetch.'
Russ dives after the improvised ball. For a few seconds, all Ethan senses is rippling water. Then, Russ steps back onto his chest and drops the rock onto it.
'Good fetch,' Ethan praises. He grabs the rock but stops himself from throwing it as he senses Russ' claws tensing.
Russ shakes himself off and growls, his head snapping to the side.
'Shadow,' Ethan commands, and Russ obeys without delay. Triggering predator's sight, he senses that a large wooden door has manifested there and hears drums rumbling on the other side.