Path of Dragons

Book 6: Chapter 40: Harried and Harassed

The arrow whistled past as it narrowly missed Miguel’s head, but the next projectile had much better aim. It slammed into the segmented plate of his helmet, skipping off the lacquered wood before spinning off into the underbrush. Meanwhile, Trevor leaped to avoid a Voxx that tried to disembowel him. The stag’s hooves came down hard, digging into the monster’s thick scales.

But Trevor knew better than to linger. There were six pursuers and five more Voxx in the area, and if they hesitated even for a moment, the enemy would catch them. And given the four Miguel had already killed, they likely wouldn’t treat them with respect or dignity. No, getting caught was more than a death sentence. Instead, it was assuredly a path toward torture and long captivity.

Miguel refused to allow that for himself, let alone Trevor. So, he bent close to the stag’s neck and urged him to greater speed. The deer responded, embracing his moonlight powers until he glowed with ethereal light. Using that ability to push him his speed to new heights, he soon began to outpace their pursuers.

Trevor leaped over a dry ravine, then darted to the left just in time to avoid a descending spear. Miguel repaid the owner of that weapon with a quick slash of his sword. It wasn’t a weapon meant for mounted use – it was far too short for that – but he made do. The wooden blade sliced through the dark elf’s forearm, stopping only when it hit the bone. To the elf’s credit, she didn’t even cry out. Instead, she clutched at the wound as she fell behind.

Miguel didn’t see any other reaction.

Another arrow missed him by a wide mark, thudding into a nearby pine tree. “Faster,” Miguel coaxed the stag, and Trevor responded. The sprint was enough to outrun their pursuers, but Trevor couldn’t keep it up indefinitely. Eventually, he’d find the limits of his stamina – especially after making such copious use of his lunar abilities.

They allowed him to run faster than even his attributes would normally allow, and he could also use them to create planes of moonlight so he could travel over water or bound high into the air. However, he was still a very young deer, and as such, he’d not had the time to build his reserves.

That was one thing Miguel had learned about guardian beasts. They were powerful creatures, but they were not infallible. From what he could tell about Trevor, the deer only had one ability, and if he pushed it, he could quickly run himself out of stamina. So, it was up to Miguel to rein him in, lest he push himself too far and make himself vulnerable.

Of course, if that happened, Miguel would protect his friend, and he knew that if their situations were reversed, Trevor would do the same for him.

For the next few minutes, they continued their mad dash through the forest, but it soon became clear that they wouldn’t escape so easily. The dark elves were everywhere, and even if Miguel and Trevor managed to leave a few behind, their path soon took them into another group. That pattern repeated often enough that Miguel began to wonder just how many dark elves had come to Earth, and how far they’d managed to spread.

More troublingly, he started to realize that if he was going to survive, he only had three options. And none of them were good. The first was to simply keep going, but as Trevor’s heaving chest told him, that plan’s viability had a distinct expiration date. Soon, Trevor’s stamina would give out. Maybe it would take hours more, but the stag simply couldn’t keep going indefinitely – not at full speed, at least.

Making that even worse was the notion that they weren’t just being chased. The dark elves were everywhere, and even as they left one group behind, their path took them into another group. So, outrunning them wasn’t really a good plan.

That brought him to the second option – hiding. There were a few caves here and there throughout the area, but he questioned whether or not hunkering down in the dark elves’ native territory would be a good thing. They were subterranean creatures, so trying to hole up in a cave seemed like a very bad idea. That made the second choice even worse than the first.

Finally, there was the third option, but it was one that Miguel didn’t really want to choose. He just wasn’t sure he had much of a choice but to fight back. He had no idea how many elves there were, and from what he’d seen, they were powerful enough to push him to his limits. Perhaps well beyond.

If he fought, there was a distinct possibility that he’d die.

But wasn’t that true of every time he went into a battle? He couldn’t go through life avoiding danger – especially when there was no other viable choice but to fight. It was a simple concept, but the realization was still profound. With that gripping his mind, Miguel shifted his focus from lamenting his lack of choices to making the most out of the one path that had a chance of survival.

The first order of business was to find a properly defensive position. As he’d previously established, caves wouldn’t do, and for obvious reasons. He didn’t know which ones might lead further underground, and he didn’t have time to explore them thoroughly. A cliff face might work, but with their advantage in range and likely attributes as well, there was a good chance that the elves would simply climb the cliff and attack him from above.

So, natural formations were probably out.

That left the possibility of finding a defensible building. It had only been a little more than five years since the world had been transformed by the touch of the World Tree, and that amount of time wasn’t enough to tear down all of the buildings. Sure, some – like the prefabricated houses that had populated much of suburban America – had fallen, but there were plenty of others that had survived intact. And Miguel had seen enough of them during his journey to recognize that he stood a good chance of stumbling upon one during his flight from the elves.

He just needed to keep an eye out.

