His wish to find a shade ran asunder.
The wanderer drank water he created using the action of water with the help of his trusted little metal pipe. He drank gulps in an instant.
Yet, his goal felt becoming ephemeral as the mirage always seemed distant no matter the distance he travelled. He had chased after it for couple of hours and the desert let its heat sneak into his overcoat. If he claimed that the desert was a frying pan, it would not have been too far from his own truth.
A thought strove against the heated weather in his mind and asked, "Why am I doing this? What's it for?"
He did not have an answer at the ready.
Sweat blazed on his back evaporating leaving a cool sensation time to time. Wind picked up on it and grazed against those spots with more ferocity than it assaulted his rest of the body.
This cruelty of the desert added up with the vast swathes of sand particles that rode the wind. He knew he wasn't caught in a sandstorm, yet his surroundings never let a moment be wasted not to assault him.
His steps never faltered. Taking a few more while drinking down water, he held on his rope in the left hand. For the last day and today he had not ran into something but he always felt there was something or someone hidden. 'What was this premonition's basis?'
It had even made him quieter as if being silent would be better.
The land below him and around him was either stark white or shone with a golden hue, while the sky kept clear.
Were the clouds afraid of being in the desert or they stopped existing as it tried to pass over it?
A question he had no answer of, yet felt compelled to ask.
Albeit he may have been dulled at the edges, still he was no fool to ignore the hidden signs that the world had embedded.
The desert had grown quieter while the heights of the sand dunes became uneven. He pressed on. A lingering hunch remained under his skin and his preparation apt according to it.
The next action depended on the world and its inhabitants.
Ascending a sand dune, same as the last one, the wanderer reached its top. Craning his neck and back to destroy the lethargy of constant travel.
While he did that, a dune few dunes later in the same direction he was going in expanded vividly. The boy was unsurprised.
Sand bellowed and flowed down on the sides of a vicious beast hidden as if behind a sand made veil.
Wind crashed into its body but it hid a subtle sound of a rope whipping. The wanderer's arms moved, "So what kind of a terrabeast or earthenbeast are you?"
Rather than using his rope like a sling, his rope swung and straightened for a split second.
The terrabeast had not even declared a roar. Yet, the boy had chosen to seal its fate. In a battle who moves first doesn't win, but one who moves better wins.
As wanderer's custom made rope unfurled and straightened under force created by him rotating it at full speed. The rope became straight as much as it could like line drawn from the wanderer's hand to the supposed chest of this particular obscured terrabeast.
And then within the split second, the wanderer drew the action of earth on his rope and pulled back on it.
But he wasn't over.
While the effect of the action of earth understood the structure of the rope, it didn't have time to ascertain the direction of the rope. The wanderer not only pulled back on his rope but moved it out of the forming structure of a spear as the effect of the earth.
At the same time, the terrabeast began its roar. A terrifying screech that crashed and suffocated the air away from its surroundings.
Was it enough? For the wanderer had moved to perform a second action. The action of fire on the forming structure that replicated the empty spaces of the rope using the action of earth's effect.
Wrinkles of a smile found its way to the wanderer's sky eyed face, as the structure forming was shining with a metallic sheen.
'It's going to hurt.'
His smile expanded while the roar attempted to reach its middle. The split second slipping, the action of fire ignited the formed spear of metal.
Closing his left hand, he punched hard into the bottom of the floating semi-formed blazing metallic league-long spear.
The spear ignited and not by the first effect of the action of fire but by the second directed force flame. A spear of blazing hot metal punched by a boy of 16 years flew.
It flew as it embedded and pierced the heart of the terrabeast. Coming out partially out of the back of the beast.
Huffing, the boy screamed, "Yes! First successful hunt! Woo-hoo!"
Terrabeast responded similarly.
Its claws escaped the veil of sand. Shining under light the claws proved their ivory colour, while the terrabeast's body silhouetted against the sky matching its own colour in the shadow.
Yet it bled. For its roar was its last ever in this wide unending desert.
Before the wanderer could brace himself, the beast rolled over with the spear embedded in it coming out of its supposed chest and back.
The dust and sand flowed over taking advantage and became a blast by the wind. The boy's face tasted several dust particles blow in.
"Ehhh!" Coughing out he belched over to the side.
If he hadn't, his own spear's broken shard would have slashed his face or neck. Saved by the sandblast, the wanderer looked in horror at the beast he had killed.
"That's… That's a desert monger. Ivory claws, no head, dark hide." He gulped down empty.
A flash of memory of a script he read once, that detailed how treacherous and terrifying a desert monger could be. One that has grown to its full size.
The wanderer's breath tasted the scent of deep metallic blood. He thought he killed it for sure, but that scent gave it away that he is successful in it.
"Any beast that dies, including humans, if their blood smells deep metallic they are more than likely to be dead given the blood pool is bigger than their body." He repeated the words to its last syllable.
Breathing in, and glancing at the fast forming blood pool told his kill was a success.