Path of Dragons 16 - Chapter 43 - Frustrations Fit for a God (Patreon)

Ok’tarik did not rage.

He refused to throw a tantrum, even though his every instinct told him to show his lessers just how angry he was.  Instead, he just stared ahead, outwardly calm as his mind roiled with intense frustration.

“Find him,” he ordered in a low voice.  “Do not attack.  Track him so that we can predict his movements.  Then bring the information directly to me.”

Finally, he turned his attention to the scout who’d come to report her failure.  She was one of the flyers, smaller and slightly lighter than a normal orc.  More importantly, she possessed what Ok’tarik now recognized as an air attunement.  He could feel the atmosphere flexing around her, as if it was eager to do her bidding.  That was why the flyers could do what they did.

She hastily clapped a fist over her chest, then backed away.  Like one might do with an unpredictable beast. 

Not surprising, given his reputation – especially over the last few weeks. 

Once she was gone, Farouk said, “The warchief Hokj is waiting.”

Ok’tarik nodded, telling Farouk to send him in.  The old work-slave did as he was ordered, disappearing from the cabin.  That gave Ok’tarik a moment to collect his wits and establish some semblance of serenity.  It wasn’t easy, either.  Not with the Druid still out there.

The first blow had come when he discovered that his raiding party had failed so spectacularly to capture the dragon.  In that group had been a handful of his most powerful shamans, and from what he could glean, they had succeeded in capturing the Druid.  However, he’d somehow broken free and slaughtered them all. 

After that, the dragon had gone on the offensive, killing thousands of other shamans and weakening the overlapping domains enough that they only provided the barest hint of an advantage. 

Ok’tarik had been forced to abandon his fight against that disgustingly durable defender just when he’d verged on victory.  Instead of finishing that dragon off, he’d left the defender battered and bloody, but still alive.  By now, he’d likely been healed.

At the time, Ok’tarik had considered it a worthwhile sacrifice.  The Druid was the ultimate thorn in his side, and killing him was an absolute necessity. 

Once again, Ok’tarik had failed.

The explosion he’d endured would have killed just about any other orc in Orveth Kaal.  For his part, it only resulted in grievous injury that rendered him vulnerable to a bombardment of cannon strikes that pinned him down for hours.

As his body was pummeled into the ground, he was forced to use every trick at his disposal just to survive.  Even then, he was rendered unconscious, and when he awoke, it was to discover that the dragons had chosen to retreat into their mountainous ship.  Now, the battle had devolved into a proper siege, proving once again that he didn’t properly understand dragons.

Everything he thought he knew told him that they would continue the fight as they’d started it.  They weren’t opposed to retreat, but they also couldn’t refuse such an enticing target as what the orcish fleet represented.  After all, orcs were nothing to them but fleshy bags of kill energy.  They came to Orveth Kaal not to accomplish real goals.  Not to save their people. 

Ok’tarik’s people were simply fodder for their progress.

Or at least that was how they approached it, completely ignorant of the ongoing development happening under their very noses.  Ok’tarik could see it.  He could feel how close his people were to breaking away from the cycle to which they’d been long confined. 

He only needed to nudge them in the right direction.

Doing that required that the dragons be defeated.  Outside of Orveth Kaal, his people might have a real chance to reach their potential, to become more than the system’s mindless tools meant to populate their oppressive trial.

But the dragons would not fall so long as the Druid lived.

For weeks, he’d maintained steady pressure on the orcish fleet, making the ongoing siege an absolute nightmare.  Even Ok’tarik avoided going out of his cabin unless necessary. 

That thought had barely crossed his mind when Hokj entered the cabin.  The open door allowed a swirl of yellow-green mist into the room, and when it drifted toward Ok’tarik’s position, it seared its way through his soul.  The mundane toxin did little to his body, but his soul was far more vulnerable.

Most of the other orcs were much more affected, with some of the lower-level demigods completely incapable of enduring it.  They were confined to the ships’ holds, where the work-slaves’ enchantments kept them relatively safe.  For everyone else, they could only lean on the shamans’ domains, which were far less effective than they had been when the siege had begun.  There were plenty who still lived, but too many of the most powerful leaders had been slain.

The door slammed shut behind Hokj, evidence of the other warchief’s irritation.  It mirrored Ok’tarik’s own.

“You summoned me.”

Ok’tarik met Hokj’s eyes, and he was surprised to find there was no defiance nestled within.  Was Hokj completely loyal?  No.  He would pounce on any opportunity to dominate, the same as any other orc.  However, so long as Ok’tarik never showed any weakness, Hokj would stay in his place.

“Report,” Ok’tarik ordered.

Hokj wasted no time before doing just that, detailing the number of orcs who’d been slain by the mountainous ship’s weapons.  The defenses had grown much stouter since that first battle – not a surprising turn of events.  If nothing else, dragons were competent and industrious.  They had clearly put the extra time to good use, augmenting the defenses in ways that could not be countered, outside of overwhelming force.

Not by orcs, at least.  The work-slaves could do miraculous things.  The ships were evidence of that.  But they were incapable of adaptation.  If it wasn’t part of their heritage, passed down from one orc to another and originating with the dragons who’d once occupied Orveth Kaal, then it simply didn’t exist for them.

“They have adjusted to our efforts to tunnel in,” Hokj went on.  “Hundreds die each time we try, crushed by the mountain.”

“And the fog?”

