"What the hell difference does it make!" Zhou Ming shouted. "I know perfectly well that it's devilishly dangerous there even without that! Sand tigers live all over the desert near Dunhuang, and they are senior pack leader level beasts with the earth element! Are you sure you can handle them! In the best-case scenario, I can only scratch them!"
"Don't worry so much, I've studied this issue thoroughly and will be able to guide us, maximally avoiding encounters with those monsters, and besides, we'll head northeast towards the river of lost sands. The scorpions we need live near it," I said confidently, without a shadow of doubt on my face.
"Are you sure you can handle it? Even the desert near the scorching plain is full of treasures, but it's also very dangerous! If we ever encounter a sand tiger, we'll definitely die!" she stated confidently. "And the river of lost sands is a deadly place!"
"Yes, I've heard of it," Jiaxing Er returned to the conversation. "Sand monsters live there; they are elemental creatures of the earth element and essentially form the river itself. Even if you, brother, allowed me to use magic, I would be of little use. My poison is only good against living organic creatures without a shell; for all others, it is much less effective. Traveling through that desert will be very dangerous."
"I know that perfectly well, but the sand monsters do not leave the river's boundaries under any pretext," I stated confidently, recalling a moment from the light novel. "I have already worked out the optimal route for us. This time, Zhou Ming, you are only responsible for Jiaxing Er's safety; you will not engage in battle under any pretext, unless you are attacked while I am busy with other monsters. I will take care of everything else."
"Are you sure you can handle this task?" Zhou Ming asked with disbelief, looking at me strangely.
"Yes, consider it a short excursion that will be as safe as possible," I said, frankly, they weren't really needed. "I'm only taking you so you can see this desert, and also because I have nowhere else to leave you," I said, pausing for a moment and adding, "It will be useful for you, Zhou Ming, to visit this desert; perhaps you can develop your skills to a completely new level. The Gobi Desert area, where the scorching plain is located, is marked for you as one of the special training locations."
"Uh-huh, I see," she said indifferently, apparently resigned to my methods or simply considering me crazy.
"If brother says everything will be fine, then it will be," Jiaxing Er declared confidently, smiling and hugging my arm, pressing it to her chest, to which I didn't react at all.
"You're too confident in him, even though you've only known him for a couple of months," Zhou Ming said thoughtfully, and then, realizing, added in a flustered and worried voice, "What are you doing! Do sisters behave like this? Where have you seen someone hug their own brother like that!"
"What's wrong with that?" Jiaxing Er asked innocently.
"I don't care at all," I shrugged, as I didn't see anything wrong with it, plus I enjoyed feeling a woman's breast with my hand. On the other hand, I had only walked like this with Lin Yun Er, and after realizing this fact, my chest felt somewhat empty. It had been a month since she finally broke up with me, but I still deeply regretted the memories of her.
"But... but... You're not a little girl, Jiaxing Er, you could be mistaken for a couple of lovers!" Zhou Ming continued to protest.
"So what? The main thing is that we know we are brother and sister," Jiaxing Er countered. "What difference does it make to you? Or have you set your sights on brother?" she added playfully, smiling slyly.
"No, I'm not going to fall in love with this crazy tormentor teacher!" Zhou Ming said angrily, turning away.
"Still can't let go of Lin Yun Er?" Asura's voice echoed in my head. "There are so many beautiful girls around you. Jiaxing Er, though a bit strange, what difference does it make! And Zhou Ming, though she doesn't admit it, definitely has feelings for you!"
"You know yourself what I feel. Lin Yun Er wasn't just the first person I loved. She was the first person I wanted to show warmth to. Even if she broke up with me completely, it doesn't mean I'll give up, or at least forget her quickly," I retorted in an indifferent tone.
"But what's stopping you from having fun... training with other girls for now?" Asura asked in response to my words.
"I don't want to betray my first love, firstly. And secondly, Zhou Ming can't even be considered; she's just confused about her feelings. As for Jiaxing Er, she's just a tool for me to achieve my goals. Excessive attachment can ruin everything."
"Are you sure you don't feel anything for Jiaxing Er anymore?" Asura asked resignedly.
"There's definitely some attachment due to the similarity of our fates, but nothing more. You could say it's just pity for a kindred spirit. However, she's not like me; she's accepted her fate and just ran away," I said with slight contempt. "Did you fall for someone among them?"
"No, of course not. We have similar thinking and almost identical emotions. Consider that what you feel, I feel too," Asura said indifferently, as if shrugging. "However, female affection is pleasant."
I didn't continue this idle conversation with him anymore and focused on what was required for the successful completion of the tasks. Firstly, I went to the store and bought water, remembering that it would be bad in the desert without it. Well, and secondly, I bought light clothing for myself and the girls that covered the whole body, similar to what they wear in Arab countries. I didn't want to suffer from the intense heat in the desert.
