Path of Dragons - A LitRPG Apocalypse (BOOK TWO STUBBING AUGUST 15)

Flickering ethereal lights cast the gate in wavering shadows, which proved to be perfect cover for Elijah’s ingress. He slipped past one of the guards, narrowly avoiding her by a scant handful of inches. She started, looking around in shock, but when she saw nothing, she muttered, “Must’ve been the wind.”

Her partner said, “Storm’s comin’, I think. Saw it on the horizon earlier.”

The woman shook her head. “What I wouldn’t give to still be able to check my phone for the forecast,” she sighed. “The things we miss, huh?”

“Netflix.”

“Huh?”

“I miss Netflix,” the man elaborated. “Not just the good stuff, either. Those cheap, cash-grab, one-big-star movies they used to pump out. I would get some beer and pizza, and just turn one of those silly things on.”

“If they were silly, then why did you watch them?” she asked.

He shrugged. “Guess we all need a little silliness sometimes,” he answered. “Call it a release. I don’t know. But I miss it.”

“I guess that makes sense. I liked…”

Elijah passed out of earshot as he stepped into the city, completely unnoticed by the guards. Even when he was well out of sight, he didn’t bother shifting back to his human form. He knew his appearance was distinct, and his experiences in Seattle told him that he only had a vague idea of what kind of identification abilities people could aim at him. Isaiah had known his whole status, and Elijah couldn’t chance someone with similar abilities recognizing who he was and inferring with his plans for Easton.

Or, as he discovered a few minutes later, Valoria. He’d overheard that bit of information by eavesdropping on a conversation between two pedestrians who were more than a little critical of the name change. Unbeknownst to them, not only did Elijah overhear them, but their conversation didn’t go unnoticed by a few other pedestrians. Most notably, there was a man with shifty eyes who seemed extremely interested, and he followed the pair as they turned a corner.

Elijah let them be, but he suspected that he’d just discovered the presence of the secret police Carmen had described. How fascist had the government become if people couldn’t even criticize something as innocuous as a name change without incurring the city-state’s wrath?

Shaking his draconic head, Elijah moved on, wandering through the city. A couple of times, he bumped into one of the many pedestrians, but there were enough people in the area that no one suspected that an invisible predator moved among them. However, as the night wore on, the traffic slowly dwindled, and Elijah let himself truly take everything in.

And he had to admit that the city represented an impressive achievement.

It was clean, orderly, and far more structurally advanced than places like Seattle. There was no obvious crime, and certainly, it didn’t feel like every alley might be the site of a murder. There were blue-and-white clad guards on nearly every corner, though, and plenty of plain-clothes watchers were out and about as well. Elijah recognized them easily enough, and he suspected that the citizens did as well. However, the residents clearly chose to ignore the obvious.

Still, Elijah couldn’t help but offer his begrudging respect for what Roman had accomplished. Sure, it was built on a foundation of evil, but there was no denying that the city was a safe place to live.

Eventually, Elijah passed through a large square. At first, he didn’t understand the purpose of the platform in its center, but after inspecting it more closely, he smelled the unmistakable scent of blood. Then, recognition dawned in his mind, and he saw it for what it was.

A stage for execution.

A series of blocks – ten – stood in a line on the stage. Each one was missing a rounded chunk, and the resulting divot was stained with the blood Elijah smelled. Seeing that, it wasn’t difficult to imagine a row of prisoners strapped to the blocks and being beheaded by an axe-wielding executioner.

And given the prevalence of the iron-rich scent that pervaded everything, the edifice had seen quite a lot of use.

Elijah moved on, his anger mounting. Sometimes, executions were necessary, especially in a situation where you couldn’t afford to jail a dangerous prisoner. When you were struggling to provide for law-abiding citizens, it was an easy decision to rid yourself of that sort of burden.

Yet, that situation didn’t describe Valoria.

More, from Elijah’s perspective, that sort of circumstance was, by definition, rare. The fact that executions in Valoria clearly weren’t uncommon told Elijah that there was more at play than simple expedience or the public good.

Moving on from the square did nothing to assuage Elijah’s outrage, especially when he wandered into a less affluent portion of the city. There was a clear line of demarcation, beyond which were simple, unadorned, and unimaginative buildings that looked like cubes made of lifeless brick. A few bore graffiti, some of which were messages that insulted Roman or his government, and the residents were poorly fed, dirty, and cloaked in rags.

Obviously, all was not well in Valoria.

Over time, Elijah overheard enough to recognize that the majority of the poorest caste were Scholars, which because of Carmen’s descriptions, he knew were second-class citizens in the city. Roman didn’t value their potential contributions, and as such, even being permitted to live in Valoria was a relatively new development. For the first couple of years, they were routinely turned away unless they could prove themselves immediately valuable.

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Most couldn’t.

Elijah wondered how many had died because Roman saw no value in Scholars? Thousands, at the very least. Certainly, overextending the city’s resources might have destroyed everything they had built. But Elijah found it distasteful that they hadn’t even tried to find a solution that didn’t involve turning a bunch of people away to survive in the hostile wilderness.

But at the end of the day, Elijah hadn’t come to Valoria to judge the city based on its policies. Instead, as distressing as the situation was, he only really cared about holding Roman – and his comrades – accountable. And that meant he needed to gather some information. So, he found his way to the back of a secluded alley, where he assumed his human form.

Regrettably, he donned a pair of boots, largely because, for once, he didn’t want to stand out. In addition, he focused on his Ring of Anonymity: