"Monoblos?!" Altaïr exclaimed.
The red Sandship they were piloting was tucked in tight, less than ten meters off the lead ship's flank, using its massive hull as shelter from the sandstorm and the Cephalos school's attacks.
At least seven or eight other Sandships had made the same choice, clustering into a large mass beside and behind the lead ship.
The gaps between these small Sandships were barely a few meters, maintained solely by the exceptional piloting skills of the competitors in such a tight formation.
A single wrong move by any one Sandship would trigger a widespread collision and capsize them all.
When the sandstorm dispersed, everyone cheered; when the Cephalos school appeared, tension rose, but no one panicked.
After all, at least half the Sandship pilots in the race were fishermen from the sand sea by trade.
Though Cephalos were far more dangerous than the common sand fish spread throughout the Great Desert, they were still a key target for sand-sea fishermen. Every crew had its own methods for handling them, so they would not panic like ordinary people at the sight of a Cephalos.
But the moment the Monoblos appeared, everyone panicked.
This Monster was on an entirely different level from Cephalos. Even the strongest of the Cephalos school, a Cephadrome whose size approached that of a Flying Wyvern, had been killed in an instant without the slightest ability to resist.
A Monoblos could flip a large swath of small Sandships like theirs with just a shake of its head.
Altaïr's expression grew terrifyingly grim.
This was his first encounter with a Monoblos, but as a Hunter, especially one from the Great Desert, how could he not understand the terror of this "Desert Knight"? Countless Hunters attempted to challenge the Monoblos every year, seeking to claim its horn, widely hailed as the "Hero's Proof," to prove their valor, but only a handful truly succeeded.
Most challengers stained that crimson horn with their own blood and were buried in the sand sea.
The Monoblos, with the Cephadrome's corpse impaled on its horn, landed back in the sand sea. Altaïr's eyes locked onto this notoriously ill-tempered "Desert Knight."
He watched as it violently shook its head, flinging the Cephadrome's mangled corpse aside.
"Groooaaarrr!"
Letting out a frenzied roar at the sky, the Monoblos flailed its two powerful wing claws, gouged through the yellow sand, and burrowed beneath the surface in the blink of an eye, vanishing without a trace.
But instead of letting Altaïr breathe a sigh of relief, this only sent his heart leaping into his throat.
The Monoblos was one of the rare, purely herbivorous Large Flying Wyverns, yet its temperament and aggression far surpassed many carnivorous Flying Wyverns.
When a Rathalos or other carnivorous Flying Wyvern attacked, it was usually for food. But the Monoblos was different: its nature was purely violent, and it craved battle.
Whether the opponent was a "weakling" like a Cephadrome, a formidable foe capable of killing it like a Tigrex, a powerful Hunter, or even just an eyesore of a giant boulder, it would charge without a moment's hesitation.
If it were any other Monster, even its close relative the Diablos, it would retreat upon seeing such a large fleet.
But not the Monoblos. The Monoblos craved battle above all else.
"Scatter! Everyone scatter!" With no time to think about the race, Altaïr, standing at the bow of the Sandship, waved his arms vigorously and shouted to the tightly clustered competing ships around him.
However, he was not equipped with Armor or a weapon at the moment, so no one knew he was a Hunter.
Even if they had known, most people's first reaction to a stranger suddenly shouting orders would be confusion rather than immediate compliance.
Altaïr had no choice but to keep shouting, "A Monoblos won't stop its attack easily! It will burst out from under the sand! We're too big a target!"
His cries finally caught the attention of the other competitors. Now that the sand and dust had cleared, there was no need to keep clinging tightly behind the lead ship.
A few competitors tried to maneuver their Sandships and spread out.
But they were packed together too tightly. To avoid collisions that could capsize them, they could only slowly disperse from the outside in.
Suddenly, a giant horn like a sky-piercing Lance shot out of the sand, snapping a small Sandship clean in half. Then, the Monoblos burst through the sand's surface, swinging its giant horn and wings, overturning three or four nearby Sandships in a single breath.
The remaining Sandships scattered in every direction, no longer caring about collisions, desperate only to get away from the terrifying Flying Wyvern that had emerged onto the ground.
