Adlet left Savar at a steady pace, following the southeastern trade road—at least, what used to be a trade road.
The path was still there: compacted earth, wheel ruts half-filled with sand, occasional stone markers worn smooth by time. But the life that normally clung to such routes—caravans, guards, shouting merchants—was gone. Silence ruled it now, broken only by the rasp of dry wind and the faint creak of his gear.
No one walked this way anymore.
Not unless they had no choice… or unless they were a Protector with something to prove.
The local guild officer's instructions had been almost casual.
You'll find it easily, he had said. Just follow the road until you start seeing what's left of the caravans that didn't make it.
Adlet didn't like how simple that sounded.
So he walked, eyes alert, and used the emptiness of the road the only way he knew how—by turning it into training.
While his steps carried him forward, his mind was already on the next piece of his arsenal.
The Ruby Turtle's Aura.
The one he used least.
Not because it was weak—far from it—but because it wasn't his instinct. The scarab's black Aura felt natural to him: aggressive, sharp, decisive. The lizard's green Aura had become a second nervous system: speed, freedom, control.
The red Aura was something else.
A fortress.
And fortresses were only truly tested when something tried to break them.
His first thought was simple.
Make it stronger.
Thicker. Denser. Larger.
If a single shell could stop a strike, then a larger one could stop a heavier strike.
He tried it as he walked.
A flicker of red gathered at his forearm—then spread outward, forming a curved plate along the side of his body, almost like a wall he carried with him. It shimmered with a heatless intensity, its surface smooth in places and ridged in others, like stone polished by time.
He let it fade and tried again—this time thicker, forcing more Aura into the same shape.
It held.
But it consumed more of him.
Adlet frowned slightly, adjusting his pace so his breathing stayed steady.
He tried a second approach.
Multiple shells.
If he could manifest two horns at once… if he could place them anywhere now…
Then he could do the same with the Ruby Turtle's defense.
He pushed Aura outward—one shell along his left forearm, another forming near his ribs like a second layer.
It worked.
He could feel the strain immediately, the way maintaining separate manifestations demanded more focus and Aura than simply expanding one.
But it worked.
He experimented further.
A shell near his shoulder. One at his thigh. One just above his spine.
He moved while keeping them active, letting his steps become part of the test. He pivoted. He jumped. He rolled once onto his shoulder and came back up, seeing which plates flickered, which held, which demanded too much.
The desert around him remained arid but not dead. Tough shrubs clung to life. Isolated trees bent low, their branches twisted by constant harshness. Far in the distance, massive silhouettes moved—unmistakably Apexes, their exact forms impossible to discern from this distance.
Either way, they remained far.
The first day passed like that.
Training. Walking. Training again.
And still—no caravan wreckage.
No sign of the Dominator Scorpion.
When darkness settled and the Stars' glow shifted into the quieter rhythm of night, Adlet finally stopped and made camp beside a cluster of rocks that broke the wind. He didn't light a large fire. Out here, the wrong kind of attention could turn rest into regret.
He ate quickly, drank carefully, and then sat with his back to stone until his breathing slowed.
The stillness of the desert at night always felt different.
Not peaceful.
More like… watchful.
As if the land was waiting to see what you would do when no one was looking.
Adlet lay back, closed his eyes, and did what he had learned to do only recently—emptied his mind with intention rather than exhaustion.
He let his muscles loosen.
Let the tension of travel dissolve.
Let the world fade.
And when it did—
He was standing in the familiar clearing.
Soft grass underfoot. A river running nearby, calm and steady. The air carried the scent of water and leaves—familiar, unmistakable.
Pami drifted above the riverbank like a silent ribbon of light: long and sleek, white and gold, seven tails flowing behind him like cloth caught in a slow current. Three of those tails carried distinct hues—black, green, red—colors that didn't clash, but belonged.
The moment Adlet appeared, Pami's gaze turned toward him.
"Your training seems to be bearing fruit, my friend," Pami said.
Adlet's expression brightened immediately. "You saw that?"
"I felt it," Pami corrected gently. "Your control is steadier. Your manifestations are cleaner."
Adlet couldn't help himself. "Good. Because I can't wait to test these new defensive techniques in a real fight."
Pami hovered closer, tails drifting in a quiet arc. "Between that and your evasive ability… I'm beginning to worry less about your survival."
