Chapter 139: A House in the Desert

Things didn't go as they thought. Leafwhisk reasoned that they had to get out of this desert in a single night, but the desert was bigger than their imagination; on top of that the attacks of the magic beasts also came from time to time, decreasing their speed even further.

The moon faded and two suns rose from the east, glaring at everyone threateningly as if mocking and challenging this group of humans to escape their grasps.

Akash couldn't take the heat of the sun and started to perspire from head to toe, his body covered in sweat and his face burned red in heat, his breathing unsettled but the stubborn expression still present on his baby countenance.

In the end, Ayaan couldn't see his appearance and placed him over his shoulder. The boy's stubbornness knew no bounds, he refused to sit on Ayaan's shoulder. Only after everyone explained to him that he would take much more time to walk that would make things difficult for everyone, only then, the boy settled on his shoulder.

Everyone exchanged bitter looks and shook their heads. It was hard to control little children. As Ayaan thought about children, his attention drifted into his past where his father would also place him over his shoulder and become a horse for him.

As he remembered his father and mother, his eyes became wet. How nice would that be if they were with him, he looked at the sky, but there was only a vast blue sky, ruled by two suns.

"Roar!"

A deep roar interrupted and brought him back from his absentmindedness. The group looked in front of him and saw a tiger growling at them. However, it was only at the early stage of the king mage.

Noor disappeared and reappeared in front of the beast, looking at its prey which had delivered itself in its jaw, the tiger lunged forward, trying to pin Noor down under its claws.

However, before the tiger could catch the lady, she again disappeared.

"Plop!"

This time, Noor didn't give any chance of retaliation to the beast and her dagger flushed with silver light and separated the tiger's head from the body.

"There aren't many edible beasts in this desert, most of them are poisonous. We encountered this beast which could be eaten after such a long time; we don't have anything left to eat; there is only water in my ring. This tiger's meat would do, though I don't know how it tastes." laughing bitterly, Ayaan grabbed the tiger and just when he was about to place the tiger inside his ring, he changed his mind and gave it to Leafhisk to store.

"Those two maggots are still in my ring, I don't know if they will eat the tiger if I place it in my ring," everyone chuckled at his words.

The two people he was talking about were naturally, Rex and the Punishment Hall Leader. It came to him as a surprise that his ring could store living people and animals and why did he place those two in his ring, was because Rebecca didn't want them to die an easy death, simple.

Leafwhisk's ring was the same as his, capable of storing living things. Alas, he didn't have much time to store animals in his ring and never thought that he had to go through such a hardship in the future. 

Her ring had been filled with herbs, in which most of them had died due to the lack of energy they received in this world. Of course, they wouldn't survive in the lower world because this world didn't have spirit energy as dense as the higher world. So only a husk of those medicines left.

After storing the beast, they continued to walk under the blazing suns.

Noor drank a mouthful of water to wet her mouth and place it inside her ring. Not daring to waste even a dorp, they had to preserve even a single drop at the moment.

"Water, I want water," said the little guy with his weak voice, from Ayaan's shoulder.

"Here, drink as much as you want," Ayaan gave him a bottle to drink. After a few mouthfuls, he passed the container back to Ayaan.

Ayaan took a deep breath and exchanged glances with everyone before tumbling on the sandy land.

One more day passed and their provisions fell short. They started to drink less and less, no meat left, nor did they have any other thing to eat. Ayaan looked at his empty water bottle and couldn't help but sigh. 

He looked at others and they also shook their heads; looking at their dried faces and cracked lips, Ayaan's heart pained. However, he couldn't do anything.

Night arrived and they again wanted to take a rest when in the distance they saw a light.

Ayaan looked at the light and a thrilled expression appeared on his dried face, exchanging glances with everyone, he said, "Let's go, check it out."

Everyone nodded and followed closely behind him. Though the place was looking close from a distance, it still took them an hour to arrive at their destination.

In front of them laid a house, it couldn't be said a decent place to live, because it was worn-out and shabby looking; its ceiling felt as if it would fly at any moment by the next gale and the gate produced the creaking sound continuously. The candle burned behind the window, but they couldn't see anything inside.

"I don't like this place," warned Leafwhisk with a frown. She looked at the house and a bad feeling crept out from her heart that's why she warned Ayaan.

Ayaan looked at her and nodded before proceeding.

"Knock~ knock~"

He knocked on the door two times, but no one responded from inside. He exchanged glances with his companion and smiled towards them before once more knocking the door.

However, it was still silent. When no one responded after knocking a few times, Ayaan smashed his hand over the door in frustration and surprisingly… the door opened.

"Chu~"

The sound was just like the horror movie Ayaan watched on the earth. Ayaan looked behind the door but there was no one standing there. Only then he realised that the door was opened this entire time. He was just knocking like a fool.

He shook his head and entered the house with everyone. The place was dark, so no one could see anything inside. At this moment, Leafwhisk's hand started to glow with a green light, illuminating the hall in front of everyone. Not much bigger, but good enough to be called a hall. At the centre rested a round wooden table, with four wooden chairs surrounding it. 

At the right side of them was a door and a small window beside the door. Ayaan looked and saw many cooking utensils inside, indicating that it was a kitchen.

When he turned to the left side he saw another door but there was no window, moving just a little to the left of the door, where stairs went up to the first floor.

"Anybody's home!?" shouted Ayaan, but only silence responded to him.

Not wasting any time, Ayaan walked towards the kitchen and everyone followed, no one wanted to be left behind in this haunted house. So everyone entered the kitchen. 

Ayaan looked around but didn't find anything to eat. He turned his attention to the basin and saw a bowl, a small piece of meat was still sticking on it, indicating that someone had eaten here not long before.

The group exchanged glances and walked out of the kitchen. Afterwards, Ayaan walked towards another door that was on the left. He stopped for a second and looked at the stairs, but still decided to check out the room first.

Subsequently, he opened the door and saw the view in front of him. There was no one inside either.

"Where are the people of this house?" asked Noor impatiently.

"Shh!"

Ayaan gestured towards her and she fell silent after grumbling, turning his attention inside the room, he saw the bed, it was wide enough for two people. There was a window on the right side, but it was hard to see anything due to the night. A long old mirror hung at the left wall of the room. Under the mirror was a drawer, on the drawer was a lamp burning continuously.

This must be the lamp they had seen from outside.

Ayaan walked toward the mirror and pulled the drawer but there was nothing inside. He tried to find something in this room but couldn't find anything.

"Where are the people of this house? Are they on the upstairs?" he said, and just when he turned around, his hand touched the lamp and it fell on the floor.

"Dang!"

"Ohh, my hand touche… heh?" Suddenly, he stopped speaking and looked at the ground in surprise.

"What happened?" asked Leafwhisk curiously.

"Did you hear the sound produced by the lamp?" asked Ayaan.

"Yes… but what so special about that sound?" Rebecca replied.

"Let me confirm something," he said and started to fold the mattress on the ground.

"Move a little bit," he asked and continued to fold the mattress and when he completed his work. Everyone saw something that turned their eyes wide.