Path of Dragons - A LitRPG Apocalypse (BOOK TWO ON KINDLE SEPT. 2)

Elijah should have known it was a trap.

It was too convenient. Too easy. And yet, after spending most of a day fruitlessly exploring the factory, he was so eager for answers that he never even considered that the room didn’t really fit with the rest of the factory’s aesthetic. But he’d blundered inside, grabbing the information crystal like he’d found the most precious treasure in the world.

He didn’t even get a chance to access it before the floor opened beneath him and he was falling. A couple of seconds later, he hit a sharp decline featuring more than a few jagged and rusty edges. They mercilessly dug into his flesh, ripping small and ultimately inconsequential, but still painful wounds in his back and legs before he could shift into the Shape of Venom and halt his fall.

Breathing hard, he looked around.

He was in another duct, though this one was more corroded. Thankfully, there was no toxic gas to worry about, so he had time to think. His first idea was to climb back the way he’d fallen and reenter the room that had contained the crystal, but when he reached the top of the duct, he found that his way was barred by thick metal doors that absolutely hummed with dense ethera.

For a moment, Elijah considered trying to break through, but he could feel that even if he managed it, he wouldn’t do so without significant noise and a significant investment of time. And given the ethereal signature emanating from those doors, he couldn’t believe that his efforts would go unnoticed. They probably wouldn’t even be rewarded with success.

So, he had no choice but to see where the duct went.

With that in mind, he climbed downward. Thankfully, his ability to cling to any surface came in handy, so he was able to control his descent. The rusty duct went on for what felt like miles, growing every steeper until it became completely vertical. Then, after nearly a thousand feet, he found its end.

Clinging to the exit, Elijah saw a massive vat of green liquid. Judging by the way the dislodged hunks of rust sizzled upon splashing down, Elijah suspected it was acid. He had no intention of testing his Constitution against that, so he crawled out of the duct and to the ceiling. That vantage gave him the opportunity to truly inspect the new environment, and he was more than a little distressed to find that it was just a black iron cube of a room. Like the duct, the walls were rusty, with jagged edges that could have cut through a vanilla human’s flesh with ease.

The room’s only feature was the vat of acid, which didn’t fill Elijah with confidence. Images of the room being flooded with acid flashed through his mind. At least Unchecked Growth had come off of cooldown, though he didn’t want to waste it when he had no idea what else the Primal Realm might hold.

For the next hour, Elijah climbed across the ceiling, over the walls, and within inches of the floor, but he found no other features. The walls were entirely solid and without a single gap. On top of that, Soul of the Wild was incapable of bypassing those iron boundaries, which left him feeling almost entirely blind. To make things worse, the second he’d fully entered the room, a thick metal panel slid across the opening to the duct, sealing any chance of retreat.

Finally, with no small degree of trepidation, he touched his claw against the floor.

It didn’t take a prophet to predict what was coming, and Elijah was unsurprised to see acid bubbling over the edge of the vat. It hissed and sizzled as it began to pool. Elijah climbed higher, studying the huge vat, and over the next thirty seconds, he was distressed to find that it wasn’t stopping.

Something was refilling it.

Elijah let out a hissing sigh, then climbed higher. Over the next hour, the room continued to fill as he pondered how he was meant to combat the situation. It was entirely possible that there was no solution, but he just didn’t believe that would be the case. In his experience, there was always a way.

Over the next couple of hours, he was forced ever higher as the acid enveloped the vat and filled half the room. Soon enough, he found himself clinging to the ceiling as the first vestiges of panic suffused his heart.

Then, when the level was only a couple of feet below the ceiling, he felt something interesting. It was just a hint of a pulse of ethera, but when it stabilized, Elijah latched onto it. He couldn’t sense anything else within the acid – like the walls, it seemed to block Soul of the Wild – but he could still feel that subtle pulse of energy.

He knew he needed to make a decision, and soon, or the choice would be made for him. So, wanting to be proactive, Elijah released his grip and fell from the ceiling. He hit the acid with a corrosive splash, and he was immediately enveloped by a level of pain that exceeded even what he’d experienced in the duct far above.

But that pain was not indicative of the damage he incurred. Certainly, his scales melted. He knew that. Yet, he had some time to investigate before his body dissolved. Not much, but he hoped that, with a cast of Wild Resurgence, it would be enough.

Without further hesitation, Elijah dove, already shifting into his more durable Shape of Thorn. The increased Constitution came in handy as he reached the bottom and began his search for the pulse of ethera.

Predictably, it originated within the vat.

He didn’t have time to delay, so he quickly covered the ground and pulled himself over the lip. That’s when he saw the bottom of the vat for what it was. A plane of ethera stretched across the base, rippling with potent energy. Elijah swam forward, his scales slowly succumbing to the acid, and laid his claw on the shield.

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It went right through.

And what’s more, he felt air on the other side.

Elijah’s heart fluttered, and he kicked forward, diving headfirst through the permeable barrier. Frigid air greeted him on the other side before he slammed head-first into the floor.

Predictably, it was cold and rusted iron, pitted and cracked from the acid.

He rolled over, then immediately shifted back into his human form before summoning a shower via Blessing of the Grove. After that, he peeled his armor and clothing off of his blistered body, then reveled in the healing and cleansing storm. Once he’d re-cast Wild Resurgence and Nature’s Bloom, he retrieved some of his rejuvenating soap from his Ghoul-Hide Satchel so that he could ensure that his body was entirely rid of the corrosive acid.

