As summer laid its hand over the region, the island transformed. Flowers bloomed, fruit ripened, and wildlife became more active than ever before. Elijah was no exception, spending his days hunting and exploring. It wasn’t long before he’d visited every corner of his island, and his efforts as a hunter were more successful than not. In short, he began to thrive.

However, despite his efforts in keeping the island clear of Voxx, he’d only barely progressed to level nineteen. Fortunately, that got him back on the ladder, if only onto the ninety-ninth spot. Still, it was progress, and he appreciated the allocation of the additional attribute points that came with the level.

As he sat in his Grove, he looked at his status, a habit he’d developed over the months since he’d been stranded on the island. Barely a day went by when he didn’t flick the window open and study his progress. Most of the time, there was nothing to see, but he still did it, nonetheless. That action came with varying degrees of pride and disappointment, depending on his mood.

Pride, because he’d come a long way in a little more than a year. When he’d washed ashore, suffering from cancer treatments and terminal cancer, he’d been incredibly weak. In fact, he was so powerless that a few overgrown crabs had nearly killed him. Since that time, his Strength had grown by leaps and bounds, rendering survival trivial.

But he knew just how far he was behind the others at the peak. The ladder spoke for itself, after all. So, while his progress had been substantial, Elijah couldn’t help but think that it wasn’t enough.

The same could be said for the Grove, which had been transformed by his presence. What had been a simple field with a lone tree at the center had become a beautiful and thriving garden, ringed by a tower of trees and featuring lush vegetation that had been enhanced by his abilities. The only thing it was missing was a water feature until it could rival the elaborate and well-tended botanical gardens he’d visited before Earth was transformed.

But it wasn’t enough – not to become the safe haven he and Nerthus had envisioned.

The coalition of dwarves, gnomes, and goblins across the strait had continued to settle the area, and their little town had become a thriving city with a population in the thousands. The surrounding landscape had been decimated, and though they hadn’t covered everything with concrete like humanity was wont to do, it still smacked of the artificial. More, they’d begun to expand their efforts into the sea, sending sizable ships out that soon returned with massive whales in tow.

Elijah had never been a true conservationist, but there was enough of the marine biologist left in him that he saw whaling as an abominable practice. Once, humanity had driven the mighty creatures to near extinction, so he couldn’t help but feel a sense of anger as he saw those carcasses being dragged into the strait.

But he couldn’t do anything about it.

There were no regulations anymore. Not that he knew of, at least. And if the state of the crabs was any indication, those whales were probably more than capable of defending themselves. But that didn’t really affect the way he felt about any of it.

The fact was that he was inadequate, and his efforts to change that had so far come up short.

So far.

He still had time, but the settlement continued to grow with every passing week. Soon, they would expand to his island. Why they hadn’t done so, aside from sending the trio that had run into the panther, was a mystery he’d yet to solve.

Shaking his head, Elijah took one last look at his status:

Name

Elijah Hart

Level

19

Archetype

Druid

Class

Animist

Specialization

N/A

Alignment

N/A

Strength

20

Dexterity

19

Constitution

20

Ethera

28

Regeneration

22

Attunement

Nature

Cultivation

Body

Core

Mind

Soul

Wood

Unformed

Opal

Neophyte

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Sighing, he pushed himself to his feet and looked around. Behind him, his home was nearing completion. The branches had woven together, giving it a rounded shape that culminated in a leafy and impenetrable canopy that, when it was finished, would block out the elements. The interior construction – or growth, if he was being accurate – hadn’t even begun, but according to Nerthus, that wouldn’t take long to complete.

Almost as soon as he thought of the tree spirit, Elijah felt a stirring in the ambient Ethera that announced Nerthus’s arrival. He looked up to see the vaguely humanoid knot of twisted roots and said, “You’re popping up a little more often lately.”

“The Ethera climbs a bit more each day,” Nerthus said in his whispering-wind voice. “Soon, it will be capable of supporting my continuous presence.”

Elijah nodded. “I have questions,” he said.

“As is your habit,” Nerthus replied from his perch.

“You’ve talked about those dimensional rifts,” he started. “The one I closed was a minor version, right?”

“It was.”

