Path of Dragons

As the sun rose high into a cloudless winter sky, Elijah looked down on the corpse of small town Americana. A strip of a street, overgrown with weeds and other vegetation, sliced between two rows of abandoned businesses. From a distance, Elijah couldn’t identify them all, but he recognized the striped pole of a barbershop, a few signs declaring the names of the businesses, and a handful of rusting automobiles. The structures themselves were no more than two stories tall, many with glass fronts shaded by rotting cloth awnings, the remnants of which fluttered in the breeze.

Once, it might have been a quaint little town, but now, it was nothing more than the crumbling ruins of a lost world. Elijah knelt by the tree line, hundreds of yards away, and used Eyes of the Eagle to study the ruins, but he saw nothing out of the ordinary. In fact, he’d passed through a handful of similarly abandoned towns on his journey from Ironshore to Norcastle, and he knew he’d seen only a fraction of what was out there.

Likely, whole cities had been laid to waste.

If the transformed wildlife hadn’t done the trick, then people certainly would have. Elijah had seen how people reacted in even mundane times of crisis. Looting. Murder. Tribalism. It was all so commonplace as to have become cliché. And with something like what had happened after Earth had been touched by the World Tree, it would inevitably be worse. It didn’t take much of an imagination to envisage a situation where a particularly strong despot came to power.

And there wouldn’t be anything to keep them from doing whatever they wanted to do. No government. No law enforcement. Just chaos and anarchy, which always favored the amoral.

But there had to be some hope. As often as Elijah had seen evil rise up, he’d also seen plenty of instances where people had come together to support one another. It had happened in Norcastle. Hopefully, that would prove to be the rule, rather than the exception. Still, Elijah couldn’t look down at that snippet of a once-thriving town and feel anything but a sense of poignant loss.

It wasn’t just for the people who’d died, though that was a significant part of it. Added to that was the cultural loss as well. Would it survive? What Elijah had seen in Norcastle suggested that it wouldn’t – at least not intact. Bits and pieces would persevere, but the world, as Elijah and everyone else had known it, was gone. Never was there a more apt representation of that fact than the ruins of the abandoned town in the distance.

With a sigh, Elijah rose to his feet and ran his hand through his hair. It had been almost an entire day since he’d left Norcastle behind, and according to the map Essex had given him, he was incredibly close to the tower. Soon enough, he intended to enter it, and then, he’d spend the next days or weeks fighting for his life.

When he thought of it in those terms, he almost turned around and left it all behind. By all rights, he shouldn’t have committed himself to the quest. However, the fact remained that, over the course of the two-plus years since he’d been stranded on that island, he had changed. Not only had he gained magical powers and the ability to shapeshift into powerful animal forms, but he’d also attained nearly superhuman strength, endurance, and coordination. But it was more than that. Those were important, but even more impactful was his shifting mindset.

Things that should have terrified him, he simply took as a matter of course. He wanted to enter that tower in order to save Norcastle from the plagued Voxx. That was a given. But his decision to challenge it was also seeded by a need to advance. He wanted to get stronger, and a tower was the best place to do that.

But more than that, even, was Elijah’s need to seek a challenge. To balance on the edge of life and death and come out on top. That was the real benefit of conquering the Keledge Tower near his island. It had changed him, body, mind, and soul. And he wanted to experience that feeling, that sensation of overcoming adversity and conquering what should have been unbeatable, again.

Since then, he’d learned that most towers were only challenged by groups of people. As many as six individuals could enter the same tower, which meant that most people wouldn’t dare try with less. The notion of going alone was unthinkable except at the highest echelons of power when finding peers became nearly impossible.

That he’d managed to conquer the tower by himself was a feat worthy of praise. That he wanted to try to repeat that accomplishment was a little insane, though he felt that there were two factors in his favor. First was his versatility. By virtue of his varied spellbook as well as his animal forms, he was suited to combat a wide variety of situations. So, going alone wasn’t the detriment that it would be for, say, a Warrior whose ability to heal would be very limited. With his Dragon Core, he felt even more strongly about his chances.

But the second factor was arguably more important. Nerthus had informed him that a tower’s relative strength was based on Ethera density. They were graded according to the density, much like items. The lowest-ranked tower was simple-grade, but they could reach as high as miraculous-grade. And while Elijah didn’t think that the tower he’d conquered was the highest-grade possible, he knew it couldn’t have been the lowest, either. That certainty was based primarily on the fact that the Ethera on and around his island was far denser than what he felt in the Norcastle region. By extension, any tower that would have manifested would have to be much weaker than one near his island.

Or that was what he hoped.

He was still a novice when it came to those sorts of things – every human on Earth was – but the theory fit together well enough, as far as he could tell. And given that there was no more information available at Ironshore’s Branch of the World Tree, he didn’t think he’d ever learn the truth without copious experimentation. Basically, he needed to challenge and conquer a variety of towers before he could come to any viable conclusions.

But before that, he needed to find the Norcastle region’s tower.