Only then did he truly let himself notice his surroundings. Thankfully, he didn’t find himself inside another box. Instead, it was a corridor made of the same material. Just as he was donning his armor, he felt a rumbling deep in the walls.

Fortunately, there were no apparent effects, so Elijah just chalked it up as one of those things he needed to investigate while he finished dressing. After his armor, he shrugged his way back into his Cloak of the Iron Bear. Letting out a sigh, he once again thanked the cloak for its Temperate trait. Without it, he would’ve had to endure the corridor’s frigid air.

Dressed and ready, Elijah ate some roasted monster meat he’d stockpiled during his last bout of convalescence. Then, without any other options, he started down the corridor. As he did, he felt another rumble, but he was still incapable of finding the source. Soul of the Wild was once again incapable of bypassing the walls, so he still felt a little blind.

There was nothing for it, though.

Fortunately, there was only one way to go, and the corridor went on for more than a thousand yards until Elijah found a fork. After taking the time to mark the route – just like he had in the first maze he’d found, he chose the leftmost option.

A sudden clicking sound was the only warning he received before he found himself beset by a burst of flames. He dove forward in a roll, thankful that the fire wasn’t quite powerful enough to roast him alive. It did leave him slightly blistered, so he took a few seconds to heal himself before continuing on.

Another rumble shook the corridor, but again, Elijah could sense nothing about what it meant. So, he kept going until he heard another clicking sound. He dove ahead just in time to avoid being roasted. That’s when he settled down for a few seconds to try to understand what was going on. He pushed Soul of the Wild as hard as he could, and after a few seconds, he felt something.

It was just a tiny trickle of vitality buried in one of the walls, but it was there all the same. Elijah had no idea what it meant. For all he knew, it was nothing. But he didn’t believe that. Still, over the next few minutes, he couldn’t figure anything out. So, eventually, he decided to simply keep going.

After all, what else was he meant to do?

Over the next few hours, he found more of the same. An endless corridor of rusted iron, gouts of dense flame, and a trickle of vitality with no source and no destination. Then, he found the mark he’d made at the first fork.

His stomach twisted.

He knew he hadn’t made enough turns to get back to where he’d started. In fact, he’d mostly gone straight, and for dozens of miles. He shouldn’t have been anywhere near his starting point.

But there it was – a symbol consisting of two lines scratched into the rusty wall.

Elijah slammed his palm into the wall and screamed in frustration. Then, he did it again. And it wasn’t just the maze. It was the entire Primal Realm. It seemed hellbent on pushing him to his absolute limits. Every turn brought with it one frustration after another, and he was getting close to the end of his rope.

He took a deep breath.

Pitching a fit might make him feel a little better in the moment, but it was ultimately a useless endeavor. So, he turned his attention to the predicament, and it only took him a moment to realize the answer to at least one of his questions. Clearly, the maze was moving. That was the rumbling.

But how was he meant to overcome it? Or was it all just a trap that was supposed to keep him bottled up until he died of starvation? Elijah couldn’t believe that was the case. He refused.

There was always a way.

He just needed to find it.

To that end, he dropped into a squat, and cast his senses out. If he’d felt the trickle, then that meant he might feel something else.

But then it hit him.

So far, he’d been unconsciously following the line of vitality. With every turn, he’d picked that. He hadn’t even realized he was doing it.

What if he chose the other route?

That single question was enough to ignite a fire of hope, and Elijah soon found himself heading down the corridor with a bit of optimism in his heart. He’d gotten this far, hadn’t he? He could keep going. He could win. He had to believe that.

Eventually, he reached another fork. This time, he spent a few seconds concentrating on Soul of the Wild before choosing the route completely devoid of vitality. Only a few minutes later, he found the first change.

Before him stood a corridor populated by metallic vines. In a way, they looked a lot like corrugated metal hoses, but they were tipped with steel claws the glistened in the scant light. But what truly alarmed Elijah was that each one of them had a core of life within them. It was like someone had taken the flesh vines from the Veinroot Hollow and encased them in gleaming metal.

And as disgusting as those hated vines were, the new version was even worse.

Elijah took a step forward, and the things came at him en masse. Thankfully, they couldn’t quite reach him, stretching taut and falling to the floor only a foot away. He half-heartedly tried to cut one with his scythe, but the blade skated off the metal.

He’d expected as much, but he was still a bit dissuaded by the failure.

The only other option was magic. So, Elijah leveled his scythe at the nearest vine and let loose with Storm’s Fury. The lightning arced out, slamming into the thing and frying the fleshy vine within. It fell limp, dead before it hit the floor.

That was enough for Elijah, who immediately embraced Lightning Domain and absolutely decimated the entire corridor with whips of electricity. With a little concentration, he could keep it going even while moving, so that’s what he did until he reached the end of the hall, which terminated in yet another fork.

He chose the lifeless branch once again, and predictably, he found more vines, which he dealt with via repeated casts of Storm’s Fury. The spell was one of the first he’d ever gotten, and so, it cost almost no ethera to cast. Because of that, he could keep it going almost indefinitely.

Which was a good thing, because the next day was characterized by more of the same. But finally, after he’d begun to wonder if he’d ever find the end of the maze, he found himself standing at the entrance to a large room populated by a single figure.

Elijah stepped inside.

“Good. G-good. Good. G-g-g-good,” the figure said in a voice that wavered between stuttering and robotic distortion and disturbingly human. “I-I-I was hoping you’d figure-figure-f-figure-recalibrating – figure it out.”