The dragon's harem

“Was that… an entire sun?” A maid gasped with a pale face as she looked into the massive holographic screen shooting out of an array of crystal orbs.

“He dodged a sun; is that even possible?” Another maid mumbled, looking back at Merlin, who was channeling mana into the orbs. Of course, she was half-naked in her underwear as usual, but this time, out of necessity, as she needed every possible inch of her skin exposed to release as much mana as she could and fuel the stream from outside the universe.

The maids did question why she gets half-naked all the time inside the private quarters, and the answer was simple. There was a reason why mages only wear light robes and not heavy armor. Clothes get in the way of their mana leaving their body, or entering to recharge them. So, with how many spells and great machinations Merlin is controlling at any time, she needs to remain half naked to be able to endure the load.

Merlin smiled, flicked her wand and channeled even more magic into the orbs, rewinding the footage a bit and showing the maids that Arad didn’t dodge the sun; he got hit and managed to escape before getting burned.

While it wasn’t as crazy as dodging a sun, it was still an impossible feat to achieve, and none of the maids could understand what kind of nightmarish power their Emperor had. At this point, Arad and Eris’s fight was being recorded through Kali and Yog’s eyes and being broadcast back to Arad’s private quarters, where all of his wives, maids and servants could watch from safety.

“Using common sense in a battle between a goddess and a dragon that can kill gods isn’t possible. Those two operate on a whole other level of power than we can understand.” Merlin looked toward Linda, who sat in the back, hiding in the shadows of the corner of the massive hall.

“At their level, their powers are less like solid rules and abilities and more like dough; they can knead it however they want.” She looked at the massive screen.

One of the maids gulped. “Are you saying… that either of them isn’t just strong, but able to one slap end this entire world?”

Aella looked at her and giggled. “Ah, you’re the one who scolded Arad for flipping the firewood in the kitchen with his bare hand. Now you know why Mira couldn’t stop laughing.”

“Look, they are starting.” Gamond pointed at the screen.

[Elemental Expansion: Devouring Void]

[Elemental Expansion: Purple Sun]

Eris and Arad unleashed their expansions all at once, while not being more than a hundred meters apart. As a divine goddess, Eris’s Purple Sun Expansion had produced a dwarf star third the size of the mortal world’s sun. It was about 0.4 million kilometers wide, 400k km, a hundred times wider than Arad’s expansion, and she sucked it into the core of the star to crush it.

One of the maids had her mother die recently, and Eris was the one who prepared and held the burial for her. So now, watching that gentlewoman summon an entire sun, showing enough power to obliterate an entire world, just made her realize the ridiculous extent of power she and the maids hold.

Even without being actual queens, with one work, they could have someone of that power to move. At this level, the lowest-ranked servant here in Arad’s private quarter, that young woman who can barely do any chores and gets yelled at by the head maids all day long, probably has more power over the world than all of the foreign queens combined.

But the real question was, just how many of the queens are that powerful? Do the maids even need to gain Arad’s approval? Won’t just serving one of his wives be enough political and wealth for them?

Back to the clash. The two of them were now inside Arad’s expansion, floating face to face as Eris lifted her hand and flicked her fingers. “Remember this? It almost killed you once before.”

The same way Arad almost died trying to prevent Eris’s sun from exploding while she was trying to create a Gravastar, Eris had put Arad in a deadly trap once more. At this moment, the purple star was collapsing on itself, crushing Arad’s elemental expansion, and would eventually hit him as well.

“You took it, the bait.” Arad smiled, and as he opened his palms, a roaring black hole the size of an apple was roaring and burning like a radiant star. “Thanks for the food.”

Eris frowned, “You say I belong in the kitchen?!” She tried to cancel her elemental expansion, but the star’s collapse had already begun and couldn’t be stopped. The only one here who had enough will to stop it was Amaterasu, and she wasn’t going to interfere in this fight.

As the star collapsed upon itself due to gravity, all of that matter, heat and energy flew into Arad’s crumbling expansion and got swallowed by the black hole, making it grow rapidly in size.

