Chapter 66: Blood Warrior Rank 1
Chapter 66: Blood Warrior Rank 1
The sand beneath Oliver's feet gave way to silence as the last of his steps echoed into the desert's throat. And before him lay the high and low ground riddled with mounds, each twitching, shifting, moving.
The Bottomless-Bellied Desert Bloody Scorpions burst from the sand like summoned demons—red carapace gleaming, stingers long as spears, claws thicker than wagon wheels. Each one was the size of a royal carriage and like before, they were fast. Much faster than anything their size had a right to be.
Oliver didn’t wait. He let out a sharp breath and activated his Aether Sense
The world changed in his eyes.
Light and sound sharpened. The air quivered with the breathing of monsters. In his mind’s eye, the battlefield was a three-dimensional map of hostility and motion. Every claw twitch. Every sand shift. Every hidden sting.
><"Oh, look at him go. I'm so proud." The skull watched with a particular look in its eyes.
Oliver took his stance, fingers loose, legs grounded, exhaling through his nose.
And then they rushed him.
The first scorpion lunged, its stinger lashing toward his chest. He rolled to the right—barely—feeling the wind of the sting brush his skin. As it landed, he slid beneath the beast’s shadow, his hand cocking backward with precision.
Thud!
The one-inch punch struck the scorpion in its lower thorax.