A chill crept up his back.

‘From below.’

He immediately crouched and, utilizing the full power of his leg muscles, dashed to the side. Less than a second afterwards, the worm rose from the earth beneath where he was moments ago. Had he stayed still, he would have been swallowed whole and likely torn to shreds by its powerful teeth. What followed was a sequence where the sandworm would dive into the ground and attack from below before diving again, while Liam madly dashed around, avoiding its attacks. It was an enemy unlike any he had fought before.

‘If it keeps damaging the ground, it will collapse.’

The creature was enormous. The tunnels it was making below him were sure to be big enough to weaken the soil’s structure, especially given the large cracks on it. If the battle continued on in such fashion, the ground he was standing on would soon collapse into the canyon.

‘Maybe…’

An idea crossed Liam’s mind. He started running to previously undamaged patches of ground, making the worm burst through them and damage their structure. The whole earth below them shook dangerously. Doing this several more times, Liam managed to make it start to slide into the canyon. It was a gigantic landslide.

‘Now!’

As he slid towards the abyss with the sandworm in tow, he jumped at the rocks falling through the air, hopping from one to another with blinding speed before leaping towards the canyon wall. Nonetheless, he was still too far away. He gathered his focus on the tip of his Aura Blade. He had never tried it before, but it was now or never. Almost in slow motion, he started falling as the Aura Blade crawled over itself, lengthening. As it reached a length of almost three meters, it dug into the canyon wall.

Creating a large scar on it, Liam managed to grind to a halt. The sandworm, on the other hand, fell helplessly into the abyss. Liam was not done yet, however.

CRACK

Punching the canyon wall, his arm entered it until he was elbow deep. Digging his toes into the solid stone with ease, he felt stable enough. Grabbing his spear with his free hand, he pulled his arm back.

‘Pierce.’

Then, he threw the weapon. Like a railgun, the spear shot downwards, splitting the air apart. It shot as a beam of light into the worm’s body. It was Liam’s Nameless Skill to its fullest. The only Aura that remained within him was the one he was using to hold onto the spear as a thread.

BANG

The spear hit the sandworm’s outside armor. The air froze before imploding, large cracks spreading throughout the carapace. Blood oozed out of the cracks. The sandworm roared in pain as it fell towards the depths. Liam’s arm shook as he pulled back the spear and grabbed it.

‘It’s still alive.’

He hadn’t managed to completely pierce through its armor and damage the body directly. Even so, he was now too tired to even move properly, much less chase the sandworm into unknown territory. The fog inside the canyon burned his skin. It was different from the one outside, almost as if it were by design. It corroded his body the same way it corroded the soil and wood. Liam hissed in pain as he pulled himself up, scaling the canyon walls. Climbing out of the crack, he laid on the ground, huffing. With his back touching the ground, he finally allowed himself some time to breathe.

‘Damn, I wish all those Shades gave me XP.’

Even so, he felt a small bit of happiness regarding how far he’d come. He was now so more powerful than when he started, it was incomparable. He finally allowed himself to check the System notifications he got during the fight.

[Your proficiency with the Aura Blade Active Skill has sharply increased.]

[Basic Footwork Mastery has become Intermediate Footwork Mastery (Modified)]

[You have killed a great number of Spawns! The Source begins to stir.]

While he was happy about the first two notifications, the last one worried him.

‘So they’re called Spawns? Not Shades? Eh, Shades is a better name. And what is the Source?’

He felt too exhausted to ponder these questions deeply. Still heaving, he sat up and watched his surroundings. Soon, the fog would coalesce into monsters once more and he would have to fight.

‘Now that I think about it, while they don’t grant XP, they’re great as fighting partners.’

The Spawns’ endlessly respawning nature meant that they could be used as a great way to obtain experience and develop his skills in life-and-death situations. Liam had already begun to notice that his skill proficiency rose much faster during fights, especially during the more dangerous ones. The higher the risk of death, the faster his skills developed. It was also a way for the System to reward those who constantly fought.

‘The sandworm should rise again soon.’

