Sand Mage of the Burnt Desert - Chapter 53: Cyclops' Packed Lunch
“Snap out of it.”
Someone tapped Mandy's cheek and whispered.
Only then did Mandy regain consciousness.
The first thing to enter her vision as she opened her eyes was the dim cave ceiling.
“Where are we?”
“Cyclops' nest.”
“What?”
“Quiet!”
The man pressing a finger to his lips in a shushing gesture was someone Mandy knew.
Unlike her, he had distinct East Asian features.
Black hair, black eyes. A young man whose face still bore traces of acne.
“Korean descent, Kim Sang-sik, right?”
“Yeah. Keep your voice down.”
Kim Sang-sik nodded.
As Mandy had said, he was of Korean blood.
He wasn't an Awakener.
He was a technician dispatched to maintain the vehicles.
Mandy shook her head and pushed herself upright. The cave's interior came into sharp focus.
The ceiling loomed a full ten meters overhead.
High enough for even a Cyclops to walk without stooping.
The floor was littered with countless monster corpses—clearly the remnants of the Cyclops' meals.
Mandy and Kim Sang-sik were trapped in a birdcage-like contraption dangling from the ceiling.
Crafted from some unidentified metal, the bars were woven so densely that no escape route was visible.
Mandy snorted.
“Hmph! I can just smash this damn thing.”
Though she'd been caught off guard and knocked out by Anika's ambush, she was an exceptionally skilled Awakener.
Otherwise, Neo Seoul wouldn't have bothered sending her out as a super supervisor.
She was a magic-type Awakener.
Her specialty was wind magic.
Mandy tried to slice through the cage with blades of wind. But for some reason, the mana in her body refused to stir.
“No use. You can't use mana in here.”
“What do you mean? Why not?”
“This cage seems like an item that suppresses mana.”
“What? No way a Cyclops could make something like that, no matter how clever they are.”
“They didn't make it. Looks like they lucked into some dungeon loot.”
“Hmm!”
Only then did it click for Mandy.
Dungeons could spit out anything.
Neo Seoul itself owed its existence to items scavenged from them.
“Ha! So we're the Cyclops' packed lunch, huh.”
The only reason she and Kim Sang-sik were still breathing was that the Cyclops weren't hungry yet.
Made sense—they'd devoured everyone from the shelter.
Mandy clenched her fist.
“What about Team 7? You see what happened to them?”
“No. I blacked out too...”
“Daring to sucker-punch me. Once we're out, they won't get away with it.”
Mandy vowed revenge.
The super supervisor gig in Neo Seoul wasn't some poker bluff. She had the skills to back it up.
Once she made it back safely, dealing with Team 7 would be child's play.
The issue was getting out first.
Thud! Thud!
Heavy footsteps reverberated through the cave.
The Cyclops were back.
Kim Sang-sik's face drained of color.
“The Cyclops... Ngh! We're done for.”
He went pale as a ghost.
He wasn't an Awakener like Mandy—just a regular guy.
He'd held it together until now, but the Cyclops broke him.
Mandy tried to steady him.
“Stay calm. We won't die.”
“How? Against monsters that shrug off Awakener attacks...”
“...”
Mandy had no answer.
Things looked just as bleak for her.
Cyclops were the bane of Awakeners.
A catastrophe for magic-types like her.
She still had no clue how to take one down.
Thud! Thud!
The footsteps grew louder until the Cyclops appeared.
Groooar!
Their single eyes flashed as they lumbered closer.
Up close, they were even more horrifying.
“Ugh!”
Kim Sang-sik curled into a ball, clutching his head. Focus fled his eyes, drool spilled from his mouth.
The Cyclops' aura was driving him mad—one key reason normals couldn't fight monsters.
The three Cyclops had fresh blood around their mouths from a recent hunt, yet they scanned hungrily for prey.
They spotted the two in the cage.
Groooar!
Thud! Thud!
They strode forward.
Three Cyclops, two meals.
They fought over them.
The massive cave shook like it might collapse.
