The dragon's harem

Kali was now faced with a difficult decision, and that was how to go about finding out if Arad is aware of himself as AO or not. If he is aware, then that’s a huge problem for the gods. Soon, his growth would explode as more of his power returns, and it risks him losing himself in the process.

She can either press him to find out or leave him alone. If she made the wrong decision, then she would be dooming everyone. Neither of those two options was good enough, so she had to use her authority and wisdom as a goddess to force a third option, and it wasn’t that difficult.

She would train Arad to endure the possibility of his knowing the truth. If he knew that he was AO, it would save his mind in the future, but if he didn’t know, she would have just put him through useless and exhausting training for no reason.

“You’re good, just too good.” Kali smiled, “You might be ready, how about I train you directly? That would hardly be an advantage, as Amaterasu had already trained Eris before. What do you say?”

Arad stared at her with a wide grin. “Training under the goddess of destruction? That might be just what I need to defeat the goddess of murder in a fair fight. Why not?” He cracked his fists, “What would it be.”

She giggled. “I hope you are ready. I’ll make you cry.” She clapped her six hands, and the entire area around them changed in the blink of an eye. She had brought them to her heaven, and they were now in the middle of an endless flat plane of polished gold.

Arad looked around, then bent down and touched the ground. His face changed, and his eyebrows lifted. “This isn’t gold… but compressed divine magic. How strange.”

Diana approached him. “This is where Archons train, the ground is like that from us blasting it with world-erasing divine spells.” She extended her massive wings and floated into the sky, and Kali engulfed Arad in a dark barrier.

Her wings were jet black, unlike the other archons, and her eyes burned with destructive magic. Arad immediately felt a shiver down his spine as Diana’s face turned cold, and he could sense her divine magic spiking like a violent explosion.

All that he could see in her now was pure destruction, the inevitable wrath of a god. Those who the archons were, the gods’ strongest weapons of mass destruction.

Diana’s wings expanded to thousands of kilometres wide, and the entire sky got engulfed with a dark cloud of roaring thunderclouds and flashing divine lightning. Her voice boomed across the sky, and it sounded more akin to that of a machine than a woman.

“Mortals, you have sinned, and by divine judgment, this world shall meet its end.” Her wings flashed with light, and an enormous wave of destructive divine magic fell from the sky like a crushing shockwave.

[Heaven’s Strike]

All that Arad could see was blinding light, and then, nothing. He was alone in the darkness, only to gasp back to his senses a second later back, on the golden plane, but now, the ground itself was smoking and sparking with divine radiance.

“As you can see, she engulfs the entire planet with a true divine body, and then rains down a wave of powerful divine magic to burn, flatten, and shock the surface, killing anything and everything in a single thunderclap.” Kali leaned on Arad’s shoulder. “Many archons train here, and so this is how the place ended. Now, I’ll train you, so we’re reserving the place for a while.”

Diana landed behind them and threw a glance at Arad. “What do you think? Could you have survived that?” She approached them. “Eris should be able to throw something similar even if she isn’t trained well, since she is a true goddess after all.”

“I should be able to survive it, somehow. But I won’t be unscathed.” Arad sighed, “Now that I’m thinking about it, do I even have a way to survive if Eris decided to throw a sun on my head?”

“It’s not like you can dodge that…” Diana scratched the back of her head, and Kali shrugged. “Arad should be fine; he is a tough nut to crack. The problem is Eris’s physical power; she has the entire weight and gravity of a sun behind her. Dealing with that would be hard, so let’s start with that.”

She pointed at the ground. “Arad, get down. Pushups until your arms break, with me sitting on your back.”

Kali was heavy, far heavier than any mountain Arad saw. The moment she sat on his back, he could feel the muscles in his arms and chest wanting to rip apart. He couldn’t even do a single pushup with her on his back.

“Don’t just rely on your physical body, use your gravity magic and space manipulation to make it work. If your muscles are tearing, fix them with your regeneration and keep going.” She lifted one foot and smacked him on the back of the head, “And don’t slow down.”

She then shifted her gaze toward Diana. “Since I’ve just returned from the frontlines, bring me a report with everything that happened, something to drink and eat, and a bit of sweets. I’ll be here with Arad for a while.” She then tilted her head, “And, since you’re going to rest, you can send me some of my private archons to help with the fights, the ones who stayed home.”

As Diana left, Kali looked back at Arad, who was behind her, doing his best to finish another pushup under her crushing weight. “Once we’re done, I’ll have you fight some of my archons to get you ready. I’ll tell you this beforehand, in terms of fighting skills, you’re far better than Eris, but in terms of raw stats, she far outclasses you as a goddess.”

“I know, it’s like a well-trained, unpowered human trying to kill a powerful giant in a fist fight. It’s nearly impossible, but theoretically possible.” As he replied, she smiled. “That’s why we’re trying to raise your basic stats now with training.”

After a while, three archons showed up with a large box filled with everything that Kali had asked for. They set it down, put a table, and prepared everything before approaching her and Arad.

“Your divinity, everything you asked for is ready.” One of the archons bowed first, and the other two followed after.

Kali looked at them with a smile, “Good, then get ready and do some warming up. I’ll have you fight Arad after he is done training.”

The archon threw a gaze at Arad, then back at Kali, “Are you sure?”

Kali laughed, then pointed at the archon. “Of course, don’t underestimate him.” She leaned forward and looked at them. “I bet that if I locked you three up with him in a world, he’ll be the one to walk out alive.”

The archon frowned. “Are you saying that even if we three ganged up on him, we would still lose?”

Kali smiled. “That’s what I’m saying. So get ready so you’ll offer him a real challenge.”