The sun rose once more and they continued their journey across the great desert, all three of them.
"Really? That's not how I envisioned a zombie," Enzo said in surprise as the figure of a young man with glistening hair walked right beside him.
That person was Thane.
Between his resurrection and now there was a small gap of time, but the changes he had undergone were massive. No longer was he the scribbled corpse he was previously. He looked young, his skin meaty and puffy like a young man, and not to talk about his brightly colored blonde hair.
He looked more like a prince than anything.
"Zombie is such a loose term, it's easier to say dead… hence the title dead follower?" Thane explained.
He had turned out to be a very nice person, even offering to carry the void coffin in Enzo's stead. Unfortunately, the coffin was just too heavy for him, so he had to give up on that.
However, he had volunteered a lot more information about what was happening than the lazy nibbleskin had done since they got there.
So in that sense, he was useful.
"Ohhh, that makes sense," Enzo nodded as they walked forward.
Because Thane was just a dead man, he didn't need to fear the sun. So he could walk with Enzo easily. Plus, he was a Ranked Tyrant, not as much as Victoria but powerful enough to scare off a lot of the beasts in the sand like the sand Trihorn.
"He's also a big scaredy cat, putting up a brave front." All of a sudden, nibbleskin appeared on Enzo's shoulder and commented in a mocking tone.
Hearing those words, Thane's expression darkened as he immediately gave chase, trying to catch nibbleskin.
The two of them were like cat and mouse… literally.
"Sigh." Looking at this scene, Enzo could only shake his head. Maybe he was wrong, that feeling he had… Thane looked to be very down-to-earth.
"All of this doesn't really matter, as long as I can get out of here." Enzo made sure not to forget that all of this was a test… these people had died a long time ago.
Yet… he couldn't quite shake this feeling.
That something was horribly wrong somewhere.
As he walked forward, he soon noticed hurried movements behind him, forcing him to look back.
"Not again!!" Enzo whined.
In the far distance, a massive sand worm dove from underneath the sand and faced nibbleskin and Thane… it was chasing them down!!
Without a second thought, Enzo also began running, using the shadows around him to leap forward. Thane's aura worked within a limited space; if he wanted to get far away, he would need to go farther than his range.
The sand worm was one of the few things in the great desert they had to be afraid of. Not only was it monstrously powerful, its blood was also corrosive, especially to night creatures.
And so they ran and ran until finally they lost it.
"So annoying." Enzo collapsed onto the hard ground and heaved a massive sigh of relief.
He was good at running, but that didn't mean he wanted to run. These two's shenanigans had almost got them killed, and it annoyed him to no end.
However, before he could react—
"We've crossed the great desert's threshold…" Thane mused, looking over the horizon.
The sand worm had chased them through a large distance and had only stopped when they crossed through the great desert. Enzo didn't even notice until he was already there.
"Ohh." Enzo frowned.
He could remember… like it was just yesterday they started this journey, and now they had crossed the great desert.
"Hehe, we were already close to begin with, not surprising at all." Thane patted Enzo on the shoulder as nibbleskin landed on the coffin on his back.
"The Grand Canyon isn't far. Let's set up camp in that cave structure over there and wait for nightfall," nibbleskin suggested.
They weren't supposed to pass the threshold without Victoria present. The Grand Canyon was many times more dangerous than the desert.
The things crawling there were scary.
"Okay." Enzo nodded sharply.
And moments later, they moved directly towards the cave and set up camp in the dark.
Exhausted, Enzo closed his eyes and slipped into the kind of heavy sleep only weeks of desert walking could bring.
As his eyes slowly went shut,he heard a voice.
[Night Vision skill activated]
Then his eyes snapped open in a haze as he looked at his hands instinctively. They were covered in blood…no he was covered in blood, his entire body was drenched in a sea of blood in the middle of a massive underground pit.
He hurriedly looked to his left and right, trying to understand where he was all of a sudden, then he noticed several familiar silhouettes.
One was his mother, his real mother making a pot of fish soup, another was Mr. Noland playing a hand of cards with several nightmarish creatures.
It was a very bizarre scene that really caught him off guard. However, he soon noticed something horrifying while looking around.
Victoria was standing right beside the pool of blood completely naked, with someone whispering into her ear.
Enzo knew who this was… it was Thane.
A moment later, as if agreeing with Thane's whispers, Victoria stepped into the pool of blood and covered herself in it before approaching Enzo.
She then asked a strange question:
"Why is there a knife in your head?"
After hearing that, Enzo reached up to his forehead and noticed a knife was firmly lodged within it.
This realization caused a bolt of fear to shoot up his spine as his body suddenly jerked, and he woke up sweating bullets in the cave.