Tim, with Ayuka on her back, went on through the desert, following Ireene in the lead, while the rest of his friends struggled to keep up with the heat that the sun and its light had poured upon them, the most affected by it being Elliott, who happened to walk at the very back of the pack.
"I thought we were supposed to be riding the crab, not dealing with our feet slipping on the scorching desert ground!"
With wonders ahead of them and exhaustion enveloping them, Codey turned to gaze at Elliott's worn body, which he had nearly dragged on the sand's edge, and sighed in irritation at Elliott's complaints.
"We would've had a ride if you didn't scare it by saying that we'll eat it..."
~ After being pounded by the two girls, Elliott's body slowly stood up and scratched the top of his head, revealing a giant crab standing before Tim and the others. With his eyes nearly bulging out, he drooled all over his face after seeing the enormous crab in the heat haze.
"It appears to be wonderful! Guys, as soon as we arrive at the Golden Wasakona! Let's cook it!"
As the sweat began to stream out of the crab's head, its eyes shook. It shrieked in terror and bolted away on all fours, claws flailing over its gigantic bulk. ~
Elliott's unmusement continued to blaze in his thoughts as he dangled his arms below, his head falling forward, and his hair writhing left and right, with a sudden dazzling light glossing his body and blackness surrounding his complete location.
"I fully forgot that I said something this stupid. Now I'll feel this depression haunting me in the dreams, when I go to sleep. If I'll ever make it out alive from this desert-"
The girls looked at him with Karisa grabbing the side of her shoulder and slowly scratch it for being itchy.
"He sure got gloomy about it quickly. And why is my shoulder so itchy...?"
She turned her view onto her right shoulder and notice a spider on top of her shoulder, which had been dangling its thin legs at her. They looked at each other, with her mouth starting to shiver, and in the next second she hurriedly swiped her left arm across the right shoulder and flung the spider into the distance with a loud scream, alarming the others in shock and surprise.
"H-Hey! What happened?!"
Wondered Nina, who looked at her from surprise and sweated with a feeling of being attacked. She quickly listened to Karisa's explanation with the others being close by,
"T-There was a spider on my shoulder! S-Sorry, I don't like spiders. I overreacted after seeing it on top of me."
"She's really terrified of spiders, but prefers to risk her life on the line of battling..."
Ellie claimed with an unimpressed and disappointed attitude obvious to the others, prompting Karisa to scream angrily and point fingers at him.
"Who are you to judge what I'm afraid of against what I'm not?! These kinds of spiders terrify me! Don't start complaining about me just cuz' you're not afraid of spiders! It's not like I'm the only one afraid of them!"
"People who are terrified of spiders are just a bunch of crybabies. They won't hurt you until they feel threatened by you. Because they are not bloodsuckers and do not feed on humans, they have no motivation to bite humans."
"What does it matter? I can't handle them, they're too freaky! Plus, who wants a spider crawling all over their body? I never said I was coming to kill them! I just don't want them crawling all over me!"
While Karisa continued to whine, she observed Ellie stopping in front of her and picking up a spider, at which point she froze and turned white. She trembled and felt a chilly breeze about her as she gulped, and observed Ellie immediately turn to gaze at her, gradually approaching her.
He pushed the spider in front of her chest by opening his arms, on which it had been crawling. The spider's eyes turned to hearts the instant she looked at it, and it saw how pink and beautiful sparkles continued to surround Karisa's body. It leapt from Ellie's hands, surprising her, and landed on top of Karisa's head in a matter of seconds.
She raised her head slightly on top of her hair and began to quiver in surprise. She shouted and cried out for compassion.
"Aaaaaah! Get it away from me, please! Just give me some mercy!"
She was too terrified to move and remained motionless for a few seconds until the spider began to move, prompting her to begin swiping her arms in an attempt to free herself. It moved down her neck, down her shoulder, and then in front of her chest, diving into her T-shirt, where she became even more terrified after others watched the spider crawl inside her T-shirt, between her breasts, and to her stomach. It began to crawl across her tummy slowly, making her laugh while crying at the same time.
"Please! Help me, get it off me! Whoever, just get it off me! It's tickling me!"
While she was scared of spiders, she couldn't help but chuckle as the spider's feet proceeded to creep across her stomach and around her hips, causing Elliott's eyes to change to pink hearts and he began to sweat and fantasize caressing Karisa's body.
"She asked to touch her? And she said, whoever...?"
Elliott's nose began to bleed as he imagined today would be his luckiest day ever. He pictured his hands gliding across her body, beneath the T-Shirt, and once free of the spider, he felt the vibrations of love and his potential proposal.
