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

Elijah’s efforts took him all the way to two-thirty-nine, and a good ways through that as well. He wasn’t certain why the system had decided that every ninth level took so much more experience, but he’d begun to dread them. That he’d progressed nearly halfway to two-forty was a testament to both the quantity and quality of his fallen opponents.

Once the final vespiran was dead, Elijah took a moment to compose himself. As he did so, he looked inward, and he was shocked to discover just how depleted his resources were. His ethera levels had dropped to less than a third, and now that he didn’t have the benefit of adrenaline keeping him going, he felt bone-tired. Using so many abilities, so constantly and in such quick succession, had really taken its toll on his stamina.

But he didn’t dare rest.

For all he knew, if he delayed too long, another abyssal monster would plant itself at the end of that chain. Instead, he shifted into the Shape of Spores, mostly to take advantage of its increased regeneration, and set about looting the vespirans. As it turned out, there wasn’t much there. Just a few weapons that emanated a decent amount of ethera and a few pouches containing some silver and gold ethereum.

Not a fortune by any means, but Elijah wasn’t one to turn down free money.

In the end, his haul was a little disappointing, especially considering that he’d slain more than half a dozen demi-gods. Sure, they were barely past that mark, and he didn’t think they were all that strong for their levels, but he had expected them to have at least something of value.

It was probably due to them being inside a Primal Realm.

Or maybe demi-gods, by and large, were much poorer than he thought. One way or another, it didn’t take long for Elijah to pick through the corpses. Briefly, he considered taking one of the corpses. After all, if Griff could make decent armor from some random wasp, then he could do something at least equally as impressive with the carapace of a demi-god vespiran.

But in the end, he decided not to go down that route for two reasons. The first was the most obvious. There was very little undamaged chitin on the battlefield. Most of it was at least cracked, but a good portion had succumbed to fungal rot as well. That rendered the bulk of those bodies entirely unusable.

The second issue was both more surprising and a lot more obvious. The vespirans, for all that he hated them, were people. And using their bodies as crafting materials just felt wrong. Like skinning a person and making a pair of leather boots from the byproducts.

So, Elijah took what intact weaponry and equipment he could before moving on to the chain.

Crossing those massive links a third time came with an odd sense. On the one hand, it was familiar territory. But on the other, he didn’t feel the same pervasive danger he’d felt during either of his other crossings. The abyss was just as close, and for all he knew, another monster stood at the end. But with what he’d already accomplished, he felt more secure than ever.

It was enough to permit him to inspect his status. His attributes had continued to climb, and even with the loss of his armor, the numbers were impressive. He also finally took the opportunity to calculate just how much of a boost he received from the Shape of Spores.

In total, the form gave more than six-hundred points across his attributes. One-seventy-five in both strength and constitution, fifty in dexterity, and a whopping two-twenty-five in regeneration. That made it his most powerful form by a long shot, though he expected that, when he upgraded Shape of the Master, it would be bypassed.

However, the comparison between Shape of Spores and Shape of the Scourge was a little frustrating to consider. Comparatively, the scourgedrake form gave him right around half as many attributes. But it only took a moment to remember that the Shape of Scourge – and its predecessors – had never been reliant on raw attributes. Rather, the scourgedrake was about one thing – spreading as much toxicity as possible among his enemies. And in that, it was unmatched.

Still, Elijah couldn’t help but wonder what things might look like if he’d taken a different path back when he’d evolved Shape of the Predator into Shape of Venom. At that time, one of his choices had been clearly focused on physical power, rather than ambush and venom. Had his choice put that line of transformations on a different path?

Perhaps.

Even so, Elijah wasn’t unhappy with any of his choices. Least of all, Shape of Spores, which had outperformed even his wildest expectations. Not only was it strong and durable, but even its base regeneration was outstanding. And when he got everything going? He was like a king standing in the center of his mycelial domain.

That he could take on – and defeat – demi-gods was a testament to everything that had come before. All the pain. The hardship. The grueling cultivation. It had dragged him forward until the combination of his advantages was enough to let him punch well above his level.

The second that thought crossed his mind, he remembered the abyssal monster. Fighting it had been like a gnat trying to kill an elephant. Perhaps he could have whittled it down over the course of months. But one little mistake, a single error in judgement, and he’d have been killed.

In addition, he couldn’t ignore the fact that, so far, he’d only killed a few demi-gods alone. The first had been the most difficult. The second time was the enemy Druid – along with the Warrior – who clearly hadn’t anticipated his resistance. That surprise, along with the Druid’s non-combat class, meant that they hadn’t put up as much of a fight as their demi-god status might have suggested. In all other cases, he’d had help or surprise on his side.

So maybe he wasn’t quite as powerful as his kill count seemed to imply.

Whatever the case, he didn’t intend to go out of his way to hunt demi-gods, but he was satisfied to know that if a fight came, he could at least hold his own. The abyssal monsters were a different story altogether. If he saw another one, he would attempt to escape. Only if there was no other option would he fight something like that creature again.

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After a few days, during which Elijah focused on his core cultivation, he finally reached the end of the chain. Blessedly, it was still abandoned. Many of the vespiran corpses that had lain at the monster’s feet had been destroyed in the previous battle, but there were still enough around to send a chill up Elijah’s spine.

So many dead.

And he knew there would be more to come.

Now that he was mostly recovered, he shifted into the scourgedrake form and took on the Guise of the Unseen. Cloaked in stealth, he took off across the barren and rocky landmass on the other side of the chain. Every now and again, he saw ruined buildings that evoked that same sense of familiarity he still couldn’t place, but for the most part, there was nothing but jagged rock.

