Chapter 877: Chapter 877

Only when Elijah crept a little closer did he sense just how injured the draconic woman was. Not only was her body a mass of open wounds, but there were multiple afflictions creeping through both her veins and the channels of her soul. The latter characteristic was the more troubling of the two, largely because those toxins served to block her channels. That had a rippling effect that kept her from activating any abilities, and Elijah suspected that it would stop even passive effects.

He shifted into his human form, then stepped into the room. Before the woman could say anything, he started healing. Only when he’d cast Wild Resurgence, Blessing of the Grove, and Nature’s Bloom did she remark, “So, you are more than a beast.”

“Most of the time,” Elijah added, extending his Mantle of Authority. It hit a wall after only a second, and even though he knew he could push through, he said, “Please don’t resist.”

“A Mantle of Authority? From one so young? You are full of surprises, beast-man.”

“That’s me,” he said with a small smile that he hoped would mask his worry. She retracted her own mantle – which was much weaker and less expansive than his – allowing him to extend the boughs of his soul. This time, he didn’t use his Mantle of Authority to counter ambient ethera or others’ abilities. Rather, he intended it to cleanse and heal.

And for the moment, it worked. The afflictions clogging the channels of her soul began to degrade. Not quickly, but enough to give Elijah some hope that he could guide her to recovery.

Finally, he asked, “What happened?”

She let out a sharp breath through her nose. “What did not happen? This entire operation has been a failure from the very beginning. We were not prepared for this much resistance.”

She nodded. “The abyssals as well,” she added. “Even now, they assail the Red Tyrant.”

Elijah’s brow furrowed in confusion until he remembered that the Red Tyrant was the dragon transcendent responsible for keeping the planet chained together and protecting it from the corruption of the abyss.

“They cannot defeat him,” she said with no small degree of pride. “But neither can he best them – not so long as he must protect us and keep the Broken Crown intact.”

This time, Elijah’s frown of confusion elicited an explanation. To that point, he’d thought the Broken Crown only referred to the Primal Realm itself. Or maybe the fortress floating above the dragon skeleton back in the Painted Wastes. But after noticing his confusion, the draconic woman explained that the Broken Crown was the colloquial name given to the planet.

“Once, it was the jewel of draconic heritage. A shining city stretching across the entire planet,” she went on. “It is the seat to which every dragon traces their lineage. The greatest of their cities.”

That was when Elijah realized the origin of that sense of familiarity that had dogged his every step.

“I have been here before.”

“Of course. Every dragon has,” she stated. Then, she shook her head. “I wish I had seen it in its prime. But alas, that is not my nature.”

That statement elicited another surprising realization. The woman, despite looking draconic, was not a true dragon. Elijah should have recognized it immediately, but he’d trusted his eyes rather than his more ephemeral senses. It was an excusable mistake, given that her appearance followed the pattern set by Kirlissa. Save for the horns and tail, at least – which Elijah now realized were not aesthetic choices, but rather immutable realities of the woman’s species.

Elijah decided to address it directly, asking, “What are you?”

“A person,” was her clipped reply.

Elijah let out a sigh. “You know what I mean,” he remarked. Her demeanor didn’t change, so he went on, “Okay. Fine. How about this? What’s your name?”

“Ika. I’m Elijah,” he said, extending his hand. She did not take it. Instead, she looked at it like she had no idea what she was meant to do with it. That tracked. Handshaking was such a ubiquitous part of Earth culture that he’d made the mistake of assuming that everyone followed the tradition. But in retrospect, there was no real reason for that to be the case. So, he pulled his hand back and awkwardly explained his situation.

“You probably know more about me than I do about myself,” he acknowledged. “I’m a human who was granted a dragon core after doing something for a transcendent.”

She snorted. “As if you could do anything a transcendent couldn’t do for themselves.”

Elijah shrugged. “Maybe she saw something else in me. I don’t know. The point is that I have no idea what being a dragon really means. Outside of the obvious. You know, the scales and whatnot. And what I’ve seen when advancing my core. So, I’d appreciate any information you can give me.” He paused for a second, then added, “We’re going to be here a while one way or another. Might as well fill the time productively.”

She hesitated for a moment, then said, “Very well. You are helping me.”

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Then, she explained that the planet that was the Broken Crown had once gone by a different name, though she’d never been privy to such information. “True dragons guard their heritage closely,” she added by way of explanation.

She went on to say that the planet had been afflicted by some calamity which forced the dragons to abandon it. That, in turn, splintered the once monolithic force into multiple groups that spread across the multi-verse. She’d never heard of the Empire of Scale, but that was not surprising. For one, Ika was inside a Primal Realm, so she only knew what the system wanted her to know. For another, the groups had spread far and wide, so it wasn’t out of the question that some were so isolated that a relatively meaningless demi-god would be ignorant of the other draconic groups.

What did come through was that she didn’t hold true dragons in high esteem. “My people are not slaves,” she stated. “But neither are we true citizens. We scrape by however we can, but even the transcendents among my people are held in low regard by true dragons. It is the same with all lesser races.”

“Their designation. Not mine,” Ika pointed out. “Though I can’t deny their power. Your power. The might of a dragon core is undeniable.”

Elijah couldn’t disagree with that assessment. Every time he looked at his buffs, he saw verifiable proof of its power. He wasn’t certain how much of a difference his core currently made, but he was certain an ability like Shape of Spores wasn’t intended to give him six-hundred-plus attribute points. If he had to guess, the base spell was probably half as powerful.