So, to that end, Elijah strode forward with a confident gait. He crossed a wide meadow before reaching the outskirts of the ruined town. The moment he passed the first building, though, he felt a steep rise in the ambient Ethera. It didn’t feel like a dimensional rift, though. There was no mistaking that much. Rifts – and towers, to an extent – felt wrong in a way nothing else really could. This, by comparison, felt natural.

But even though his senses told him to relax, Elijah kept his guard up as he progressed through the town. Originally, he’d intended to scavenge anything useful, but he quickly saw that the stores on either side of the street had long since been picked clean. Likely, the people of Norcastle were responsible.

Still, Elijah continued to check each building. He wasn’t certain what he hoped to find – in fact, he had almost everything he needed – but he wasn’t going to pass up a golden opportunity just because he lacked imagination or foresight. So, he went through each abandoned store with a proverbial fine-toothed comb.

And he found nothing of note.

But as he searched the small town, Elijah felt the density of the ambient Ethera continuously increase. Eventually, he was following that more than he was looking for anything useful, and after almost two hours, he finally found the source.

He caught a quick glimpse of it through the broken windows of an old appliance store before he hastily ducked back out of sight, his heart beating out of his chest. In only a second, he’d already channeled Ethera into Shape of the Predator, and it only took a few more moments before he once again assumed the form of a scaled panther. When he did, he embraced the Guise of the Unseen, hiding him from view.

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Only then did he allow himself to relax.

He waited for almost a minute before his heartbeat slowed down. Then, crouching low and trusting his ability to keep him hidden, he slithered out from cover and searched for the creature that, before, he’d only glimpsed.

And there it was, in the back of the store, looming over a broken washing machine. Most of the store itself was empty, obviously having been plundered by Norcastle’s scavengers. They had electricity, even if it was obviously in short supply, so the appliances were still useful for them.

In any case, Elijah wasn’t even remotely concerned with those sorts of mundane thoughts. Because a bear had mistaken the appliance store for a cave.

It wasn’t just any bear, though. The thing was enormous – at least the size of a polar bear – with mottled black-and-red fur. But Elijah’s gaze quickly flicked past the creature, and he saw the reason the enormous ursine had settled in the store. At first glance, it was obviously a mushroom. Red-and-white, which a stereotypically thick stalk and a bulbous cap, it was easily identifiable as a fly amanita. However, with a diameter of at least six feet, it was many times larger than any mushroom Elijah had ever seen.

And it was clearly the source of the thickened Ethera. Elijah could feel it with every cell in his body.

Nerthus had often spoken of natural treasures. The ancestral tree with which the spirit was linked was one such treasure, but he’d also intimated that the transformed world would be full of them. Once, Elijah had wondered how he might identify such a treasure. Now, though? Looking at that enormous mushroom – and more importantly, feeling the waves of dense Ethera pulsing off of it – Elijah no longer wondered.

But what was he supposed to do with it?

More importantly, whatever he decided, how was he going to deal with the bear? Was it an intelligent guardian like the panther had been? Or was it just a mutated animal? More importantly, did it matter? Because, judging by the bear’s size – and more urgently, the feeling Elijah got when he looked at the thing – it was just as powerful as the panther had been. So, the source of that power, or rather, its origin, was somewhat a moot point.

Elijah settled back on his haunches and watched, though the bear seemed lethargic. Probably due to the winter’s onset. It wouldn’t be long before the blizzards swept through the region, and it didn’t take a biologist to suppose that the bear was settling down for hibernation. Perhaps that would give Elijah an opportunity.

At first, he considered attacking the creature with every weapon he had at his disposal. Perhaps he could even take it out before it had a chance to respond. However, even if that was possible – which he doubted – Elijah’s thoughts traced a different path. The bear had done nothing to him, and he couldn’t stomach the idea of killing it for the simple crime of existing.

With the spiders, his hand had been forced. They were in the way, and he couldn’t have gotten through the pass without dealing with them. But the situation with the bear was different. It had done nothing to him. It didn’t really pose a threat to him, either. In fact, he could easily bypass the overgrown ursine and continue on his way.

And he would have, if it wasn’t for the call of that amanita.

So, if he didn’t want to kill the bear – or couldn’t – Elijah needed to find a different path to getting what he wanted. And it didn’t take him long to remember how he’d originally befriended the panther. A little fish could go a long way toward building a friendship.

With that in mind, Elijah retreated and quickly set off toward a stream he’d passed a few hours before stumbling upon the ruins of the nameless town. By the time he reached the stream, though, night had begun to fall, so he chose to set up camp rather than approach the bear at night.

So, he built a fire, then settled in to eat a supper of dried meat, a few berries and mushrooms he’d gathered along the way, and a piece of flatbread he’d gotten back in Norcastle. It was not a pleasant dinner, and he was once again reminded of the meals he’d eaten back in the city. Or of the berries he grew on his island.

