Path of Dragons

Book 1: Chapter 75: Protector of the Grove

The charging gnome was shorter than any of the others Elijah had seen, a fact he’d tried to disguise with a very ridiculous mohawk that extended almost a foot higher than was reasonable. Still, the diminutive man moved with enough alacrity that Elijah almost didn’t have time to respond. At the last second, he pointed his staff in the gnome’s direction, casting Entagling Roots.

The spell took hold, transforming the targeted area into a quagmire of thorny roots. They reached up, wrapping around the racing gnome’s legs and digging into his flesh. But he never stopped moving, ripping free and leaving quite a bit of blood behind. He was unaffected, though, moving just as quickly as before.

Next came Storm’s Fury, sending a bolt of lightning in the gnome’s direction. It hit, and the attack was effective. The gnome – Cabbot, Elijah thought he’d heard someone say back in the camp – tumbled backward from the force of the lightning’s impact, flipping end over end until he came to a rest after ten feet.

Elijah watched as Cabbot staggered to his feet, his clothing smoking and the flesh on one side of his face charred. Only a moment later, the red energy cloaking his form pulsed, and the blistered and black flesh flaked away, leaving unmarred skin behind.

He was healing, and at a rate Elijah thought impossible. Even with Touch of Nature combined with Healing Rain, if he’d tried to heal that much damage, it would’ve taken hours. Perhaps days. But Cabbot had accomplished the feat in only seconds.

Seeing that, Elijah turned to run.

He couldn’t keep up to that kind of power. Not in a straight-up fight. Instead, he intended to use the same tactics he’d used before, harassing the gnome with hit-and-run tactics until he went down.

However, before he could get more than a few steps, something hit him in the back. He went flying through the air, then hit the ground where he tumbled, end over end, until he hit the tree line. Thankfully, he didn’t collide with a tree. Instead, he was slowed by the underbrush, and about ten feet into the forest, he came to a stop on his back.

He felt something wet.

Confused – there was no water around – he reached down, dipping his fingers into the puddle below. Pulling his hand away, he held it up in front of his face. And all he saw was red.

Blood.

He was bleeding.

That didn’t seem right. There was something he needed to do. Some way he should have responded. But in his foggy state, Elijah couldn’t solve that seemingly insurmountable puzzle.

Then, by instinct more than conscious thought, he cast Touch of Nature. The healing power coursed through him, healing his concussion and clearing his thoughts. But it did little for the gaping wound in his side.

“You ruined everything!” came a shout, accompanied by something – Cabbot, his slowed mind reasoned – crashing through the underbrush.

Elijah used Touch of Nature again, but it was like trying to fill a bucket one thimbleful at a time. The bleeding slowed, but it didn’t even come close to stopping.

He tried to rise, but his legs didn’t seem to work. So, all he managed was to awkwardly lever himself into a sitting position. When he did, he saw the gnome, still pulsing with angry red energy, charging through the forest, an enormous, bloody axe raised above his head.

Cabbot’s murderous intentions were clear.

Elijah’s options were nearly nonexistent. In fact, he only had one, and it was untested. But he had no choice. So, without any other options, Elijah embraced his newest spell. Ethera raced through his body, transforming it with every passing millisecond. Scales sprouted, muscles inflated, and his skeleton twisted into the appropriate shape. After only a second, he had assumed the Shape of the Guardian.

Shape of the Guardian Archetype: Druid Class: Animist Level: 30 Take on the form of a stalwart guardian, vastly increasing your Strength and Constitution attributes. Spellcasting is suspended while Form of the Guardian is active.
Guardian’s Renewal	Instantly and completely regenerate. Cooldown affected by Regeneration attribute. Current: Once Per Week

Elijah gasped as the notification flashed before his eyes. Whether it was a sign from the System, or his subconscious mind reminding him that his shapeshifting forms came with innate abilities, he had no idea. But regardless of whence it had come, Elijah wasted no time before using Guardian’s Renewal.

