Path of Dragons

Elijah was done.

His patience had long since given way to frustration, which in turn, had ceded ground to that had threatened to overwhelm him ever since the first time he'd been shot. But miraculously, he didn't give in to the fury roiling within. Instead, he pushed it away, replacing it with cold logic. He had a chance to get some answers, and he wasn't about to pass it up.

His voice was placid as he spoke. "I think it's time you and I had a little talk," he breathed, leaning close even as he felt the broken pieces of the assassin's arm in one hand. In the other was the man's neck. He could feel the pulse of the sniper's heartbeat. It was slow. Steady. Calm.

If he'd had any doubts about the man's nature, the fact that his pulse hadn't quickened confirmed that he was no normal man. Not that Elijah needed that confirmation. The previous weeks had proven that well enough.

Despite using Unchecked Growth, Elijah was tired. Not physically. The surge of Regeneration had seen to that. Even his ethera had been topped off by the ability, which was far and away one of the strongest tools in his toolset. But mentally? Trekking through the jungle, constantly harried by traps and sniper shots – it was enough to test any man's resolve.

And then there were the monkeys. He'd known they were there. He had felt them, but he'd assumed that they would be incapable of seeing him in stealth. They had proved that assumption wrong. They had also proved aggressive, which should not have been surprising. They'd tried to attack him when he'd flown over New Delhi all those weeks ago, which proved their territorial nature. Yet, after being led around by the nose for so long, his frustrations had gotten the better of him. He hadn't even remembered them until it was too late.

And the beasts were strong. More powerful than they had any right to be, if Elijah was honest. Some of them had teetered on the edge of passing him in levels. If they'd been sapient, he might have been in trouble. As it was, he'd been pushed to the limit of his abilities, and that wasn't even considering when he'd been shot by the opportunistic sniper.

After that building had collapsed upon him, Elijah knew he had only one shot to survive. That was when he'd used Unchecked Growth, combined with Domain of Vines. The rest of the fight went as expected, largely because, so long as his regeneration was subject to the multiplicative effect, he was functionally unkillable.

At least by the likes of someone like the sniper, who was surprisingly low-leveled. One-seventy-five, at best. Maybe even as low as one-sixty. That he'd pushed Elijah so hard was just a testament to what a hyper-specialized fighter could do with a little preparation and the perfect situation.

It was also another reminder that Elijah was not nearly as invulnerable as he sometimes liked to believe. The sniper had already delivered one such lesson when he'd nearly killed Elijah in the middle of the battle with the war elves, and he'd hammered it home over the past couple of weeks.

The fact was that Elijah needed to stop procrastinating, embrace his responsibilities, and get back to leveling. Otherwise, someone else would take advantage of his laziness and put him down for good. If that happened, not only would it result in the suffering of nearly everyone he cared about, but it would also spell doom for the rest of the world.

Because they couldn't confront the threat of excisement without him.

However, at that very moment, with his tormentor in hand, he wanted nothing more than answers. When he got them, he would get back to his resolution to move on with his responsibilities.

With that in mind, he asked, "Who are you?"

"Gunnar Lindstrom."

Elijah narrowed his eyes. "I know that name. Why do I know that name?"

"Top ten."

That made sense. He hadn't stared at that list as often as many people had, but he still remembered most of the names. He'd already met many of them, though he'd often wondered how many would have maintained their positions, had the power rankings still existed. Clearly, Gunnar Lindstrom would have. He wasn't as strong as Oscar – or even Sadie – but he was at least on the same level as the guild leaders. That made him one of the world's elites.

"Why have you been hunting me?" Elijah asked.

"Because that's what I was hired to do."

Feeling a tiny swirl of ethera, Elijah leaned closer. "Stop."

"It was just a self-healing spell," he said. "Nothing –"

He slammed his Mantle of Authority into the man. To Lindstrom's credit, he didn't pass out. Nor did he go limp. Instead, he just gritted his teeth as his ethera stilled. As much as Elijah preferred the full expression of his mantle, he couldn't deny that the more primitive use was still very useful in combat. It had saved him quite a lot of grief during the fight against the monkeys.