Over the next half hour, Trevor bore him through the forest. Elves attacked frequently enough, and more than once, Miguel was forced to counter their ambushes with vicious attacks of his own. He even managed to kill one. However, his previous conclusions held firm, supported by the fact that, in all that time, he didn’t break away.

Then, finally, he and Trevor stumbled upon a gold mine of a location. It was a container yard next to an enormous warehouse that Miguel expected had once been a distribution center for a shipping company. The collection of buildings was so damaged that the structures were useless for his purposes, but Miguel was far more interested in the shipping containers themselves. They were made of solid steel, and while that didn’t make them quite as fortified as it would have before Earth had changed, it was still enough to stymie the elves’ pursuit and hopefully force them into a bottleneck.

So, with a plan in place, Miguel urged Trevor to greater speed, and the stag responding with a burst of acceleration that took them into the forest of stacked containers. Many of those stacks had been overturned, spilling their contents onto the ground, and most of the others remained locked. Miguel and Trevor raced past those, looking for one that met their requirements. After only a minute or so – with the dark elves still in hot pursuit – Miguel found the perfect one.

It was positioned on the ground level and surrounded by a half dozen other containers on each side. There were three stacked atop it as well, which meant that if the dark elves wanted to get to him, they’d need to go through quite a lot of steel – and whatever was contained within the huge, metal boxes – to do so. The final advantage was that it stood open, and it was clear that someone had looted most of what had been inside.

Miguel saw a couple of mostly rotted boxes that suggested it had once contained electronics, which told him that it had been empty for quite some time. Regardless, the emptiness gave him plenty of room with which to work. So, he ushered Trevor inside, and the moment Miguel dismounted, the stag’s stamina finally gave out. Trevor collapsed, his breathing labored as his emotions went wild with fatigue, a desire to help, and shame that he couldn’t do so.

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“It’s okay,” Miguel soothed. “You did a great job. It’s my turn to protect you.”

With that, Miguel closed one of the container doors, then jammed a wooden dagger through the ground to keep it shut. That was all the preparation he could make before the first pair of dark elves came into view.

They did so warily, both carrying bows with nocked arrows. One had a slash across her cheek, which Miguel vaguely remembered giving her. At the time, he hadn’t known she was a woman, but in retrospect, he couldn’t bring himself to care. An enemy was an enemy, regardless of gender.

“Surrender!” she called from afar, her melodious voice sounding like a song on the wind. “We will treat you fairly!”

Miguel remained silent. He had no intentions of giving up. Even if he trusted that they wouldn’t kill him – which he didn’t – he couldn’t afford to fail his mission. The people he’d sent back to Ironshore from Norcastle represented a good start, but most of those refugees had been noncombatants. If his city was going to survive the coming war, they needed a lot more fighters.

The dark elven woman, with her purplish-blue skin and white hair, shook her head, then raised her bow. A second later, an arrow was in the air.

Miguel slapped the projectile aside with his sword. He didn’t need to use any skills or spells. His swordsmanship and attributes were more than enough to accomplish a feat that was possible, albeit rare, even before the world had transformed.

The dark elf frowned.

Then, she rapidly fired six more arrows. Miguel could scarcely see how she had drawn so many so quickly, but he didn’t have time to worry about that. Instead, he used his latest ability, Protection of the Wind.

Protection of the Wind

Surround yourself with gusting wind, protecting you from ranged attacks and spells. Power determined by relative Constitution.

A gust of wind swirled around Miguel, and the arrows went wide. As they clattered against the walls of the steel container, the elven woman raised an eyebrow and said, “I see.”

Even as she spoke, ten more elves stepped into view. Thunder rolled before a few drops of rain splattered against the concrete ground, but otherwise, the atmosphere was one of pregnant silence. Miguel steadied his breath, but in his chest, his heartbeat had reached a crescendo of anticipation, excitement, and fear.

Then, they rushed him.

Miguel reacted immediately, using Enrage to improve his attributes before activating Impale even as he lunged toward the first elf in line. His wooden sword slashed through the fighter’s armor like it was nothing, slicing into the elf’s vitals before Miguel ripped his blade free. Blood spurted, but Miguel paid it no mind. He kicked out, sending the elf staggering backward and into the other charging fighters.

In a split second, Miguel sheathed his sword and drew his spear from its harness on his back. Because of its extended reach, it was a much better weapon for the situation. The elves were all armed with axes or swords, so he hoped to exploit that particular advantage.

The group recovered, then rushed him again. This time, he didn’t bother with any abilities. With his armor and Protection of the Wind, he was as well-defended as he could manage. And over the next few minutes, he used every ounce of skill he possessed in order to keep the elven warriors at bay.

