Path of Dragons-Chapter 71Book 9: : Sky Lords

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Another updraft slammed into Elijah just before he reentered the broken tower, and with enough force that he would have broken bones had he been a pre-World Tree human. Thankfully, he wasn’t, so it only drove the breath from his lungs. Throwing his arms and legs out wide, he angled his ascent so that when he fell, he would do so on one of the silvery bridges nearby.

It worked, and soon enough, Elijah crashed down on the smooth surface. It swayed a bit with the impact, but otherwise, the structure seemed solid. Only a few seconds later, the dogs joined him, with Oscar being the last to land with a graceful roll. When Elijah looked up, the other man’s face had turned slightly green.

“Are you hurt?” asked Elijah, already casting a healing spell.

Oscar shook his head.

“What’s wrong, then?”

Without any more warning, the man raced to the edge of the bridge and vomited. The volume would have been impressive if Elijah wasn’t disgusted by the smell. Thankfully, it didn’t last long as the stuff went right through the fluffy white clouds, presumably to land on some unsuspecting elemental beast far below. Oscar wiped his mouth, then rocked back on his heels.

“I don’t like heights,” he muttered. “And I don’t like…whatever that was.”

Elijah would have laughed at the incongruity of it if his friend wasn’t so obviously miserable. Still, in the back of his mind, he had to acknowledge how silly a fear of heights was when Oscar was durable enough to survive a fall from just about any elevation. But he supposed that was the thing about phobias – often, they were incredibly irrational.

He handed Oscar one of his canteens. It contained water from his island, and he’d discovered that, while it wasn’t quite as magically potent as his grove fruits, it was still vaguely beneficial in ways Elijah didn’t truly grasp. He could feel the notes of vitality in it, though, and when he drank it, he sensed the tendrils of ethera reaching out to embrace and nourish his body.

“Drink. It’ll settle your stomach,” he said as Oscar took the canteen.

When the pack leader tipped the canteen up and drank the contents, Elijah looked around, and as he did, he truly let himself appreciate the obviously magical landscape before him. An expanse of white clouds that looked like nothing so much as a field of fluffy cotton stared back at him, broken up only by a series of silvery bridges that periodically emerged from within those clouds.

Elijah couldn’t see any unique structures, but after only a moment, he could feel the changing density of the ambient ethera. Usually, that was enough to lead him forward – especially when it came to Primal Realms. Thicker ethera meant more power, and every important feature within a Primal Realm was tied to more magical energy. So, with that, Elijah felt certain of the direction.

There were only two remaining questions, the first of which was simple enough. What would they find at the center of the trial? In both of the others, it meant fighting a powerful creature that exemplified the element in question, so Elijah suspected they’d find something similar in the Gauntlet of the Sky Lords. However, what form that powerful monster might take was a mystery.

But perhaps more urgent was the second question at hand. How were they meant to reach it? None of the bridges – at least as far as Elijah could see – were connected. Leaving Oscar and the dogs behind, he strode down the bridge, stopping when he reached the point where it merged with the clouds. After dipping his hand into the fluffy stuff, he found two things to be true.

First, the bridge ended only a couple of inches past visibility. He’d felt as much on approach, but it was still a disappointing reality. The second thing he discovered was that the clouds were not clouds at all. They were a little too solid, and they certainly weren’t as moist as normal fog. Unfortunately, they were still diffuse enough that there was no chance that they could hold more than the weight of a feather.

Elijah crouched at the end of the silvery bridge, uncertain how to proceed. As had been the case inside the tower, he could have simply flown. If he was alone, he certainly would have already done so. But the idea of ferrying the entire pack from one bridge to another was extremely unappealing.

As he gave it some consideration, he focused on Soul of the Wild, and to his annoyance, there was nothing but more clouds as far down as he could sense. Idly, he embraced his mantle.

He felt it immediately.

There was something within the clouds, and it was huge. At least twice the size of a giant, it drifted only a few feet below the surface of the clouds. To Soul of the Wild, it was invisible, but the second the branches of his soul came into contact, Elijah felt it, and on an intimate level.

It was one of the challenge’s titular sky lords. A creature of pure air-attuned ethera. What’s more, it longed for a place it could scarcely remember. Open, blue skies as far as it could sense. It took Elijah an embarrassingly long moment for him to realize what that memory represented.

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Aesira. The realm of air. That was where the sky lord had originated. That was its home. To its perception, it had been plucked from its home and shackled to the Primal Realm. And it was angry and frustrated, driven mad by the situation.

Vaguely, Elijah wondered if it, too, was powered by the soul of a volunteer.

Maybe.

Or it could have been like the monsters. There truly was no way to tell, though it was a question he intended to ask the next time he could obtain the services of a Librarian. The way all of that worked was fascinating, but the need to understand it had never been urgent.

And he knew that despite his resolution to learn, that would likely remain the case going forward.

All of those thoughts flitted through Elijah’s mind in a scarce instant before he recoiled from the alien mind. Unfortunately, the disturbed creature didn’t enjoy the touch of Elijah’s soul, and it reacted accordingly.

