Path of Dragons-Chapter 20Book 9: : Journey Home

Towing a corpse weighing hundreds of tons came with a host of problems, not least of which was the fact that it tended to attract every scavenger – and in a lot of cases, predators – in the region. Because of that, Elijah had spent the past two days alternating between dragging the leviathan’s corpse through the ocean and fighting off the opportunistic beasts wanting to get a piece of it for themselves.

He didn’t blame them, either.

Even he was impressed by the sheer amount of energy the enormous monster still contained. And aside from its destroyed heart and the small hole through which he’d exited, it was in pristine condition. As he’d suspected, the thing’s curious relationship with the submerged ice forest had healed the results of the battle. If he hadn’t already been inside the thing, he never would have managed to kill it.

Fortunately, he wasn’t too beat up from the battle, so after only a few minutes of healing, he’d embarked on his quest to drag the corpse back to Ironshore. Owing to the need to fight off scavengers, he’d only made it halfway, and he knew it wouldn’t get much easier going forward.

So, with one end of a giant rope coiled around the monster’s tail and the other end in his mouth, Elijah continuously paddled forward, his giant flippers straining against the increased drag that came from the thing’s size and weight. The only solace to be found in the situation was that he’d left the ice floes behind, which made his task that much easier. Still, he knew it’d be at least a day before he reached his destination.

The other advantage of fighting off so many beasts was that he’d finally ticked over the edge to level one-eighty. Killing the leviathan had put him right on the edge, so it hadn’t taken much experience to push him over. Still, most of the beasts in the area were so underleveled – at least compared to him – that it had taken almost a hundred to gain even a tiny percent of the total needed for a single level.

But he’d gotten it, which was all that mattered.

To reassure himself, he checked his status:

Name

Elijah Hart

Level

180

Archetype

Druid

Class

Primal Lord

Specialization

Connection

Alignment

Empire of Scale (Dragon)

Strength

899(535)

Dexterity

890 (521)

Constitution

900 (544)

Ethera

580 (502)

Regeneration

722 (549)

Attunement

Nature

Cultivation Stage: Expert

Body

Core

Mind

Soul

Bronze

Drakyn

Jade

Student

His attributes – especially in the physical categories – had reached astounding heights. A lot of that was because of the two-hundred point bonuses he got from Shape of the Sea, but his evolved class was really starting to shine as well – and not just in the abilities it granted him.

Not for the first time, Elijah considered just how far ahead of most – if not all – of Earth’s population he really was. Sure, there were probably people out there who’d taken advantage of their own opportunities and could hold their own. But he couldn’t believe that anyone had been through what he’d been through.

Not on his planet, at least.

But it was a big multi-verse, and he was certain that he wasn’t unique. He did think he was on the right track, though.

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More importantly, with level one-eighty, he found himself with a decision to make. He looked at the notification he’d received upon gaining the level:

Congratulations! You have achieved the requirements for the evolution of the ability Ward of the Seasons. Please choose a path:

Aegis of the Elements

Evolving Elements

Season’s Refuge

Evolve Ward of the Seasons by converting it into a powerful passive trait.

Evolve Ward of the Seasons along a linear path and adapting to incoming damage types.

Evolve Ward of the Seasons by converting it into an active and potent shield against the elements.

Elijah had read it a dozen times already, and he thought he had a decent idea of what each evolution represented. Aegis of the Elements was the simplest, converting the buff spell into a passive trait that would grant him increased resistance to elemental magic. Evolving Elements would function similarly to his new Mantle of the Chimera, providing baseline protection that would likely increase depending on the damage inflicted. And Season’s Refuge was a more active ability that would require his input.

Elijah immediately eliminated Season’s Refuge. He already forgot to use some of his abilities in the heat of battle. More than once, he could have benefited from using Nature’s Rebuke, Bestial Charge, or even Flicker Step, but trying to keep everything at the forefront of his mind while staying alive was an ongoing struggle. So, he had no interest in adding something else to the mix.

That left him with two options, and both seemed very useful. Aegis of the Elements would almost assuredly be stronger initially, but Evolving Elements would scale better during battle. Combined with his Mantle of the Chimera, he might even become functionally immune to an element.

Of course, there would be an internal cooldown to it. He knew that much. But the idea was definitely attractive.

The question was – did he want to be strong initially or after taking a few attacks? When he phrased it like that, the choice was much easier. His biggest fear – at least in battle – was that something would surprise him and inflict grievous damage before he had a chance to respond. Once he was in the thick of things, he had a host of options to combat incoming damage, including powerful heals.

With that rationale in mind, he chose Aegis of Elements, prompting a notification:

Aegis of the Elements

Harness the power of the changing seasons, passively increasing your resistance to elemental effects. Potency based on Constitution.

If he wasn’t in the Shape of the Sea, he would have pumped his fist in celebration. It was precisely what he’d hoped it would be. Better, because it scaled off of his Constitution, which was already extremely high.

In all, he was extremely happy with the choice.