And that was the least of the dragon core’s effects.

Every single spell benefited from its power, and he knew it was the single biggest factor in his continual survival.

After Ika fell silent for a few moments, Elijah asked, “Do you feel any better?”

Elijah had kept his healing spells going since the beginning, but despite his Mantle of Authority’s continuous effect, the blockages in Ika’s soul remained stubbornly obstructive. At the current rate, it would take days for them to break down. Perhaps even weeks.

Given her condition, Elijah didn’t think she had that long.

She gave a harsh laugh. “I came here to die,” she admitted. “Your abilities have only given me a few more hours. Despite your dragon core, you simply lack the power to save me.”

“I don’t believe that.”

“Of course you do not. Hubris is the partner of power.”

Elijah bit off a retort. Arguing would do no good. Instead, he asked, “What happened to you? The vespirans I found weren’t strong enough to do this kind of damage. Neither was the abyssal.”

“The last fight in a string stretching back for months,” she said. “Not everyone is blessed with your healing abilities, young dragon. My army was destroyed soon after arrival. A few of us made it, but…”

Elijah knew the tale before she told it. He’d seen the same unfold with his own army, and since leaving the dead behind, he had witnessed many other falls. The dragons were losing. The only solace was that the vespirans hadn’t fared much better.

In Ika’s case, the problem was obvious. She was either a Sorcerer or a Warrior – maybe her class toed the line between them – focused on fire. That didn’t lend itself to healing, which meant that, while she could probably output a ton of damage, she was wholly reliant on the support of defenders and Healers to keep her going.

In addition, she lacked the self-reliance of Druids, Explorers, or Rangers, meaning that every step she took was dogged by opposition. She couldn’t hide. She probably couldn’t run, either. Her only option was to fight. And over time, that constant and ongoing battle had taken its toll.

She was like a mountain. Strong. Enduring. Powerful. But even the tallest mountain could be eroded over time.

Elijah pitied her, which only seemed to draw her ire. Still, she had no choice but to endure it because, without him, she would have already expired.

As she spoke of her life – revealing little except personal anecdotes – Elijah focused on pushing the power of his spells to their maximum potential. At one point, he’d thought the range fairly narrow, and in one case, he was right. Nature’s Bloom seemed very limited. Not quite static in terms of its expressed power, but not far off of it either.

Elijah reasoned that it had something to do with how outdated it was. Of his healing spells, it had been the first to evolve from its initial incarnation, and Elijah could only think that had something to do with its intractability.

By comparison, both Blessing of the Grove and Wild Resurgence were far more flexible. Elijah pushed increasingly large amounts of ethera into each spell until he was forced to acknowledge that he couldn’t keep it up indefinitely. Even when he used Grove Conduit, his regeneration couldn’t keep up with the expenditure.

And he didn’t dare keep that open for too long. He’d already tapped into the grove multiple times over the previous few months, and despite Nerthus’ efforts, Elijah knew that there would be consequences if he continued to go to that well too frequently. For all that he wanted to save Ika, he had to keep reminding himself that she was not real. That no matter what he did, she would be whole and hale when the Primal Realm reset.

It was a small comfort, but a comfort all the same. ɴᴇᴡ ɴᴏᴠᴇʟ ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀs ᴀʀᴇ ᴘᴜʙʟɪsʜᴇᴅ ᴏɴ NoveIＦire.net

Gradually, she grew weaker as the various afflictions stubbornly resisted Elijah’s efforts to heal them. Most of them had originated with demi-god level creatures, be they wasps or abyssals, so Blessing of the Grove wasn’t nearly as effective at curing them as it should have been in just about any other situation. The corruption from the abyssals was particularly difficult to combat, and even with all Elijah’s efforts, it persisted.

The message was clear. He just wasn’t powerful enough. Not yet.

Even so, he continued to push himself as hard as he could, though he quickly realized that the writing was on the wall. Especially when Ika’s steady stream of conversation drifted into incoherent mumbles. Elijah dug deep, draining his core with every passing hour until, at last, he ran dry.

“I told you I came here to die,” she said, giving him a tight smile. Her first since he’d arrived. “Perhaps if you were a Healer, you might have changed my fate. But even then…”

Elijah knew what she wanted to say. He might’ve been able to fight demi-gods, but at the end of the day, he was still just an ascendant. He had limits, just like everyone else. And the world – or maybe the system – seemed keen on reminding him of that.

First, with the panther. Then, with Alyssa. Nina and Fremont. Over and over, he was forced to confront the reality of his existence. He couldn’t save everyone. No matter how much power he gained, no matter how many levels he reached, failure would always lay in his future. That was just life.

There was always a mountain to climb. A more powerful enemy to fight. A disease he couldn’t cure. A person he couldn’t rescue.

In this case, that person was Ika.

He kept reminding himself that she wasn’t real. That her death didn’t matter. That she would live again. But in that moment, with his failure settling onto his shoulders like a heavy clocak, none of those excuses made any difference.

So it was with anger, grief, sadness, and helplessness that he watched Ika finally succumb to her injuries. Right before she closed her eyes, she breathed out a whisper, and despite its quiet nature, Elijah heard it like a shout.

“Thank you. Most dragons would not have bothered.”