Path of Dragons

Elijah felt Strength flow through him as he felt the effects of One With Nature take hold. More, for the first time, the spell came with understanding. It felt as if he’d suddenly remembered a long-lost memory, and the result was that he knew how the new spell worked. And he was impressed.

The effects of One With Nature were threefold. So long as he remained in contact with natural earth, the spell would enhance his physical attributes. His new understanding wasn’t specific about the exact degree of enhancement, but he could feel that it was significant. Further testing would need to be done if he wanted exact information, though.

The second facet of the spell’s enhancement came in the form of natural healing. It wasn’t even close to rivaling his other spell, Touch of Nature, but it would go a long way toward staving off minor injuries and the effects of fatigue. More importantly, the effect it would have on his physical training would almost assuredly be profound.

Finally – and he suspected, most importantly – the spell came with a sense of connectivity with the natural world. He’d felt a version of that the moment he’d awoken with his new archetype. However, One With Nature enhanced that feeling a hundred-fold. More than that, though, he could sense the forest’s aura of life far more keenly, and within a few feet, he almost felt as if he could identify individual organisms.

But he suspected that he’d have to grow much stronger for the spell to reach that level, if it ever did. For now, though, he took comfort in the feeling that he was that much closer to belonging in the forest. Elijah also got the feeling that it would protect him from natural predators, at least to some extent. If he antagonized them, they would still react with vicious certainty; however, he felt that they wouldn’t instigate anything.

Of course, Elijah suspected that something like the panther would be unaffected. He had no gauge or context for its power, but he knew it was too far above him to succumb to any attack or spell he could muster. Not that he wanted to try – no, he’d been disabused of that notion when he’d witnessed the battle between the panther and the monster. That was a battle he had no interest in fighting.

After testing One With Nature, Elijah glanced at the monster’s corpse. It had begun to decompose within an hour of its death, and now, it was little more than a mass of discolored refuse. In the beginning, he’d harbored notions of harvesting its impenetrable scales and using it for armor, but even if it hadn’t rotted into a state of uselessness, Elijah was more than a little put off by both the smell and the sense of wrongness that radiated from its body. Even in death, it didn’t seem like it belonged in the world, and he wanted nothing more than to let it rot so that it would cease its corrupting influence.

Mostly, that aura of corruption had faded, but Elijah still wanted to get away as quickly as he could. So, after a few more seconds, he headed in the direction of the stream. As he did so, he marveled at how much stronger and more vital he felt.

“Could definitely get used to this,” he muttered. The spell’s effects had nearly doubled his physical ability, making traversal through the forest trivial. Soon, he reached the stream, where he stripped off his soiled clothing and washed them as best he could. The endeavor was only a moderate success; the monster’s black blood seemed to have suffused everything, right down to the tiniest of fibers, but he did what he could.

Next came his body, and though the water had grown much colder since his first encounter with the stream, One With Nature made him much more durable, so he barely felt the stream’s frigid embrace. Without soap or something abrasive, it took quite a while before Elijah was satisfied with his relative cleanliness, but when he stepped out of the stream, he felt refreshed in a way he hadn’t since awakening on the shore after the plane crash.

After dressing, Elijah made his way back to the cabin, which was much the same as he’d left it. The fire had been extinguished, and it looked like some small animal had rooted around in his food stores. Not unexpected after two days, but still disappointing. Before Elijah got down to trying his other new spells, he set about the task of restarting the fire. He might not have needed as much protection from the cold as he had before using One With Nature, but he still didn’t want to go through any more nights without a fire.

Summer had already faded, and he knew from experience that fall could turn into winter in a matter of days. So, he needed to be prepared for it.

As he worked, Elijah continued to feel his way through One With Nature, and along the way, he discovered that, once cast, it would remain in place indefinitely. However, he also sensed that his body only had room for a single augmentation of its nature. Part of that feeling came from the information he’d been granted alongside the spell, but he could also feel the subtle way the spell stretched his soul. Any more, and it would collapse.

But that was fine by Elijah. He didn’t have any other augmentations to cast, so he didn’t have to worry about it. For now. Perhaps he’d have to revisit the problem in the future, though.

In any case, once Elijah restarted the fire, he took a few minutes to test the other new additions to his spell book. After One With Nature, the next one on the list was Eyes of the Eagle, which gave him a brief duration of telescopic vision. After casting it for the first time, he looked down at the ground and could see everything as if it was under a weak microscope. It wasn’t powerful enough that he could see microbes or individual cells, but he suspected that wasn’t the purpose. Instead, it was meant to give him the means to see long distances, and he expected that it would accomplish that goal very well.

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The next new spell was Ancestral Circle, which, for now, proved useless. However, like his other spells, it did come with a thorough understanding of the spell’s purpose. And that was enough to make Elijah’s jaw drop.