As the description promised, his wounds instantly healed. The exhaustion he’d felt from his days of fighting a guerilla war disappeared. And just like that, he was ready to meet the gnome on equal footing.

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However, the transformation had clearly surprised Cabbot, who’d stumbled to a stop.

“W-what…”

Elijah didn’t wait for him to regain his composure. Instead, he pushed himself to his feet and raced forward. Or he tried to, at least. His new form was enormous and powerful, and the sudden disparity between his Strength and Dexterity made him clumsy. As a result, he found himself stumbling.

Cabbot took that as an opportunity to regain his momentum. Fury evident in his expression, he leaped forward, hefting his axe in a herculean swing that took Elijah by surprise.

He tried to dodge, but he still hadn’t managed to master his new form. So, he once again stumbled, and Cabbot’s axe took him in the hip. A loud clang filled the forest as Cabbot’s momentum took him tumbling past Elijah’s surprised form. The blow hadn’t even drawn blood. Instead, the axe had gotten lodged in Elijah’s scales.

With a sweep of his powerful foreleg, he knocked the weapon aside, then turned to face Cabbot.

“What are you?” the gnome demanded, pulling another weapon out of nowhere. This one was a plain-looking greatsword with a blade almost twice Cabbot’s size. He held it easily, though, evidence of his inflated Strength attribute.

“A druid,” Elijah growled, speaking before he thought better of it. He’d never even tried in his predator form, so the ability to do so surprised him. “And you’re trespassing in my Grove.”

Cabbot took a step back, and the red light enveloping his form flickered, then dimmed slightly. “A d-druid? Here? How?”

Elijah tried to shrug his massive shoulders. It was difficult, given his new anatomy. As far as he could tell, the Guardian form was a mixture of dinosaur, ape, and bear. But that was inadequate to describe what he felt. He could move on two legs, but he was much more comfortable using his long arms to move in an ape-like gait. Perhaps he would know more about the form when he had a chance to study it further.

For now, though, he had a gnome to kill.

Cabbot easily interpreted the situation, and as a result, his light flared as he charged forward. This time, his attacks were more measured, but his blade was incapable of doing more than chip Elijah’s scales. At least at first.

With each ineffectual attack, Cabbot’s fury rose. With it, he grew stronger. Faster. And less controlled. In seconds, he’d become a whirling dervish of slashing blades. Elijah tried to respond in kind, but due to a combination of his mismatched attributes, inexperience with his new form, and the gnome’s rapid movements rendered his own counterattacks ineffective.

Each miss brought with it more frustration, and soon enough, Elijah was roaring like the beast he appeared to be. If he’d been in his Predator Form, he could have easily kept up. But it came with its own weaknesses – chiefly, that if he was hit, he probably wouldn’t survive. By comparison, the Guardian Form lived up to its name, and it traded coordination for explosive Strength and durability.

In any case, he was stuck in the form because he didn’t have the Ethera to fuel another transformation, and he couldn’t endure the gnome’s attacks as a human. No – he had to remain in the Guardian form for now.

Which meant that the two combatants reached something of a stalemate.

The fight wore on. Minutes passed, becoming more than an hour. The whole time, Elijah stoically withstood the gnome’s ferocious attacks. Eventually, though, the everlasting battle took its toll. Not on Elijah, who was well-suited to such a fight – not only due to his Guardian form, but also because of his experiences in the tower. There, he’d learned to endure, and against Cabbot, he put those hard won those lessons to good use.

As he did, he slowly grew more used to his new body. He knew it would take quite some time before he was nearly as comfortable in the Guardian form as he was as a human or in the Predator shape, but he did improve, even clipping Cabbot a few times.

Still, the biggest deciding factor was that the gnome’s abilities clearly weren’t made for a long-drawn out battle. As it wore on, it became obvious that he was fighting against impotent frustration as much as he fought Elijah. And in the end, his abilities began to peter out. The red light dimmed, and his movements slowed.

