Path of Dragons

Elijah stared at the gnomish Sorcerer, barely even seeing the mushrooms still sprouting from her back. They'd ripped right through her robes, spewing spores into the air. If any other enemies had been around, they too would have been infected.

But he wasn't thinking about what he'd done. Rather, he was more concerned with the fact that he felt almost no guilt over his actions. He'd just killed three people. The two men weren't innocent, but it was obvious that they were merely underlings doing the Sorcerer's bidding. Did that mean they'd deserved their ignoble deaths?

Maybe.

Following orders didn't absolve someone of their sins, after all.

The Sorcerer herself was even less ambiguous. Elijah had no real questions concerning the justification of her death. The only problem was that, with her size and overlarge, gnomish features, she looked strikingly childlike. That prompted a wealth of emotions Elijah was not prepared to deal with.

The reality was that he believed what he'd told her. Killing was part of nature. He could accept that. He even embraced it every time he hunted down and killed a beast for food. However, there was a fine line between that and whatever the Sorceress had done to create her minions. Sacrificing those prairie dogs – and whatever other animals she'd found – to animate those golems was an abominable practice, and one Elijah refused to tolerate.

Turning life into…whatever those things were…

No – Elijah didn't feel guilty about ending the gnome's life. In his mind, it was entirely justified, and for once, he didn't need to add to the trauma facet of his mind.

Still, he did take a few more moments just to work through his thoughts until, at last, he chose to move on. The first step was to search the tent for anything of value, and in doing so, he found a few things of note. First on the list was a small chest containing a few gold ethereum and a single platinum coin. That was an incredible amount of wealth to find just lying around, and Elijah quickly pocketed it.

Unfortunately, that was the only real find. Sure, the décor was interesting, and Elijah took a particularly fluffy blanket and a couple of pillows – all of which glowed with a subtle undercurrent of ethera. But the rest of it was either mundane or so garishly colored that he didn't even want to sully his storage space with it.

There was also a hookah-style apparatus that smelled of pungent smoke, quite a few crystals that he suspected contained information, and a handful of low-quality weapons that he assumed belonged to the two males. He took those, too, if only because they might end up being good for scrap metal.

Finally, he tried to take the tent itself. However, no matter how hard he tried, he couldn't figure out how to take the thing down. He tugged and tugged on the stakes, but they were as firmly planted as any mountain. Eventually, he just gave up.

What use did he have for a tent, anyway?

The obvious answer to that question was that he had plenty of uses, but his frustration told him that he liked sleeping out in the open or in dank caves. He almost believed it, too.

Either way, he didn't want it enough to spend days trying to figure out how to uproot the thing. Besides – he felt he'd come out pretty well with the platinum ethereum and the other odds and ends he'd gather. Idly, he took the gnome Sorcerer's staff as well, though he was forced to dig through a mound of mushrooms to pull it free of her hand.

From experience, he knew the fungi would dissipate into ethera at some point, though the timing varied depending on the environment. For all intents and purposes, it was just as alive as any naturally-occurring fungi. The biggest difference was that it grew exponentially quicker, and its lifespan was similarly accelerated.

Once he had dismissed the staff into his Arcane Loop, he turned his attention to the area surrounding the tent. He spent a few seconds smothering their campfire, then inspected the piles of mud to ensure that none of the golems had survived Eternal Plague.

They had not.

So, it wasn't long before he returned the way he'd come.

After only an hour, he found the herd of cattle. Many of them were still wounded, a problem he intended to remedy. With that in mind, he shifted back into his human form and approached cautiously. Despite his precautions, the herd did not react well to his presence, and a stampede ensued.

Even his nature attunement wasn't enough to make them forget the hell they'd experienced. Elijah had no idea how long they'd been hunted by the golems, but it had to have been an enduring situation, based on the number of bodies he'd seen on his way to the gnomes' camp. Hundreds of cows, all dead – and for what? Just a little experience? The waste was palpable.

Elijah followed the herd for a few more miles before they settled down. Then, he tried to approach again, but to similar results. It wasn't until the fourth time he attempted to make contact that they chose to endure his presence, and that, only because they were too tired to respond.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

There was one bull – a huge, hulking creature that might've given an elephant a run for its money – that seemed to have plenty of energy, though. It snorted at him in warning, then stomped its hoof into the soft turf. Elijah stood his ground as the thing gathered ethera.

Then, it charged.

Elijah barely had time to avoid the attack, and the sweeping horns nearly gored him. Still, he managed to dodge by only a few inches, leaping to the side with a roll that quickly found him back on his feet. The bull kept going for a few dozen more yards before slowing to a stop.

In the interim, Elijah summoned Blessing of the Grove, conjuring a localized storm of healing rain. The cattle did not react well at first, but soon enough, they realized that it was beneficial. After that, their panic faded.

