Path of Dragons-Chapter 71Book 8: : A Failed Iteration

The sound of metal grinding against metal hissed through the air as Elijah beheld a monstrosity – a macabre fusion of man and machine. It – or maybe he – looked like two disparate creatures fused together, neither fully whole nor entirely broken.

One half was faceted metal, a patchwork of jagged and rusted shards barely distinguishable from the walls with which Elijah had become very familiar. The joints were the worst, their mechanisms choked with ocher grease long since crystallized, locking them in an obviously agonizing and barely functional state.

The other half was even more disturbing. Though it bore the dimensions of a Vey’thaalian, that was where the similarities ended. Its skin was coal-black and charred, crisscrossed with deep fissures through which molten light pulsed with the color of dying embers. From those cracks came wavering heat and steam, distorting the air around it in a shimmering and feverish haze. freёweɓnovel.com

“What are you?” Elijah asked, stopping only a few feet inside the room. The space itself was more of the same – corroded black iron, jagged edges, and the occasional gout of flame – but he still catalogued every single detail. He knew a fight was coming, and from what he sensed from the creature in the center told him it would be no easy battle.

“A lost thread,” it said in a robotic voice. Then, it switched to something more Vey’thaalian, “A failed iteration. The wrong path made real.”

Elijah stepped to the side, circling. “That doesn’t really answer my question,” he stated.

“Questions must-must-m-must be answered,” it hissed, its fissures steaming angrily. It twisted to keep Elijah in its line of sight, and its mechanical parts clanked together. Crystallized grease flaked off. “I am…I-I-I am the first of a new-new-n-new race. A progenitor and the last of a dying breed. The final chimera. The first mechanique. A stepping stone to-t-to a better future.”

Elijah frowned. Mechaniques were an elder race – at least according to Nerthus – of sapient golems. From what he knew, they were entirely mechanical, though with free will, self-awareness, and agency. He’d never really thought much about how they might have reached that point, though he’d let popular science fiction influence him to the point where he’d just assumed it was a Skynet situation.

“Mechaniques are just chimera?”

“More,” the thing said. “Manipulating flesh is easy and d-diffi-difficult. Unpredictable. Powerful. Unsustainable. Weak. Machines are better. Stronger. More stable. Inevitable. Better.”

It stepped forward, its joints creaking. “Realization came. Deniers arose. A war was fought. The right side won. The Great Work began.”

“What is the Great Work?” asked Elijah.

“The pursuit of the perfect form,” it said. Then, it twitched, its mechanical parts seizing. “I am the link between the old world and the new. An enforcer. The first and last of my kind. A monster of flesh and metal, tasked with protecting the Great Work. E-e-even a failed iteration must have purpose.”

“Don’t suppose you’re going to let me pass, then,” Elijah guessed, speaking mostly to himself. He was already preparing multiple spells so he could unleash a barrage at the creature the second it proved itself the danger he expected it to be.

“That is n-not-n-not permitted,” the self-styled Failed Iteration declared in its robotic voice. “I am sorry.”

Without any other warning, the thing burst into motion, raising its charred arm and aiming it at Elijah. By that point, he was already moving. Even as he dashed to the side, circling the room, the melded Vey’thaalian-and-machine let loose a waist-thick column of magma that splashed against the wall only an instant too late to completely consume Elijah.

Even though it missed, it only did so by a hair, and the billowing heat singed his hair. That was when he completed his first cast of Eternal Plague. It wasn’t quite as powerful against singular opponents – he suspected it was best used against hordes of weaker creatures – but it was still his go-to opener, especially when he couldn’t use stealth and inflict Predator Strike upon an enemy.

The second the glittering fireflies manifested, Elijah cast Blessing of the Grove, then initiated the shift into the Shape of the Master. He wanted to end the fight as quickly as possible, and that form offered the most firepower.

As he shrank and reformed, the monster continued to fire jets of melted rock and metal in Elijah’s direction. To counter that, he couldn’t let himself stop moving. Thankfully, the transformation completed after only a second or two. Time seemed to slow, making dodging the pillars of magma that much easier.

But the enemy had no intention of continuing down a failed path. When it realized that Elijah was too slippery for its current tactics to be effective, it shouted, “Upgrade Protocol Seventy-One!”

The barrage of molten rock ceased, leaving Elijah with only six charges within his Heart of Fire. He considered unleashing it then and there, but he suspected that such a weak Ignite would do little good. So, he held off, slowing to a stop and holding the Verdant Fang out in front of him as he readied for whatever was coming.

He only had to wait a second before the creature twisted, its mechanical parts shifting and reshaping its body. By the time it finished only a moment later, the robotic side was much bigger than its mirror, and when it stepped forward, it did so with a lopsided gait that should have been impossible to maintain. Somehow, it managed to maintain its balance, though.