Not as much as his new ability, Phantom Shift, which had expressed itself in a surprising way. While he was under its auspices, he was practically untouchable. Feeling himself shift from one phantom to the other was odd and slightly disorienting, but he suspected that the ability put in quite a lot of work to keep the confusion to a minimum. As a result, most potential attacks hit nothing but the apparitions.

The secondary effect was that when he attacked, so did they. They didn't hit nearly as hard as he did, but they still used Spreading Blight. In short, the ability was even more powerful than he'd expected, largely because it was both offensive and defensive in nature.

He could have survived without it, but not in the Shape of the Scourge. Instead, he'd have been forced to shift out of that form and use the full force of his healing. Or he'd have needed to activate Unchecked Growth even sooner.

Either way, he was happy with his choice.

He let his Mantle of Authority fall. "If you use any other ability, you're dead. Do you understand?"

"You're going to kill me anyway."

"I haven't decided that. Much of what I do depends on your answers to my questions," Elijah said, knowing full well that it was likely a lie. He wanted nothing more than to crush the man underfoot. He also knew that without giving him a little hope, any interrogation would be useless. "Why did you take the job? You had to know it was going to end up like this."

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Lindstrom coughed. "I've killed high-level monsters before."

"Not like me," Elijah stated, barely even registering that the man referred to him as a monster. "What were they paying you?"

"Normal fee."

"That's it?"

"You wouldn't understand."

Elijah released him, and miraculously, the sniper did not collapse. Instead, he held his head high and his back straight. He did clutch his broken arm, though he didn't seem to register the pain. Was it shock? Or was he like Elijah, and advanced his cultivation enough that he could quarantine that pain in its own facet? Either way, it was impressive.

"Try me. They didn't just give you money," he guessed.

"No," Lindstrom agreed. Then, he let out a deep breath. "Promise me you won't destroy them all, and I will tell you everything you want to know."

"You're going to tell me everything regardless."

"I know what you're thinking," the man said, oddly confident for someone facing his death. "You believe you can torture information out of me, right?"

"The thought had crossed my mind."

"Won't work. Torture is all but useless in the real world. I should know. I've done it before," he said. "Besides, I've been through worse than you can dish out. Do you know what SERE training is?"

Elijah shook his head.

"Survival, evasion, resistance, and escape. We're going to focus on the resistance part," he said. "C-Level. They call it a simulation, but that doesn't really matter. Torture is torture, even if you know it's your guys doing it. It can make every minute feel like an hour. Ever hour, like days. You think you can break me? Good luck."

"Did they rip off your arms and legs?" Elijah asked.

"Wouldn't have mattered."

"You say that now, but…well, you know I can heal, right? Keep you alive indefinitely, removing bits at a time. One day, you're missing a finger. Then a toe. A foot. Your eye. But you're still alive through it all. Perfectly healthy to cope with the horror you're slowly becoming," Elijah said.

"Do your worst. Or you can just promise not to commit genocide, and I'll tell you everything you want to know."

"I could just lie."

"I trust you not to."

Elijah clutched his hands into fists. He wanted nothing more than to get started on said torture. After what the man had put him through, he felt he had a right to let off a little steam. But he knew that he would have lost a taste for it after only a few minutes – if he even lasted that long. It was one thing to kill a man. Elijah could commit to that without issue, so long as he felt justified. But torture was an entirely different animal, and he was well aware of where his limits lay.

"I promise I won't slaughter a whole city. I'm guessing Seattle, given that fancy gun of yours."

"Rifle."

"Whatever. I gave you your promise. Now talk."

And after only a moment, Lindstrom said, "The first thing you need to understand is that things in Seattle are not as settled as most people think. There are three distinct factions within the city. Isaiah Roberts is in charge, though his grip on the city is nominal at best. The only reason he's still at the top is because that's what people expect. He's also the city lord. That's –"

"I know what it is," Elijah said, remembering the Seal of Authority he'd given Ramik. Since then, the goblin had used that to empower his people, and from what Elijah understood, the choices he'd made had melded nicely with Ironshore's focus on manufacturing. Something told him that Isaiah went a different route.

"Right," Lindstrom said. "Any chance you can heal my arm?"

Elijah cast Wild Resurgence, though he knew it would do little good with such a clean break. The bone would need to be reset if the arm was ever going to function again. There was a better than good chance Gunnar Lindstrom would never see that eventuality to fruition.

