Path of Dragons 17 - Chapter 79 - Father (Patreon)

Pain.

Anger.

Territorialism.

Those three emotions were the most prominent within the wyrm’s mind, but there were hundreds of others it simply could not understand.  Somewhere deep down, it understood that that should not have been the case, but it didn’t have the means to process anything but those strongest feelings. 

They overwhelmed everything else, even the wyrm’s survival instincts which should have been screaming at it to escape what had become a lopsided fight against another predator. 

Normally, the wyrm would have long since fled.  That was how it had managed to survive all these years.  It fought the battles it could win and retreated from those that were beyond its abilities.  Every now and again, it would push things a little further than was comfortable, but in most cases, it was extremely careful.

That was a necessity.

After all, the world contained a host of extremely powerful creatures that could and would kill the wyrm given half a chance.  Even if it somehow emerged victorious, the cost of such a battle would render it vulnerable to others. 

Of course, the wyrm didn’t actively think those things. Instead, it functioned entirely on instinct, with barely any thoughts about anything deeper than where it would acquire its next meal. 

So it had been when the wyrm felt those first spatial fluctuations.  At the time, it had been curled around a natural treasure, slowly recuperating after a fight against some two-legged beast who’d ripped its fang away.  That tooth had long since regrown, but the echoes of the defeat lingered in its mind. 

Thankfully, the planet’s cyclical nature meant that the wyrm was much stronger now than it had been back then.  The wyrm didn’t understand how it all worked.  Maybe once, that hadn’t been the case, but now, it simply accepted the ebb and flow of power and adjusted just like any other beast.

It had been on the verge of going into hibernation – just for a year or two – when those spatial fluctuations sounded an alarm in its mind.  At first, it had ignored them, but they were persistent enough to needle the wyrm until, at last, it had dragged itself away from the natural treasure to investigate.

And what it had found was a competitor.

Another predator who’d encroached upon its territory. 

The rage that came from that realization drove the wyrm into battle.  After only a brief delay, the other wyrm committed as well.  They’d been fighting ever since. 

Vaguely, the wyrm was aware of other beasts in the area.  The odd clouds that felt both right and wrong as well.  The lingering vulnerability, the detestable hornets, and the other beasts’ attacks left the wyrm weakened.

But he – and the other wyrm – were largely unharmed, allowing both to focus on what was truly important.  That was to say that they concentrated almost entirely on killing one another.  Everything was just noise.

Then, everything changed.

The storm above shifted in both form and purpose, descending upon the two beasts and choking the life out of their bodies.  Not enough to kill, but more than enough to considerably weaken.

After that came the fiery explosions.  They were concentrated on the other wyrm, but their effect could be felt for miles and miles in every direction.  The disaster didn’t stop there, though.  Next, a barrage of projectiles slammed into the other wyrm, pushing it closer to the brink.

And finally, there was the little dragon.

She was strong enough that when she charged, the wyrm noticed.  There was a wildness to her, as if she stood on the brink of recognizing her own shackles for what they were.  The wyrm didn’t consciously understand its descent into wyrmhood, instead only knowing that it hadn’t always been a beast. 

The little dragon was the same.

She came with a blade, and when it descended, the other wyrm was nearly bisected.  That sent a wave of panic through the wyrm.

It only mounted when he saw another beast – a long, serpentine creature with eyes like the stars – ram into the wyrm, only to disappear.  A few minutes later, the other wyrm fell from the sky, already dead.

At that moment, something broke through the barriers of wyrmhood, and he briefly recognized the other wyrm for who she was.

“Daughter,” he muttered, staring at her corpse as it fell.

That simple word came with a cascade of emotions, culminating in a level of shame and regret that the wyrm simply couldn’t process.  So, that momentary lapse into dragonhood quickly dissipated, replaced by bestial instincts that didn’t care that he’d been trying to kill the daughter he’d once loved.

The dragon he had once been retreated into the depths of the wyrm’s mind, never to be seen or felt again.  Whatever emotions it had felt faded in favor of pure and destructive rage that only grew stronger when he saw the creature responsible.

It was small.  Bipedal, with scales and a bone-like protrusion jutting from one arm.

The wyrm bore down on the creature, ready to snap it up and assert dominance.

But then, something slammed into the wyrm, sending it cartwheeling across the atmosphere. 

Only when the wyrm managed to right itself did it see its attacker.

When that happened, the wyrm’s heart beat a little faster as panic began to rise in its chest.  Because it recognized the new arrival.  They’d clashed before.  What’s more, brief flashes of torture exploded into the wyrm’s mind.  Remembered pain overwhelmed all thought, pushing even the wyrm’s instincts aside.

Suddenly, it was as helpless as it had been in that dungeon, chained to a wall as orcs picked it apart.  Over and over again until the only solace on offer was to break free of the system’s shackles and embrace something primal within ever dragon. 

Descending into wyrmhood came with a massive surge in power that had allowed the newly minted wyrm to escape.  Over time, the creature’s nature had settled, and some of that power had faded.  But in that moment, it had been something truly spectacular.

The wyrm had regained some of that power in the years since. 

Still, it couldn’t help but reel at the sight of that hated orc.

                          *

Ok’tarik was barely alive.

He’d been fighting that grey-scaled dragon for days, slowly wearing him down until the creature simply couldn’t keep going.  Finally, after everything, Ok’tarik had plunged his new spear into the dragon’s heart, finishing him off.

That gave him leave to focus on the rest of the battle, and he had been both unsurprised and horrified to see that his fleet had been mostly destroyed.  The ships that hadn’t been broken had retreated, leaving him behind.

