Eden's Gate: The Scourge: A LitRPG Adventure

by Edward Brody

  I flopped forward on the boulder once my center of mass was positioned well enough that I wasn’t holding all my weight with my fingers, and slowly squirmed ‘til I was fully on top.

  I felt a moment of triumph as I steadied myself and got to my feet, but when I looked down to where I had leapt from, I felt dread at the idea of jumping back down. Thankfully, I could recall, but the odd crevice between the wall and the mountain coupled with the lack of any meaningful footing meant surely more pain on any return trips.

  I surveyed my surroundings, and like the shady dealer had said, there was only one reasonable way to move forward from the boulder, and that was to begin climbing the mountain using the rougher, yet less inclined slopes above. If I had jumped down the boulder on the other side, I would’ve found myself in an even tighter wedge that quickly led to a blocked dead end.

  I started my gradual ascent up the mountain, using both my hands and feet. Each step of the way, loose rocks and rubble slipping out from below me, but the further I climbed, the more confident my footing became.

  There was no indication that a person had ever climbed the route I was taking, so it clearly wasn’t frequented, and I couldn’t imagine how anyone would ever find it on their own. It felt like I was exploring territory that truly wasn’t meant to be travelled.

  After a few minutes of climbing the rough slope higher and higher, the ground evened out, and I found myself on an obvious rocky path. On each side of me, the mountains continued to rise, and while the route ahead was obvious and straight, there were still no signs of life or that anyone had ever ventured there.

  I took a moment to brush myself off before trekking down the mysterious path. I kept my eyes peeled, but there were no enemies, no foliage, caves, or anything of note. Just rocks, rocks, and more rocks.

  It took ten minutes or more of walking through empty terrain before I finally heard signs of life—but not the sound of life I was used to. It was a heavy, monotonous crunching sound, almost as if something was digging or pounding against the mountain.

  The path curved, and when I rounded it, the mountains opened up more, and I found myself in the middle of a small canyon. Several meters ahead, an eight-foot-tall monster was roaming aimlessly back and forth.

  The entity consisted of several unevenly-shaped rocks and boulders that were somehow melded together to form a rough, humanoid form. Its arms and legs were thick, and debris fell from its joints with every step it took. It had no fingers or toes, and its head was a single unevenly-shaped boulder.

  Name: Desolate Rock Elemental

  Race: elemental

  Level: 28

  Health/Mana/Stamina: 380/100/220

  Status: unknown

  Using my knowledge from the Mages Guild, I thought about how I could defeat the elemental, if I even needed to. I knew that every branch of magic had a logical way to counter another branch, but nearly all of my spells seemed like they would be ineffective against something consisting only of rocks. An Arcane Missile would likely do no harm, and something like Fireblast would likely do very little damage. Fire Curtain would likely do nothing as well, which left me with Arcane Slash and Firebomb.

  I reached into my bag and made sure my Liar’s Mask was ready to go, just in case I got into trouble, and proceeded to unfasten my staff. I stepped forward ‘til I was just out of what seemed to be reasonable aggro range and swung my staff forward towards the monster, focusing on releasing an Arcane Slash in its direction.

  I had never used Arcane Slash in combination with a staff before, so I wasn’t sure if or how it would work, but I remembered that the spell description only said it required a level 10 weapon mastery and didn’t specify a branch. To my relief, a wave of blue energy sped from the edge of my staff, not much different than a sword. When it struck the elemental, small shards of rocks were torn from it, leaving a deep groove in the area of impact.

  You have gained 1 point of Intelligence!

  The elemental was barely rocked from the blow, but it turned its head slowly towards me and started stomping my way, its feet crunching and thumping with each step.

  I backpedaled as the elemental marched towards me, and I fired both a Fireblast and an Arcane Missile, to test their effectiveness. The Fireblast seemed to do nothing but leave a black spot on the area where it struck, and the Arcane Missile did nothing at all.