Adlet snorted softly. "Our survival, you mean."
For a moment, Pami didn't respond with words. One of his tails flicked, subtle but deliberate. It wasn't quite a nod—Pami didn't have a body built for that—but the movement carried the same meaning.
Adlet's lips twitched.
He realized, with mild disbelief, that he was starting to interpret the nonverbal communication of a fish.
The thought amused him more than it should have.
Then Adlet's expression shifted back to seriousness.
"Pami… I had another idea," he said.
Pami's tails stilled slightly, his attention sharpening. "Tell me."
Adlet stared at the river for a second, replaying an old memory: the Ruby Turtle's shell, unyielding—and then the sudden violence of its counterattack. The heat. The burning force. The way even the air seemed to recoil.
"The most striking thing about the Ruby Turtle wasn't just its defense," Adlet admitted. "It was the power of its… flaming attacks."
He looked back at Pami, eyes narrowing with determination.
"Do you think it's possible for me to replicate that?"
Pami didn't answer instantly. He drifted in a slow circle, as though considering how to phrase something that was both obvious and dangerous.
"You are meant to be capable of replicating all the abilities of your Guardians," Pami said at last. "So yes."
Adlet's chest loosened, just slightly.
"But," Pami continued, "replicating an attack of that nature would be an entirely different level of complexity."
Adlet smiled—small, sharp, stubborn. "Complex or not… as long as it's possible, I'll get there."
Pami's tails rippled—approval, unmistakable. "Of course you will. And I'll have a front-row view."
Adlet felt something warm in his chest, not pride, not arrogance—something closer to reassurance.
He had always been alone in his ambition, even when surrounded by people. But this bond… this strange companionship inside him… made the solitude less absolute.
He leaned back slightly, letting his thoughts connect like pieces of a map.
The scarab gave him power and versatility.
The lizard gave him mobility and perception.
The turtle gave him defense—
And if he could unlock its destructive aspect…
He would add something he truly lacked.
A devastating long-range attack.
It wasn't just about being stronger. It was about being complete.
He met Pami's gaze, voice low but resolute.
"Be patient," Adlet said. "Soon I'll give you even more impressive performances. Together… we'll dominate this desert."
Pami's tails drifted again, slow and calm. "I never doubted it."
They spoke longer after that—about Savar, about the board, about the names carved into the top ten. Adlet didn't say it directly, but the competition burned behind every word.
Gillan Horus. Linoa Neraid.
And himself—absent.
Not for long.
Eventually, fatigue returned—not the exhaustion of muscles, but the deep pull of sleep that even a Protector couldn't ignore forever.
Adlet felt the clearing blur at the edges.
"I'll see you again," he murmured.
"That is the path you are walking," Pami replied.
Then Adlet fell into true sleep.
Morning came with a steady rise in the Stars' brightness.
Adlet sat up, rolled his shoulders, and breathed once—slow, measured. His body ached in familiar places, but it was the ache of work, not damage.
He packed quickly and resumed the road.
As he walked, his mind returned to the conversation.
Fire.
He couldn't let it go.
He focused on the red Aura, trying to imagine it not as a shell, but as something that moved outward—something that released rather than contained.
He tried to manifest it as heat.
Nothing.
He tried to push it through his palm like a breath.
Nothing.
He tried again, forcing the image of flame into his mind, forcing Aura to follow the shape of that concept—
The red Aura gathered.
But it remained what it always was.
Dense. Defiant. Defensive.
Adlet exhaled through his nose, irritation rising—then he pushed it down. Anger never helped him learn. It only wasted time.
He kept walking and kept trying.
Failure after failure.
Not discouraging.
Just… information.
Eventually, the road changed.
Not in shape—still the same worn path—but in what surrounded it.
The first shard of a broken wheel lay half-buried in sand.
Then a torn strip of cloth snagged on a thorny branch, fluttering weakly.
Then pieces of wood—splintered, crushed, blackened in places as if scraped by something harder than stone.
Adlet slowed.
His gaze sharpened.
He followed the debris like a trail.
And then he saw it—an entire section of the road littered with wreckage.
Caravan frames snapped in half. Crates torn open. Dried supplies spilled into dust. Dark stains on stone that had been scrubbed by wind but not erased.
A ravage.
Unilateral.
