Path of Dragons 18 - Chapter 4 - Silvara (Patreon)

“This is fucking weird,” Gunnar muttered to himself as he knelt on the branch.  Silent Death’s stock dug into his shoulder as he aimed into the nearby prairie, sighting in on a massive beast that looked like someone had combined a buffalo and a moose.  The thing’s stocky form was at least elephantine in size, with a massive array of antlers that spread out for more than a dozen feet on each side.  A long, shaggy coat obscured its legs, dragging across the earth as it feasted upon the grassy buffet offered by the field.

In the distance, Gunnar could see the end of the plains, marked by a precarious cliff that separated what amounted to a tall plateau from the forest below.  From his experiences over the past few days, that forest would stretch on for thousands of miles.  Maybe across the endless expanse that constituted Silvara.

As far as he could tell, the realm didn’t consist of planets.  Instead, it was just infinite nature.  Forests.  Swamps.  Massive rivers that played host to aquatic beasts large enough to swallow a house.  Every biome seemed to be represented, and the inhabitants were all out to kill one another in an endless war for survival.

And now that included him and his other companions.

The first few minutes in Silvara had seen two peak deities trussed up by the local flora.  They would have died, had it not been for Elijah Hart’s newest ability. 

That situation had repeated itself more times than Gunnar could count.  It wasn’t always vines attacking them, either.  There were plenty of animals who’d tried their luck as well, though those were far easier for people like Illska and Ok’tarik to fight. 

Still, it was obvious that survival would be no easy feat.  They had a year to go, and Gunnar wasn’t sure they would all make it.

He intended to.

Hard would survive as well.

But Illska and the orc?  They were ill-suited to the environment, and neither had the self-control necessary to simply hole up and wait for time to run out.  Gunnar would be surprised if one or both of them made it to the very end.  More likely, they’d run out and pick a fight with something that could obliterate them in the space of a second.

Either way, that had no bearing on his current situation.

Because he knelt upon one of Elijah’s branches.  For the most part, the shape didn’t really seem all that different from any other tree.  All the parts were the same, though Elijah did sport a scale-like bark and thorns that looked suspiciously like claws or teeth.  Otherwise, he appeared much the same as the ancestral tree back in the center of the Hartwood Grove.

That meant a white trunk, blue leaves, and a size that made most trees back on Earth look tiny by comparison.  And as far as Gunnar was concerned, it was entirely too creepy to sit on one of Hart’s branches.  The man was a tree, but he also wasn’t.  And he couldn’t escape the feeling that something was off about it all.

Thankfully, the Druid seemed incapable of responding while in that form, so all Gunnar heard was the rustle of leaves.  He ignored it.  Instead, he focused on his charging his weapon. 

Of course, he also made certain to keep Innocuous going at full strength.  Normally, it kept him from gaining attention, but the beasts in the Plane of Nature were more than capable of seeing through it.  To counter their senses, Gunnar had been forced to keep his stealth ability going at all times.

It was especially important when he was charging his rifle, which agitated the local atmosphere enough to alert beasts even from a mile away. 

He’d only needed to learn that lesson once before he incorporated it into his process.  Now, it came almost as second nature.

Once the weapon was charged, with all of its chambers full, Gunnar cycled through his abilities until he’d used more than half of his ethera.  Only then did he refocus his aim, take a deep breath, then fire on the exhale.

The beast reacted instantly.

But it was still too late.  More, Gunnar had compensated for its movement, so when it bucked, it did so in a way that put it directly in the path of a kill shot.  The bullet tore into the creature’s hide, eliciting a bellowing shout that sounded like a horn going off.  The beast flipped over onto its side, a massive hole in the side of its torso. 

It heaved one breath after another, calling out the entire time.

Then, with a herculean effort, it pushed itself to its feet and staggered away.

“Fuck,” Gunnar growled to himself.  To date, he’d not killed a single beast within the Plane of Nature in one shot.  Most didn’t even fall after two.  They were just too strong.  Or rather, he was too weak. 

He aimed to change that, scrambling across Elijah’s branches, leaping from one to another until he finally got another shot.  The beast had slowed to a stop, and it remained unmoving. 

It was obviously dying.  Gunnar had hunted often enough to recognize that.  However, he couldn’t just let the thing bleed out.  Doing so would attract predators, probably of the sort nobody in their party was equipped to deal with.  Now that he’d taken the shot, his only option was to kill it as quickly as possible, harvest the meat, and fall back. 

The problem was that he didn’t have the ethera to efficiently finish it off.

“Need some help here,” he growled, already leaping from the branch.  By the time his feet hit the ground, the tree had begun to shrink. 

Gunnar glanced to see the odd and slightly macabre sight of a tree turning into a man.  And an infuriating one at that.

“Thought you said you could take it down by yourself,” Hart said with a slight grin.

“Well, I was fucking wrong.”

“Aw. Don’t be like that, buddy.  A lot of people would be proud to get a shot off, much less one that would’ve eventually killed it,” said the Druid.  Gunnar wanted to punch him in the face.

“Just kill it so we can head back to camp.”

For once, Hart didn’t have a quippy rejoinder.  Instead, he just nodded, then shapeshifted into a gruesome pterodactyl-looking creature.  The thing was huge, and if Gunnar was honest, it didn’t really look like a dinosaur.  No pointy head or anything like that.  But that was where his mind went.