Unlike Elijah’s other spells, Ancestral Circle required significant preparation. Once he chose an appropriate spot – and the moment he understood the requirements, he knew precisely where he wanted to put it – he would have to plant a series of trees in a perfect circle. Then, he would have to empower that circle with his spell. Once that was done, the true purpose of Ancestral Circle would be available to him.

And it could be summed up in one word: teleportation.

It was limited, but the idea was that he could use the second portion of the spell to instantly transport himself from anywhere in the world to his circle, which the burst of information he’d received with the spell referred to as a Grove. He could only do so once a week, but it was an incredible ability.

Still, it would take a vast amount of work to create his Grove. He was so eager to get started that he very nearly set off to his chosen spot right then and there. But good sense won out, and he moved on to the second-to-last spell he’d received after healing the panther.

Nature’s Bounty was far more straightforward than any of his other spells. He only had to channel his Ethera from his core and through his soul before casting the spell, and it would cause rapid plant growth within a ten-yard radius. Of course, to plants, rapid meant that it would only take weeks for a plant to reach maturity, but that was still a huge boon. Already, Elijah’s task of growing his Grove had gone from being a project of years to one that might only take months. Doubtless, the two spells were intended to be used in tandem.

Finally, Elijah’s exploration of his spell book reached Storm’s Fury. Ever since learning that his transformed world was one of magic, Elijah had imagined being a grand wizard and slinging fireballs at his enemies. Of course, he knew that wasn’t what being a Druid was all about, but even so, he’d become enamored with the fantasy, and he’d found himself hoping that his path would include something of the like.

And now, it did.

Standing a couple of dozen yards away from his cabin, Elijah sighted in on a rock he’d placed twenty feet away. Then, as he had with every other spell, Elijah dragged Ethera from his core and pushed it through the pathways of his soul and into the spell he wanted to cast. And for a split second after he released it, nothing happened.

Then, suddenly, a bolt of lightning tore through the forest’s canopy and hit the ground five feet away from the rock. Electricity spiderwebbed across the ground for another few feet before dissipating, leaving only a few tendrils of wispy smoke snaking up from the point of impact.

Elijah grinned.

On the one hand, the spell seemed incredibly powerful. He knew the power of that much electricity, and he could surmise that it could be a potent weapon. But on the other hand, he’d missed his target, and badly. Clearly, he needed to practice.

That was okay, though. He was nothing if not persistent, and it wouldn’t take a significant shift to add target practice to his exercise regimen. The only big problem was that the spell was incredibly Ethera-hungry, and it had taken almost a third of his capacity to cast it a single time. Not ideal, but Elijah was used to that.

Once he’d finished exploring his new spells, Elijah set about replenishing his food stores, gathering mushrooms and berries as he walked around the forest. Eventually, his path took him to the meadow that was home to the powerful tree that had eased the cultivation of his Body of Wood. When he arrived, he noticed something peculiar – the meadow was perfectly circular; it was as if it had been made to accommodate his Grove.

Perhaps it had. Or maybe the tree had influenced the area for that purpose. Whatever the case, it was precisely what Elijah needed. He’d already decided to use the tree’s thick aura to his advantage when placing his Grove, and the discovery was just further evidence that he was on the right track.

But with the sun dipping toward the horizon, he didn’t have time to get started just yet. Instead, he gathered more berries, some dogbane for more cordage, and a few dozen acorns that had fallen from the tree. The arboreal spirit that dwelled within still seemed dormant, but Elijah hoped that it would awaken soon. After all, if it had guided him through the process of cultivating his body, then it was probably full of other useful information.

Once he was finished, Elijah trekked back to his cabin, where he enjoyed a meal of berries and mushrooms before, at last, releasing One With Nature and letting himself fall asleep.

When Elijah awoke the next day, he held off on reapplying the augmentation as he went through the daily regimen of exercise he’d established before the fight against the viridian scaled monster. However, instead of being confined to physical exercise, he interspersed target practice into the routine. He still had to stop and concentrate before he could focus enough to cast Storm’s Fury, but by the end of his workout, he’d progressed noticeably. His aim was still lacking, especially if he rushed through it, but he'd found that the process of casting the spell came quicker every time he did it. It was still alien, but like any process, it was on its way to becoming instinctive. Now, he only had to spend the time necessary to push it over the edge to where he could use the spell without thought.

Of course, that wasn’t something he could accomplish in mere hours. Instead, it was a task of weeks. Or perhaps months. Maybe it would even be years. But stranded in the wilderness, he had time to spare.

More than that, he had plenty of motivation to get it right. After all, that monster had come at him out of nowhere, and if the panther hadn’t saved him, Elijah would have been slain. Even with the cat’s help, it had been a close thing. The new world wasn’t benign. It was deadly. And if Elijah wanted to avoid ending up as some monster’s lunch, he needed to grow more powerful.

To that end, he redoubled his efforts and leveraged every ounce of his focus as he continued to practice his aim, one lightning bolt at a time.

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