And abyssals.

None of them were as strong as the one guarding the chain, but they weren’t weak, either. The smaller ones looked the most dangerous, largely because they moved so quickly, and many were equipped with stealth abilities of their own. Elijah almost ran into one such creature, only recognizing it via Soul of the Wild just in time to avert his course.

Gradually, Elijah noticed a pattern, though.

Most of the abyssals were going in the same direction. They took haphazard routes, and many times, they stopped to fight one another, but still, they moved inexorably along a similar path. And it only took Elijah a little while to recognize something both troubling and, in retrospect, obvious.

They were going to the same place.

Elijah continued to follow the course, encountering a few smatterings of other buildings along the way. The implication was that, at one point, the entire planet had been settled. What’s more, from the ruins, he suspected that much of it had been covered by one huge city. The previous continent wasn’t quite proof of that, but it was highly suggestive that Elijah’s assumption was at least partially correct. Further supporting that theory was that he could barely go a few miles without running into more ruins.

Sure, there were barren stretches in between, but it didn’t take a leap of logic to conclude that the intervening buildings had simply been destroyed.

But there was a chance that Elijah only saw what he wanted to see. After all, he’d grown up watching science fiction movies that featured cities that stretched across entire planets. So, maybe he just wanted that to be true of his current environment.

It did beg the question of just how much of the planet was represented in the Primal Realm. The Elemental Maelstrom had been huge. So had the Chimeric Forge. And though his trek through the Desolate Reach had been confined to a single mountain range, he suspected that it was equally as large.

What was the limit? Was there one? Elijah didn’t have the answers to those questions, though he did know that there were system-defined spaces above Primal Realms. For one, he’d read about Ancestral Worlds, which were the next step up, and he wasn’t so naïve as to believe that there weren’t even higher forms out there.

Those thoughts accompanied him as the weeks passed. Eventually, he reached another chain, which led downward at a steep slope, ending in another continent-sized chunk of land floating in the middle of the abyss. The journey across that chain was nearly a thousand miles, though Elijah managed to cross it very quickly in the Shape of the Sky. So long as he was careful, he could skim over the top of the links without scraping the invisible and ethereal barrier holding the abyssal corruption at bay.

He just had to keep an eye out for wasps or the rare flying abyssals, though with Eyes of the Eagle, he managed that just fine. However, he was forced to land on the other side of the chain when he saw just how infested with vespirans the area had become. Once again, he used Guise of the Unseen to travel undetected.

Just like the abyssals, the vespirans and their allies moved in the same direction as Elijah’s intended path, so he was forced to remain in stealth the entire time. In addition, he took many detours, weaving between the ruins and outcroppings of rocks to avoid any groups of vespirans who might see through his ability.

His pace slowed considerably, but he continued along with dogged determination. The current continent was much like the one where he’d battled the abyssal chain guardian in that it featured a constant and high concentration of ruined buildings. Some were almost entirely intact, and when Elijah looked upon them, he became convinced that the’d seen their like before.

But he couldn’t place it.

The most reasonable explanation was that he recognized some of the design principles at play, and his brain had made a connection with some of Earth’s architecture. But that didn’t feel right to him. He felt certain that there was something more to it, though no matter how much thought he devoted to the matter, he couldn’t find any answers within his mind.

After another week, during which he camped within the surrounding buildings, Elijah came upon a battlefield. Scorched body parts were scattered throughout the wide avenue, with hundreds of vespirans having fallen. There was an abyssal there as well, though not nearly as strong as the chain guardian. Not only was it much smaller, but even in death, Elijah could feel the echoes of its power.

It was strong. At least demi-god level. But it was still less powerful than the one Elijah had helped defeat.

But he wasn’t that concerned with dead bodies, abyssal or vespiran. Instead, when he inspected the battlefield, he couldn’t help but recognize a familiar flavor of ethera. Whether it was an instinctive recognition or one borne of experience, Elijah was immediately aware that the creatures had been killed by a dragon.

And given that there was no dead dragon in evidence, he was forced to conclude that they had escaped.

Elijah decided to search for them, and not just because he had a soft spot for other dragons. He also wanted information. Clearly, the Primal Realm was dedicated to dragons, and so far, Elijah hadn’t discovered much about his adopted people. Sure, Dolo had given him some good information, but ultimately, that was just a taste. Elijah wanted to know more.

So, he extended his senses, focusing on the smallest details. He wasn’t really much of a tracker. Not like some Rangers who developed specific abilities dedicated to the skill. But with his enhanced senses, both mundane and via Soul of the Wild, he could do a fair impression of a real tracker.

It just took unbroken concentration and time.

After only a couple of hours, Elijah found the trail when he sensed a tiny speck of draconic blood. He followed that, finding another couple of drops a few feet on. And another after that. Soon enough, he was on his way.

The trail went on for a dozen miles before it led into one of the more intact buildings in the area. Elijah crept inside, though he didn’t fail to notice a few traps left near the entrance. He deftly avoided them, knowing full well that without Soul of the Wild – or his current level of focus – he’d have blundered right into them.

Up and up he went, following the spiral ramp that led to the top floors. Hundreds of stories until, at last, he found his target.

And he was surprised to see that the dragon in question was fairly humanoid in appearance. She had a lot more scales than Elijah – and they were red – but she’d taken on something like an elven body. Lithe and sharp-featured, she had swept-back horns that extended from the sides of her head and a forked tail.

She was also a demi-god.

“I can see you,” she said, looking directly at him. Her eyes glowed red, like twin coals. “Come in. If you are bold enough to creep so close, then perhaps you can help.”