“But there are presumably major ones, as well, right? And you said something about towers before. Can you explain how that works?” Elijah asked.

Nerthus cocked his head to the side, then, after a moment, said, “Some.”

Elijah gestured for him to go on, but when Nerthus clearly didn’t take the hint, he said, “Okay? Go ahead.”

“The minor dimensional rift is the second-weakest version of a Voxx incursion,” he stated. “If left to its own devices, it will eventually spew forth a small horde of comparatively weak creatures.”

“Second-weakest? What’s the weakest?” Elijah asked, already guessing the answer.

“The spontaneous manifestations. Singular Voxx who manage to tear through the dimensional membrane and invade the world. Weak is a bit of a misnomer, though. Typically, the creatures that come through spontaneous manifestations are much more powerful than those in minor rifts. These, you have encountered as well.”

Elijah nodded along. That explained why he’d never been able to find the source of the monsters he routinely killed. If they were spontaneous manifestations, then there was no source. They simply appeared.

“What causes them?” he asked.

“A combination of factors I am prohibited from explaining to you.”

Elijah sighed. It was so frustrating, having a source of information so close but being incapable of getting what he needed. It felt like reading a book that was missing pages.

“Okay, what comes after the minor dimensional rifts? Major ones?”

“No. After that comes average dimensional rifts. Then major. And finally, primal realms. There are more dangerous incursions, but not on this planet. Not yet.”

“What else can you tell me?”

“Average dimensional rifts are little different from the one you encountered. They act as a simple bridge between our two realities, and the creatures they manifest will be dependent on the region and ambient Ethera levels.”

Elijah latched onto the last part, asking, “So, you’re saying that as ambient Ethera levels rise, the Strength of the Voxx will rise, too?”

“Yes,” Nerthus answered. “Until the planet stabilizes, you will face increasingly powerful Voxx.”

Elijah sighed. “Fantastic,” he muttered to himself. “Okay, so what about the major dimensional rifts? And the primal realms? Are there any of those around here?”

“No. You would know if you were anywhere near a primal realm.”

“What –”

“I am prohibited from revealing anything else about primal realms.”

Elijah shook his head, then asked, “What about major dimensional rifts, then?”

“Those are…different,” said Nerthus.

“How so?”

For the first time, Nerthus looked flustered. “Towers,” he said, obviously straining. “Look for towers.”

“I don’t –”

“I can say no more on the subject,” Nerthus said. “Just…just remember what I said.”

Then, without any further warning, the little tree spirit retracted into his branch, disappearing entirely. Obviously, he’d overstepped, and as a result, he was incapable of sustaining his presence. Was that the secret, then? Was it a matter of energy keeping Nerthus from revealing too much? Elijah had no idea, and he suspected that it would be some time before he got any more answers.

However, the information Nerthus had revealed was incredibly useful. Because Elijah had seen something that might have been the top of a tower. During his exploration of the island, he’d seen a rocky spire a few hundred yards out to sea. At the time, he’d thought it just a curious rock formation, but now that he knew what to look for, he could easily imagine that it was the top of a tower.

Or perhaps he was just grasping at straws. After all, there was nothing else to suggest that there was a major dimensional rift near his island. But then again, perhaps its presence was the reason Nerthus had strained his limitations to give him the small but necessary bit of information that would steer him in the right direction.

But if there was a tower near the island, then it represented both a danger and an opportunity. Since the beginning, the ambient levels of Ethera had continued to rise, and according to Nerthus, the relative danger of the dimensional rifts rose right along with it. So, if there was a tower, it made far more sense to deal with it as soon as possible rather than let it continue to strengthen.

Or fester. That seemed a more accurate word, given the nature of the Voxx.

Was he ready to face such a challenge, though? His cautious nature screamed at him to avoid finding out. Hunting a few monsters that had manifested on his island was one thing, but to enter a major dimensional rift? That seemed like a recipe for disaster, especially considering that he’d nearly died in the minor version.

In fact, if he chose to combat the new threat – if it even it existed – he’d be skipping an entire level. Logically, he should look for an average dimensional rift, then work his way up from there. Instead, he was thinking about jumping from the lowest level threat to one of the highest, with nothing in between.

