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

Elijah closed his eyes and tilted his head toward the sky, basking in the sunlight as he focused on One with Nature. He could feel everything for almost a hundred yards, and he was both awed and disturbed at the results. There were hundreds of the blue-and-white skinned, four-armed creatures all around him, yet most were underground. The ones that weren’t seemed to be in some sort of hibernation, their breathing rapid as they twitched with every passing second.

That was the source of his disturbance.

By contrast, he was overcome by the breadth of life stretched out all around him. He’d been in a few jungles over the course of his life – especially in Hawaii – and his island could best be described as a temperate rainforest. Yet, he’d never experienced vitality on par with what he sensed in the surrounding jungle. There was so much life, ranging from the tiniest microorganisms to much larger animals, most of which were completely unfamiliar to him.

Elijah was nearly overwhelmed by what he felt.

Fortunately, he had the benefit of his Quartz Mind to deal with the onslaught of information, so rather than being overcome, he could properly appreciate the novelty of the setting.

The remnants of a mighty city were in evidence as well, though the further they’d traveled from the domed building, the more obvious the collapse had become. And after traveling more than ten miles away from the site of the battle, most of the walls had long since been torn down by the combination of erosion and creeping vines. Even the foundations were gone, giving way to dense vegetation that either covered or cracked the sturdy stone.

Every now and again, Elijah had caught sight of a standing tower or wall, but those instances had become increasingly rare with every step. Soon, Elijah expected they would completely give way to unbroken jungle.

He opened his eyes, and he couldn’t help but appreciate the sky. In a lot of ways, it resembled Earth’s atmosphere. Predominantly, it was still blue, though the clouds were cast in muted hues of the rainbow. He took a deep breath, then let out a sigh as he studied the alien expanse. If he hadn’t already been convinced he’d traveled to a different world, the sight of the sky above certainly drove that reality home.

The same was true of the surrounding jungle. The general structures were similar to what might be found on Earth, but all the details were off. For instance, many of the trees’ leaves were the wrong shapes. Or they tended toward blue-green, rather than the verdant vegetation with which Elijah was familiar. The bark was mostly the same, at least, which Elijah found oddly comforting. Still, every now and again, he’d caught sight of glowing plants or he’d sensed vegetation that was clearly a lot more mobile than anything he’d seen on Earth.

To put it mildly, the parts were similar, but to Elijah, it felt as if the entire environment had experienced a violent evolutionary shift, creating something wholly unique. To the biologist in him, it was fascinating, but he was more concerned about the unknown dangers that lay ahead.

After a few more minutes, he took a deep breath, then descended from his perch atop one of the towering trees. Within seconds, he was mired in darkness created via the shade of the jungle’s dense canopy. Some light peeked through, but it was only enough to establish a twilight-like atmosphere. Fortunately, there were a few glowing plants, moss, and fungi that alleviated some of the gloom.

The tree was more than two-hundred yards tall, so Eliijah’s descent took a couple of minutes’ worth of hopping from one knobby branch to another before he finally alighted to the soft ground. Venka looked up at his arrival, asking, “See anything?”

Elijah shook his head. “Nothing but more jungle,” he admitted, taking his tablet from his Ghoul-Hide Satchel. He glanced at the map readout, seeing a couple of points-of-interest, but nothing to indicate which direction they needed to travel. “I think this place is a lot bigger than we first thought.”

Indeed, with Eyes of the Eagle, he could see incredibly far – hundreds of miles, at least – and he’d seen no indication of the Nexus Town mentioned in the initial notification. It shouldn’t have been surprising. There were more than five thousand participants in the Trial, so without a large enough playing field, they would spend more time fighting one another than attempting to conquer the challenges. Still, Elijah was a bit put off by the fact that, to leave, one had to reach the promised safety of Nexus Town – a fact that would probably trip more than a few people up. Clearly, the system didn’t intend to coddle anyone.

“We should probably just keep going east,” Elijah added. He and Venka had decided to use Earth’s celestial patterns – meaning that the sun rose in the east and set in the west – to establish directions. That seemed easier than considering that they really didn’t know anything about the planet’s rotation, so it was possible that it rotated on a completely different axis.

Venka grunted, then glanced at Grod, who’d remained almost completely silent since the battle. Elijah recognized the signs of post-traumatic stress disorder, though he had no idea how to combat it. The ogre was clearly bothered by what he’d had to do – as well as the deaths of the others – and he didn’t seem capable of dealing with the aftermath.

“How’re you doing, Grod?” Elijah asked, trying to get through to the ogre.

In response, Grod only shook his head and said, “Grod fine.”

At the same time, he held a small, red gem – made to look even smaller in his large hands – turning it between his fingers as he stared at it. He seemed to take some solace in the depths of the faceted shape, so Elijah left him to it. Instead, he focused on what he could control.

Like his own status, which he hadn’t inspected in quite some time. After completing his core cultivation, he’d given it a quick peek, but he’d quickly become distracted by crafting his Staff of the First Dragon. So, he’d not had the opportunity to look at everything now that he was fully equipped and completely buffed. Now that he had a few spare minutes, he decided to do just that.

And he was more than a little surprised at what he found: