On the sea of sand, five dromedary camels moved slowly in a single-file line, followed by more than a dozen guards and attendants.
“Elon, how much water do we have left?”
The clear voice came from the second camel. It belonged to a figure wrapped entirely in a light brown, sand-resistant hooded cloak, with fiery red hair rebelliously peeking out from the edge of the hood, fluttering slightly in the hot wind.
The voice responding to her came from a camel slightly behind and to the side, belonging to a middle-aged man in his forties or fifties with dark green hair.
He was her druid mentor, Elon.
He shook the shriveled waterskin at his waist, feeling its weight, and said in a heavy voice, “Your Highness, it will last half a day at most.”
He then pulled out a piece of parchment and unfolded it on the camel's back, tracing his finger across the map. “If the map is correct... the Little Emerald Pool should be just behind those sand dunes ahead.”
“Should be?” The woman addressed as “Your Highness” repeated the words, a self-deprecating smile curling the corners of her lips beneath her hood.
She was the Third Imperial Princess, Alicia von Augustus.
Once upon a time, the word “should” did not exist in her vocabulary—only “certainly” and “must.”
As a loser in political infighting, even water had now become a blessing she had to beg for.
But even so, her ambition had not dissipated with her exile; it was merely baked by this cursed desert into something more intense and restrained.
“The Golden Sea...” Alicia murmured, her gaze sweeping across the yellow sand that stretched to the horizon. “The Empire's dumping ground, the graveyard of the exiled...”
“To assign this barren land to me as my territory is truly an exquisite insult.”
“Life will always find a way, Your Highness.”
Hearing the princess's words, Elon put away the map and tried to comfort her with his teachings, even though he himself felt an instinctive aversion to this land, whose vitality had been withered by chaotic magic elements.
“An oasis is a gift from the desert, a testament to life. As long as we find a water source, we can establish a foothold...”
But before he could finish, the guide's camel at the front suddenly let out a low bray and halted, bringing the rest of the caravan to a stop behind it.
Puzzled, Elon nudged his camel forward. “What is it?”
The guide did not answer but pointed down the sandy slope ahead with a look of astonishment.
There, rows of vibrant green abruptly caught their eyes.
Moreover, unlike the dull, grayish-green stems commonly seen creeping along the desert floor, these saplings stood upright in neat rows, clearly planted by hand.
There were about a dozen of them, evenly spaced and planted in shallow sand pits.
They were only about waist-high, and though their leaves were sparse, they showed a healthy, vibrant light green, indicating they had been planted recently.
Furthermore, the sand at the base of each sapling was slightly darker, clearly showing they had just been watered.
“This is...” Elon froze. He instinctively pulled back on his reins, his voice filled with disbelief. “Someone is farming? In a place like this? Who?”
Behind them, the guards and servants also began to stir, their faces filled with confusion and curiosity.
For seeing hand-planted, healthy saplings in the Golden Sea was far more shocking than simply stumbling upon a natural oasis.
After all, no one had ever succeeded before.
Alicia pulled back her hood, revealing an exquisite face that already bore the faint traces of wind and sand. She narrowed her eyes and studied the neat row of saplings, her initial surprise giving way to careful scrutiny.
To think someone had actually succeeded in this place marked as a “dead zone” on the maps.
“Interesting,” she murmured softly. Sensing something unusual, she immediately looked at Elon. “It seems my territory isn't as dull as I thought. Is it a fellow druid who was exiled here, Mentor Elon?”
Elon did not answer immediately. He dismounted his camel, slid down the sandy slope, and walked a few steps over to the nearest sapling before crouching down.
He then extended both hands, hovering them over the roots of the sapling, and closed his eyes, attempting to commune with the plant.
However, instead of the gentle, lingering life force he usually felt, he was met with a stubborn, tenacious vitality that surged like a tide.
Yet deep within this tenacity, a faint trace of icy coldness was intertwined, making him feel extremely uncomfortable.
It felt as if a handful of ice shards had suddenly been mixed into warm soil; although it was being melted and neutralized by the heat of life, its core nature was clearly the polar opposite of life—necromantic energy!
Elon snapped his eyes open and withdrew his hands as if he had been burned. His face turned incredibly grim, even slightly pale.
As a devout believer of the Church of Life, he revered natural growth and balance. Consequently, he had an almost visceral, physical aversion to anything related to death, decay, and especially the undead.
“No, this is not the work of a druid! Behind this burst of vitality, there is the intervention of death energy!”
“How is this possible?” In that moment, Elon felt his entire worldview shatter.
In his faith, life and death were like light and darkness, water and fire—absolute opposites that could never coexist.
Undead power meant decay and the draining of life force. How could it possibly be used to stimulate plant growth?
“Death energy is promoting the growth of saplings?”
Having caught up to him, Alicia frowned upon hearing Elon's muttering. This combination was far beyond her understanding.
But unlike Elon, who was paralyzed by the shock to his worldview, her vigilance spiked instantly. The presence of undead power meant...
As if to confirm her suspicion...
“Clack... Clack...”
A faint but distinct sound of rattling bones echoed from the other side of the sandy slope.
Everyone instantly tensed, their hands flying to their weapons as the guards quickly formed a protective ring around Alicia and Elon.
Three figures emerged from behind the crest of the sand dune, walking with stiff, mechanical strides.
They were three skeletons!
Their bones were grayish-white, and their eye sockets were completely empty, yet their movements were coordinated.
One of the skeletons cradled several saplings in its arms, their roots wrapped in damp sand, while the other two carried a bucket made of pieced-together bones, filled to the brim with fresh water.
Ignoring the heavily armed human caravan entirely, they walked straight to the end of the row of saplings and began to mechanically dig new sand pits with their bony fingers.
Once a pit was dug, they placed a sapling inside and covered it with sand.
Then, one of the skeletons picked up a ladle made from the skull of some large animal, scooped out half a ladle of water from the bucket, and carefully poured it over the roots of the sapling.
The water seeped into the sand with a soft sizzling sound.
Next, they moved to the next spot.
Repeat: dig a pit, place the sapling, cover with sand, water.
Silent, efficient, and meticulous.
If one could ignore their non-human nature, they looked exactly like dutiful gardeners.
For a moment, time seemed to freeze.
The guards gasped, cold sweat breaking out on their palms as they gripped their weapons.
It wasn't that they had never seen the undead before; on the battlefield, those creatures were monsters that brought nothing but terror and slaughter.
Yet the scene before them was so bizarre that their minds nearly ground to a halt.
But compared to the others who were bewildered by the sight, Alicia remained far more level-headed.
“On guard!”
Her sharp voice shattered the silence, her eyes constantly scanning the surroundings. “Since undead creatures are here, their controller cannot be far. Watch our surroundings!”
As if in response to her call...
On a slightly higher sand dune not far behind the skeletal gardeners, a figure quietly appeared.
Rate on N.U.