More important was the ethera swirling around it in a typhoon of energy that Elijah knew wasn’t a good sign. He rushed forward, ready to test the viability of his staff against such a monster.

He never reached his destination.

Before he could take three steps, he felt something coming for him from behind. He dove into a roll, narrowly dodging what turned out to be a hunk of sharpened metal that had somehow detached from the wall. And it wasn’t alone, either.

Hundreds of metal shards – varying in sizes from the size of his hand to almost as big as the Shape of the Master – pulled free of the walls, making a beeline toward Elijah.

He dodged the first few, building a handful of charges to Heart of Fire, but there were far too many – and they moved much too quickly – for him to maintain that strategy. The first one to hit him did so with enough force to rip through his amphibious flesh and send a spray of blood arcing through the air.

He winced in pain, but he didn’t have time to indulge such a minor inconvenience. Instead, he used Infernal Plague.

Even as a good portion of his stamina drained away, hundreds of fire beetles manifested from the local ethera. However, before they could descend upon the monster, the tornado of metallic shards destroyed them. A few made it through, but there weren’t nearly enough to make a difference.

Cursing himself for not anticipating it, Elijah continued to dodge, but his efforts proved entirely insufficient to the task at hand. Every time he managed to build a couple of stacks of Heart of Fire, it would be ruined by a swirling hunk of metal. He didn’t take many solid hits, but even glancing blows were enough to ruin everything.

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After a few minutes, Elijah knew he needed to switch strategies. The creature’s storm of metallic shards – which filled most of the room – was a perfect counter to the Shape of the Master.

But he didn’t panic.

After all, if nothing else, Elijah was versatile. That was his class’s greatest advantage, and he was well-versed in using it to the fullest extent of his capabilities. So, the moment he recognized that his strategy wasn’t working, he initiated another shift – this time, into the Shape of Thorn.

The second he did, something he should have expected – but had overlooked – happened. With his abandonment of Shape of the master, he lost the increased reflexes that defined it. When he did, he was forced to acknowledge that the storm of weaponized metal shards was moving far more quickly than he thought.

Three hit him in quick succession. Two were only glancing blows, but one buried itself in his thigh, eliciting a stumble. Even as Elijah adopted the form of the thorned sentry, he yanked the shard free, cast Wild Resurgence, and charged. He didn’t bother dodging. He couldn’t have even if he tried. Instead, he just resolved himself to taking the damage and pushing through it.

Indeed, that was the form’s purpose.

With the increased Constitution that came with the Shape of Thorn, even solid hits did only a little damage, and that was manageable with his ongoing heal-over-time. It wasn’t inconsequential, and Elijah knew that if he continued along that path, he’d be ripped to shreds. But he only needed to endure long enough to get his hands on the monster. After that, he would tear it to pieces.

He crashed into monster only a second or two after his transformation completed. It staggered, and Elijah used that short opening to rip into anything he could reach. Pieces of rusted iron and bits of charred flesh flew at the behest of every raking blow, but the Failed Iteration recovered from the sudden charge after only a couple of moments. In that time, Elijah had done a lot of damage, but it wasn’t enough to disable the monster.

It hammered Elijah with its robotic arm, the attack forceful enough to crack his ribs. Meanwhile, it used the charred limb on the other side to send a gout of magma deep into Elijah’s stomach.

He ignored it.

He’d taken more damage from his recent acid bath.

Instead of reacting, he forged ahead, tearing into the monster with stoic determination and fiery, pain-filled rage. And it worked. He paid the price for his success, though. The creature continuously hammered him with blows that hit like a pile driver and burned him with the power of an erupting volcano.

But Elijah’s simpler attacks were far more effective.

He was winning. All he needed to do was continue along the same path, and he would emerge victorious. Not without consequence, but Elijah resolved to deal with that when the time came.

Then, the Failed Iteration changed the game.

It erupted into flames, exploding with enough force that it threw Elijah all the way across the room. He hit the wall hard enough to dislodge a huge panel of iron, then fell to the ground. For a brief moment, his mind went blank, but after only a second, his thoughts returned.

It was just in time for him to see a wave of flames coming his way. He tried to avoid it, but the wall of fire went from floor to ceiling and seemed to encircle the whole room. There was no dodging. Elijah had no choice but to simply endure it.

It hit him a second later, and even in the durable Shape of Thorn, he was badly burned. His vines turned to ash on his arms and shoulders, and his scales melted. However, when the flames passed, he had survived, which was all that matters. However, aside from his grievous burns, there were two other problems.

First, the Failed Iteration had inexplicably healed. With every passing moment, magma gushed out of every crevice, hardening into new, charred flesh and hunks of black iron meant to replace the bits Elijah had ripped away.