Before it did, he would have to have recovered enough to fight once more. Hoping his Constitution and Recovery stats would be enough, Liam forcefully sat up, in spite of his body’s aches of protest. At the very least, he hadn’t been injured heavily by the worm. Most of his wounds had been inflicted upon him by the Shades. He was slowly but surely getting more used to fighting the behemoths.

‘The sandworm is weaker than the Flood Dragon Hatchling.’

Despite being bigger, it was also slower and weaker than the Hatchling. Its methods of attack were more varied, however. Its underground attacks were much more dangerous than the Flood Dragon’s open movements, all of which Liam had learned through fighting the stone version. In addition to the fog, it was a challenge comparable to the hardest fights he’d fought in his life. Even so, Liam’s situation was better than in the past, in spite of the odds stacked against him. It was a clear sign of his development and made his chest swell with pride. The emotion was quickly killed off. He had no time to be feeling such things.

For the next few hours, he focused on recovering his Aura as his injuries stitched themselves up automatically. While his Aura regeneration rate was barely enough to keep up with his healing’s energy demand, he was still beginning to feel hungry and thirsty. The sensations were thrown to the back of his mind as he thought about the question he had been grappling with for the last hour.

‘Why didn’t the sandworm come up again?’

It had presumably fallen all the way down to the bottom of the gorge, but that shouldn’t have been a problem for something of its size. Liam could think of two possibilities. The first, the gorge was much deeper than he anticipated and the creature’s weight made the fall’s impact great enough to seriously injure or kill it. This was unlikely, since he hadn’t heard the notification indicating the sandworm’s death. Then again, maybe the System couldn’t analyze environmental deaths very well. The second was the one Liam found to be more likely.

‘There’s something at the bottom.’

It was a rather simple premise, really. Something at the bottom of the canyon had rendered the sandworm unable to climb back up. In Liam’s opinion, it should be the so-called “Source”. The fog inside the crack had been capable of eroding his skin. If, as expected, it got worse the deeper one went, it wasn’t far-fetched for it to be able to also erode the worm’s armor.

‘Only one way to find out.’

Liam stood up and looked over at the concentration of fog above the crack. It was where the sandworm had been, as well as the general area the army of Spawns had been circling. Some of the Shades had already taken form once more, but their numbers were still low. Grasping his spear, Liam dashed forward, following the gorge’s sides. Quickly dispatching the enemies, he coated himself in Aura before walking into the fog.

Immediately, he frowned. The fog was cold. Unreasonably so. It ground against his Aura, the two different kinds of darkness intertwining and fighting each other. It was only then that Liam truly noticed how similar the fog and his Aura were in color. In fact, they were practically indistinguishable from the other. The youth froze, stopping in his steps for just a moment before continuing to walk. What did this mean? Could this mean that his Aura and the mysterious fog were similar in nature? No, that shouldn’t be it. His Aura did not feel cold and could neither coalesce into solidified shapes or creatures. Then, why were they alike? Why was his Aura also dark in color? His frown deepened.

Throwing the questions to the back of his mind, Liam focused on walking increasingly forward. The fog was starting to become denser, as if solid shadow were trying to engulf him. His Aura was beginning to falter, slowly being pressed against his skin by the fog’s pressure. Gritting his teeth, Liam endured. The cold around him chilled him to his bones, making him unintentionally shiver from time to time. Closing his eyes, he tried to keep moving his feet and ignore the sensations around him. The darkness swallowed his body. He could no longer tell if he was walking in the same direction, or if he was even in the same place. His sense of direction was affected. He could no longer tell which way was up and which was down, his head heavy. Anguish gradually took hold of his heart. Would he be unable to make it out? Would he be trapped in this crushing darkness forever?

He could no longer feel his Aura. Opening his eyes, Liam found himself in a completely black environment. He felt as if he were in outer space, the overwhelming darkness all around him. In front of him, a single hole could be seen. It was as if it were floating in the dark, the stone outline being the only thing visible. Liam walked up to it. Looking down, he could not see the bottom. All that remained was pure darkness, somehow even darker than the one around him.