Adlet stepped closer, crouching beside a broken axle. His fingers brushed a deep gouge in the wood.
Too wide for a blade. Too clean for random damage.
A pincer.
His pulse steadied instead of rising.
He stood.
And that was when the ground trembled.
Not a small vibration.
A weight.
A slow, heavy rhythm approaching from beneath the sand.
Adlet turned his head.
The earth to his right bulged upward like something surfacing from water.
Then the sand erupted.
An enormous scorpion rose from below—its carapace a hard, orange-tinted armor that caught the light like heated metal. Thick pincers unfolded, each one large enough to crush a man's torso. Its tail arched high, segmented and powerful, ending in a stinger that looked less like a needle and more like a spear.
A Dominator Scorpion.
Rank 4.
It didn't roar.
It didn't need to.
Its presence was a threat on its own.
Adlet exhaled once and let his Aura answer.
Red gathered first—not as an instinctive habit, but as deliberate preparation.
A Ruby Turtle shell formed along his left side like a shield.
The scorpion moved.
It lunged forward with shocking speed for its size, pincers snapping.
Adlet stepped back and angled his body.
The first pincer slammed into his shell.
The impact rang through the Aura like a bell.
His feet slid a half step in the sand, but the shell held.
Adlet's eyes narrowed.
So that was the level.
The scorpion's second pincer came in from the opposite side—wide, crushing, meant to trap him between force and force.
Adlet manifested a second shell instantly, this one appearing on his right side.
The pincer struck it.
The two impacts overlapped—pressure from both sides.
Adlet felt his Aura strain, not breaking, but demanding more of him.
He shifted—red Aura dissolving in a breath.
Green Aura wrapped his body in its stead, sharpening his balance and letting him reposition with cleaner control.
He slipped backward, out of the attempted clamp.
The scorpion's tail snapped down.
Adlet saw it coming—his reflexes already sharpened from a month of training.
He pivoted—
But the stinger didn't aim for him.
It struck the ground beside him.
Stone cracked.
Dust burst upward.
The vibration traveled through his legs.
A feint.
Before the dust could settle, the scorpion's left pincer whipped through the cloud—fast, predatory, aimed at where it expected him to be.
Adlet threw up a shell—thicker this time, layered.
Two red plates overlapped, one slightly behind the other.
The pincer hit.
The first layer flickered.
The second held.
Adlet's eyes sharpened with interest.
Layers absorb better… but the cost…
The scorpion didn't pause to let him think.
It pressed forward, pincers alternating—strike, strike, strike—each impact forcing Adlet to adjust, to reposition shells, to keep his defense aligned.
Adlet moved like a careful dancer in a battlefield of crushing force.
Left shell. Right shell. Shoulder shell. Rib shell.
His new control let him place them anywhere, and he used it fully.
But the scorpion's advantage was relentless pressure.
Adlet had to spend Aura to maintain defense, and the scorpion knew only one rule:
Break the prey.
The tail struck again, this time directly for Adlet's head.
He formed a shell above him like a dome.
The stinger hit.
The dome cracked—Aura rippling.
Adlet felt the strain punch through his concentration.
He stepped out from beneath it, switching angles, forcing the scorpion to turn.
The creature rotated—heavy but quick for its size.
And suddenly, in the way it moved—pincer positioning, tail alignment, the timing of its strikes—Adlet felt something unsettlingly familiar.
His mind flashed back to the arena.
To Gillan.
To those orange pincers that had felt like they had no gaps.
Adlet's eyes narrowed further.
Same species.
Same guardian type.
But—
This scorpion was cruder.
Its attacks were powerful, but not refined. It committed too hard. It chased openings with instinct instead of planning.
It was like watching the shadow of Gillan's style… slowed down, with rough edges.
Adlet's breath steadied.
He didn't feel fear.
He felt clarity.
If this was the blueprint—
Then he could learn from it.
The scorpion lunged again.
Adlet didn't retreat this time.
He stepped into the motion—just enough to bait the pincer into overextending—then slid to the side with green-Aura sharpened footwork.
The pincer slammed into the ground.
Adlet placed a layered shell between himself and the tail, timing it so the stinger struck the first layer and wasted momentum.
Then he moved again.
He wasn't just blocking.
He was shaping the fight.