“Persistent.”

After that simple word, he explained the problem in detail.  The fog in question came from the Druid, and each time they managed to disperse that soul-destroying mist, the Druid reapplied it.  So far, they’d barely caught sight of him, and even then, not for a long while.  At first, he’d revealed himself by dropping poison bombs and swooping in to kill high-value targets, but when he realized that those actions revealed his position, he’d stopped.

Now, they had almost no way to find him, except through sheer luck.

Making things even worse was the little assassin Ok’tarik had almost killed at the very beginning of the battle.  She had escaped, only to pop up every now and again to kill important orcs.  Top-tier shamans constituted most of her targets, but she’d also slain a few powerful warriors.

Despite Ok’tarik’s frustrations, he had to admit that the siege was going as well as anyone could have expected.  The dragons were cornered, and day by day, their defenses weakened.  One day – perhaps soon – the orcish army would defeat them altogether.  It was just a matter of time, and not that much of it.

Ok’tarik simply needed to be patient.

Even as Hokj finished the explanation, a massive shockwave shook the flagship.  Its origin was distant.  Miles and miles away.  But even then, he could feel the heat of it. 

Briefly, he was reminded of the ship-turned-volcanic eruption he’d endured some time ago.  This latest explosion tasted slightly different, and in a way that was very familiar to him.

The second Ok’tarik recognized it, he let a wicked grin spread across his face.

The Druid had used his ultimate ability, and that meant he was vulnerable.  Ok’tarik had no idea why he’d changed tactics, but he was more than eager to take advantage of what constituted a mistake.  Within a second, he had pushed past Hokj and onto the deck of his ship.  After that, he sprinted toward the cloud of dust, ashes, and nascent trees in the distance. 

At last, he would rid of himself of the Druid.

                          *

Elijah was exhausted.

The influx of vitality that came from using Flames of Renewal helped, and because he’d not infused it with his soul, it was a net benefit.  However, it did little to negate the sheer fatigue that came on the heels of a month of constant pressure, ability use, and anxiety.  He dove beneath the forest floating in mid-air, already shifting into the Shape of Withering.  The second the transformation completed, he assumed the Guise of the Stalker.

Once he was well ensconced in his stealth ability, he let out a sigh of relief.

The last month had been an absolute slog, and it was one he’d been forced to endure alone.  Everyone else had retreated into the Vengeance – at his insistence – leaving him fighting a war of attrition against an uncountable number of enemies. 

Doing so had left him tired in a way that he’d never really experienced before.  Not even on Gorveth, when he’d spent weeks fighting single enemies.  The difference lay in the reality of the situation – that if he failed in even the smallest way, his friends would be the ones to pay the ultimate price.

If Elijah survived and they did not, he wasn’t sure if he could ever forgive himself.  That created a certain degree of pressure that weighed on him like nothing else ever could. 

As he glided away, riding natural wind currents to keep his ethereal signature minimized, Elijah sensed someone coming.  That was as expected.  So far, he’d remained almost entirely undetected, which had to be frustrating for the orcs.  They weren’t accustomed to being attacked by unseen enemies, and they clearly favored straightforward engagements.

Elijah didn’t stick around.

He knew that aura, and he wasn’t ready to face Ok’tarik.  Not yet.  The idea wasn’t so different from the last time they’d clashed.  Elijah wanted to force the orc into obeying his nature.  Maybe he would make a mistake.  Or maybe he would just recognize what Elijah would do if left to lesser orcs.  Either way, getting Ok’tarik to respond – preferably recklessly – was the key.

Elijah didn’t delude himself into thinking he could kill the orc.  He’d already thrown everything he had at Ok’tarik, and it had proven to be insufficient.  But what he could do was distract him long enough for the Vengeance to escape the blockade the orcs had built around the mountainous ship.  And maybe Elijah could put him out of commission for just long enough to give his allies a proper lead that might persist until the end of the trial.

Even so, Elijah only got about half a mile away from the forest that had grown in the wake of Flames of Renewal when he saw another explosion.  In this case, there was no fire or ash, just kinetic impact.  Trees shattered and went flying in every direction, evidence that Ok’tarik had arrived.

And he was not happy.

If Elijah could’ve smiled in the form of the venomwing stalker, he would have.  As it was, he banked and dove, putting as much distance between him and the site of the explosion as he could manage.

Even so, he felt the shockwave that came with the forest’s destruction. 

He rode the wave of air for a few miles before finally using Ride the Wind to summon an updraft that took him above the ship-line.  Once he’d gained enough elevation, he glided around the blockade and to the other side of the Vengeance.  By that point, he was more than a hundred miles from Ok’tarik, so he finally resumed his bombardment.

Just Cloud of Decay.

No Plagueburst or Falling Talon, because that was a good way to give away his position.  He did use Phase Shift, summoning an entire fleet of clones for himself.  They mimicked his Cloud of Decay, blanketing the already saturated atmosphere with venomous gas. 

Elijah knew it wouldn’t kill very many.  Over the previous month, he had already engineered the deaths of any orcs that weren’t strong enough to endure.  The ones that were left were the strongest, but even though they weren’t in danger of dying, that wasn’t the point.

Instead, Elijah only wanted to weaken them before taking the next step.  Hopefully, that would push the situation further so he could clear the way for the others’ escape.  But for now, he put his nose to the proverbial grindstone and continued his flight pattern.