Still, Elijah didn’t dare make his move.

He knew that the moment he did, it would reignite the gnome’s fury. So, he had to make that first major blow count. Cabbot flailed against inevitability. Eventually, his sword broke, and he produced another axe from thin air. That broke, too. However, with every passing minute, the gnome’s attacks grew weaker until they were incapable of even chipping Elijah’s scales.

Still, he waited.

And waited.

The gnome continued, but Elijah knew how to be patient.

Then, finally, the light winked out, and Elijah struck.

With his Strength attribute so thoroughly inflated, he was well into superhuman territory. And even if he didn’t have the Dexterity to control his power, he didn’t really need to, either. Not with Cabbot having slowed to more normal speeds.

Elijah lashed out with his foreclaw. It was a simple jab, but it took Cabbot directly in the face. The gnome flipped backward, then hit one of the nearby trees. It shuddered with the impact, and Cabbot crumpled.

The red light flickered back into being, but Elijah had no intention of letting the gnome get going. Using his explosive Strength, he rushed forward. Then, clasping his hands together, he brought both fists down on the injured figure. Red light flared again, and bones snapped back into place. Elijah hit him again.

And again.

Over and over, his attacks barely outpaced the Berserker’s Regeneration.

Slowly, Elijah gained ground. He shattered bones, over and over, and then, suddenly, the red light disappeared.

Kill energy rushed into Elijah – less than he would have expected – as the gnome finally died. Elijah sighed, the sound coming out in a growling hiss, then let his shoulders sag. He still wasn’t finished.

There remained a few survivors who’d managed to live through the barrage of Cataclysm, Swarm, and his traps. So, after letting himself resume his human form, he looked down at his body. There were hundreds of tiny cuts where his scales had been chipped. Shaking his head, Elijah used Touch of Nature, healing the minor damage, then marshalled his resolve.

Most of the fighting force was dead, but as he’d suspected, a few had managed to survive – all of which were still impaled on the stakes he’d planted at the bottom of the pits. After taking a deep breath, he used Storm’s Fury to finish them off. It wasn’t pretty, and it usually took more than one cast, but he did what he had to do.

He would have preferred something more humane. The gnomes and goblins certainly suffered more than Elijah would have liked. But in the end, he needed to protect his Grove. That meant finishing the job he’d started.

When he reached the last one, though, he hesitated. She was a goblin, with huge, green ears and sharp teeth. But unlike the others, she hadn’t fallen into one of the traps.

He pointed his staff at her and demanded, “What’s your name?”

“Calix,” she coughed, spitting blood. She was either a mage or a healer, judging by her robes and the staff lying nearby. But she was just as clearly out of Ethera – using it was probably the only reason she’d survived so long.

“Do you want to live, Calix?” he asked.

“I…I do…”

Elijah stepped forward, then put his hand on her shoulder. The battle against Cabbot had gone on long enough that he’d managed to regenerate most of his Ethera, so he had no issues with casting Touch of Nature. It took four pulses – and half of his remaining Ethera – but in only a few seconds, Calix was healthy.

“W-why?” she asked, looking up at him with mingled fear and awe.

“You need to go home,” he said. “When you get there, I want you to let everyone in that town know what happens to anyone who comes to my island. You come here, you die. Period. This is the last bit of mercy I’ll give. Do you understand?”

“I…I…”

“And if I hear about you trying to harvest sentient creatures as fuel for your advancement, I will come for you. If it comes to that, Ironshore will not survive. Do I make myself clear?”

She nodded eagerly.

“Go,” he growled.

Calix didn’t need any further prodding. After all, Elijah had killed almost fifty people in less than two days, so it wasn’t surprising that she was far too frightened to do anything but flee. However, before she got more than a few steps, she did manage to stop, turn, and ask, “W-what are you?”

Elijah thought about it for a second before he said, “I am the protector of the Grove. Challenge me at your own risk.”

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