He didn’t blame them.  Orcs were no cowards, but they weren’t selfless, either.  Nor were they prone to loyalty.  If the situation demanded retreat, they wouldn’t hesitate for a second to leave their comrades behind.

His only hope was that his flagship had escaped with Makit onboard.

He didn’t have any room to consider her fate, though.  Instead, his attention remained on the blue-scaled wyrm in the distance.  He was responsible for that dragon’s descent, though he didn’t feel guilty for it.  Would he do it again, had he another chance?  Probably not.  But it was difficult to regret an act that ultimately led him to so much personal development.

The fallen creature was wounded, though not severely.  However, it had also been fighting for just as long as Ok’tarik, and its reserves had obviously been taxed.  Fortunately, Elijah and the others had dealt with the rival wyrm.

Where that creature had come from, Ok’tarik had no idea.

But it was far too powerful for him to overcome.  Even now, spatial rifts cut across the atmosphere, destabilizing the world.  Ok’tarik was no student of ethereal theory.  He barely even understood it as a category, functioning almost exclusively off of instinct.  He’d worked long and hard to take more control over his own power, but he recognized that he was far from a finished product.

Whatever the case, Ok’tarik didn’t intend to let the former dragon live for much longer.  He would have killed the creature long ago if tracking it down wasn’t such a hassle.  And he wouldn’t let this new opportunity go to waste.

With that in mind, he tightened his grip on his new spear – made in the Star Forge with the assistance of a human Blacksmith – and launched himself forward.  Running across the sky had become as easy as breathing, and even in his fatigued state, Ok’tarik could move fast enough that he covered the intervening miles in only a few moments.

The wyrm never had an opportunity to react before Ok’tarik rammed his spear in the creature’s chest.  The blade cut through those blue scales with ease, plunging past the ribs and into the wyrm’s heart.

Then, it disappeared.

However, it never got far, reappearing only a mile away.  Unfortunately for it, that put it directly beneath the roiling and unnatural storm.  Columns of mist-wreathed poison and mutated hornets snaked out, wrapped around the creature, and squeezed.

Ok’tarik was already moving, ready to once again ram his spear into the wyrm’s heart.

Suddenly, he felt the atmosphere stir.  He leaped to the side, but his dodge wasn’t quick enough to avoid the pending attack.  His arm – and the spear – disappeared a moment later. 

Ok’tarik screamed, both in frustration and pain. 

But he didn’t stop.

He’d let that wyrm live for long enough.  It was past time he put an end to its life.

                          *

Elijah leaped free of the falling wyrm that had once been Masasha, content that she was finally dead.  In the thirty or so seconds it had taken him to confirm her passing, they’d fallen a few miles toward the core.  Looking up, he could still see the other wyrm. 

More, he saw a tiny speck running through mid-air and brandishing a spear.

Ok’tarik, Elijah was certain. 

Throughout the battle, Elijah had been aware of the orc’s fight against the dragon he’d chosen as an opponent.  Most of the others had either died or fled the scene, and Elijah had sent his remaining fungal thralls after them.  They wouldn’t make it far.  In fact, they’d already begun to fall apart.  Without his direct input the thralls could only exist for so long before the fungi inside them began to die. 

It didn’t matter.

They had already served their purpose, so Elijah severed the final few connections to his mind.  Somewhere out there, the last of the vitality and ethera keeping those dragon corpses going dissipated, and they fell toward the core.

That freed his mind to focus on the problem at hand.

One wyrm was down, but that didn’t mean that they were out of the woods yet.  For one, the world’s destruction hadn’t ceased.  The spatial rifts continued to spread, just at a slightly slower pace.  Moreover, the remaining wyrm was still a dangerous creature who could – and probably would – destroy everyone and everything, given half a chance.

Second, their assets were greatly depleted.  Elijah had used pretty much all of his cooldowns, and those abilities wouldn’t be available again for quite some time.  On top of that, Illska was still out of the fight, her core completely drained.  And finally, Gunnar had made it clear that he couldn’t replicate his feat with what had turned out to be a bane bullet. 

He only had the one.

Probably.

Elijah didn’t quite trust the sniper to tell the truth on that count, largely because he suspected the thing had been commissioned to deal with him.  Gunnar wouldn’t exactly tell Elijah he had another one, would he?

At the end of the day, what mattered was that they were just about out of options to fight the wyrm.  Sure, the remaining former dragon was weaker than Masasha, but in their state, killing it off would be almost impossible.

Which meant that Orveth Kaal’s demise might take a little longer, but it would come all the same.

The only hope was Ok’tarik, who wasn’t really a hope at all.  Clearly, he was just as drained as the rest of them.

“Should we call the other dragons in?” Elijah asked through his phone as he shifted into the Shape of the World Serpent.

“How?” asked Gunnar.  “They don’t exactly have phones.”

“Oh.  Right,” Elijah muttered.  “Any ideas?”

“I intend to just keep shooting.  Maybe it’ll die.  Eventually.”

Elijah shook his head.  Just keep shooting until it died.  It was a simple plan, and far from ideal.  But Elijah wasn’t sure if there was any other answer.

“You can still retreat,” Elijah suggested.

“Pass.”

He sighed.  “Figured you’d say as much.”

Then, Elijah felt something he didn’t expect.  He jerked his attention to the west, only to see that the Vengeance had drawn much, much closer. 

“What the…”

A voice crackled over the phone, saying, “Might want to clear the area.  We’re comin’ in hot.”