The red Sandship piloted by Altaïr and Asa was positioned farther ahead and was not caught by the Monoblos's underground ambush, but the two still chose to turn their ship sideways, decelerate, and stop immediately.
One of them was a Hunter, the other a member of the Loc Lac Rangers. Facing an attacking Monster, their first instinct was naturally not to flee, even without their weapons.
There was both good news and bad news.
The good news was that, for experienced Sandship handlers, capsizing was a common accident. Even if the ship flipped while underway, they had enough experience to ensure they would not suffer serious injury when falling into the sand.
Thus, those who capsized were not too badly hurt; at least no one died on the spot or was completely incapacitated.
But the bad news was, they had fallen near the Monoblos.
This Large Flying Wyvern, over twenty meters long, could crush them into paste just by pacing back and forth casually.
What could they do?!
—--
Meanwhile, on the lead ship.
The Monoblos's sudden appearance left both Isis and Nymera relieved and alarmed.
Relieved, because Lambert's luck had turned at the last possible instant, saving her from the jaws of death; alarmed, because compared to the Cephadrome, or even the entire Cephalos school, the Monoblos would only be harder to deal with.
Without a moment's thought for anything else, Isis swung her Gunlance, chopping down the figurehead with Lambert still tied to it.
Before she could fall, Isis grabbed the iron chain and tossed the foaming, unconscious Lambert back onto the deck.
Then, with no time to discuss anything with Nymera, she grabbed her Large Shield and Gunlance, vaulted over the ship's side, and ran toward the Monoblos left behind in the lead ship's wake.
Clawdia and Sajji followed close behind. Nymera was about to join them when the lead ship's captain called out to stop her.
"The Cephalos school still isn't dealt with! There could be other Monsters ahead. We can't have everyone leave!"
Nymera's steps halted.
Just as the captain said, the lead ship was the most vital vessel in the entire fleet. It could not stop, and it absolutely could not be put at risk.
Whether it was the racing ships or the other support vessels, all of them had to be guided by the lead ship through the perilous Great Desert.
That was precisely why the organizers had assigned her and Isis, the two strongest escorts, to this lead ship.
Left with no choice, Nymera had to abandon the idea of joining Isis against the Monoblos. She dashed over to the corner of the deck where they had stowed their luggage, grabbed Altaïr's Khanga Rebellion, and tossed it to Hibiki.
"Go help!"
Hibiki caught the Long Sword in his jaws, leaped over the deck railing, and bolted after Isis at full speed.
—--
On the other side, with no other options available, Altaïr and Asa could only try to draw that Monoblos's attention by shouting at the top of their lungs.
But the effect was extremely limited. Compared to the two of them hollering and the wounded scattered across the ground, the Monoblos was clearly far more interested in the next Sandship passing by.
Asa did not even dare fire an SOS Flare to call a support vessel over, terrified that before the support ship could get close, it would catch the Monoblos's attention first and cause even greater casualties.
Just when they were caught with no good options, two booming cannon blasts rang out from a hundred meters away. Boom! Boom!
That unnatural sound seized the Monoblos's attention. It swiveled its gaze toward the source of the cannon fire.
"Hraaaaaagh!"
Isis charged at full speed toward the distant Monoblos, her Large Shield raised in her right hand and her Gunlance angled behind her in her left.
This bizarre, seemingly incongruous charging stance originated from the Arbiter Estrellian battle, the "Assault Shield Rush" that Fabius had once used.
Isis could not condense her fighting spirit into a spiraling, storm-like airflow to further boost her propulsion the way Fabius could; she had only managed to mimic the posture in rough form.
But she had to admit, with enough raw strength behind it, this charging stance was quite a bit faster than the standard shield rush, where a hunter normally leveled their lance and braced their shield.
The Monoblos snapped its attention to her.
A head-on charge? Not a single Monoblos alive could refuse that kind of "challenge"!
It lowered its massive skull, aimed its lance-like single horn straight ahead, and clawed at the ground with its powerful hind legs. In the next second, it roared and burst forward in a thundering charge.
(Translated by yourtl.app)