THE PYRAMID GUARDIAN MADE FROM SAND

THE PYRAMID GUARDIAN MADE FROM SAND

Sara speculated that there was an energy link on the pyramid which was like electricity flowing through a circuit board.

The pyramids apex was a switch or knob of some kind that might turn on the circuitry on the building and it was possible that was the key to gain access to the building.

"Hey, I know how to activate the entrance", I told Cartelle who was all ears for ideas because he had none.

"What can we do?" Cartelle asked me.

"We need to push and twist the pyramid's apex", I told him.

"But the entrance is under the pyramid at its base and not on its tip", Cartelle protested to me.

"You got to take a leap of faith with me on this", I told him.

Cartelle and his men did as I asked from them.

To their surprise, the apex of the pyramid wasn't fixed into the building but was a turnable knob or switch of some kind as I predicted.

"Creakkk…creakkk"

After a few attempts the apex gave way and turned and as the apex turned, energy from the base was reconnected to its apex which formed a circuit of some sort.

Energy was suddenly projected from the pyramid which spun around it as it dragged away the surrounding sand which buried it, to reveal an entrance below as we immediately climbed toward the entrance.

"There that is the entrance", Kay shouted to us as he dashed for it.

However, before we could reach the opening to the pyramid the sand which were blown away by the cyclone suddenly returned in the form of a large humanoid made from sand which charged at us, as if to prevent us from entering the pyramid.

"Damnit, what the hell is that sand monster?" I asked Cartelle.

"It's the Pyramid's guardian", he told me.

"Why the hell didn't you tell us about a guardian?" I asked him but he was too busy fleeing from the guardian than answering me.

We quickly ran as the sandman transformed into a tidal wave of sand that splashed onto some of us.

Suddenly the ground under us hollowed out as many escorts and I fell into a quagmire.

Kay was lucky to have escaped the magical quicksand, so he was ready to help as he quickly threw rolls of climbing ropes at us. Although we managed to grab onto the ropes, the suction and pull from the sand were too great for them to extract us, so in no time all of us were swallowed into the desert and practically buried alive.

"No,…" Kay screamed at me as I was eaten by the quicksand.

The Magus' quest was apparently much less benign than I originally thought as I struggled to free myself from the quicksand which encased me deep under the desert ground.

"Mercury Tier: Tornado"

"Vvrooosh..vrooosh..vrooosh"

After some time, suddenly a bright circle appeared above me as a tornado rushed out from the circle which swept away the quicksand around me.

As the sand was blown away, I was the only survivor among those trapped in there while the rest were suffocated and killed by the sand probably due to the loss of breathable air underground.

My body stores oxygen and other chemicals that I needed in a compressed form inside my lungs, so most of the time l didn't need to breathe which was the only reason I survived being buried alive.

"I don't have any more wind magic", Cartelle shouted to us.

What saved me was Cartelle's magic who summoned a tornado to free me from the quicksand. But Cartelle's magic took time to prepare, and he couldn't muster another tornado spell in a short time.

"Run everybody run to the entrance for cover", I shouted at the guys as Kay quickly pulled me out from the ground and we rushed to the pyramid's entrance before the sand returned.

The quicksand transformed into humanoid again which chased and grabbed onto more of us and buried them under the ground, killing them by suffocation.

"Whew, we are here finally", I told them.

Finally, we were at the entrance of the pyramid. There was once a door or gate here, but it was gone. Or it could be because we turned the pyramid's apex, the door to the pyramid opened itself for us.

We didn't wait or hesitate because we dashed immediately to the entrance while the sand monster chased us.

When we reached inside the pyramid, the sandman bothered us no more, but only Cartelle, Kay, and I survived the ordeal.

When we activated the pyramid's burglar system by forcefully turning the apex knob and revealed the entrance, the sand guards were sent for us.

The only way to deal with the sand was to disperse them with a much greater kinetic force than the Elemental's inherent magnetic pull. That was how Cartelle's spell managed to disperse the Sandman.

The only way to escape from Sandman was to enter the pyramid.

------

The rest of Cartelle's security escorts were buried in sand and were killed and we didn't have the opportunity to give them a proper burial because their corpses were gone and none of us dared to recover them while the sandman was guarding outside the pyramid.

"What was that sand guardian?" I asked Cartelle.