But the ongoing heal spell would help with the pain.

"The other factions?" Elijah asked.

As it turned out, one was fueled by Victoria Brockerton, who'd somehow managed to recover from her father's death and had seduced one of the city's most prominent weapon's manufacturers. Elijah thought back to when he'd first met the woman. Back then, she had tried to weasel her way into his bed, probably at her now-deceased father's behest. Even knowing she was bad news, he'd been a little tempted.

After all, she was a beautiful woman.

However, his good sense had prevailed, and he'd turned her down. Not long after, he'd dive-bombed her home and killed her father, all so Isaiah could get a firmer grip on Seattle. Clearly, she'd been busy since then.

"Her husband – Jean-luc Lefevre – is good at what he does, but without her, he would have been happy just working in his shop. With her influence driving him, he has become one of the richest and most powerful men in the city. Perhaps the world, given the proliferation of his cannons," the sniper explained.

"Then there's the other threat. Nathan Kaffee. Former army colonel who promoted himself to general," Lindstrom explained. "He's behind the city's military strength and one of the most dangerous men in the world. Personally, he's not that strong. Maybe level one-forty. But he's a Tactician who's put everything into empowering his men. They're loyal to him, too. Needless to say, he works hand-in-hand with the weapon's manufacturers. He and Lefevre hate one another, but they understand they're in the same boat."

"Why haven't they overwhelmed Isaiah, then?"

"Other than the fact that he sees everything that happens in the city?"

"Yeah."

"Lucy Bennett. Without her, the city starves. And she's loyal to Isaiah Roberts. They frequently disagree, but she has made it clear that if he falls, she takes her expertise somewhere else."

"Interesting," Elijah admitted. "But you didn't answer my question. In fact, you haven't answered any of my questions. Not directly. That needs to change."

"Or you'll kill me. I get it."

His nonchalant attitude toward his own death was both endearing and frustrating. Elijah realized that he could almost like the man – if he hadn't spent the past two weeks being harassed by him. And if he hadn't shot him multiple times. That last flurry of fully-automatic fire had very nearly ripped him in two. If he'd not been under the effects of Unchecked Growth, there was a good chance he wouldn't have survived.

"Who hired you and why did you take the job?" he repeated.

"I don't know, and because there are some things more important than money or my life," he said.

"You're going to have to do better than that."

"I don't know the identity of the woman who hired me. She might not have been a woman at all, for all I know. She had on a disguise and was under the effect of an illusion," he answered. "I've gotten jobs from her before, but every single time, she's worn a different face. Sometimes female. Sometimes male. She even looked like a child once."

"You took a job from someone you don't even know?"

"Not the first time. I kill people for money. The clients expect a certain degree of anonymity. But I do know one thing – it wasn't Isaiah."

"Why do you say that?"

"You've met him, haven't you?"

"I know him pretty well."

"Then you know he's not the type to hire anonymously. If he wants someone dead, he does it on the up and up. He's hired me before, usually to kill monsters in the desert, and it's always gone through official channels," Lindstrom stated. "I know what you're thinking – that doesn't mean it wasn't him. It just means he changed his M.O. I don't think so, though. It was one of the other two. Or a fourth option I don't know about. But one thing I'm certain of is that it wasn't Roberts. Not his style."

Elijah frowned. "And the why?"

"You're familiar with the city, right?" he asked. Elijah nodded, and he continued, "Then you know about the Undercity. Things are bad down there. Everyone has enough to survive, but it's not a good life. People die because they don't get healing in time. They drink or do drugs because they want distractions from their lives. They –"

"I've felt it. I know what it's like down there."

If anything, Lindstrom was underselling the misery.

"They promised to help them," the assassin stated. "In real ways. More Healers. Better work conditions. Better food. They offered hope. And all I had to do was kill one genocidal maniac. Seemed like a win-win."

"Except that you failed."

"It was always a possibility. I've been fighting one war or another since I was eighteen years old. I made peace with my own mortality a long time ago. It is what it is. No point letting it rule my life."

Elijah could relate to that.

Gunnar sighed. "You doing it here? Or…"

"That's a good question," Elijah said, frowning.