Additionally, his deliberation had occupied his mind long enough that he was only an hour or so out from Ironshore. So close to the city, the local wildlife was a little less imposing. Most of the stronger aquatic monsters seemed to prefer deeper water – not surprising, but a good thing to confirm.

Gradually, Elijah closed in on the city, and along the way, he passed multiple ships. Some were simple fishing boats, but others were huge whaling vessels meant to take hits from large sea creatures. Elijah could feel the ethera used in their construction as well as the swirl of energy that marked an ability in progress.

Fortunately, they all recognized the Shape of the Sea, and they were quick to give him a wide berth. Before he knew it, Elijah had reached the docks, where he shifted into his human form and climbed out of the water. With the giant leviathan bobbing in the calm harbor behind him, he approached the whale processing warehouse, where he was quick to encounter a surly Vork. From the look of it, he’d just completed the dismantling of a whale. His canvas smock was covered in blood, and his sturdy boots had a couple chunks of meat still stuck to their surface.

“What do you want?” he demanded.

“Making a delivery,” Elijah said. “Morin told you about our deal, right?”

“Aye. You killed it?” the dwarf asked, seemingly unimpressed.

“I did. It’s right outside.”

After that, Elijah showed Vork to the dock, where he’d left the leviathan. That definitely got the dwarf’s attention, “That thing…how did you kill somethin’ like that? It’s bigger’n our ships!”

“Persistence, mostly,” Elijah said. “So, how do you want to get this thing into the warehouse? I can probably drag it easily enough, but I guess you probably have a system. I don’t want to step on any toes.”

As it turned out, they did have a system, which included mobile cranes and harnesses that they used to lift the monster’s carcass out of the water and drag it into the warehouse. The space wasn’t large enough to accommodate such an enormous creature, so they left the tail sticking out of the giant double doors.

Then, Vork and the rest of his people went to work.

It was a sight to behold. They looked like ants crawling over the monster, but with their obvious skills – both in terms of system-granted abilities as well as those earned through long experience – they took the thing apart far more quickly than Elijah could have expected.

That wasn’t to say they had an easy time of it. More than once, Elijah heard one of them cursing about the tough skin. And to his absolute astonishment, Elijah witnessed an entirely unexpected phenomenon when the lowest level dwarf grew so ill she couldn’t continue.

“Ethera poisonin’,” Vork remarked, shaking his head. “It ain’t usually a problem, but the low levels can’t take that powerful energy for very long. Surprised she held out as long as she did.”

He went on to explain that it was a real problem with processing powerful monsters. Ambient ethera was much easier on the body, but even that could affect people negatively if the disparity was too great. Elijah couldn’t help but wonder if his grove might cause issues as it grew more powerful.

Maybe he needed to monitor the children a little more closely.

Even now, they were on the island being put through their paces. Nerthus wasn’t nearly as harsh of a trainer as someone like Colt – or like Elijah would be – but he’d seen enough to manage it well enough with a dozen children. Currently, they were running around the island and dodging crabs, which might have seemed slightly dangerous if Nerthus’ tree-men weren’t right there with them.

Elijah turned his attention back to the carcass’ progress. The general pattern was apparent. Skin went in one pile, while meat went into another. The fat, meanwhile, was carefully placed in specially prepared barrels that would maintain the ethera. Elijah had commissioned those before he’d left on his hunt, using trees provided by Nerthus.

Each one was capable of holding a hundred gallons, but even with that enormous capacity, it took more than two-hundred to contain the fat from the monster. Even inside the barrels, Elijah could feel the dense ethera contained in each one.

It took an entire day before the whalers were finished, and even then, the skeleton needed to be broken down. Elijah was entitled to half of the bones, but for now, he wasn’t terribly interested in them. Sure, there was a good chance that he could use one to make a new staff – and he intended to give it a try – but he felt that doing so would rob the final product of much of what made his previous staves special.

Or maybe he was just nervous about using a new medium.

Regardless, he was far more interested in the fat – and the meat, if he was honest. As much as he didn’t like the idea of eating the stuff he’d eaten back in the Chimeric Forge, that was at least as much because of the macabre forms taken by most of those monsters. His inability to cook – even with his special pan – contributed to his distaste as well.

But if that meat was prepared by a true Cook? It would assuredly make great travel rations.

Once Vork and his crew had finished their task, Elijah began the arduous process of transporting the barrels back to the island. The meat would go to a butcher to be parcelled out, and the skin would be divided into usable sheets by the Hunter’s Guild’s specialists. Elijah expected to get those in the next few days.

For now, he focused on the original goal of the hunt – he now had plenty of fat to make literal tons of soap.

It took longer than he expected to get everything back to the island, where he stored the barrels next to the dock. That would be close enough to get a few benefits from ethereal density while he took care of everything else. His mind whirled with the logistical problems ahead.

Not only did he need to create a huge bonfire from which he could gather his wood ash, but then he needed to spend the necessary time creating lye. And that wasn’t even considering the fat rendering process, which would require a Cook and an appropriate apparatus.

Standing on the dock and looking at the mass of barrels, he let out a sigh. He had a lot of work ahead of him.