Path of The Dragon Mage (Nomad) 70. Demon Nest (2) (Patreon)

Notes: Two quick editing changes. Corvus dislocated his shoulder not his knee. (That got screwed up in the rewriting). Also one of his future subclass options has been changed from Rune Weaponsmith to Runic Soldier. 

Alert! Due to sudden extensive bodily damage, you are in a state of temporary shock. Stamina maximum has been reduced by 50%.

Stamina well will not recharge until 3 of the 6 injuries are properly addressed.

Pain screamed from the right side of his body, which had taken the force of the impact. It was an agony like nothing else he had experienced in his life. Corvus’s stomach protested, and he started to heave but that brought a new flare from his ribs.

Messages of all kinds flashed in front of his eyes. He dismissed them and reached with his good arm for his jacket pocket.

He did know a ‘reduce pain - minor’ rune but hadn’t packed it in his stack of runes. Bad mistake. He feverishly promised himself he’d never do that again.

He forced himself to make a quick self-assessment.

He’d broken bones, but they all appeared to be fractures — not compound breaks. Landing as he did, his entire side took the impact and none of the bones required splitting. The force had spread out fracturing many bones without forcefully breaking any. That meant there was nothing to set.

And hopefully nothing would heal wrong.

The pocket with the runes was on his right side and reaching across himself was a new agony with every muscle protesting. The system hadn’t told him, but he suspected he’d strained or torn muscles, too.

He grabbed the stack and dumped them on the floor, biting the edge of one finger to touch the blood to the ‘knit-bone’ minor.

He activated the rune and felt a gasp of relief as some of the agony ebbed. But not all of it. The flashing warnings over his stamina continued.

Well, it was only a knit bone minor.

Thankfully, while he hadn’t packed a ‘reduce pain’ rune he had packed several copies of the ‘knit bone’.

It took three until the last of the stamina warnings darkened. The pain went from screaming to a dull ache from abused joints and… of course his shoulder.

He had no rune to pop a joint back into place and didn’t dare use a knit flesh rune in case it locked that way. His right shoulder was down at an unnatural angle and although he could twitch his fingers he didn’t dare flex the limb past the elbow.

With the reduction of pain, the thundering of his pounding heart receded from his ears.

The entire cavern was silent around him.

Completely, utterly silent.

Corvus looked around to see the mass of nest guardians still surrounded his friends, with a good portion turned toward him. Some were frozen mid-step in a way he’d seen twice before.

“No,” he muttered. “No… it can’t. It’s too soon!”

He swiftly went back through the alerts he’d minimized and found what he was looking for.

Congratulations! You are ready to take another step along your Path. Please choose your new subclass.

You have three subclass options that lead to your next step along the Path of the Dragon Mage.

“But I just got my Witch Professor class!” he said in dismay.

Perhaps he should have been happy with advancing to the next step along his path, but he hadn’t had time to really learn about is last class. He’d ached to go through the library he’d uncovered, learn the finer details of rune lore and study them academically. He’d had his Witch Doctor class for over a year, and the Witch Professor class for a few days at best.

But he’d also advanced through many levels since then. He had learned a fair share of rune lore — not as much as he would have liked. Perhaps the system or the Paths thought it was time for him to move on.

Besides, he would always have the books to access at a later point.

After his first flash of indignation faded he realized that, had he not reached this crossroads in his Path now… the nest guardians may very well have swarmed him.

Now he had five minutes grace.

Or… less than that.

Swiftly, he checked the timer. 3 minutes 50 seconds remaining.

He could be annoyed later. Now he had to act.

Swiftly, he went over his options.

To choose Runic Elementrist, immediately continue through the nearest exit out of the dungeon complex.

To choose Runic Soldier, defeat the nest guardians threatening your friends.

To choose the Draconic Diplomat, solve the runic puzzle on the wall.

He stared and then reread the options again to be sure. His first preference had been the Runic Elementrist. From the description alone, he might find a way to duplicate the elemental talents he’d always wanted.

Finally, he could stand toe-to-toe with Starella. Maybe he could throw fire back in his father’s face.

But… Starella was a Path user. She had chosen an ominous one. Gravity.

Gravity was an ancient word for a concept that didn’t translate well into modern speech. It had to do with the weight of things.

Where Corvus had gone general -- His Path was a general Path focusing on dragons with his emphasis on runic magic -- Starella had chosen narrow specificity.

Corvus shook his head, dispelling that train of thought. It didn’t matter what his cousin had picked. Right now, he had to choose something for himself.

He could travel a Path toward something he’d always wanted… and the price would be to abandon Gwen, Roan and Starella.

He wanted to shout invective's in the air at the injustice of it. But he didn’t have time. The timer still counted down.

Runic Soldier then?

He had been offered a choice to be a foot soldier. . Some of the branches in his Path intersected several times. Serving at the border to fight directly with the demons was not… unappealing.