"It is a Sand Elemental which is created by magic to protect this Pyramid, I should have studied the documents more and brought a counter spell", Cartelle replied to me as he cried at the death of all his escorts.

Cartelle regretted that he didn't prepare for the situation well and his lack of experience caused the death of so many.

"What's done is done and there is no point dwelling on it", I said to Cartelle offering to console him.

"The Sand Elemental is a strange magnetic force of unknown kind", Sara explained to me about the Sandman.

The Sand Elemental was a shape-shifting pile of sand that had no physical parts or solid constituents, but there was plenty of radiation around the creature which indicated there was a form of sand-specific magnetism which gathered the sand together which gave it form and abilities.

There was a program that directed the sand once it was formed and even controlled its actions.

"I have no idea what kind of technology can control the sand in this way", Sara admitted to me on her lack of knowledge in this matter.

"Maybe it's magic", I told her.

"Yes, Harry", Sara replied to me in a riposte that was unusual even for an AI.

Sara's program has evolved after we came to this world or corrupted. But I wouldn't know it because there were no diagnostic machines in this world who could check her.

"How did the bloody Sandman kill us if it's made from sand?" Kay asked us.

"When the Sandman caught its victims, it wasn't the sand that killed them, but the eventual suffocation from being buried alive did", I explained to him.

------

When Cartelle gathered himself, we had to continue with the quest because the only way ahead was to go forward.

"We can only move on", Cartelle said to us.

We couldn't turn back now with the sandman waiting for us in the desert.

Inside the pyramid there was a long spiral tunnel that went downward, so Cartelle cast a magical torchlight that shone the way for us, as we climbed down the tunnel until we reached an entrance to a very large cavern.

The cavern was filled with a pool of molten lava at its bottom.

"It is rather strange that lava would appear in the middle of the desert", I said to Cartelle.

"We need to get to the other side", Cartelle said to us.

Over the other side of the cavern, there was an opening and Cartelle guessed that we needed to enter the opening at the other end, so he placed his hands on his amulet and focused.

Suddenly a boat appeared on the magma below us.

Cartelle just teleported an item again and this time he had time to explain to me the magic of his space locker as we rowed across the lava lake.

"A space locker is a magical space where I could teleport items inside for storage and retrieve them when I need it", Cartelle explained to me.

I could understand the theory of a space locker. It was like storing data into cloud servers and retrieving them from it, except the stored items weren't data but physical things.

I guessed it could be explained as teleporting or beaming objects from one location to another, and in this case from the current location to a space storage, and vice versa provided the technology to teleport something was made available.

"Beam me up Scotty", was in my mind when Cartelle did his hocus pocus again.

There were experiments on Earth that deconstructed objects into fine particles and transferred them to a different location to be reconstructed like the original.

But such experiments were in the fringe of science and really weren't successful, and I would never have imagined a pre-modern society in Ouamua would have achieved what we would consider as the holy grails of science.

But the miraculous teleportation was clearly demonstrated and proven in front of me so I couldn't deny it. The magic of this world truly astounded me and questioned the logic and understanding of our science and technology.

If I had the opportunity, I would not miss the chance to study and master this strange technology called magic, and perhaps it might help me advance my scientific knowledge and technology.

"I must study this technology called Magic", I repeated to myself again.

Once we dropped ourselves into the boat, we rowed to the other side, and Cartelle retrieved the boat into his space locker, as we entered the opening.

There we found another tunnel and walked for another day until we reached another molten lava-filled cavern, yet again. However, this cavern was not the same as the previous one, and in the middle of it, there was a large man-made island.

"We need to get to the Island," said Cartelle as he took out his boat again as we rolled toward the Island.

When we were halfway across the lake, a creature flapped its wings above us with great intensity and a murderous aura beset us.

As it flapped its wings, strong winds were formed that violently rippled toward us and rocked our boat. The wind nearly threw us off balance and into the magma lake.

The presence of the predator drove us to pedal faster to escape from the dangerous situation.

The creature circled the cavern above, as it observed and considered its next move and after a few laps in the air, it swooped down on us with a fiery breath which hit our boat and destroyed it with its flame.

"Kaboom"

Fortunately for us, we have just climbed onto the stone island and none of us were harmed except that the experience pushed our adrenalin to highly elevated levels.