The bull – one of many, but clearly the most powerful – was not so easily convinced. He postured and stomped, swinging his horns back and forth, but Elijah held his ground. When the bull didn't immediately charge, he stepped forward.

The great beast – a king of his kind – didn't retreat or act the aggressor, Elijah continued forward until, at last, he laid his hand on the bull's leg. That was when he felt the full weight of the creature's injuries.

It was covered in scars, but those weren't what concerned Elijah. Instead, he focused on the other wounds, many of which had festered. There were splinters embedded in many, and clearly, some sort of abilities had injected foreign ethera into the punctures.

None of it was enough to kill the mighty bull, but they did weaken him. In nature, that might end up being the difference between living and dying.

Elijah extended his Mantle of Authority, but the foreign impurities resisted his influence. At least for a while. So, he continued to pump more and more ethera through the extensions of his soul, and they gradually wore down the contaminants until, at last, they dissolved beneath the power of his influence.

At the same time, the bull healed – mostly from the ongoing Blessing of Nature, but also due to the vitality that came with his dual-natured Mantle of Authority. Meanwhile, the portion of the herd closest to Elijah healed as well, which endeared them to him in a way that a simple attunement could not.

Even so, there was a wariness to them that no amount of healing could counter.

When Elijah completely healed the bull, he worked his way through the rest of the herd. As he did so, he considered his next steps.

His initial thought was that the world had a significant beef shortage, but as much as he liked a good steak, he didn't think he could contribute to their mass slaughter. He wouldn't act if others engaged in the practice – people had to eat, after all – but he would not take a personal hand in it.

Did that make him a hypocrite? Perhaps. Maybe not. But he felt there was a distinct difference between those options.

But he probably wouldn't refrain from eating the resulting meat if offered.

"Yeah – I'm totally a hypocrite," he muttered to himself as he walked among the herd. It was not a pleasant thought, but he was at peace with his boundaries. Everyone had to draw the line somewhere.

As for the fate of the herd, he didn't think they needed further protection, so he intended to leave them where they were. The grassland was vast, so it would be a great environment for them to flourish.

But as for his next steps, Elijah wasn't so sure. There were so many things begging for his attention. First, the Primal Realms were still out there waiting on him to intervene. He was honest enough with himself to recognize that there was very little chance that Earth would avoid excisement without his participation, so, sooner or later, he was destined to plunge head-first into another Primal Realm. Probably the one in the Hollow Depths, if Miguel's stories were anything to go by. Elijah trusted his nephew's assessment of the situation, so he suspected that he'd be fighting trolls sooner rather than later.

And he very much didn't look forward to that.

Then there was the grove and the newcomers. He wasn't quite ready to induct Nara and her people, but he knew it would need to happen before he got too distracted by other demands on his time. Not only did the grove need more people, but those elves needed a grove even more. Without it, they were lost – Nara especially.

Binding them to the grove would go a long way toward solving that problem.

In addition, there were the broader issues at hand. Like figuring out what Seattle was up to. He expected that the warning from the Prophet he'd encountered in New York concerned Isaiah and the city that had, to date, been nothing but a thorn in his side.

Finally, there was the war raging in and around the mountains north of New York. Elijah had spent a few days searching for the armies in question, but he'd found very little evidence that it even existed. Rather than widen his search, he'd returned to his grove, but the problem was still out there.

And after what he'd seen and heard of the consequences of that war, he knew he couldn't ignore it for much longer. His conscience simply wouldn't allow for that.

Over everything hovered questions about his place in the world. About who he would be for Earth. A protector? Just another denizen? A vengeful guardian of nature? There were so many routes he could take, and because of his power, they would all come with significant consequences.

That wasn't even considering what else was coming. After the world was safe from excisement, Elijah would be leaving Earth. He had no idea how long he'd be in the Empire of Scale, but he suspected it would be quite a long time. What would happen to the grove in the interim? How would Earth develop in his absence?

So many questions, so few answers.

Finally, Elijah dwelled on his upcoming bout with mind cultivation. He was well aware that it would not be a pleasant experience. Advancing his cultivation rarely was. But he had a suspicion that this instance would be worse than most.

It had to be done, though, and if he waited too long, he stood the risk of losing his momentum. He couldn't afford that, because he wanted to reach the fourth stage of overall cultivation before he attained level two-fifty and advanced to demi-god status.

In short, his schedule was full, and it would only get fuller.

"Maybe I should stop going on side quests," he muttered to himself. Though when he looked at the herd of now-healthy cattle, he couldn't regret his choices. He did take one lesson to heart, though, and he wasted no more time before throwing himself into the air, using Cloud Step to launch himself even higher before he shifted into the Shape of the Sky and began his journey home.