  The rock elemental powered forward very slowly, so I ran back again to get more distance, and started charging a Firebomb with both hands. I knew that the longer I charged the bomb, the bigger it would get and the more damage it would do, but I also knew that the larger the bomb, the harder to throw and worse the accuracy.

  When the bomb reached the size of a baseball, I hurled it at the monster. It landed on its shoulder, exploding loudly and throwing shards of rocks everywhere.

  The elemental rocked back and toppled sideways from the blast, and its rocky arm was completely blown from its body. The monster seemed to feel little or no pain, however, and immediately began pulling what was left of its being up and off the ground.

  I started charging another Firebomb as the monster got back to its feet, and by the time I had another baseball-sized bomb ready, it used its one good arm to lift a huge rock that had fallen from its severed arm and hurled it in my direction.

  I ducked, and the rock flew over my head and slammed into the mountain behind me. When I stood back up straight, I flung the bomb at the monster, and this time, the attack hit one of its knees. Like last time, the bomb exploded violently, dropped the monster to the ground, and launched broken stone everywhere. Its leg had been severed, and the rock around the impact had been nearly obliterated.

  The rock elemental seemed confused about its missing leg and tried to pick its mangled body up, fruitlessly. It kicked its one remaining leg out, pushed itself up a bit, then fell back to the ground. It thrust its arm against the ground, causing it to roll, then pushed itself up into a sitting position. Finally, it seemed to examine its body, then appeared to look up to me—though it was difficult to tell, since it had no visible eyes. After a moment without movement, the rocks that made up its body simply came unglued, and the creature collapsed into a heap of lifeless rocks on the ground.

  You have gained 2100 XP!

  Not bad, I thought to myself and grinned. For quite some time, I had been stuck fighting nothing but goblins and orcs or doing whatever possible to keep our village afloat, so it was nice to be away adventuring and seeing a different kind of creature.

  I was inclined to simply walk past the hunk of rubble left by the elemental, as I couldn’t imagine it carrying any loot, but just as I was just about to pass, I noticed something shiny catch a glimmer of light between the rocks.

  I kicked at the rocks to push them aside, and knelt down to find a shiny, rough ball that fit in the palm of my hands.

  You’ve received: Elemental Core. Durability: 10/10. Quality: Average. Rarity: Legendary. Weight: 0.1 kg. A reagent with various uses.

  I had no idea what use the elemental core might be used for, but I noted that it ended in an ‘E’, and pocketed it before continuing down the path.

  I ran into six more identical rock elementals as I slogged through the hidden canyon at the top of the mountains, and after the second or third encounter, I realized that they were particularly easy to kill if I managed to connect a decent sized Firebomb directly with their heads—instant death but hard to land.

  An even easier way I found was to place a Firebomb on the ground, shoot the monster with an Arcane Missile, and coerce it to walk over the bomb. The monsters died immediately when they lost their dome, but if they lost a leg, they’d struggle to get up after a brief period of confusion before dissolving into normal rocks and boulders.

  I considered myself lucky to have Firebomb as no other spells I had were very effective against them.

  Advancement! You have reached level 32 and gained 3 ability points. To assign your ability points, open your status page. You can also increase any of
your known skills by 1 level. Choose wisely, as your choices cannot be undone.

  You have gained 10 SP!

  I was pleased to have gained another level after killing the last rock elemental and pulled up my stats to assign everything right away. Balance was key in Eden’s Gate, and my Intelligence and Wisdom stats were starting to run away from everything else. My Vitality and Willpower were both weak, so all three points went to those two stats, and I decided to drop my LP into Mentalism and sacrifice the small amount of progress I had gained naturally in it. Nothing else seemed as important.

  The path continued linearly through the canyon, and for quite some time after the elementals, I ran into no monsters. There were plenty of snakes, birds, rabbits and other small animals that I saw on the way, but none of them made an aggressive move.

  Grass and foliage were scant in the area, so when I saw a patch of tall, orange and pink flowers growing in a dark corner, I moved in to get a closer look. The flowers were beautiful, with dark green stems, and a thin white tube growing between its long, floppy pink petals.

