Path of Dragons 16 - Chapter 61 - Warm Welcome (Patreon)

The journey back took nine days.

At first, Elijah found it difficult to tear his eyes from the notification as it slowly ticked down.  However, after the first day, he began to settle into something  approaching a meditative trance.  He didn’t completely clear his mind.  That state had always eluded him, and to the point where he had begun to wonder if such a thing was truly possible.  However, he did manage to shift his thoughts into constructive territory. 

That made the wait a little more tolerable. 

Mostly, he thought about his plans for Fungee.  He could still feel the fungal colony back on Orveth Kaal, but his awareness of it felt a little further away with every passing moment.  After the first day, it was barely even noticeable, and that only if he specifically focused on it. 

Of course, that prompted apprehension that he wouldn’t be able to return.  After all, there was no guarantee that Roots Nexus would work to teleport him back to the ancestral world.  He believed it would.  Everything he knew about how the spell worked said as much.  And yet, some degree of doubt remained.

With that came some very reasonable worries.  Not only was he anxious about Fungee’s development, but he was also concerned for what he would become if left untended.  Elijah had spent quite a bit of time and effort trying to corral some of the fungal colony’s expansionist tendencies, but they weren’t completely gone.  And if Elijah left him alone for too long, they would slowly creep back into Fungee’s habits.

That Fungee would grow out of control was one of Elijah’s biggest sources of anxiety.  The only reason he wasn’t more worried about it was because, at the end of the day, Orveth Kaal was still in the middle of the abyss.  Sure, it was also connected to the Empire of Scale – and to the World Tree via Root Nexus – but that bond was thin and inconsequential. 

If Fungee grew too much, he’d find himself expanding into the abyss. 

Briefly, Elijah worried that he’d become corrupted by its atmosphere, but everything he knew said that Fungee wouldn’t survive such a transition.

Not really a pleasant thought, but comforting in a saddening sort of way.  Sure, Fungee would die, but he wouldn’t take any innocent worlds with him. 

That was the kind of thought spiral that came with more than a week of idleness, and for the first time, Elijah wished he would’ve taken the hibernation option.  After a while, he moved on to other considerations – chiefly his plans for his body cultivation, but including anticipation for what he might find when he got back to Earth.

His perception of the grove suggested that it would be pleasant, but Elijah was well aware that the world didn’t necessarily follow the Hartwood Grove’s lead.  For all he knew, it was a figurative – as well as literal – island amidst a sea of chaos, violence, and petty wars. 

It was such a plausible possibility that Elijah didn’t even realize that he’d begun to spiral again. 

Fortunately, by the time he began to imagine the true horrors describing humanity’s capabilities, he only had a day left before his arrival.  With that in mind, Elijah pushed those thoughts aside in favor of more pleasant anticipation. 

Then, at last, his journey came to an end.

Suddenly, Elijah found himself kneeling in the shadow of the ancestral tree.  Dense ethera and vitality enveloped him as he took a deep breath.  The smell of a forest greeted his nostrils, accompanied by the unmistakable odor of habitation.  It wasn’t an unpleasant aroma.  Cooking food, a little woodsmoke, and a scent that screamed humanity made up the bulk of that undercurrent, but there was something else in there that Elijah couldn’t quite identify. 

But it smelled like home.

It had clearly just rained – not a surprise, considering that it felt like spring – and moisture still clung to the thick grass surrounding the tree.  A light sprinkle fell upon Elijah’s head as a breeze shook the branches overhead.  He looked up, smiling as a few drops hit his cheeks. 

Closing his eyes, Elijah just basked in the comfort he felt in his grove.  The tactile sensation of spongey earth.  The sound of rustling branches combined with distant laughter.  The underlying rightness of the local ethera. 

He took a deep breath, tasting the sweet air.

“Welcome back.”

Elijah’s smile broadened as he acknowledged, “You’ve been busy.”

“So have you.”

Elijah finally turned to look at the speaker, and as he took in the sight of Nerthus, he had to admit that the spryggent had grown considerably stronger.  He wasn’t any bigger than when Elijah had returned to the Empire of Scale, but he felt more solid.  Like a tree that had begun to settle into its maturity. 

“Nice beard.”

Nerthus stroked the thick strands of moss descending from his gnarled chin, and for a moment, he looked truly pleased.  “Thank you.”

“So?  What’s been going on?” Elijah asked.

As it turned out, the answer to that question was an overwhelming cascade of improvements to the grove.  Elijah already knew about most of them, but hearing Nerthus describe the minutiae associated with those advancements gave him an incredible amount of insight into how much work had been done.  In addition to expanding the boundaries of the grove proper by growing massive coral reefs well into the sea, Nerthus had also been building downward. 

Most of the island’s subterranean caves were submerged, but Nerthus and Nara had worked with a contingent of miners from Ironshore to populate them with various appropriate flora and fauna.  The rest of the grove had helped as well, resulting in some potentially game-changing treasures.

As Elijah had anticipated, Nerthus had also worked to upgrade the grove battery plants, and to the point where he claimed that they could shoulder the load of Grove Conduit without any issues. 

For what it was worth, as impressed as Elijah was, he also suspected it was a bit of an overstatement.  Because he hadn’t been forced to fully tap into Grove Conduit for quite some time.  Sure, he’d used it.  But not in quick succession, and he’d always remained as careful not to overdraw as he could possibly be.  If he went full bore, the results would almost assuredly tax whatever Nerthus had built.