"Touch... Her...?"
He quickly felt Nina smack the top of his head and slam him on the floor by giving him another bump to the top of his head, as he was preoccupied with his filthy imagination.
"What is it about a female body that you are so obsessed with?! Don't put too much pressure on her; you can tell she's afraid of spiders, and one is currently crawling across her body!"
"Sorry..."
"Somebody! Please, I beg you! Get it off me!!!"
Codey crossed his arms and exhaled with disappointment, while Nina flinched and happened to be scared of spiders as well.
"Sorry, Karisa. But there's no way I'll touch a female body. I'm just a navigator, who tends to remain clean..."
"Yeah, no way I'm touching you. If you want to get the spider off your body, do it yourself. I only showed it to you, didn't expect it to jump between your garments..."
"Please, Nina!"
"I-I.... N-No, I can't! I'm scared of spiders too! I'm sorry, but I definitely won't touch it! Even if I'm a girl, no!"
"Please! Anybody! I don't care if it's a boy or girl, just get it off me!"
As she screamed, she felt the spider's feet creep from her stomach to her chest as it became caught between her cleavage, yet it appeared to be smiling and have pink cheeks from feeling the squishy female body part.
"Not there! Just not there! Get off me!"
She began to scream aloud, tears streaming down her chin, some of which evaporated in the heat after splashing on the sand.
"Tim! You're the captain, right? Do something about it! Because of Elliott's fixation with female bodies, I'm not allowing him touch her." Nina screamed, pleading for assistance.
"What? Me? You've got to be kidding, right? Why don't you go ahead and do it? It's only a spider; unless you hurt it, it won't do anything."
"Like I said! I'm scared of spiders too!"
"I'm still not doing it..."
Moments later, Tim heard a soft and weak mutter of words on his back, seeing that Ayuka managed to regain some of her consciousness.
"I-I'll do it... J-Just get me closer..."
"Ayuka!"
They looked at her, but learned quickly that she was still unable to move easily, nor did she have enough strength to keep her consciousness for the rest of the journey, and instead Tim sighed and stepped toward Karisa.
"P-Please, get it off me..."
Tim instantly realized he couldn't turn around with his complete body, so he closed his eyes after watching Ayuka delicately reach between Karisa's T-shirt and, with a spider falling into the sand, managed to extract it out of her clothes.
"T-There... I'm done..."
When Tim eventually opened his eyes again, he noticed that Ayuka was becoming increasingly hot by the minute. She was on the verge of losing her hold and realized they needed to act quickly. She even heard Karisa thanking her and then noticed an arrow hurtling through the air at high speed, straight for Ireene's head.
The arrow was ready to puncture her head, and there was nothing Tim could do about it, but out of the corner of his sight, Elliott flickered through a bolt and sliced forward with his blade from up to bottom, splitting the arrow into two pieces, and then fell into a squat in front of Ireene's stance.
Codey and the others quickly prepared to guard, with Ireene shocked and astonished after witnessing the group of people who stood on top of some kind of an animal.
"T-Thank you!"
"Who the hell are these guys?!"
Ellie questioned while Ireene's eyes quickly opened wide in surprise. She introduced them as an enemy and told them the truth of who they were.
"That spider on Karisa's shoulder earlier. It had to have been the warriors' Messanger. The Sand Shark Surfers or otherwise known as the "SSS" is a group of people who work under Byron's orders and function as scouts for the trial participants. If they notice that a trial participant has broken the rule, they are sent into the wilderness to track down and eliminate the offender."
A group of ten people stood on the top of gray shark's backs, acting like a surfing board and each of them held a different weapon. Some of them had spears, one of them had a bow and others had some sort of a cutlass that were enough dangerous weapon for the trial goers to be eliminated with ease.
"What rule?! You didn't break a rule, we were here the entire time!"
Ireene looked at Ellie, who was taken aback and perplexed as to how these soldiers had managed to find them so quickly until Ireene revealed why they had came.
"And that is precisely why they have come here. You assisting me is a rule violation, which means they have the power to assassinate me whenever they choose."
"What a scumbag bunch. Attacking a beautiful, innocent and defenseless girl out of the shadows. That is a true coward's title."
After seeing them defending Ireene, the Sand Shark Surfers glared at them with scary looks and the sharks beneath their feet growled.
"Princess Ireene. You've caused a rule violation and have put your life on the line of execution. You, who have protected her, do not intervene or we'll eliminate you as well."
The journey continues...