The second issue came when the monster erupted into another flame wall. It moved slower than an explosion, but Elijah could tell it was going to hit him in only a couple of seconds.

He couldn’t endure another one.

Not if he wanted to avoid using Unchecked Growth – which he needed to keep in his back pocket until absolutely necessary. He hadn’t reached that point, but if that flame wall once again enveloped him, he would be there.

So, he initiated a shift into Shape of Venom, completing it just before the flames reached him. Frantically, he activated Flicker Step, then shifted through the nether before appearing on the monster’s back.

He didn’t use Envenom, though.

Not yet.

Instead, he activated Stormbind:

Stormbind

Attack unseen, binding your opponent in place and preventing all spellcasting or ability use. Duration based on Core Cultivation. Current: 2.9 Seconds. Cooldown based on Dexterity Attribute. Current: 8.4 Minutes.

Lighting arced from his fangs as he bit into the monster’s neck. Fire and the taste of charcoal assaulted his tongue, but the ability did its job, interrupting whatever spell the Failed Iteration had used to create the walls of flame and enable its regeneration.

But Elijah was vulnerable, and he only managed to bite one more time – using Envenom – before he was thrown free. Thankfully, he managed to twist mid-air and land on his feet.

He shifted into his human form, and before the monster managed to recover, he’d already cast all three of his healing spells. He added Nature’s Rebuke, hoping that the creature counted as unnatural. It did, which meant the spell did triple damage – but it didn’t scale nearly as well as something like Storm’s Fury, so it was only mildly effective. It did help to elicit a response from the Failed Iteration, though.

“Overheating. Viability compromised.” the thing intoned in its unhurried robotic voice. The Vey’thaalian voice echoed the sentiment a second later, though it was suffused with panic. Wavering heat rose from its body as globs of magma oozed from every crevice. “Final Protocol initiated.”

Elijah didn’t like the sound of anything called Final Protocol, and judging from the immense surge of ethera, he suspected it would be something incredibly destructive. More urgently, the monster started to twitch and vibrate, like it could barely contain its own strength and speed.

Then, it threw itself at Elijah.

He barely managed to dive out of its path, and even as he rolled to a stop, the Failed Iteration hit the wall with enough force to dislodge an even larger panel. Then, it threw that hunk of metal – it must’ve weighed multiple tons – aside like it was no heavier than a feather. A second later, it sighted in on Elijah and charged again.

This time, he was more ready, and he’d already begun another transformation – this time, back into the Shape of the Master. He would have preferred to cast a few more heals, but partial healing was the best he could manage under the circumstances.

At least he’d still have Wild Resurgence available.

Because this charge came even faster than the last, and even though Elijah mustered enough speed to dodge, the impact against the wall was even more devastating than the last. If it kept going, Elijah suspected that it would tear the entire room apart.

But for the moment, he could only worry about staying alive.

Three more charges – all in quick succession – came before the Failed Iteration changed tactics and approached with a little more caution. It quivered with barely restrained power as it attacked Elijah. Fortunately, Shape of the Master was perfect for that kind of fight, and even though the creature far outstripped him in terms of sheer power, it couldn’t overcome the advantage of his improved reflexes.

What’s more, as the blows came hard and fast, Elijah had plenty of opportunity to build charges of Heart of Fire. Multiple attacks came at him with every passing second, and Elijah managed to block or dodge each and every one of them. The lessons he’d begun to learn about using his scythe came in handy, and even though he knew he was a long way from mastering the weapon, he leaned on the improvements he’d made so far.

And after only thirty seconds, he’d saturated Heart of Fire.

Without further hesitation, he leaped backward, flipping through the air until he hit the wall. Even as he flexed his short legs, he opened his mouth and let loose with Ignite. A stream of dense flames erupted from his throat, bathing the Failed Iteration in fire.

Elijah watched as the charred flesh turned to ash and the iron melted, but he kept going, narrowing the flame. The air crackled, growing heavier until, at last, the flame ceased.

Elijah fell to the ground, landing with one knee on the floor and his scythe stretched out behind him.

Before he could even look up, the creature announced in a broken voice, “Overflow warning. Energy reserves at nine-hundred percent capacity. Self Destruct imminent.”

Elijah’s mind went briefly blank, but one facet of his mind – the one usually responsible for planning his actions during battle – kept churning. Before he even knew what he was doing, he’d dashed toward one of the enormous slabs of metal. At the same time, he began the transformation back into his human form.

He’d only just managed to complete that shape-change and raise his impromptu shield before the monster exploded. Elijah’s mind went white as the shockwave hit him, smashing him back into the wall.

A roaring inferno followed.