After all the purchases, we finally headed to the airport, where we were going before I remembered the necessary purchases. No, they could have been made in Dunhuang, but they would have cost many times more there. During the flight, I carefully checked our route again. Unlike the foothills of Qing-Ling and Tian Shan, where there were rather weak monsters, as well as the forests of Bo City and the jungles of Taihu Lake, the Gobi Desert, especially near the scorching plain, is a very dangerous place. It is recognized as such at the national level and is one of the most dangerous places in China!
So, despite all my confident words, I had to be very careful and double-check everything before leaving. Our lives truly depended on it. I am sure I can defeat a sand tiger one-on-one, but if there are two of them, it's definitely death. Of course, it is too dangerous to embark on this journey now, but not as much as going into the center of the Qing-Ling mountains. Besides, there is an urgent need to go there, so there is not much choice.
Upon arrival, I immediately felt the heat. Despite it being the height of summer, it was too hot in Dunhuang. We arrived in the evening, so we stayed at a local hotel for one night to finally freshen up after the foothills of Qing-Ling and rest before the desert journey. Naturally, there will be almost no landmarks there, but I am far from Mo Fan and do not have geographical cretinism; on the contrary, I orient myself very well in the terrain.
The next day, I woke the girls up very early, gave them sets of sun-protective clothing, as well as sunscreen. It's summer now, and we're heading to the desert, so extra sun protection will definitely not be superfluous. The journey ahead was quite long; only by noon tomorrow would we be able to reach the habitat of the fire scorpions, and that's in the best-case scenario.
As we walked through the safe territory, I recalled everything I knew about this desert from various books, as well as the original. It was precisely in the scorching plain that Mo Fan would find a small fire elemental, a hetera, a few years later, which would greatly increase his powers. This encounter is essentially one of the key ones. If it doesn't happen or leads to a different result than in the original, Mo Fan will become much weaker, that's for sure. Nothing can replace such a huge loss.
Recalling this moment, I also remembered the circumstances under which this encounter occurred. They are actually quite tragic; perhaps I could have improved them, but it is dangerous for me in every sense of the word. Firstly, it will undoubtedly affect the encounter itself, and possibly lead to the worst-case scenario for me. Secondly, for this, I will have to cross the river of lost sands, which for me at the moment is equivalent to suicide.
When we left the safe zone, I immediately became very cautious; now, with every step, we were approaching one of the most dangerous places in China. Sand tigers, of course, did not live so close to the city, but they are solitary, so they can easily wander into these lands. Also, under no circumstances should we discount other servant and pack leader level monsters of this desert, of which there are quite a few diverse species.
From sand spiders and lizards to full-fledged large herbivores, tigers have to eat something. Also, a bunch of sand golems lived in the desert; they are very strong creatures of the higher servant or junior pack leader level, with great resistance to all elements. Although our path lay along the safest route possible, it was impossible to completely get rid of uninvited guests.
The first to appear on our path was a giant sand spider, or rather a whole group of them, ten in number. They were all together wrapping a killed copper-skinned lizard in their webs, a creature of the true pack leader level, while the spiders were only high servants and differed little from the giant spiders from Lake Taihu that I had seen many times before. The fact that victory over this carcass cost them great effort was proven by a couple of corpses of similar spiders lying nearby. We certainly had the opportunity to go around and not fight them, but their poison, chitin, and some other organs could be very useful to us.
"You see, I told you this was a dead end! Look at the dangerous monsters we're encountering, even though we've only gone fifteen to twenty kilometers from the city!" Zhou Min began to grumble.
"Brother, will we go around them, or do we need them too?" Jiaxing Er asked calmly, as if she didn't see any threat in these spiders.
"Yes, it wouldn't hurt to take their venom glands and chitin, though we'll have to act fast so as not to attract the attention of other monsters," I said, stretching slightly.
"Are you serious…" Zhou Min didn't have time to finish before I was already heading towards the spiders.
On the way, I instantly created a couple of wind blades and killed the two closest spiders. The rest noticed something was wrong, and seeing me, they hissed and started to attack. Although they were very fast, they weren't fast enough. Six more fell to my wind blades as they ran towards me. Using a wind dash, I flew up about twenty meters and finished off two more with the same wind blades. The reason I didn't use lightning was that it could attract other beasts, looking for tasty mages. And I still have to butcher these carcasses!
"…tried…" Zhou Min finally managed to finish her sentence. "Damn it! How do you form star paths so quickly! It feels like you already have them ready and you just unleash the magic!"
"Well, something like that," I answered honestly. After the raid on the Khabarovsk Guardians' base and strengthening my inner star energy, the star path formed by itself, so it was literally instantaneous. All I had to do was wish to create a spell and unleash it.
"Just don't tell me you achieved this by experimenting with the stars?" Zhou Min pleaded, clearly not thrilled with such a method of developing abilities.
"Exactly, only I think you'll need more time to reach the same level as me, although even a visible effect might appear only after a couple of months of training," I said with a smile, starting to butcher the spider carcasses, and at the same time collecting the teeth and claws of the lizard, the skin unfortunately was badly damaged.