The victor was the biggest Cyclops.
It quickly overpowered the others and approached smugly.
Mandy's face darkened as it drew near.
Creak!
The cage door swung open, and a massive hand seized Kim Sang-sik.
With the door ajar, the item's effect lifted—the mana suppression vanished.
“Get off him!”
Mandy flung a desperate Wind Cutter. But it fizzled harmlessly.
It couldn't breach the Cyclops' formidable anti-magic.
Her attack was enough to provoke it, though.
Groooar!
The Cyclops switched targets, grabbing Mandy.
“Urk!”
She groaned as crushing force gripped her. Her mind fogged under the pressure.
The Cyclops lifted her toward its maw.
Eloi!
As Mandy desperately called out the name—
Whoosh!
A strange sound reached her ears.
Like water rushing through a narrow pipe.
But this was a deep desert cave.
No water passages here.
Mandy figured it was a dying hallucination.
The Cyclops reacted oddly, though.
As if a massive foe had invaded, they snatched up clubs and glared toward the sound.
Roooar!
The noise swelled.
The leader sensed trouble, shoved Mandy back into the cage, and joined the others staring ahead.
What the hell's going on?
Mandy peered out, her life barely spared.
Her vision was blurry—blood vessels in her eyes burst from the earlier squeeze.
Then—
Roooar!
An enormous torrent of sand flooded the cave.
The "water" sound had been sand surging through the tunnel.
The speed defied imagination.
Like a tsunami, it engulfed the Cyclops.
Roooar!
Groooar!
They roared in resistance.
But no matter their size, they couldn't repel sand filling the entire cave.
Boom boom boom!
Like a high-pressure jet, the sand blasted in with ferocious momentum.
The Cyclops swung clubs wildly. The sand didn't yield—instead slamming into them harder.
Groooaaar!
Their roars weren't threats.
They were cries of terror. But Mandy and Kim Sang-sik couldn't tell.
They'd both blacked out.
Clang!
The invading sand spun at blinding speed, shredding the Cyclops.
Their anti-magic hides tore away, exposing raw red muscle.
Mighty muscles ripped free, bones laid bare—then pulverized in seconds.
For the Cyclops, the cave was the worst terrain imaginable, amplifying the sand's power.
No escape in the sealed space; the sand whirled like a mixer, grinding the colossal beasts to nothing.
Clang!
The horrific whir drowned even their dying screams.
Mandy and Kim Sang-sik groaned back to consciousness almost simultaneously.
“Where...”
“Ugh!”
They blinked, and a white canopy blocking the sky filled their view.
A unfamiliar voice spoke.
“You're awake. That's a relief.”
“Gasp!”
Mandy instinctively tensed, spotting a man in her vision.
He wore a blackish-red robe with a hood pulled low, hiding his face.
As she prepared a Wind Cutter, she demanded, “Who are you?”
“Just a traveler passing through. Not an enemy—relax.”
He doffed his hood with a smile.
Long hair fell to his shoulders, framing pale skin.
Tall and slim, handsome features softened by a gentle smile.
But his eyes stood out most—deep and clear as black jewels, impossible to read.
Seeing no malice there, Mandy asked cautiously, “Did you save us from the Cyclops?”
“Hardly. I was passing nearby and stumbled on you collapsed.”
“Stumbled on us?”
“Yeah. Found you passed out in that cage thing. Figured you'd die if left, so I brought you here.”
Mandy rubbed her throbbing head at his answer.
She recalled the sand flooding the cave.
Quicksand?
She couldn't fathom why it had poured into the Cyclops' lair.
She didn't care what happened to the Cyclops.
The miracle was surviving that deluge—and getting swept outside, rescued by a passerby.
Luckiest break imaginable.
Behind him loomed a double-humped camel laden with gear.
They lay under wooden poles draped with white cloth for shade.
It had kept them alive.
Mandy bowed her head.
“Thank you. You saved our lives.”
“No big deal.”
“I'll repay this debt. What's your name?”
The man smiled.
“Zeon! Name's Zeon.”