How To Survive A Calamity-Chapter 172: Impulse [3]

As Ceres' blade descended, she cleaved through the length of the Sand Worm from the exploded portion of its maw — her sword tore through mangled flesh, muscles and armoured scales with almost the illusion of slicing through butter with a hot knife.

Ceres' actions gave the impression of making it all look so easy. If i hadn't known better about how tough it actually was to wound that thing — talk less of slicing it in half— , maybe i would have thought so too.

The humumgous body of the giant worm, partially cleaved in full halves, quickly followed to the torn ground with a deafening rumble.

And so, just like that...

The notorious Desert King, and ruler of Blood Earth breathed it's last.

—The Sand Dragon was dead.

A painful breath escaped my bloody lips in the form of a painful wheeze.

From above, Ceres' attack looked flashy and all, but the death of the Sand Worm that followed... felt kind of drab.

It was like...

'...And that's it.'

And i probably wasn't supposed to be one to think this, considering what i had to go through.

No.

In fact, considering the struggle each and everyone of us faced against that titan.

The scale of the battle against Sand Dragon was massive, shouldn't it's outcome be something more... incredible?

One would imagine the ending would be a little more....i don't know...

Flashy, right?

Or something like that.

The living voice inside of my head buzzed and mused.

[I particularly liked the fire works part towards the end. It was flashy.]

The side of my face twitched.

Ignoring Meta's comment — mostly because i couldn't really find it in me the strength and drive to retort from the current state of my body — i watched Ceres figure touch back against the ground with half open eyes.

Her silver armoured boots — the same items that granted her flexible movement while in mid air — touched soundlessly against the ground.

Those same boots seemed to have been a pair with the stainless silver gauntlets.

Those were also probably items, but i was too exhausted to check what kinds they were with Appraisal. Usually by now, i would have already done so because i had a questionable habit of spamming my Appraisal skill on most new or unfamiliar targets.

—i was also cautious about doing do so because of Ceres, actually.

I thought maybe there was a chance Ceres could sense my probing gaze when i activate the Appraisal Skill just like before.

It was probably by luck i managed to glimpse the stats of her boots.

While my cloudy thoughts trailed like that, for a moment, Ceres lingered and remained still in her position.

She stood over the sprawled massive corpse of the Sand Worm with an indescribable expression that masked her thoughts.

Ceres had the last kill against the titan, this meant that all of the experience points from the kill went entirely to her.

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Leaving me, or anyone else, with nothing, despite all of whatever shared effort at the beginning.

I wanted to sigh in lamentation, but even just breathing was a painful chore with the state of my lungs and ribs.

The loss felt massive to me and tugged painfully at my greedy heart — I wondered just how much experience the Sand Worm would have given to me if i were the one who finished it off — but in the end, i couldn't complain.

The truth was.

Despite everything, i couldn't have dealt the last blow or finished off the Worm on my own, all alone.

I should try to look at things from the perspective of the bigger picture, though.

The Sand Worm was finally dead, Nicodemus couldn't recall or summon it anymore whenever he wished, and hopefully we've managed to buy some little time — however insignificant it may be.

The Sand Worm was dead — we had gotten rid of a major opponent and distraction.

If i managed to save Alexander after this, then I'd still get my Instant Rank up reward, and everyone would be happy.

'Positive thoughts, Vic... It's all a matter of mentality...' i tried to console myself inwardly.

Ceres turned around and began to walk across to where we were after a short couple of seconds.

Ceres' figure was graceful, easch step silently resounding with dignity and composure and her sword gleamed exquisitely.

There wasn't a single strand of hair displayed on her beautiful appearance, and her form felt as whole and untouched despite everything—a striking contrast to how I looked.

—and felt.

At the same time, Deandra, too was slowly closing in, and Xavier shifted at my back.

"We did it." Xavier was the first one to speak.

I could imagine him doing so with a smile even without looking at him.

As gently as he could, Xavier moved me off him, placing me gently against a wall.

I appreciated his efforts, sincerely i did, but it was bo different than torture.

My ruptured left hand hung loosely.

Everything below my left shoulder was a black, dark, twisted and mangled mess, without even a single trace of blood.

I couldn't feel the entirety of my left arm at all. To be honest, a small part of me seriously considered I'd never actually be able to use my left arm after this.

The pain was excruciating, it was hard to stay conscious.

Deandra sighed. Her eyes held severe traces of exhaustion.

"Victor, what you did there was too reckless. Even for you. You could have died."

As Deandra scolded sternly before me, my eyes lowered to my blackened arm, my vision was growing darker.

'Impulse was...less powerful than i thought.'

Either that, or my body was just more stronger and resilient than i gave it credit for.

Of course i knew the dangerous risk of my actions, better than anyone.

But i still went ahead and did so, fully acknowledging the intention of having my left arm get thoroughly blown off my shoulders.

'I expected the explosion to be much larger, actually. Am i disappointed?' i mused.

If Deandra or anyone else found out the real details of my thoughts, i wasn't sure what they would think.

But now, i had to give more credit to the resilience of my body and durability.

I'm more solidly built than i thought.

Hehe... I laughed weakly — tried to but flew into a coughing fit instead.

Gods...my whole body felt like I'd been put through a heavy, brutal steel grinder and smashed to paste.

Just then, i heard Meta's comforting voice jeer inside my head.

[Although your entire left arm wasn't completely blown off your shoulders, it's current state is no different than being completely useless — so that is also a commendable achievement.]