Path of Dragons

The giant skeletal warrior’s steps thundered with incalculable weight that shook the ground beneath Elijah’s feet. It was more than twenty feet tall, and the bones that composed its body were far thicker than they should have been. They were also pitch black, as if they’d been charred, and the joints glowed the same aquamarine as the lightning dancing between the towers aboveground. That same light burned in its eye sockets, somehow conveying extreme hate in those flickering, teal flames.

Sadie dashed ahead, using her personal shield as she swung her sword in a horizontal strike. The skeleton ignored her attack, and the reason for its disdain quickly became apparent. Her blade hit its shin, bouncing back as if Sadie had hit a brick wall. Then, the skeleton – who wielded a massive axe – brought its own weapon down on her.

Sadie’s shield flashed, but it held against the heavy blow. Still, the sheer momentum of the attack smashed her into the ground, cracking the stones beneath her feet.

That’s when everyone else let loose.

Dat and Kurik fired their ranged weapons, while Ron leveled his sparkly wand at Sadie and cast a healing spell. Light enveloped her, mending her injuries – which probably included a concussion – so that she could lash out with another attack. Instead of simply swinging her sword, she used Blade of the Avenger. An enormous sword ripped free of the ground, slamming into the skeleton’s thigh bone. This one had much more effect than Sadie’s mundane attack, and cracks spread across its thick femur.

Elijah leaped in, swinging his staff, only to take a swift backhand that sent him skipping across the chamber. He slammed into the wall a moment later, causing a cascade of dust and rocks to fell upon him. He ignored the debris, already shifting into the Shape of Venom as Ron hit him with a heal spell.

A second later, he was racing up the wall and across the ceiling. At the same time, Sadie aimed another Blade of the Avenger at the creature, but the skeleton didn’t let the sword hit the same spot, which minimized its effect. Dat fired a barrage of glowing crossbow bolts, which caromed ineffectually off the creature’s thick bones. Kurik retreated to the side of the chamber, where he was busy deploying one of his traps. From experience, Elijah knew that would take a few moments.

He dropped from the ceiling, landing on the skeleton’s head. He used Venom Strike and Envenom, then bit down as hard as he could manage. His fangs skipped off the hard bone, barely scraping the surface.

But that was enough. In the beginning, Elijah had thought Envenom worked like a snake’s bite, injecting caustic venom into his victims. Yet, he’d since learned that it was more like a spell. The liquid that came from his fangs was simply a medium for the swirling ethera the ability used to assault his foes. Even a drop was enough to make the proper connection.

Energy swirled and rushed into the skeleton. The moment the skill took hold, the monster tilted its head back and let out a soundless scream. A second later, spikes of bone erupted from the creature’s skeletal body. There were hundreds of them, each one like daggers of bone, and Elijah narrowly managed to avoid being impaled. Still, he took a few wounds, and the force of one of the blows sent him tumbling from his perch atop the skeleton’s skull.

He fell, but before he hit the ground, the creature’s skeletal hand darted out, its fingers wrapping around him. It squeezed. Elijah let out a hissing cry as he felt his bones being rearranged. Shape of Venom had a lot going for it. It was quick and lethal, with the invaluable ability to remain unseen.

But it was not a durable form by nature.

That weakness was on full display as Elijah felt his ribs break under the immense pressure the skeleton brought to bear. To combat it, Elijah used two abilities at once. First, he embraced Savage Might, increasing his physical attributes by more than thirty percent. That kept his bones from shattering as he used Shape of the Guardian. At the same time, one of Ron’s heals landed on him, mending his cracking bones. That afforded him the couple of seconds he needed to complete the transformation.

The skeleton’s fingers spread under the influence of his increased mass, and the moment he took on the shape of the lamellar ape, he let out an immense roar and pried the monster’s hand entirely apart.

It was strong, but under the influence of Savage Might, he was stronger. He broke away, ripping one of the fingers completely free of its joint. The teal light that functioned as its ligaments spewed deathly energy onto his scales, but he was durable enough to endure it. He fell free, but he didn’t retreat. Instead, he threw himself at the creature, hammering it with one blow after another. Beneath that onslaught, bones cracked and shattered, and for a few moments, it seemed as if he would make progress.

Then, it erupted with teal light that quickly enveloped it, looking like aquamarine flames. Suddenly, it moved with more strength and speed than ever before, and before Elijah knew what was happening, he found himself once again flying through the air. He had only enough time to twist before he hit the wall, shoulder first. The stone shattered before the impact, but with Iron Scales active – along with the massive increase in his Constitution – he remained largely unharmed.

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He fell to the ground, rolling to his feet a second later. That was when he saw that the battle wasn’t going well. Sadie held her ground – probably using an ability to keep her comparatively small body from being thrown aside – but there were a few new dents in her armor. It wasn’t as powerful as her old set, but it was Simple-Grade, making it extremely durable. The fact that, after less than thirty seconds, it was already damaged only confirmed how dangerous the giant skeleton truly was.

But Sadie kept fighting, and not just because she didn’t have a choice. She was fundamentally incapable of giving up. It was one of the things Elijah admired most about her and likely the biggest reason he’d tolerated her obvious flaws for so long.