  I reached down and touched one of the flowers.

  Poisonous Mittitori Bloom. Durability: 10/10. Quality: Average. Rarity: Rare. Weight: 0.1 kg. A reagent with various uses.

  I assumed that the flower was poisonous in an ‘eat this and you’ll be poisoned’ type of way, but as soon as I plucked one of the flowers from its stem, a mist sprayed from the tube between the petals of the flowers, stinging my skin when it made contact.

  You have been poisoned and require medical attention. Poison is a weakening and damage-over-time effect.

  I rolled my eyes at my misfortune as I placed the flower in my bag. I hadn’t brought a poison potion, so I’d have to wait until the effect subsided on its own.

  The poison knocked a percentage off my health every ten or so seconds, but it hadn’t done any major damage during the spray. Since I was already poisoned, I decided to pluck a few more of the flowers. When I pocketed the next two, I got sprayed each time but didn’t notice any additional detriment to my status. It didn’t seem that the effect stacked.

  As I picked the flowers, I noticed that above the grow location, the mountain rose at a particularly steep incline, and there were a series of rocks and notches along the way. I couldn’t be sure, but the face seemed possible to climb, and there was a small ledge sticking out from the top.

  I looked down the path and considered my options as poison coursed through me, causing me to flinch with each pulse. I didn’t want to waste much time getting sidetracked, but I also wanted to know if there was something hidden higher up.

  I sucked in air and grabbed the first protrusion on the side of the mountain, knowing that curiosity would drive me crazy if I didn’t give the climb at least one attempt.

  I grunted as I started to climb, and each time I felt a wave of poison, I nearly lost my grip. The rock face was a bit difficult to scale, and there were several instances where stone broke apart under my weight. The last haul of the ascent was the most challenging, as there was a large area right below the precipice without anything to grip onto, and it wasn’t possible to reach the top edge with my hands.

  I was standing with one foot on a rock and one foot nudged in a small crevice as I looked down to see how high I was. Falling would definitely hurt me from that height—maybe even break a bone—but it didn’t seem like it would kill me. Like the boulder that seemed impassable, it appeared that this was yet another area where someone of my level with good timing and coordination could actually make it up with persistence or luck. I wagered the odds at around sixty/forty with a sixty percent chance I’d make it and forty percent chance I’d hurt myself—better chances than scaling the tall boulder the first time. With that in mind, I decided to jump—not to the ground, but jump for the top of the ledge.

  I bent my knees a bit and used what little leverage I had to push myself up as hard as I could. I stretched my arms out as much as they would go and slapped my hands against the corner of the ledge, barely managing to hold on. Rock and rubble fell below as I dangled there for a few seconds, thanking my lucky stars that I managed a grip on my first, and likely only, try.

  I took a deep breath and pulled myself up, but when I was almost over the top, another rush of poison hit me, causing me to slip a bit. I winced, repositioned my hands, and took a deep breath before trying again. With a tiring heave, I managed to pull my chest over the top and lifted a knee up so that I had a better, yet awkward grip. After a little more clawing against the ground, I managed to get myself all the way to the top.

  I lay on my back, exhausted, staring at the sky, and through the sound of my heavy breaths, I heard an odd otherworldly shimmering sound and turned my head to the side to see where it was coming from.

  I sat up when I saw a large runestone jutting from the ground. It was an odd, covert spot for a runestone to be placed, but even more odd was the thing rising beside it. The object was nearly the same size as the runestone, but instead of being rectangular, the top portion of it rose into a triangular point. The tip glowed a bright white and etched below it was a series of ring patterns, with smaller rings set inside larger ones. Each ring had a single dot inside at a seemingly random point.

  Behind the runestone and the noisy glowing object was a small dark cave—so small that I would’ve had to crouch to fit inside.

  I debated whether or not to bind at the runestone, but ultimately decided against it. The location was in an awkward place, out of the way, and if I did ultimately fail my mission and die in the Wastelands, I’d be better off respawning in Edgewood than somewhere completely out of the way.