Suddenly, it rose from the white clouds in all its massive glory. Ten-armed and made of what looked like clear glass, it shone with white light as air-attuned ethera swirled all around it. Bits of cloud hung from its spindly limbs like Spanish moss. The only part that looked truly solid was the head, and even that was no more than a hunk of clear crystal. Before Elijah could react, a pillar of wind smashed into him, knocking him from the bridge. Even as he fell over the edge, he clawed at the smooth surface, but to no avail.

He plummeted through the clouds, his every sense muffled. After ten feet, he was hit by another pillar of wind. Then another. He initiated a transformation into the Shape of the Sky just as yet another column of air slammed into him. It only took a second before his arms became wings and he adopted his flight form, but in that time, he found himself knocked hundreds of feet away.

And right into a second sky lord.

The thing latched onto him, the bits of moss-like cloud sticking to his body and restricting his wing movement as it wrapped its limbs around him. Elijah snapped out his jaws, using his long neck like a whip as he aimed for the creature’s glassy head. His teeth skated off the smooth surface, but after a moment, the power of his jaws asserted itself.

A cracking sound like thunder erupted from the head, and the sky lord went wild. The second its grip loosened, Elijah kicked away, then flapped his wings. Another column of wind hit him after only a moment, but with the instincts of his flight form settling into his mind, he managed to ride the gust. It took him further away, but Elijah managed to assert some control that persisted even after he was hit by another pillar of air.

Finally, he managed to climb free of the clouds only to see that he was nearly a mile away from the top of the tower – and the silver bridge where Oscar and the pack battled the angry sky lord.

Elijah flapped his wings, then soared in that direction.

But it was only a second later before the other sky lord rose before him. A thin crack traced a path across the surface of its face, but otherwise, it looked just as strong as it had felt.

Elijah used Tempest Swarm, conjuring hundreds of tiny insects that surrounded him. Lightning sparked, then connected each individual member of the swarm. It empowered Elijah even as it descended upon and impaired the sky lord.

He could have escaped.

He chose not to. Something told him that they’d need to figure out how to deal with the sky lords if they were ever going to reach their destination. It was better to do so now than later. So, he wasted no more time before climbing high into the air, then shifting into the Shape of Venom.

Positioned above the sky lord as he was, he only needed to guide his fall. As he did so, he used Lurking Swarm, manifested dozens of phase spiders who fell right beside him. Elijah landed on the glassy surface of the creature’s head, then wasted no time before activating Envenom. He bit into it, and though his fangs only scratched the surface – and barely that – it was enough to inflict his afflictions upon it.

The spiders alighted onto other parts of the thing’s body, and they were immediately assaulted by the hoary, moss-like clouds that hung from its limbs. Fortunately, that did no real damage – not at first, at least – and it gave the spiders an opportunity to do their thing. Elijah sensed the venom – both his and the spiders’ – spreading throughout the creature’s spindly body. Visually, the only evidence was a slight change in color, going from clear to milky white.

But Elijah knew that wouldn’t be enough.

So, still clinging to the sky lord’s head, he shifted into the Shape of Thorn, then activated Domain of Vines. From his body sprouted hundreds of roots and spiny vines, which proceeded to wrap around and bind the creature’s limbs. Meanwhile, Elijah used his immense strength to batter the creature’s head.

At the same time, his tail lashed out, the barbed tip serving the same function as a machete as it sliced through the creeping, cloud-like moss. His first few blows found no purchase, but when he brought his powerful jaws into the mix, the creature’s head shattered into a hundred pieces.

It fell apart.

And Elijah plummeted back into the clouds. This time, he was ready for it, though, and the second he felt the loss of altitude, he’d initiated a transformation back into the Shape of the Sky. It completed just before he hit the clouds, and he managed to avoid that fate with a beat of his wings. In only a moment, he was soaring back to the bridge.

Just before he arrived, he saw a huge ball of fire envelop the sky lord, and when it faded, only a tangle of superheated glass remained. It had fused to the silver bridge, though it continued to move. As Elijah landed, Oscar leaped forward and slammed one of his hatchets into the thing’s head. That elicited a slight crack, but when he brought the second one around, the crystal broke apart.

For good measure, the other dogs quickly darted in and dismantled the rapidly cooling glass. When Elijah rejoined them, they’d completed the task, and he received a trickle of experience for his participation. The first sky lord had given him quite a bit more, shoving him closer to level one-eighty-eight.

Elijah looked around for more threats, but when he saw none, he massaged the back of his neck and said, “That was my bad, buys. Everyone’s okay, right?”

Oscar nodded. Then, he addressed the real issue when he asked, “How do we get to the next bridge?”

Elijah thought about it for only a second before he said, “I guess I’m your ferry. So long as we don’t go into the clouds, I think we’re fine.” Then, he gazed off at the system of bridges and let out a sigh. There was no end in sight, which meant that it was going to take quite a while to reach their unseen destination. “This is going to suck.”

"You've said that before," Oscar remarked.

Elijah shrugged. "Still applies, though."

Oscar gazed out at the bridges, turning a little pale as he acknowledged, "Yeah. It does."