Eris rushed at Arad at full speed and swung a fist at his face, but he dodged with a smile and changed his size to be smaller and match her. “Being a big target is bad, isn’t it… Well, I can only blame you and the maids.”

The maids watching all gasped, and Aella burst laughing, “What? He isn’t blaming me?” She then threw a glance at the maids, “Don’t take his words seriously; he is joking to get on Eris’s nerves. But what he is saying is that you’ve fattened him up.”

Isabelle in the back shrugged with a sigh, “Probably that fat pig’s influence.” And when everyone looked at her, she quickly told them about Pig God.

Eris pushed Arad’s fist aside and tried to kick him in the face, only for him to step aside and throw the black hole into the sky, grabbing her by the ankle with a smile and giving her foot a gentle peck. “Did that get under your skin?”

She returned the grin, “If it did, we wouldn’t be fighting.” This was a civilized fight; they were murdering and beating the living shit out of each other for sport. If this were a real lover quarrel, she would’ve had a very different attitude. She twisted her ankle, wrapped her foot around his neck, and pulled his head down toward her for a second attack.

Arad took the kick to the face and was sent flying back. But instead of crumbling, he spun several times and stabilized himself in the void of his expansion. “Now, that hurts.” He looked at her with a smile as blood gushed out of his nose, and she grinned.

“Too much for a man, letting a woman kick you around like this.” She tried to poke back at him, but Arad just smiled.

“I thought you knew, I like a woman who can kick me.” He then wiped the blood from his nose. “Besides, that reflection of yours is still active. If I attack you, I’ll get hurt right back.”

She sighed, “I thought you’d snap and take the bait.” Then, with a smile, summoned a large blood scythe. “So, we’re eating roasted void dragon for dinner.” And in the next moment, she was already behind his back, swinging at his neck.

“Slow-cooked.”

Arad couldn’t dodge her attack in time, and his head ended up getting slashed cleanly off. It was just the reflection that was active, but all the powers of every stage at once. Eris could reflect the damage she takes, has the combined power of all the souls she killed, excluding the gods who are too willful, and on top of that, she can enlarge wounds. It didn’t matter if her scythe couldn’t cut Arad’s neck, as long as it could deal a single tiny scratch; she could make that wound bigger and cut his neck.

Every hit was critical, and every wound was fatal, and the more blood is spilled, the stronger she’ll become. She is a divine of murder, and she thrives in blood and carnage.

But… no blood came from Arad’s severed neck, and instead, his body turned around and kicked Eris in the guts. She growled and then swung again, cutting the body into four pieces with a swift swing of her massive scythe.

“What’s going on?” As she looked at the pieces, one of them, Arad’s right arm, grabbed the shaft of her scythe, and his leg kicked her, sending her flying back.

“I once heard… that Death’s favorite dodging technique is self-bisection.” Arad’s head floated above, talking like it was normal. “If I can store my organs inside my stomach to avoid vital hits, it means those organs can still receive blood supplies and nervous signals; they are still connected to me while in a different place.”

That wasn’t even his idea, but it was Nyar who came up with it and showed him how to achieve it. Void dragons are creatures of space, and cutting them physically didn’t really work, especially against older ones.

Arad’s severed parts moved closer together and attached. Then, he created a thin disk of his void and showed it to Eris. “See, the space on this side is the same on the other side, so if I got two of these disks, I can do this.”

Pushing his arm through one disk, it came out of the other, giving the illusion of being severed while being just stuck midway between two portals.

She giggled and flew at him. “Well, that only works if you’re fast enough to create those portals and cut yourself before I slash you.”

She was right: this wasn’t an automatic defense but an active one. While Arad could do it a few times, now that Eris was aware of it, she could just vary her attacks and use a bit more speed to cut him before he could do it.

As Arad teleported back with a void step to avoid her barrage of slashes, he lifted one finger. “You’re a goddess, so you don’t need to eat or breathe, right?”

As she is feeding him, he was going to show her how not to do it.