But was that accurate? He’d been hunting and killing Voxxian monsters for months, and he’d gained more than ten levels since defeating the minor dimensional rift. Maybe that would be enough to see him through.

Elijah sighed and sat down, leaning against the ancestral tree that was Nerthus’s home. The reality of his situation was that he didn’t have much in the way of options. He knew he wasn’t ready to face the people across the strait. That was an indisputable fact that was supported by verifiable events. He had seen the panther in action, and he knew that, even now, he couldn’t have stood up to it. And it had been killed by the people from across the strait.

Without Elijah’s interference, they’d have done it without much difficulty, too.

That meant that they were still far above him in terms of power. And soon enough, they’d come to the island. He knew that as well as he knew anything else in the transformed world. Nerthus had said as much, but Elijah’s surety came from observation. He’d seen them consume and destroy everything they saw, and it wasn’t difficult to infer that, if they knew about the existence of the ancestral tree, they would aim their destructive tendencies in the island’s direction.

The only thing standing in their way was Elijah himself. And he wasn’t ready to fight them off. He’d long known that he needed to get stronger, and he’d diligently worked towards that goal ever since the panther’s death.

But his progress had stalled.

He needed a jolt to get him back on track, and the unconfirmed presence of a tower represented just such an opportunity. It just made sense to challenge it. After all, defeating the minor dimensional rift had given him three free attribute points. What potential rewards might a more powerful rift offer?

Elijah shook his head. No matter how much he wanted to get stronger, there was no way he could convince himself to walk into unknown danger. He had no real context to guess what a major dimensional rift would entail, and if he went in blind, he would probably end up dead.

Certainly, he liked the idea of getting stronger at all costs. He wanted to gain levels, to get attribute points, and learn new spells. But slow, steady, and alive was much better than quick and dead.

However, he did decide to check out the rocky pillar to see if it was, indeed, a tower. Scouting the area didn’t mean throwing himself into danger. He would just investigate, then make further decisions from there.

With that in mind, he rose and cast Essence of the Wolf, then Essence of the Monkey, and finally, embraced One With Nature. Stretching, he reveled in the increased power of his enhancements, then cast Shape of the Predator. Over the past few weeks, he’d spent more time as a mist panther than as a human, and the transformation felt comfortable in a way his humanity couldn’t match.

Perhaps it was the increased power, or maybe it was just easier to live as an animal. After all, with the transformation came the increased focus of a predator. And with so much stimuli tickling his senses, it was difficult to think about philosophical questions concerning loneliness, disappointment, and the future. Whatever the case, Elijah found it so much easier to focus on the task after the transformation completed.

He set off across the island, moving with incredible swiftness as he bounded over fallen trees, climbed hills, and leaped across wide depressions. Some of that speed came from the mist panther form, which increased his Dexterity and Strength attributes. Further adding to points to his status was Essence of the Monkey, which gave him an extra five points in Dexterity. The bonuses that came with One With Nature were a bit more nebulous in that it didn’t award temporary bonuses to his attributes. Instead, it just made him stronger, more durable, and more coordinated than normal. Alone, none of the enhancements were too overwhelming, but when taken as a whole? The increased power was significant.

Finally, adding to his speed was Essence of the Wolf, which gave him an extra twenty percent movement speed. The end result was that he was more than twice as fast as he would’ve been without his various augmentations, and he covered the distance to the southern shore in a fraction of the time it would’ve taken him to travel the distance in his human form.

So, it was only about fifteen minutes before he reached his destination, which was a steep cliff that looked like someone had simply sliced into the side of a hillock. As he stood at the top of the cliff, Elijah glanced down at the crashing waves more than a hundred feet below before letting his eyes wander out to sea.

In the distance – maybe two- or three-hundred yards away – he saw a rocky pillar jutting approximately fifty feet above the surface of the water. There were a few more fingers of stone surrounding it, but they barely crested the waves.

From a distance, the pillar looked natural. However, after Elijah let Shape of the Predator fall away and used Eyes of the Eagle to magnify his vision, he saw that, beneath that rocky exterior was something that looked manmade. There were too many straight lines for it to be natural.

He couldn’t be certain unless he dove into the sea, but Elijah’s instincts – or maybe his sense for Ethera – told him that he’d found a tower.