The scorpion's next pincer came across, trying to catch him mid-step.
Adlet manifested a shell on his forearm and met it head-on.
Impact.
He felt the first layer of defense weaken.
He added a second—immediately.
The pressure stabilized.
He learned the threshold in real time.
One layer holds against glancing hits.
Two layers hold against committed strikes.
Three layers… would hold against anything—but I can't afford that for long.
The scorpion's tail whipped sideways this time, not stabbing, but sweeping—trying to knock him off balance.
Adlet jumped, knees tucking.
The tail scraped beneath him, carving a line in stone.
He landed lightly and pivoted—
And for a moment, he saw an opening.
The scorpion's body had turned too far.
Its underside was exposed—less armored, softer segments between plates.
Adlet's instincts surged.
He reached for the black Aura.
Not yet.
He held it back.
He wanted to finish cleanly, decisively—but not recklessly.
So he tested the scorpion's response.
He feinted left.
It snapped its pincer toward the feint.
Adlet slid right, letting the pincer overcommit.
The tail stabbed down, trying to cover the gap.
Adlet's shell caught it—one layer, then a second as the pressure increased.
He felt the cost.
But he also felt the pattern.
The scorpion was strong.
But it was predictable.
Adlet's eyes sharpened again.
This is enough.
He made his decision.
He stopped retreating.
Instead, he forced his way forward through the pressure, shells blooming around him in short bursts—blocking just long enough to let him step closer.
The scorpion sensed the change.
Its movements became harsher, more desperate.
It tried to crush him with both pincers at once.
Adlet layered shells on both sides, bracing, feeling the impact shake his bones through Aura.
The shells held—
And in that instant of contact, the scorpion's underside shifted upward slightly.
Just enough.
Adlet didn't hesitate—he stepped in close, almost beneath the creature's body.
The tail snapped down.
A shell bloomed above his head—then a second layer over it, reinforced on instinct.
The stinger struck.
The first layer screamed and fractured.
The second held—barely—stealing the impact's momentum, forcing the tail to recoil a fraction slower than it wanted to.
That fraction was the opening.
Red vanished.
Black took its place in a single breath—no pause, no waste.
Aura surged up his right arm, gathering immediately, condensing with brutal focus.
Not flaring outward. Not announcing itself.
Just… sharpening.
And then it formed—clean and lethal—into a scarab horn along his forearm.
Sleek. Concentrated.
Ready to strike before the tail could rise again.
He drove it upward.
Not into armor.
Into the vulnerable seam beneath.
The horn struck with a violent surge.
The scorpion's body jolted.
Its legs lifted off the ground for a brief moment, weight shifting as the force traveled through it.
Adlet didn't wait for it to recover.
He stepped back half a pace, rotated his hips, and struck again—this time angling the horn into the cracked seam with all the momentum of his body behind it.
The carapace fractured.
A deep, ugly break.
The scorpion convulsed, tail flailing once, pincers snapping uselessly.
Then the weight fell.
It collapsed into the sand with a sound like stone meeting stone.
Adlet stood still, horn dissolving as black Aura faded.
He watched the creature's movement slow.
Then stop.
For a moment, nothing existed but his breathing and the quiet hum of the desert.
Then the particles began to rise.
Orange light drifted from the scorpion's body—like embers without heat—lifting into the air and flowing toward Adlet's chest.
The familiar warmth spread through him—vital energy, absorbed, claimed.
Adlet closed his eyes briefly, feeling the increase settle into his body like a new layer beneath skin.
When he opened them, his gaze was calm.
Not triumphant.
Focused.
He crouched beside the dead scorpion and gripped one of its pincers.
It was heavy—thick armor and dense muscle beneath.
Adlet tightened his grip and pulled.
The pincer tore free with a harsh crack, sand spilling from the joint.
He stood, holding it like proof.
Then he turned back toward the road.
Toward Savar.
The route was still silent, still abandoned.
But Adlet walked it with a different kind of presence now.
He had tested his defense in real combat.
He had learned what worked.
He had confirmed the shape of his next growth.
And he had taken down a Dominator Scorpion—alone.
The desert didn't feel smaller.
If anything, it felt larger.
More layered.
More demanding.
Good.
Adlet tightened his hold on the pincer and started walking.
Because Savar was only one step.
And the Sand Graveyard… was still waiting.