In any case, the Druid leaped high into the air, flapped his wings a single time, and gained a few hundred yards of altitude.  He didn’t dare go much higher than that, as the skies were just as deadly as the forests below. 

That seemed to be the theme of Silvara.

Everything was deadly.

The moment the Druid passed out of sight, Gunnar felt a deep sense of unease wash over him.  If he’d not already been aware that Hart possessed a sort of calming ability for the surrounding forest, he would’ve become well aware in his absence.  As it was, Gunnar simply focused on Innocuous so he could try to remain undetected by the local flora and fauna.

Thankfully, it worked.

Soon enough, he saw Hart’s steep dive that ended with him ripping into the huge bison-beast.  The moment he knew it was dead, Gunnar sprinted toward the kill sight, only to discover that the creature was far larger than his estimates suggested.  The dimension were consistent with his approximation, but the thing was much denser.

So, when they set to butchering the thing, it ended up taking nearly half a day.

Neither of them spoke.  There wasn’t time.  If they stuck around too long, they would end up as prey for something much larger and deadlier.  Thankfully, Hart didn’t need to be reminded to keep an eye on things.  He knew the wilderness much better than Gunnar himself, so he recognized the danger for what it was.

After a few hours, it became clear that they weren’t going to get everything.  When Gunnar said as much, Hart agreed. 

“We’ll use the hide as a bundle.  Leave the offal,” he suggested.  “We’ll fly back.”

Gunnar didn’t much care for that idea, but he also couldn’t disagree with the logic.  If they traveled on land, there was a good chance that whatever found the rest of the carcass would follow their scent to the campsite. 

Maybe they could kill any potential intruders, but neither wanted to take that chance.  They had a good campsite, and they didn’t want to have it spoiled unnecessarily. 

So, once they’d finished bundling everything, Elijah shifted into his dragon form, grabbed the makeshift hide pouch in his claws, and invited Gunnar to hop aboard.  That was even more awkward than sitting on Hart’s branches.

Gunnar endured.

A few minutes – and dozens of miles – later, they came within range of their camp site.  It was located quite a distance from their arrival point, largely because Hart admitted he couldn’t keep the local vegetation in line.  Not indefinitely.  So, they’d picked up and trekked across the land, looking for a good place to set up camp.

Eventually, they found the perfect location in a small and inconsequential cave.  Hart had been forced to scour the resident fungi, but otherwise, it was entirely deserted.  It also had a defensive entrance that was easily blocked. 

Everyone was more comfortable surrounded by walls.

So it had been for the past two weeks. 

To date, none of them had really made any progress.  Illska and Ok’tarik were still recovering from that first encounter – both physically and psychologically.  Neither were accustomed to being incapacitated so easily, and they weren’t really equipped to deal with it. 

Meanwhile, Gunnar had to pick and choose his battles even in the best of times.  And in a place like Silvara, where everything was much more powerful than him, he couldn’t really afford to take any chances.  After all, if things got bad, what was he going to do?  He couldn’t exactly retreat.

Hart landed lightly just outside the cave, and he waited for Gunnar to dismount before he shifted back into his natural form.  Soon after, the two were lugging the wrapped package of meat into the cave. 

Fortunately, Hart’s tent possessed a trait that protected the vicinity from hostile ethera and helped to hide them from the local wildlife.  So long as they didn’t do anything stupid, they could remain undetected.

At least that was the idea.

Gunnar wasn’t so sure.  He was loathe to trust something he hadn’t tested himself. 

Upon entering the cave, Hart called for the others.  Gunnar tensed at the sudden sound, but his disapproval didn’t go any further than cutting his eyes at the Druid.  After a second, Illska poked her head out of the tent.

She still looked terrible.  Her skin was pale, her scales lacked their usual luster, and if a giant, bodybuilder-esque woman could look weak, then she did.  She tried to hide it, but there really wasn’t much she could do when it was so obvious.

“You have returned.”

“I have,” Hart said as they dropped the bundle.  “And I’ve brought gifts.”

Gunnar grunted.

“We,” the Druid amended.  “We brought gifts.  Gunnar almost got it by himself.  Barely even needed me around.”

Of course, Gunnar recognized a backhanded compliment when he heard one.

Hart glanced his way. “Help me butcher this.  They need to eat.”

As he said as much, Illska pulled back to return to the tent.  As far as Gunnar could tell, that was just about all she could do.  That toxin had been extremely powerful, and to the point where even the Druid struggled to cleanse it.  According to Hart, the aftermath had left their ethereal channels scorched and beset by scar tissue.  Healing that took time.

And energy.

Most of which came from various animals they’d hunted.

For what it was worth, Gunnar didn’t mind helping.  He just didn’t  want it to be his full-time job.  He’d never been the empathetic type, and he didn’t think that was going to change now. 

Still, he and the Druid set about doing what needed to be done. 

All the while, Gunnar kept wondering why he had decided to come along.  However, it only took one look at Hart to remember.  The Druid was strong.  Too strong.  And he was unstable.  If Gunnar wasn’t there to keep an eye on him, then who was? 

It was with that in mind that, he settled his thoughts and focused on the task at hand.