Unfortunately, he didn’t get the chance to inflict any other easy wounds. That first elf was still out of the fight, so it wasn’t a waste. However, that attack had driven the others to wariness, and their approach reflected their increased caution. They darted in, attacking in coordinated, back-to-back strikes. Miguel’s work with the spear wasn’t as deft as his sword techniques, but he had enough experience – and the attributes to back it up – to keep them at bay. And in the space of the next thirty seconds, he even managed to take another elf out via a spear blade to the throat.

But then he lost himself to the flow of battle. Often, when he sparred with Colt or one of the other Warriors back in Ironshore, he found himself thinking of them like a dance. Or a boxing match that went back and forth, perhaps. True battle, especially against multiple foes, wasn’t like that. It was brutal and vicious. Within the confines of the container, there was no space for fancy maneuvers. Not time for planning. Just reflexive blocks, counters, and attacks.

Miguel sank into that state, relying on his extensive training, relatively high attributes – alongside his cultivation – and some ephemeral battle sense that he’d always taken for granted. He had always understood fighting. Some might call it talent. Others would attribute it to hard work and repetition. Still others would see his latent battle-related attunement in there. Whatever it was, it allowed Miguel to instinctively anticipate his opponents’ moves and counter them efficiently, and without conscious thought.

Gradually, the fight wore on. Despite the fact that they’d scored a few hits, Miguel’s armor and attributes kept those injuries’ severity to a minimum. The elves weren’t so fortunate, and within twenty minutes, half were already dead. Most of the others were injured, with only two – including the elven woman who’d first attacked him – remaining largely unharmed.

At some point, more elves joined the fight, but because of his efforts at finding a defensive position, they could only approach one or two at a time. Still, at some point, his spear broke beneath an axe blade that he didn’t parry properly, and his armor took more than one serious gouge. The plates held, but every set of armor was beset with plenty of gaps. And the elves were adept at finding them, which meant that with every minute of battle, Miguel picked up another wound.

Fortunately, none were serious on their own, and because of his Constitution – enhanced by Pledge of the Green Warden and Woodsman’s Constitution, as well as the bonuses from his armor – the lasting effects were kept to a minimum. Still, the sheer accumulation of injuries took their toll.

The elves had it much worse.

Miguel lost track of how many he killed, but he could see the piles of bodies that further restricted their approach. On top of that, he knew he was gaining levels. He didn’t know how many, and he didn’t dare spare the attention necessary to check his notifications. However, he didn’t have such a large pool of attributes that he didn’t feel the effects of each gained level.

But the elves just kept coming.

Dozens fell before him, and he paid the price for each one. After thirty minutes, his body was a collection of wounds, his armor was scored in a hundred different places, and his available stamina had dwindled to nothing. With weariness dragging him down like a tangible weight, he fought on. His technique grew sloppier, and his blows lacked the strength driving them in the beginning.

Still, he refused to fall.

In the end, when all but two of the elves had perished, Miguel could barely stand. Even so, he forced his shoulders back and glared at them as he asked, “Why?”

The female elf who’d begun the fight had stayed back the entire time, and she’d actually managed to land a few arrows. Thankfully, his armor had protected him from the worst of it, but a handful of his wounds could be traced back to her efforts.

“Resources are finite. The world knows no kindness. Only the strongest are fit to survive.”

With that, she drew her sword and attacked. The other remaining dark elf did the same, though he was clearly her inferior in terms of attributes and technique. She moved like liquid, and because she’d mostly sat the fight out, she was fresh. Meanwhile, Miguel was exhausted.

But he’d kept something in reserve.

Recover

Focus your Ethera, tripling your Regeneration.

It was not a high-level ability, and often, Recover wasn’t enough to truly make the difference in battle. With his Regeneration, even tripling it wouldn’t heal his wounds quickly. However, what it did do – and the purpose of the ability, as far as he could tell – was to give him a second wind.

The influx of Regeneration did just that, and his fatigue faded in mere seconds. So, when the elf made contact, she found that her opponent was as fresh as when the battle had begun. Because of that, he managed to surprise her with a wicked riposte that took her in the throat. Even as she clutched her profusely bleeding neck, the other elf attempted to stop, but his momentum was such that he had no defense when Miguel turned his attention in his direction.

The outcome was predictable.

And yet, as the leader collapsed due to blood loss, the lone remaining elf fought with every ounce of ferocity he could muster. It wasn’t enough, and Miguel dispatched him soon after.

The moment that elf fell, Miguel’s shoulders slumped. His physical exhaustion had faded, but mentally, he was a mess. However, he knew that his efforts had only bought him a little time. So, he took the leader’s bow, gathered the few arrows he could find, then took everyone’s ethereum pouches before taking off in Argos’ direction.

The threat posed by the dark elves had always been dire, but given the numbers he’d faced – and so far from Ironshore – Miguel knew that the situation was even worse than anyone had expected. So, his mission was even more necessary now than ever before. And he refused to fail.

Too much depended on him.

With that driving him forward, he led the still-recovering Trevor from the shipping container and left the site of the battle behind.