It was at that moment that he realized just how much he missed his Grove. He wanted to sleep in his bed. He wanted to tend to his garden. To catch his fish. He even wanted to eat his crabs. At some point, it had gone from a place where he’d washed ashore to an actual home.

Thoughts of his Grove settled onto his mind until, at last, he fell asleep. Somewhere around midnight, he was awoken by something tickling against One with Nature, but when he looked around, he saw that the culprit was just a racoon. Elijah didn’t shoo it away, and the small creature approached cautiously.

It sniffed his extended hand, then skittered backward a foot or so. But it didn’t flee. Instead, it came back, a little more confidently than it had before. Over and over, it repeated the same motions until, at last, it seemed to accept that Elijah wasn’t going to hurt it. Then, it settled down next to him, curled up at his hip, then promptly fell asleep.

Elijah knew that was unnatural behavior for just about any wild animal, much less a raccoon. They were nocturnal, so the fact that it was sleeping at night was a bit of a red flag. So, with as gentle a touch as he could manage, Elijah reached out and used Touch of Nature on the little ball of fur.

Immediately, he felt a host of parasites in the thing’s stomach. They might’ve been worms. Or something else native to the new world. However, they were sucking the life right out of the little creature. So, Elijah used his healing ability to banish the parasites.

Idly, he wondered how that worked. How did the spell know not to heal the parasites instead of the raccoon? Was it based on his perception? He’d done something similar with himself on enough occasions that that explanation made as much sense as any other, but he resolved to ask Nerthus when he returned to the Grove.

In the meantime, he healed his new friend, and when he’d finished, the little raccoon fell into an even deeper slumber. Elijah did as well, though he was careful to once again ensure that One with Nature was active so that the passive awareness it granted would alert him of any threats. That took him all the way until morning, when the raccoon stirred, waking him.

Elijah opened his eyes and glanced at the little critter, and with a yawn, asked, “Feeling better?”

It predictably didn’t answer. Instead, it just scurried away, disappearing into a nearby bush.

“No – don’t thank me. It was the least I could do,” he muttered to himself. Then, he shook his head and let a wry smile play across his face as he said, “What did I even expect? A talking raccoon? C’mon, Elijah. You know better than that.”

With that, he reached into his pack and retrieved his homemade fishing line. He’d always intended to get some back in Ironshore, but in all the hustle and bustle of buying the rest of his supplies, he’d forgotten. Still, his hand-made line and hooks were more than capable of doing the job. So, he got to his feet, then headed toward the stream.

That’s when he realized that his equipment was poorly suited for the job at hand. He saw the fish, but they simply weren’t inclined to be caught. So, after spending almost an hour in a fruitless attempt at fishing, Elijah shifted into his Guardian form and channeled his inner bear.

And with his incredible Strength pushing his body to ridiculous heights, he had no issues with slapping the water so hard that it stunned the nimble fish. After that, it was simple to grab them and toss them onto shore. Before another hour had passed, he had almost two dozen silvery trout.

Hopefully, that would be enough.

However, before he headed back to the town with his intended offering, he gutted one of the fish, fileted it, then roasted the results over his fire. He still wasn’t a good cook, but brook trout were difficult to screw up too badly. Once that was done, he broke his fast, then wove some cordage through the trouts’ mouths before slinging the lot over his shoulder and heading back to town.

His plan was simple enough.

Bears were already intelligent creatures, and they had a long history of peaceful coexistence with humans. Sure, they were wild animals, and they should always be treated as such, but so long as he played his cards right, Elijah felt certain that his offering of food, coupled with the subtle pacifying effect of One with Nature, would see him through to an alliance with the hulking creature.

Even so, he was more than a little nervous when the appliance store came into view. He could still see the bear – or more, the shadow of the creature – inside. But even when he approached, slowly and deliberately, the monstrous animal didn’t respond. Then, suddenly, it lifted its massive head and sniffed the air.

“I’m a friend,” Elijah said in an even tone. The bear sniffed again, then shifted its bulk. Elijah knew just how quickly bears could move, so he was on guard. As it turned out, it wasn’t necessary. The bear eyed him for a long moment, then huffed and settled back down.

Elijah relaxed.

A little.

But he knew he was still on thin ice, so he pulled the bundle of fish off his back, then tossed it at the bear’s front paws.

“All yours,” he said.

The bear wasted no time before digging in and devouring one fish after another. Elijah sat down, his back to the wall, and crossed his legs. He could spring to his feet in less than an instant, and he had a full core of Ethera, so he felt confident that he could escape at a moment’s notice. But he didn’t want to.

Instead, he was compelled to coexist with the creature. Whether it was by virtue of his archetype or something else, he wasn’t sure. But it was there, all the same.

More importantly, with the bear seemingly having accepted his presence, Elijah could bask in the dense Ethera wafting off the giant mushroom. And the moment he let himself feel it – really feel it – he realized that it was the piece of the puzzle he’d been missing in his attempts at advancing his Mind cultivation.

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