The dragon's harem

When Fernanda arrived, she looked really exhausted and in pain. Her face was pale, and her eyes had dark circles around them, as if she hadn’t slept for a while. Arad would’ve asked her if she was fine, if he didn’t already know how much she loved to mess around and put on acts.

“What do you think about her?” As Arad asked and pointed at the body on the table, Fernanda sighed. “Well, it’ll taste nice in a soup, like lamb.”

Arad sighed. “I’m talking about anything unnatural. This was a monster just hours ago, a Pricolici like myself, and we think she could swap bodies.”

Fernanda’s face cleared of all its blemishes as she sighed and touched the corpse. “This body had been fully modified, not just the brain. Probably an application of some power that can shapeshift the entire body at once. Detecting it is hard if you don’t know where to look. Now that this little girl is dead, magic won’t detect the shapeshifting.”

She found a chair and sat down, threw a glance at Arad, then looked at the corpse once more. “If it is anything like you, then I say she marks the targets by drinking their blood, then uses them later on. I can’t see any traces of a disease, but this entire body had been ravaged, and each cell was tampered with twice.”

After a long moment of silence, she stood. “I have a theory, but it’s a dark one by this world’s standards.” She approached Arad, sniffed him once, then sniffed the corpse. “I bet the true monster, the beast, is an entirely different terror than what Gamond faced. This girl was just a host of its power, and was quite weak as she only carried temporary enchantments.”

Fernanda scratched the back of her head. “The beast probably has two ways of getting hosts. Infecting them directly by drinking their blood, or by infecting their direct parents. This girl isn’t showing any signs of being the direct target, so I guess her mother or father was marked, and she inherited that mark.”

“That second part is impossible.” Arad spoke. “The beast we are tracking is called Poppy, and she was sane until recently when she snapped. There is no way this girl was born and grew in a few weeks.”

Fernanda tapped the girl on the forehead. “So, the beast knows how to hide its tracks well. How about it? Want me to hunt it down for you?”

“How would you go about that?” Merlin looked at her with a smile, and Doma as well seemed interested in her answer.

“Simple.” At one moment, Fernanda was alone beside the table, but then, she disappeared and was replaced by a young girl who looked no older than five, an old man, a mature woman, a balding uncle, a random-looking young man with bright clothes, and a shifty-looking woman.

“We are Fernanda, we are US.” They all spoke at the same time, and their eyes burned bright green. “If that Poppy thinks of herself as a horror, I’ll show what true terror is.”

The little girl spoke. “I’ll spread across the entire empire, each of those bodies of mine would live a normal life, and set a net to catch the beast. The moment she makes the mistake of infecting one of mine, she’ll have to fight me for dominion.”

Doma smiled. “So, you two are somewhat similar. You get vessels by eating them, but we don’t know what mechanism Poppy has. It’ll be a Brain Hopping Pricolici against a Cannibalistic Immortal Witch, two nightmares clashing at the dead of night.” She stood and tapped Fernanda, “Let’s give you a chance to prove yourself. Don’t kill Poppy, bring her back alive to me if you can. Arad, what do you say?”

“As long as you don’t cause any problems, and are careful. Don’t stand out too much.” Arad sighed, and he then gave Fernanda a sharp glare. “And, tell me the moment you find her true form.”

All of Fernanda’s bodies smiled at once, and silently merged back into the face everyone knows her with. “Then I’m already working on it. If you see any report of the missing suddenly being found, abandoned babies at churches and orphanages, and a surge of thugs and ruffians, then do brush it aside.”

From that moment, a second horror graced the mortal world with her presence. Fernanda, the abominable witch who once ate her entire world, was now silently spreading through the lands like a cursed nightmare.

The changes to the world were subtle, but her influence almost immediately rivaled lesser gods, and not a single person was the wiser, except Arad Orion and his wives, who knew her.

“Mom! MOM!” A noble young lad cried as his mother breathed her last breath on her bed, her face paled, her eyes froze, and her hand dropped, rapidly cooling down. Then, suddenly, she gasped for air and started violently coughing.

The young lad instantly glared back at the healers behind him. “What is going on? Hurry up! Tend to her!” As he screamed, the confused healers jumped in and started healing and inspecting her. One brought her water, one kept constantly casting healing magic, and the last one checked her diseased lungs.

“It’s a miracle! Her lungs didn’t heal, but they were somewhat restored… she might live for a few more months.” The healer’s eyes opened wide. “And this… holy magic, a divine blessing from Sol.” As he stared back at the noble lad, the lad looked at the bedside table where his mother still had her Amaterasu’s holy symbol.

“She was a firm believer of Amaterasu, not that new goddess Sol.” As he frowned, the healer shook his head.

“Her divinity Amaterasu, is a powerful goddess and can’t play favorites with… mere mortals… unless they are some powerful paladins or priestesses. Sol is a part of her pantheon, a lesser sun goddess. I bet Amaterasu wanted to help your mother but couldn’t due to the divine rules, that why she had Sol do it for her instead.”

The healer stood and looked at the now sleeping mother with a smile. “Make sure to visit Sol’s church at least once and thank her, thank Amaterasu as well. This almost never happens.”

The mother woke up two hours later and was even able to walk a bit with the help of the maids. She was already old and past her nineties, it was a true miracle for her to once again walk the hallways of their mansion.

The noble lad and his entire family were joyous, and they threw a huge party to celebrate the mother’s recovery. The mother, still tried and sickly, silently watched from her seat with exhausted, but still powerful eyes burning with a verdant flicker.

Near the end of that party, a filthy beggar covered in mud and filth stormed at the mansion’s gate, cursed at the nobles for having a party while he starved on the streets, spat at them, and even pulled his thing to piss on them.

The guards pulled their weapons and rushed in to restrain and remove him from the front gate, but it was then that the mother spoke, for the first time in three years.

“Let him in… if he is hungry, then feed him. If he is filthy, then give him a bath and new clothes.” He looked at them, and the guards growled, threw a glance at the noble lad, then sighed.

“Lucky bastard.” They dragged the still rampaging homeless beggar inside and got him cleaned and fed in hours. By the mother’s order, they even granted him a job as the cleaner of the garderobes. It was a bad and disgusting job, but still better than nothing. It took a lot of discipline, but he wasn’t a beggar anymore, and a new verdant glimmer of light burned in his eyes.

And there was more across the entire empire. A newborn baby was found abandoned at the door of an orphanage, and the demons hiding in the shadows were absolutely confused.

A young woman, who had been violated, had now taken refuge in one of Amaterasu’s churches to dedicate her life as a nun. Even she was surprised when Amaterasu granted her holy powers and made her a cleric. Her dying eyes burned with holy light, hiding a verdant glimmer of power.

The man who violated her was captured days later, enslaved, and sent to the mines for the rest of his life, but he didn’t seem regretful, not even a bit. Instead, he boasted and laughed, the verdant light hiding in his arrogant glare wasn’t noticed by anyone, not even the gods.

Merchants and the bandits who attacked them. Deserters, cults, the abandoned and the lost, hundreds, then thousands of people all around the empire silently held on to their lives, and Fernanda’s net spread faster than the plague.

All she had to do now was sit and wait for the time that Poppy would make the mistake of trying to infect her.