Chapter 783 11-53. Asserting Dominance - Path of Dragons

Elijah pushed himself to feet and finally let himself see the carnage he'd wrought. Tens of thousands of wasps, spiders, drachnids, and vespirans lay dead. But for the hatred flowing through him, it was not enough. He knew that, even when they were all dead, he would want more.

So, when he saw the large vespiran, followed by a squad of lesser wasp-men, leap free of the fortress' exit, he found himself looking forward to the confrontation. He gripped his scythe in one hand, readying his spells for the fight to come.

A sound like a helicopter reached Elijah's ears only a few moments before the creature landed. It touched down a little more than twenty feet away, kicking up a cloud of dust with the impact. The others soon followed, arraying themselves behind him.

For a long moment, Elijah faced them down. In the distance, the sun had begun to peek over the horizon, and the first wisps of color emerged from the cracks in the earth. Each of the wasp-men wore black armor trimmed in red and carried shields as well as spears. It took Elijah only a second or two to recognize that none of it was made of metal. Rather, it bore a striking resemblance to drachnid carapace.

And the spears had clearly been fashioned from the spider-women's spindly legs.

"It isn't enough that you enslave them?" he asked, his voice far more casual than his roiling anger should have dictated. "You need to dismantle them and use their body parts for weapons?"

At first, the creature didn't answer. Instead, he sniffed the air. His nose scrunched in disgust as he finally spoke. "Dragon."

"Something like that," Elijah answered.

"You have no room to speak of slavery," the vespiran spat. "Or of using remains to craft armor."

Only then did Elijah remember that his own gear had been made from a wasp corpse. Had Rakhan hunted it nearby? No – he would have mentioned it. More likely, it was unrelated. The colors were wrong, and there was an ocean between the Broken Crown and anywhere the hunter might've been.

"Dead enemies deserve nothing."

"On that, we agree," the vespiran hissed. "Perhaps I will make a cloak from your skin."

"Need to kill me first."

"That will not be an issue, little dragon."

Elijah rolled his shoulders. "Try it."

And the wasp-man did. He moved with such alacrity that, even six months before, Elijah would have had difficulty tracking his movements. But with all the advantages he'd accumulated, he managed to follow the vespiran's charge. He dodged, though only by a few inches. His scythe descended, slicing neatly through the wasp-man's wing.

Then, Elijah leaped, kicked off Cloud Step with a backflip that narrowly allowed him to avoid an attack from one of the other wasp-men. As he sailed through the air, he embraced his newfound ability to dual cast to enable the activation of two separate spells.

The first was Nature's Claim, which settled onto the first vespiran he saw. The spores took hold and immediately began to grow. At the same time, Lightning Domain lashed out, stunning every vespiran in range.

And that was all of them, save the leader.

Mushrooms burst from his first target's back, misting the air with spores that infected the other vespirans. Their wings had locked up under the electrical current, sending them plummeting to the cracked ground.

Elijah kicked off another Cloud Step, already shifting into Shape of the Scourge. Even as he took on the form of the ten-foot raptor-dragon, a scene of gruesome carnage erupted below. The lesser members of the squad had already succumbed to Nature's Claim. Mushrooms continued to propagate, spreading and covering the dying wasp-men in a blanket of fungi.

The more powerful among them were still affected by the spreading spores, but they would live.

Elijah intended to see that they did not.

He descended upon them, his talons flashing with malevolent toxins. Even the smallest scratch was enough to infect his victims with Spreading Blight and Ethereal Sepsis, but he didn't stop there. Instead, he used Lurking Swarm, directing the conjured phase spiders to attack the leader.

He was the only one that really mattered. The others were no more than fodder. But the one in charge had a few levels to his name, and as such, could pose a threat even to Elijah. Keeping that wasp-man busy while he dealt with all the rest was of paramount importance.

Fortunately, the creature clearly hadn't expected the variety of attacks. Or the crystalline spiders leaping upon his back. So, the strategy worked. Elijah used that opening to his advantage, ruthlessly infecting every other wasp-man there. But the scourgedrake form wasn't just about spreading toxicity. No – it was a fearsome predator even without its venom.

Elijah's jaws snapped out, ripping through the wasp-men's armor and tearing free chunks of carapace and flesh. Bitter blood and other gore filled his mouth. He regarded it as the taste of victory.

And given the hatred he held for his opponents, it tasted very, very good.

Before long, the ground was littered with body parts. Wings, legs, arms and fungus-infected bodies sprawled in every direction. And silence reigned over the Painted Wastes.

"What are you?" growled the lead vespiran, having shattered the phase spiders and recovered from the sudden absence of his wing. Elijah could also feel that he was infected with a tidal wave of afflictions that would have felled a lesser opponent. To his credit, the wasp-man endured them stoically.

Stolen story; please report.

Though Elijah saw the tremble in his many legs. The tension around his eyes. The clench of his jaw. The erratic flutter of his heartbeat. He was still standing, but he was vastly weakened.

Just what Elijah intended.

Using the brief cessation of fighting to his advantage, Elijah shifted again. This time, he took on the Shape of the Master, transforming his body into the diminutive shape of the salamander-like cindrandir.

