The Unsurpassed Maiden

The black haired girl nodded her head as Zhong Yu slowly guided her on her own feet. She can still feel the ominous aura behind her but she didn't let herself check it anymore. She knows it's trouble so she doesn't need to double check it. All the young girl could do was to follow Zhong Yu who was more experienced in dealing with this kind of stuff.

"How are we going to outrun it?" Mi Young whispers as she and Zhong Yu started walking with soft and light footsteps. They were both trying so hard not to let the sand make any kind of sound. The tall man said something about desert beasts being too sensitive with sounds.

"We can't outrun a desert beast. They're just too fast." Zhong Yu says while his eyes lingered at something ahead of them that the black haired girl couldn't quite see.

"Then how do we escape it?"

Zhong Yu held out his hand in front of the young girl which immediately made her stop walking. The young student knows that the man intended to stop her from the very beginning so she made every effort not to move.

Just as soon as the both of them stopped their movements, a loud rumble sounded just beneath them. Mi Young let her eyes move to check what it was. When she sees the sand shaking under their feet, she instantly knows what the beast is up to.

Both of them didn't move after that. They waited for the rumbling to stop and for the beast to get away first before they started walking once more.

When the beast was finally a kilometer away and the shaking finally stopped, that's when Mi Young and Zhong Yu finally started walking.

"Quick. It might come back any minute now. We better find something where it can't feel us." The tall man says as he grabs the young girl's hands and starts dragging her with fast pace.

Although Zhong Yu's grip is quite painful, Mi Young didn't say a word knowing that the man was only looking out for her. So with a confused voice, she asks. "What should we find?"

"Anything that could keep us off the desert." Zhong Yu replies without sparing her any glance. He continued walking at a fast pace as his eyes continued to scan their surroundings. "Although desert beasts may vary from each other, they all have one thing in common."

"Which is?"

"They can feel any movement through the sand." Zhong Yu replies.

"So, you mean to say it knows where we are right now?"

The man nodded his head grimly, "Uhn. It knows how fast we're going and where our exact location is. As long as we are touching the sand, the desert beast can feel us."

"Then why isn't it moving towards us?"

"It might be looking for a timing. That's why we need to hurry up before it gets us." Zhong Yu replies.

The young girl nodded her head as she too started looking for something that can keep them off of the sand. It took them a couple of minutes until Mi Young finally sees something that looks like a cave. She points at the stones with glee before saying, "There! Over the—"

Zhong Yu instantly has his hand over the young girl's mouth. "Stop shouting. You might agitate it. Quick, let's go!"

The young black haired girl muttered a small apology before she started running towards the stone cave just a few meters away from them. But she should have known that their running would cause the desert beast to feel angry. Because the moment they picked up their pace, the ground beneath started rumbling once more.

"Sh*t! It's on us!" Zhong Yu announces while he looks at the shaking sand. "Mi Young, run faster!"

The young student doesn't need to be told twice before she starts running the best she can. Although she still feels weak with the lack of proper sleep and energy, Mi Young still manages to run a couple of steps behind the tall man.

She can even hear Zhong Yu shouting, "No matter what happens, don't look back! Focus on climbing up that stone cave!"

Mi Young nodded her head even though she knew Zhong Yu couldn't see her. She still has a lot of things to do and she can't let a mere desert beast stop her. She can see the cave much clearer now and she knows that for a few minutes with how fast they were both going, they would reach the stone cave without being caught. However, Zhong Yu was too late to notice that the beast was indeed up to something.

"F*ck!" That was all Zhong Yu could utter before another head came up in front of them.

A beast with the head of a snake came charging in front of them while they're still trying to outrun the other beast earlier. Mi Young couldn't even move her feet as she stood there, frozen on her spot while gawking at the giant desert snake in front of them.

"Mi Young look out!" It's like everything around her started moving in slow motion the moment she saw the snake open her mouth towards her way. However, her view was immediately blocked as Zhong Yu threw his body to block the snake from attacking her.

Mi Young rolled to the other side of the sandy ground as Zhong Yu's push was too strong. She coughs out some sand that went into her mouth the moment she made contact with the ground. Mi Young looks up to see Zhong Yu's body on the ground just a few feet away from her.

She was about to run towards the man when the desert snake raised half of its body, getting ready to attack the man.

"Nooo!" Mi Young shouts. However, the moment the desert snake's mouth was about to attack Zhong Yu, the other desert beast from earlier came out from the sand.

The huge desert beast which resembles a scorpion opens its mouth to attack the other desert beast, completely stopping it from devouring Zhong Yu. The two desert beasts landed on the other side of the desert where they started fighting one another, with the giant scorpion on the upper hand.

Mi Young sees this as an opportunity to run towards Zhong Yu, who was still lying on the ground. When she reaches the man, she lets out a sigh of relief when she sees Zhong Yu groaning and opening his eyes. What shocked her was the blood that was dripping from the man's forehead.

"Sh*t! You're bleeding!" Mi Young announces. She slowly grabs the man's arms and puts it around her shoulders as she guides Zhong Yu to stand up. When Mi Young checks the two desert beasts, they are still busy fighting off each other. This time, the giant desert snake has its body wrapped around the huge scorpion who was trying to attack the snake using its pointed tail. "Let's go before one of them starts to notice us."

Zhong Yu only let out a small grunt of approval before Mi Young started dragging him towards the stone cave. It took her a lot of effort just to drag the two of them towards the top of the stone cave since Zhong Yu was a tall man and has a lot of muscles. Mi Young wanted to thank her teacher for letting her carry huge and heavy objects during her training. If not, Zhong Yu's limp body would have crushed her.

When they reach the stone cave, Mi Young instantly starts climbing up the stone, stopping from time to time to drag Zhong Yu. The moment they reach half of the cave, Mi Young stops because of too much exhaustion.

She lets Zhong Yu lean against a stone as she sits beside him while trying to catch her breath. The black haired girl looks up to check the situation between the two beasts. Her eyes widened upon seeing the giant scorpion attacking the snake's now lifeless form.

"Holy sh*t, it won." Mi Young whispers while looking at the giant snake's limp body. The scorpion let out a shriek that sounded like it was celebrating its victory before it  started to dig the sand underneath it once more. Seconds later the giant desert scorpion finally disappears from their sight.

"High…"

Mi Young immediately whips her head towards Zhong Yu's direction and that's when she realized that the man was trying to tell her something. She moves closer towards Zhong Yu and asks, "What? What is it?"

"High…"

"High? What do you mean?"

Zhong Yu had his eyes still closed as he tried to open his mouth again. "Higher."

"Higher?"

"Let's move higher…" Zhong Yu managed to say between the pain he was feeling. The man moves his right hand to grip[ something on his side and the black haired girl immediately checks what he was grabbing.. What she saw was something she didn't expect.