Chapter 316 Theya
How do you fight this thing?!
Contrary to his calm appearance, Harold's heart was buzzing loudly.
Why wasn't there a red circle on the ground when it appeared? ! Testing my ability to predict? !
When the sandworm poked its head out of the sand again, a rock elemental creature wrapped in golden dust fell before it tried to drill back into the ground. Then two more gunshots were heard, and the rock bullets hit the sandworm's head almost at the same time.
Harold's attack was much faster than his thoughts, but it was obviously useless. Harold could clearly see that the sandworm's skin was still intact and it was dragging a nearby pack animal underground.
WC, my goods!
Harold felt sorry for his cloth and food, as well as the poor beast of burden for a fraction of a second, and then a series of thoughts flashed through his mind:
Focus your attack? Find a weak spot?
Although he had done his homework beforehand, the current situation obviously would not give him too many opportunities to try one by one. Combining the guide's words with the information in the Teyvat Biological Illustrated Book, he decisively put the revolver back into his waist, turned around, and shouted:
"leave here!"
Don’t say anything, just run!
The caravan members were not surprised. Upon receiving the order, they dropped their fighting stance and moved towards the edge of the hunting ground as quickly as possible.
But because there were many pack animals in the caravan, their speed was limited, and the two mercenaries just barely avoided the sandworm attacks several times.
The sandworms' targeting made them extremely angry, but the elemental bottles hanging around their waists gave them courage.
"Captain, let's go?!" the two men roared.
"You are crazy! If you want to die, don't drag us down with you!!"
Without waiting for Harold's response, the mercenaries beside them shouted loudly and distanced themselves from them.
"Sandworms will not leave their territory!" Harold frowned and responded in very concise words.
Moreover, fighting is not cost-effective, as the value of the materials obtained from killing sandworms is not even as great as the pension of a mercenary.
Harold added in his mind with a businessman's mindset.
"Run faster! Don't fall behind!" Harold emphasized.
He had observed this long ago. Judging from the frequency and speed of the sandworms' attacks, as long as the status quo was maintained, everyone could leave Tanit's hunting ground unscathed. There was no need to fight desperately here.
There were no more objections in the team, only a few shouts and exclamations when the sandworms poked their heads out from time to time. Just as Harold had expected, the caravan's steady movement made the sandworms' attacks miss every time.
This creature living underground does not have a very high IQ. Logically speaking, it does not know how to change its attack route according to the trajectory of its prey.
But Harold found that its movements had changed, not in a direction that was more favorable to it, but became slower, and the time it took to surface on the sand was significantly increased.
tired?
Did the attack just now work?
Or has it been through a chase before us?
The latter is more likely because this is Tanit's hunting ground. Tanit's members have mastered the method of hunting sandworms. Perhaps they are hiding aside and watching the battle at this moment.
If this is the case, will they choose to take action next and do us a favor as saviors, or will they take advantage of our fatigue and rob us?
The original planners didn't spend much time on Tanit, and Harold didn't know who was leading the team - if there was one, who it was, so it was difficult to predict the next development based on his personality.
But with this guess in mind, he became calmer. While retreating to the edge of the hunting ground, he also paid a lot of attention to the surrounding rocks and building debris, trying to find the mercenaries who were ambushing there.
Several experienced mercenaries in the caravan also noticed something was wrong. They gradually moved towards Harold's direction, wanting to inform their leader of their suspicions.
"what is that?!"
"Beast of burden?"
"Where did the beast of burden come from?!"
The caravan members were surprised to find a group of pack animals running towards them from the opposite direction. Because of the swooping down from above, the running of the small pack animals seemed to them to be very powerful.
The dust raised by their footsteps obscured the caravan members' vision, making it difficult for them to see the situation ahead.
"Are you going to rush over?!"
"Use the element bottle?"
Mercenaries and merchants all swallowed their saliva unconsciously. Although they knew that the killing power of these beasts of burden could not match that of the "Legacy of the God-King" mercenaries armed with special weapons, the beasts of burden that appeared out of nowhere and were so aggressive still brought them considerable psychological pressure.
"spread!"
Hearing the familiar voice, the mercenaries instinctively chose to obey the order. When several mercenaries in the path of the beasts of burden quickly hid to the side, they found that the beasts of burden did not seem to be targeting them -
The beasts of burden had already passed them, but they continued to move forward.
No!
Over there is——!
Similar thoughts emerged in the mercenaries' minds, but the next moment, ripples appeared on the calm sand surface, and the head of a huge sandworm poked out of the sand surface.
The beasts of burden running in the front fell to the ground due to the violent shaking of the sand. These beasts, which were as tall as two people, were as small as insects in front of the huge waves of the sand sea.
Then, all the pack animals were swallowed up by the whirlpool in the desert, leaving only one or two sparse wails, and the sand sea returned to calm again. There were no huge pits, furs, wreckage... nothing was left. It seemed as if the running pack animals were just an illusion of humans.
The appearance of a group of pack animals was too strange, and the scene of them being devoured at the same time was too shocking, but no one in the caravan stopped to watch. These questions were not what they should think about now, and even if they thought about them, they could not figure out the reasons, so they chose to run and run, running towards the edge of the hunting ground.
Harold had a vague idea of the answer in his mind, but he did not intend to change the existing plan until the mastermind behind the scenes showed up.
The sandworm had three more ups and downs. Although it still brought a considerable wave, compared with just now, it was obviously unable to cope with it.
The next time, it came out of the sand and felt more exhausted than ever before. It finally realized something was wrong. Although it couldn't figure out what was going on, its instinct told it: Don't chase it anymore! Dive underground! Now! Immediately! Quickly!
The caravan members heard a strange "rustling" sound. It was not the sound of the wind, nor the cry of pack animals, but it came from beneath the ground.
Everyone looked at each other, not knowing what this strange sound meant. The unknown brought uneasiness. Although the sandworm was nowhere to be seen and seemed to have given up, the caravan members did not feel relieved.
"I think it's okay now." Harold stopped first and said to others.
This sentence had an obvious calming effect on others. Even though it had no basis, the caravan members quickly calmed down, and some even began to calm the frightened beasts of burden.
After everyone stopped running, a clear female voice came from the cliff:
"Dear guests, don't be afraid, you are safe now!"
The mercenaries and merchants looked up in confusion and in tacit understanding at the source of the sound. They first saw a tall figure, and then the mercenaries holding crossbows and scimitars behind the cliff.
"Elder Theya! It's Elder Theya!"
A mercenary shouted excitedly.
This sentence made the other members of the caravan realize where the familiar voice came from, and they shouted excitedly:
"Elder Theya! It's really Elder Theya! She's here to help us again!"
"We're fine! Elder Theya!"
Theia slid down the cliff on the sand, and her beautiful figure made the caravan members cheer again and again.
"Leader, that is Elder Theya, one of the nine elders of Tanit. He is in charge of hunting in the Tanit tribe and is the youngest hunting group leader in Tanit's history. He was very friendly to us when we first met. He can be said to be the elder in the tribe who is most supportive of foreign trade."
The clerk beside Harold introduced Thea to Harold with many praises.
Theya's greatest achievement, and one of the actions that helped the caravan gain the most favorability, was preventing the mercenaries from informing Babel that "over-planting had caused the oasis to degrade."
This matter could not be publicized in front of Theia's men, and Harold had learned the cause and effect from the descriptions of the mercenaries and merchants when he was the leader.
Therefore, the chief clerk was actually just trying to awaken Harold's memory and make him deepen his impression of Theia, so he did not deliberately single this matter out for emphasis.