  I turned my attention back to the odd glowing stone unlike anything I had seen before in Eden’s Gate. I looked around it for evidence of traps, then reached out and touched the glowing triangle tip.

  It felt like a cool breeze of air was pouring into my body from my hand, and the life I had lost from poisoning quickly healed. It didn’t cure the poison effect, however. I felt another wave of pain and my health dropped again, but touching the glowing stone almost immediately brought it all back.

  Was it just a healing stone or was it something else? The dotted rings on the front hinted that it may serve another purpose other than healing.

  I inspected it further, rubbing my fingers over each side and touching the engraved circles, to see if there was a puzzle of some sort attached to it. I tried twisting the glowing top and pressed it in various different ways to try to activate it, but nothing seemed to happen.

  Grrrrr…

  I looked up from the stone to see two glowing eyes staring at me from the small cave, and I froze when a massive, tan-colored cat slowly eased its way out of the entrance.

  You have failed to inspect your target!

  You have failed to inspect your target!

  My heart started pounding, knowing that I was outmatched. Judging by its size, I was pretty certain I was staring into the face of a Great Beast.

  The huge mountain lion, roughly the same size as Sora, walked towards me deliberately, its back muscles flexing with each slow step. It showed its teeth, and its eyes looked intent on killing me.

  I backed away slowly, feeling my odds of surviving atop the small cliff were minimal. My mind raced as I tried to think of what to do… Attack first? Defend? Fireblast? Arcane Missile?

  The Great Beast rushed towards me, and I raised a Fire Curtain between us.

  The lion didn’t hesitate from the fire, instead jumping right through it, singeing its fur but seemingly taking little damage.

  I scrambled back frantically, firing a Fireblast, then an Arcane Missile at the beast. It roared with each hit but barely slowed, only seeming to grow more ferocious and angrier from each attack.

  I eventually reached the edge of the cliff and stumbled as the mountain lion jumped towards me with its claws extended.

  Trying to avoid the lion’s wrath, I ducked, slipped, and fell over the edge of the cliff, but barely caught the edge of
the ledge with one hand. I was hanging for only a second before I felt the lion sink one of its claws into my fingers, causing me to release my grip and fall the rest of the way to the ground.

  I tried to cushion the fall with my uninjured hand but ultimately landed with a hard thwack on my right side, knocking my health down to a mere 10%.

  I heard a loud gasp, like someone’s voice, but I wasn’t sure if I was hearing things. As far as I knew, I was alone.

  My head swam, and I tasted blood pour from my mouth. I jerked when I felt the poison attack my body again, knocking a little more off of my health.

  You are bleeding and require medical attention. Bleeding is a damage-over-time effect.

  I coughed several times and shook my head, trying to will myself through the pain of the fall. I reached into my bag for my health potion, knowing I’d likely not survive without a heal—knowing I needed to get up and get away in case the Great Beast made its way down from the ledge.

  My health rose as I gulped down the tasty red liquid. When I finished it all, I tossed the bottle aside and reached in my bag for my only bandage.

  I looked up to the cliff as I tended my wound to see the mountain lion pacing back and forth, looking down at me. It appeared as if it wasn’t sure if it wanted to, or maybe was unable to, descend the mountain to finish me off.

  I heard the sound of a footstep, turned my head, and for a brief moment, I thought I saw the outline of a man, yet more of a blur than anything. When I blinked a couple times, nothing was there. Though weird, I thought I must have been imagining things after my shock.

  Once I was bandaged up and my bleeding had stopped, I got back to my feet and shook my head as I looked up to the angry lion. Was it guarding something in the cave, or was it guarding the strange glowing object I had found up there? Or was it just one pissed off angry Great Beast that automatically wanted to eat anything that entered its territory? Whatever the case, I wasn’t going to find out that day. I had another mission ahead of me, and the last thing I wanted to do was to die because I got sidetracked. And I certainly didn’t want to fight a Great Beast on my own.