He didn't bother answering the vespiran's question. The thing wasn't even real. Not in the truest sense. It came from the Primal Realm. It didn't deserve any explanation.

Instead, Elijah attacked.

He leaped forward, his feet barely touching the ground as he summoned his scythe. The wasp-man only hesitated for an instant, but that was enough. Elijah's blade bit deep. Too deep. He tried to pull it free, but it wouldn't budge.

Letting it go, Elijah jumped backward just in time to avoid a spear thrust. The vespiran didn't slow down, either. Instead, he charged, his spear darting out with brutal speed and unrivaled efficiency. Ethera danced around the enemy, a sign that some sort of ability was at play.

Elijah could believe it, too. The creature moved so quickly that even he had trouble dodging. But dodge he did. The flurry of would-be blows never touched him. The lone advantage of the ferocious barrage of attacks was that Elijah quickly built dozens of charges of Heart of Fire.

But he didn't unleash Incinerate.

That was too quick a death for the creature. So, Elijah continued to dodge, avoiding one blow after another until he had a hundred charges at his disposal.

He used them to activate Child of Fire.

The sudden influx of so many attributes sent his heartbeat into overdrive. His muscles trembled with unspent power, and his every step felt like it could shake the very earth.

Elijah threw himself at the vespiran.

The wasp-man had no idea how to react to the sudden shift. Elijah had spent the first part of their battle on the defensive, so when he turned to offense, it must have been quite shocking.

Even more surprising was Elijah's inflated strength, which he used to rip the creature's armor free and toss it aside. He didn't stop there, either. Instead, Elijah grabbed the ridged chitin crosscrossing the wasp-man's torso and tore it away. It did so in a shower of gore, accompanied by a primal scream of pure agony that was music to Elijah's ears.

Of course, the vespiran tried to fight back.

But Elijah was too quick. He skittered across the much larger creature's body, wreaking havoc with every inch. Before long, the thing was a mass of ichor-covered wounds. Its ability had long since ended, and in its wake came the weakness caused by Elijah's constant assault combined with the venom of his previous attacks.

Elijah leaped free, throwing himself into another flip as he kicked off Cloud Step. He landed thirty feet away from the wounded vespiran.

The thing was an absolute mess. At some point, Elijah had torn one of the wasp-man's legs off. Its second wing had been destroyed as well. And his torso was nothing but rent flesh and oddly iridescent ichor.

The vespiran tried to speak, but when he opened his mouth, he only coughed up ichor. Elijah stepped forward, his body still singing with Child of Fire. Heat rose from his shoulders, distorting the atmosphere with every step.

Then, finally, the enemy found his voice, only to fill the air with harsh laughter. That brought Elijah up short.

"You think you have won? I am nothing, little dragon. You will see. The Broken Crown awaits. There, you will see the fate of your kind."

Elijah wanted to know more, but the creature followed that statement with a last-ditch attack. He dodged easily, his hand darting out to wrap around the handle of the Verdant Fang. He ripped the scythe free, splattering more gore across the earth. He didn't stop there, though. In only a second, the wasp-man's head sailed away, separated from his body.

Even as that still-haughty-faced orb bounced across the ground, the vespiran's body went limp, collapsing.

And finally, there was nothing but silence.

Elijah whipped around, half expecting another attack. None came. He'd killed the entire nest.

His shoulders sagged, not in exhaustion, but rather, in disappointment. He wanted to continue killing. To take the battle to those vespirans and wasps he'd seen during his journey to the Broken Crown. He wanted to rip them all apart like the pests they were.

He took a deep breath, pushing those thoughts aside.

He wasn't there to destroy meaningless wasps. He was there to enter the Broken Crown and conquer it. That was the only thing that mattered.

So, without further hesitation, he shifted into the Shape of the Sky, then flew to the entrance. There, he saw the fruits of his labor. Spiders, wasps, drachnids, and vespirans had piled near the entrance, clearly panicked from the toxins inflicted by his Eternal Plague. Elijah spared them no pity.

They didn't deserve it.

Instead, after shifting back into his human form, he stepped over their bodies, his feet sticking slightly to the webs coating the corridor. He ignored that as he followed the same path he'd taken during his first infiltration. Along the way, he saw more dead bodies. Hundreds of them. Perhaps thousands.

Had the fortress always contained so many? Or was it a response to his first visit? A desperate ploy to fend him off, maybe? Elijah had no idea, and if he was honest, he couldn't bring himself to care.

Instead, he found his way to the portal of bone and resin. The interior shimmered with opaque ethera, concealing the other side. However, he didn't enter. Not immediately. Instead, he turned his attention inward.

After all, he'd hit a major milestone at two-twenty-five. His last specialization had been incredibly impactful on his path, and he suspected the same would be true of the one he'd just earned.

So, he resolved to take a little while to explore his options. Only once he'd made a choice would he enter the Primal Realm.

Thankfully, the portal room was clear of both webs and dead bodies. He settled down in one corner, closed his eyes, and inspected his options.

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pstrong /strong/p

pstrongArchetype: Druid/strong/p

pstrongClass: Primal Lord/strong/p

pstrong /strong/p

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pstrong /strong/p

pstrongSpecialization Options/strong/p

pstrong /strong/p

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