His old master Solt had told him there were runic weapons there. He could recharge them and be a real help in the war effort. Not to mention Charm. Starella had said a true monarch was needed on the battle front. Would this be the path to take him there?

Not to mention his emphasis on picking academic and mage-type sub-classes had left him without major combat skills. He needed to address that.

He even knew how he could defeat the nest guardians. In this place out of time he could carve ever-flame runes on the heads of the largest beasts, slap delimitating medical runes on the rest. It would be close especially as his disjointed shoulder meant he wouldn’t gain his ambidextrous bonus… but it could be done.

He may be able to cut the eyes out of some with mana charged weapons. If they couldn’t blink gains them, their eyes would be exposed.

Corvus felt both sick at the thought and disgusted at himself for his squeamishness. They were trying to kill his friends and cousin. He needed to do what it took to save them.

… But would it be right?

The third option was the one he could guess the least about. Draconic Diplomat.

He turned and looked at the runic markings on the wall.

There were twelve in total, and he could see at a glance that they reflected the markings chained on the necks of the nest guardians.

The only sigil he recognized was the sharp V points of the Stay rune. He didn’t see how this was a puzzle or how he was supposed to solve it.

He checked the timer. Three minutes and two seconds.

Running off was a nonstarter. That meant he had to set the Runic Elementrist aside.

 So he had to pick between the remaining choices: Did he slaughter the nest guardians while he was outside of time, or did he attempt to solve the puzzle?

Corvus closed his eyes and allowed himself a single measured breath. Upon opening his eyes, he limped to the back wall and the puzzle.

He’d never been much of a fighter anyway.

If this was meant to be a puzzle then there had to be a way to solve it. Corvus gazed up at the runes, looking for a legend, something to decipher or a point.

Normally when he came across new runes he drew them out himself, activated them, and learned what they were from there. It was imperfect and he didn’t have the time to experiment.

These runes on the wall glowed with a faint yellow light. Perhaps if he added his own mana—

The finger of his good hand touched the edges of the closest rune. It buzzed unpleasantly against his skin, and he jerked his hand back… the rune followed his hand as if he’d pulled it out of place.

Brows furrowing, he touched it again and felt the angry buzz of the rune — like a wasp under a piece of paper. He dragged the rune down the wall and the rune followed him, unlinking from the rest of the chain.

The others immediately turned a dull, warning red.

“I can move these. But… why?”

The answer was easy: To complete the puzzle.

“I have to put them in order,” he realized. Then his stomach sank. “But… what order?”

There were twelve in total. Too many permutations to think about. And runes could be ranged in a number of ways. He could link groups of three together to form a triangle, which made a sturdy, long lasting charm. He could chain them in a line, so that one aspect of the sigil feeding into another. The same three runes could be arranged in separate ways to provide different results.

Complicating this was that there was one rune at the end: An empty barrier circle devoid of a sigil.

Corvus had the feeling that was the key, though he didn’t know what to do with it.

Perhaps… would a cancel sigil work? He could arrange the runes as appeared on the collars of the nest guardians. Then add a cancel sigil at the end. Would that stop them?

One minute forty-five seconds.

Corvus glanced over his shoulder to the nest guardians. The rune collars were all identical.

Working quickly, he dragged the runes around to match order of the collars. He arranged the runes in a linked chain circle. The runes seemed to fall into places like puzzle pieces clicking together.

Or, like links to a chain.

When he was done, there was a gap left for the empty rune.

He put it in and heard a ‘click’ in his mind.

The rune circle went from red to yellow.

Now to add the cancel sigil.

He cut his finger and reached to draw it out… then stopped.

The runes had stopped the creatures from firing their energy at himself and Starella. For what reason, he didn’t know. But should he be working a spell to cancel that effect?

27 seconds.

“I need to add something,” he muttered. “It’s like the keystone in a bridge. I can feel it’s important.”

But what sigil should he draw?

That wasn’t the right question, he realized. What he should be asking was why these runes stopped the nest guardians from hurting royals.

And who would originally design it to be that way.

“Another royal, of course. So…  It needs a royal stamp!”

There might be an official rune to designate someone from the royal line, but all Corvus had was his name and his blood.

So, with the last few seconds counting down, Corvus wrote his name in the empty rune circle and then shoved his mana in.

The mana circle flared from yellow to green. A green which was echoed on around the neck of every nest guardian.

Time resumed and messages flashed in front of his eyes. He ignored them as beyond, every nest guardian broke off its attack, turned to him, and bowed low on their front legs.

Gwen’s voice warbled out. “Corvus? What’s going on?”

“It’s okay,” Corvus called out. “They’re not going to attack anymore.”

She knew him so well. “What did you do?”

Corvus looked back up at the rune puzzle wall and then out towards the glimpse of the nest he’d seen when Starella had thrown him into the air. A nest filled with glittering royal eggs.

“I was wrong. They’re not demons. They’re dragons.”