Heir Of Chaos

In contrast to earthworms which he was more familiar with, the worms of the desert had a dry, white, flaky coating covering their skin.

Dale crouched beside the worm’s carcass, the stench of decay already beginning to rise in the heat. He pressed a hand against his side, feeling the dampness of the bandage beneath his fingers.

The wound throbbed and he winced. ’It will definitely scar.’ He didn’t mind that as it would serve as an unforgettable reminder of how close he’d come to dying just because of the military.

It would remind him to exercise caution as well as constantly tell him that the military cared little for disposable assets.

He turned his focus away from the wound.

His eyes traced the length of the worm’s body. The vulture had done a number on it — great gashes torn through its flaky skin, exposing the pale, stringy muscle beneath. Black blood had pooled around the carcass, already drying in the scorching sun.

The metallic scent was horrid but he could manage.

He gripped part of the external skin and pulled it out examining it. It seemed less like skin and more like sand.

’Could it actually be sand?’ It wasn’t outside the realm of possibility. They did live in a desert.

Perhaps after a hunt, the sand they unknowingly consumed was expelled through their skin.

As he was about to continue with his observations, something caught his attention.

Near the creature’s head, where the vulture had torn open a particularly deep wound, there was a glint.

It had caught his attention in particular because it seemed to actively reflect light.

Dale leaned closer, squinting against the harsh light that bounced off it.

It was a crystal.

It was embedded in the worm’s flesh, roughly the size of his fist, jagged and uneven. It caught the sunlight and fractured it into three distinct colors: white, black, and silver.

Dale’s breath caught in his throat.

He reached out, hesitating for just a moment. ’This is insane. I don’t even know what this is. It could be toxic or it could explode. Heck, maybe even both—’

His fingers wrapped around it and all thoughts paused in his head.

The crystal was warm and felt smooth to the touch.

He first tugged gently but it didn’t budge so he tugged harder.

The flesh around the crystal resisted, so Dale looked at it.

Tendons slowly lost their fleshy properties and became like glass around the crystal as if the flesh of the worm had been actively turning crystalline.

If Dale was curious before, now he needed to know what it was.

He gritted his teeth and pulled with all his strength.

The crystal came free with a wet, tearing sound, and for a split second, Dale felt a surge of energy pulse through his palm — a ripple of warmth that traveled up his arm and settled somewhere deep in his chest.

It felt very similar to what he had felt when he first awakened an ability.

He looked down at the crystal in his hand and then it shattered. Dale held his breath as the crystal exploded into a fine dust that hung in the air.

He swore mentally yet forced himself to hold his breath. For all he knew, those were the spores of some kind of parasite that afflicted the worms.

For a moment, the dust hung in the air before swirling toward him, confirming his suspicions. There was no way normal dust would actively go after him.

He tried to run yet the dust cloud hung close. His lungs started to burn from a lack of oxygen and much to his regret, he gasped for air, inhaling the dust.

"Shit! Is this how I’m going to die—"

And then the knowledge hit him.

It was like a dam breaking. A flood of information, too vast to comprehend, and certainly too immense to contain washed over him.

He saw patterns in the sand, understood the heat, and felt the presence of every creature within miles.

Dale could feel the desert’s history, and even somewhat understand the origin of the worms yet all these were nothing to what he felt within himself.

It was as if someone took off a blindfold that had been blocking him from seeing the true potential of his ability skills.

He called upon AIDE.

[Energy Pulse(Active): Release a pulse of energy into any item or object to affect their operation. Requires physical contact]

Just like before, he had failed to truly understand the description of his ability skill.

’It was always there.’ He muttered.

The wound on his hand was meant to heal and scar. That was the normal operation of such an injury.

There was no natural way for the flesh to return to normal.

Yet his ability skill affected the normal operation of objects so why hadn’t he seen this before?

He placed his palms against the wounds and released two Energy Pulses in quick succession.

The wounds throbbed and a little more blood seeped out but it soon stopped.

Dale took off the bandages and his jaw dropped. He had healed himself with no scars or evidence of the initial injury.

"What else can I achieve?" But before he could think on it, his vision blurred, and his thoughts scattered.

Dale collapsed to his knees, gasping for air, his heart pounding so hard he could hear it in his ears.

His hands were shaking and his mind was all over the place. As he was, he could barely tell his left from his right.

He looked down at his palms then at his environment. It was the same yet it felt different once more.

It was almost like he had lost the sudden boost he had gotten earlier.

Dale sat there for a long time, trying to catch his breath, trying to make sense of what had just happened.

’I need to know what that was.’ He needed to know if it was a fluke, or if it was something he could find again.

He looked at the worm’s body. Other patches of flesh looked thicker as though they were almost calcified.

And the question burned in his mind: What else was the worm hiding inside itself?