He didn’t say as much, though.  Instead, he just congratulated Nerthus, heaping praise on the spryggent while subtly implying that he should keep working on it.  Nerthus assured him that he didn’t intend to let up.

As for the grove’s population, it had grown as well.  Not as rapidly as Elijah might’ve expected, but it seemed they’d taken on a quality over quantity approach.  That wasn’t meant to imply that they wouldn’t help people who needed it, just that living in the grove was reserved for those who offered benefits to the organization as a whole.  Everyone else ended up in Ironshore or in one of the satellite settlements near Elijah’s trees. 

A lot of them went to Argos, where the Hartwood Foundation saw to their needs and helped them get back on their feet. 

While Nerthus was explaining everything, Elijah’s arrival attracted a good deal of attention.  As such, it wasn’t long before they’d drawn a crowd.  Among them was Nara, trailing a line of young elves, humans, gnomes, goblins, and dwarves. 

It seemed that she’d found her calling as a teacher.

She still helped run the grove, but most of her attention remained on ushering the next generation into maturity.  Thankfully, the grove counted multiple Administrators among their number.

Elijah lost track of how much time he spent being welcomed back to his grove, but by the time the crowd began to disperse, the sun had begun to set. 

Eventually, he decided to excuse himself from the dispersing crowd and head to his tree house.  When he arrived, he discovered that it was much the same as how he’d left it, meaning that someone had thankfully kept up the cleaning.  It still felt familiar, but there was something missing. 

Or maybe something he’d begun to outgrow.

It had started when he’d been stranded on Gorveth, and it had continued during his time in the Empire of Scale.  He’d spent long stretches away from his grove, and as a result, it had begun to feel a little less like home. 

It still carried that designation.  Most likely, it always would.  But some of that was due more to nostalgia than real attachment.

Still, he took a quick shower, set his armor aside for cleaning, then donned a more casual set of clothes.  As he sat on his balcony enjoying a cup of coffee, he considered everything he needed to do.  He was so deep in thought that he barely even noticed when something passing overhead cast the whole treehouse in deep shadow.

He did notice when a giant golden dragon dove toward him, though.

Thankfully, Sara took on her humanoid form before landing.  Unfortunately, she missed the balcony and ended up smashing into the ground at the base of his treehouse.  The impact ended up digging a sizable crater and causing a small earthquake that sent most of the nearby wildlife scampering for cover.

Elijah was leaning over the railing when she crawled out of the crater, covered in dirt and grass.  She looked up, then blew a stray hair out of her face. 

“Nice landing,” Elijah said, trying to contain his grin.  He was woefully unsuccessful.

“I only missed by a couple of feet.”

“Seems like an important couple of feet,” Elijah pointed out.  “And Nerthus is going to kill you for that.”

She rolled her eyes.  “I’ll make it up to him.”

Then, she leaped, clearing the railing with ease.  A second later, she had her arms wrapped around him in a tight hug.  It felt nice.  It also served as a poignant reminder that he’d spent the past couple of years alone, with only Fungee’s intermittent presence for company. 

“What took you so long?” she demanded after she finally released him.

“I had things to do.”

She punched him in the stomach.

“Ow.”

Sara waved her hand in faux pain as she pouted.  “What are you even made of?  It was like punching a rock.  What level are you?”

“I could ask you the same thing.  Did you evolve?”

She immediately broke into a wide grin.  Then, she eagerly told him all about her evolution, pointing out that she’d gotten a Legendary class.  However, she refused to tell him the name, which prompted a bit of teasing.  She did not relent, though, and Elijah eventually dropped it.

After that, she recounted the tale of her arrival on Earth, which had come about a year after Elijah had entered the Bound Sky.  Since then, she’d been working with both Ramik and Atticus, as well as a few people associated with the Hartwood Foundation. 

Ironshore had benefited greatly from having a demigod Administrator on the job.  “We actually had a surplus this year,” she told him.  “Of course, that went into expanding the mines and refurbishing some of the city.  Those parts that were built near the city’s founding needed to be replaced.  I expect we’ll have even more this year, and I intend to push that into investment with Atticus.”

That led her into an explanation of what her partnership with the Merchant entailed, and she revealed that she had used her connections – or rather, Kirlissa’s – to expand Atticus’s operations to other worlds.  He could have managed that much alone, and he’d made some progress on that front.  But the Empire of Scale added some extra authority to his efforts that smoothed the entire process out.

And the profits were incredible.

According to Sara, at least.  Elijah hadn’t looked at his folio in years, so he just took her word for it.

“And the Hartwood Foundation?” he asked.

“Ah, that was a little…touchy.  I had to get rid of some people.”

Then, she described the foundation’s rampant corruption.  Not everyone involved was stealing money, but there were enough of them that rebuilding had taken quite an effort from Sara.  Oddly, she’d employed Gunnar to take care of some of the more dangerous crooks.

“But we’re better off now than we’ve ever been.  More money gets to the causes that actually matter, instead of lining people’s accounts,” she explained, brimming with pride.  And rightly so.  It was a worthy cause, and she’d done good work.

“So?” she asked at last.

Elijah narrowed his eyes. “What?”

 “Are you going to explain what really happened?”

Elijah sighed.  He wasn’t looking forward to it.  Sara was, at her core, a dragon. She believed in the sanctity of the empire.  So, hearing what Elijah had to say was going to be difficult for her.  But she deserved the truth.  So, after taking a deep breath, he began the story of exactly what had happened in the ancestral world.