Dungeon Raider System
Chapter 702 - 702: The Mojave desert Part 2

"The timeline doesn't add up, the location is also weird considering this is Anazasi and this is far from their territory. I've seen odd artifacts in some clusters before and I would be tempted to believe you if not for one thing. This knife is spotless clean, you moron.

If you're going to pretend you dug an artifact up, at least do it properly." Uriel grunted the last part, though the actual reason why he knew that specific flint knife was not found in the desert was because it was among the artifacts he sold in bulk on the city.

Most people would have failed to recognize something that was barely in their possession for a brief time, but to Uriel selling each artifact had been akin to selling a part of his own body. He remembered each and every one of them and he also had a long detailed record of them all.

"Can I have my knife back?" Simon asked with a wry smile.

"Absolutely not." Uriel replied with a cunning smile. "It's the price for trying to cheat."

Simon's plan to turn in a random artifact to get a passing grade and then spend the rest of the trip on the truck with air conditioning was foiled in the first few minutes. Although the knife was costly, what bothered Simon the most was that it could be used as proof to disqualify him.

When Simon retreated to his truck most people assumed he was upset which was obviously true, but he also did it because he couldn't be bothered to play in the ground like the rest of the students and started scheming a way to get his way without putting any work into the assignment.

Night came and went without any novelties which came as a surprise to Uriel who was accustomed to Cryptids lurking around in the night. Not even the insulating properties of the vehicles that kept their flux signatures from leaking outside could explain such phenomenon as they spent most of the day outside and to Uriel there was only one possible explanation.

Long ago he arrived at the conclusion that cryptids fed on flux energy, be it from humans or from a dungeon, and the fact that there were few cryptids in the vicinity could only mean they were far away from any dungeons or cities.

The previous day had been quite bountiful in terms of how many artifacts the students turned in which left Uriel busy just in cataloguing them, but they were lacking in quality. Few of the artifacts the students turned in were in good condition and even fewer had an ability. Just getting his hands on many artifacts wasn't enough to sate Uriel's greed, but it served a purpose.

It allowed Uriel to understand that the same principle that affected cryptids also applied to artifacts which meant that he wouldn't find much in a place so distant from a dungeon. It made sense and it also aligned with Medusa's theory that artifacts behaved similarly to cryptids in regards to their interaction with flux energy.

With this idea in mind, the first thing Uriel did in the morning was to move the caravan further inside the desert, precisely towards the place where cryptids had been sighted. Most students were against it since there were still plenty of artifacts laying around in plain look on the desert, but no one dared to speak a word since their grades depended on him.

Nika's vehicle was the first to make contact with cryptids and despite it being reinforced with alloy it didn't possess an orichalcum wiring which was the only way to protect electronics from the field of disruption. The Kenworth truck came to a sudden halt almost causing a chain collision which could have been dangerous, yet not nearly dangerous enough as the lack of air conditioning proved to be.

Uriel, Nika and a few others immediately jumped outside their vehicles and opened fire against the cryptids nearby which were mostly rock like creatures that moved way too fast for their size and weight. Being only beast level creatures, the bullets caused them a great amount of damage and soon enough most cryptids were taken care of and their flux orbs were collected by those who slayed them.

"What are those things?" Ashanti asked taken aback after confirming they looked like ordinary rocks.

"They're called sailing rocks due to their ability to move despite them being... rocks. They've been present in this valley from before the arrival, though to my knowledge they never posed any threat to people." Uriel explained as he put on his glasses to scan their surroundings looking for cryptids.

The soil was mostly salt and there weren't any traces of life which didn't come as a surprise to Uriel since the scorching sun was affecting him even though he was a heavenly rank hunter. It wasn't enough to be dangerous, but it was certainly not pleasant.

"How long are we going to stay here?" Nika asked in a pout.

"However long we need to," Uriel replied as he crouched on the ground to dig on what seemed to be a flux energy node. "this is so cool!" He said after unearthing a metal cylinder that could have been used to imprint a design into clay.

"Teaching assistant, I found something." Scoundrel informed as he brought what seemed to be a motorcycle engine.

"That's just junk, it has no archaeological value." Simon scoffed.

Uriel refrained from replying as it would mean sharing his theory that even technological artifacts like that could be considered valuable in archaeology as they painted a picture of what life before the arrival was like. To them, an engine seemed like a contemporary find, but to Uriel it held a similar value to that of the flint knife Simon found the day before.

"I'll buy it from you anyway." Uriel said.

"You're a saint, professor." Scoundrel replied.

"I'm not a professor," Uriel replied then muttered to himself. "yet."