Not to be outdone, he threw himself at the skeleton, and he got an axe to the side for his trouble. It happened so quickly that he never even saw it coming. One second, he was charging the thing, hoping to take out one of its legs, and the next, he had a blade buried between his ribs.

The force of the blow knocked him aside, and, thankfully, Ron hit him with a heal only an instant later. The wound mended, and he bounded off the wall and launched himself at the creature. This time, he didn’t aim for its leg, though. Instead, he targeted its now-spiky skull.

Because he’d noticed a couple of interesting things.

First, there were white streaks – almost like veins – spreading across its cranium, starting from where he’d bitten the thing as a blight dragon. That suggested that the venom was doing its job, and while it wasn’t strong enough to kill the thing, it clearly weakened that area.

Second, Elijah saw something he’d missed up until that point. Around the creature’s neck was a delicate silver chain, from which hung a milky white gem that reminded him of the crystal at the base of the tower above. Via One with Nature, Elijah could sense a thin thread of ethera extending from that gem and to the ceiling, where it disappeared.

It didn’t take a genius to figure out that the crystals were linked, and that they were important. Elijah intended to destroy it. Or failing that, dislodge it from the skeleton’s neck.

Racing forward, he saw the skeleton shift slightly, and he ducked. The blade sliced through the air only an inch above Elijah’s head. He hadn’t even seen the thing, it moved so quickly. Yet, the skeleton had telegraphed the intended attack, giving Elijah an opportunity to dodge.

Then, he leaped, using its ribcage as handholds as he threw himself upward. At the same time, he shifted into the much smaller blight dragon form. The skeleton tried to dislodge him, but with the increased Dexterity, he managed to avoid the grasping bones by skittering to the side. Up and up he went until, less than a second later, he snapped out and clamped his jaws around the white gem.

That’s when the battle caught up to him.

He saw the blow coming. The incoming fist seemed almost as big as he was, and he knew he was too slow to get away. He couldn’t avoid it. Instead, Elijah could only hope to endure – though that was a tall task, given that he’d shifted into the much less durable Shape of Venom.

Just before it hit, he realized how stupid that decision had been. The reasoning was that the smaller and quicker form would allow him to more easily dodge any retaliation, but he’d underestimated the skeleton’s speed. And now, he was about to be squished into paste.

Then, a shield bloomed around him, white and roiling with ethera. The fist smashed into it, and for a second, the blow was stopped dead in its tracks. Then, the shield burst, and the fist rammed into Elijah with the force of a runaway locomotive. Yet, even as he felt his bones crunch, he knew it wouldn’t be nearly as bad as it would have been without Sadie’s intervention.

More importantly, Elijah managed to keep his jaws locked onto the gem. So, when the monster’s fist retracted, he flexed the muscles of his neck and yanked it free.

An explosion of ethera sent Elijah sailing across the chamber, but thankfully, Ron’s aim was true, and a heal settled onto his scales before he hit the wall. Still, bones once again broke – that seemed to be a habit, of late – and he slid down the wall like squashed bug.

Another heal hit him a moment later, mending enough damage to keep him from slipping into unconsciousness. That gave Elijah a good view of the skeleton stumbling to its knees, then falling apart as the teal energy coursing through its joints winked out. In only a second, all that was left of the terrifyingly indestructible monster was a pile of black bones.

Elijah let out a deep breath as he allowed himself to resume his human shape. Once he was able to, he exchanged his Feral Spire for the Staff of the Serpent Healer and cast his trio of healing spells. Even then, he’d taken so much damage that it would take at least half an hour to completely mend his broken bones.

But at least none of them needed to be set.

“Small mercies,” he muttered to himself.

He lay there as his body healed, and vaguely, he was aware of everything going on around him. The others asked about his health, and they discussed what had just happened, coming to similar conclusions that he’d reached mid-battle. Sadie had been injured as well, but Dat, Kurik, and Ron were all perfectly fine. So, they guarded the single entrance into the chamber while Sadie and Elijah convalesced. Thankfully, the area was almost entirely devoid of death-attuned ethera, which gave them a much-needed respite.

Like that, a couple of hours passed until, finally, Elijah announced that he was fully healed. He’d come a long way since needing days to mend his broken legs after his fight with Thor, the Nordic hunter who’d attacked him outside of Seattle. But then again, Elijah knew that if he took that level of comparative damage, it would likely take him just as long – or longer – to heal. It was just that a few broken bones wasn’t as big of an injury as it once had been.

It still hurt, though, and even if he could shunt that pain off into its own facet of his Mind, that didn’t make it go away. He still felt it, even if he could ignore it far more easily.

“I think it’s pretty clear what we need to do,” he said, stretching like he was getting ready to run a marathon. “This crystal is tied to the towers, right? This whole thing seems like it’s laid out so we have to gather all the crystals beneath the towers.”

“What then? Destroy them?” asked Ron.

Elijah shrugged. “I’m still working on that part.”

Indeed, from what he felt, that seemed like a valid option, but it could just as easily require them to bring the two opposing types of crystals together. The fact was they just didn’t have enough information. What seemed absolutely certain, though, was that they needed to visit the chambers beneath all the other towers and gather the white crystals. After that, they’d find the next step.

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