The injured sandworm collapsed against the dust, letting out a final, shrieking gasp that rattled the dry air. Kyle stepped forward and drove his blade deep into its anterior, silencing it instantly.
"What was that for?" Kyle asked, wiping the beads of sweat from his forehead with the back of his arm.
Vaygar lowered himself, studying the fracturing earth beneath their paws. "I think it was calling its friends."
Right on cue, the tree they had taken refuge upon shuddered and began to sink as the ground beneath them splintered apart in a jagged web of cracks. Dozens of massive sandworms erupted from the fissures, writhing in the moonlight.
"We better get out of here," Kyle muttered, taking a leap toward the open sky. But just like before, a towering sandworm lunged from the dark, intercepting his trajectory and forcing him crashing back to the dirt.
Kyle ducked, his reflexes saving him a fraction of a second before a razor-sharp maw snapped shut where his head had been.
"Looks like we're in for a rough night," he panted, hovering just above the writhing rows of beasts. He threw his hands out, summoning a volley of multiple ice spears that rained down relentlessly. They struck hard, piercing the thick carapaces, but the dense shells only managed to slow the worms down rather than stop them.
Realizing the ice wasn't dealing the decisive damage he needed, Kyle shifted his strategy, slamming his palms against the ground to summon sharp earth spikes that impaled several beasts from below. He kept a steady rhythm of long-range attacks flying to keep the swarm at bay, spinning mid-air to hurl a condensed flame arrow straight into a worm that lunged point-blank. The arrow pierced the monster effortlessly, detonating in a violent explosion as it hit the ground behind it.
The battle devolved into a grueling war of attrition that raged on for an hour. Every time he felled a worm, two more crawled up from the widening cracks in the earth. Changing his tactics entirely, Kyle dropped down into close quarters, diving straight into the open jaws of a beast and tearing his way out from the inside.
"Vaygar, come back!" he shouted, ducking another swipe that cleanly sheared the head off a passing monster.
"Are you sure about this?" Vaygar sent back through their mental bond, his voice tight as he clawed a worm trying to ambush Kyle from beneath.
"We don't have time to test it out. Just do it!" Evading a barrage of toxic spikes hurled through the dark, Kyle glanced sideways as Vaygar bolted toward him. Distracted for a split second, another worm lunged from his blind spot, clamping its massive jaws around him.
Kyle caught the upper and lower maw with his bare hands, straining every muscle to keep it from snapping shut. With a fierce grunt, he conjured a jagged energy spear right between its jaws and forced it shut, driving the spear clean through both ends of the monster's head.
Vaygar sprinted as fast as his paws could carry him, but rows of towering sandworms closed in, their razor-sharp teeth reflecting the pale moonlight. Just before a mouthful of chitin could crush him, a heavy lance fell from the sky with devastating force, pinning and tearing through the head of the creature blocking his path.
"Here goes nothing," Vaygar growled, leaping forward and dissolving into a flash of kinetic light that rushed straight toward Kyle.
The runes along Kyle's arms flared with a blinding, violent intensity as Vaygar was absorbed. Thick, obsidian-black scales rippled over his hands, transforming into deadly gauntlets where every finger terminated in a razor-sharp claw. The distinct tribal marks of Vaygar's face materialized across his own skin, and his hair cascaded outward, growing long and wild down to his lower back.
"Remember," Vaygar's voice echoed sharply inside his mind, "you can only maintain beast rage for thirty minutes."
"Thirty minutes is more than enough." Kyle channeled the ambient mana of the wasteland, pulling it into a dense, roaring coalescence upon his palm. He thrust his hand forward, sending a devastating orb of pure energy tearing through everything in its path.
The blast carved an open lane straight toward the heavily guarded chasm crack. Kyle moved like a wraith of slaughter—gutting, tearing, ripping, and destroying every monster in his path, leaving a smoking trail of charred carcasses behind him.
*THIRTY MINUTES LATER...*
"I told you thirty minutes was enough."
Kyle sat casually atop a towering mound of sandworm corpses. As far as the eye could see, the landscape had been utterly scorched, buried under a thick layer of fine ash. The monsters beneath him had been completely incinerated, leaving behind only hollow, blackened shells.
Vaygar stepped out from Kyle's body, shaking out his limbs and landing with a heavy thud beside the pile of ashes. "Should we go into the crack?"
"No need for that. We need to recuperate and save our strength for later."
Kyle and Vaygar settled down to rest for the remaining hours of the night, letting the adrenaline fade into a heavy, aching exhaustion.
A sharp spike of intent pierced the quiet. "Kyle, someone's coming," Vaygar warned, his ears pinning back defensively. "I don't think he's someone we can take on in our current situation."
Still drowsy and battered from the grueling fight, Kyle forced his tired eyes open, turning his gaze toward the direction Vaygar was facing. Out in the desolate distance, a solitary figure draped in a tattered red cloak was slowly approaching. In his hand, he held a glowing lantern aloft, lifting it to illuminate his pale, alabaster skin and a mouth that stretched into a quiet, knowing smile.
Kyle instantly recognized the man standing before him. It was the exact same enigmatic figure who had previously claimed to be sent by the Dark Lord.
"Greetings, esteemed guest of the Lord," the figure spoke, his voice carrying an eerie, resonant echo across the ash-covered dunes. "I am Mongrel, and I have been sent to you by my Lord."