The dragon's harem

^So it’ll wait until I reach your tower.^ Arad walked toward Yog’s statue and sat beneath it, looking at one of the nuns, “How far is Yog’s tower from here?”

“A ten-year journey, two years to cross the continent, then a six-year long trip by boat, and then another two years to reach the tower from docking. The tower is on the opposite side of the world; Going there is a life-long commitment and is considered a sacred pilgrimage.” She approached with two steps, inspecting Arad’s face. “Do you want to go there? No, the goddess said so… no wonder you’ll need all the help you can get.”

Arad sighed, “Ten years, that’s too long.” He looked at the church’s ceiling with a longing face.

“The pilgrimage was never an easy feat; it’s supposed to show the discipline and dedication of the believers against hardship.” The nun looked at him with a judging glare, “Are you ready to take on such a holy journey? It’s not…”

“I don’t care about the journey.” Arad cut her mid-speech. “I’ve spent a little around one year with my wives outside. Spending ten years here will only be a few minutes outside, but I don’t feel right living here for that long, knowing and getting to know people in this place better than my family outside.” He stood and started waving his hand, forming a small statue of Lilia with earth magic. “One month, I’ll finish this and go back home.”

Mary came rushing with a brown ceramic jug filled with holy water, almost splashing it everywhere. “My dear! Did I make you wait a lot?” She immediately stopped, seeing him working on an ugly stick figure of dirt.

“What are you doing?” She looked at his hands, “What is a deformed monster? A goblin?”

“Yes, a short, ugly, and haughty little gremlin. She has a face just at the right height for kicking.” He showed Mary the statue.

“That’s indeed ugly.” She nodded; What he had in hand didn’t look like Lilia.

One of the priests looked at Mary with a slightly worried face. “That’s the goddess; he just sucks at earth magic.”

Mary suddenly felt her holy magic dropping; she screamed, “Wait! I didn’t know!” She looked up with a scared face, and Arad could hear Lilia laughing inside his head.

A few seconds later; Mary seemed to relax as her holy magic returned. As much as she brings it up, Lilia{Yog} was quite open about her height, almost always making fun of herself. She could’ve created a new body for herself to use but instead chose to stay like she is just because she likes being a half-elf half-halfling and loves how many halves she has.

Mary stood behind her Arad; who sat beneath the statue of the goddess. The nuns lined up beside the benches. Four of them approached, filling their hands with holy water, and started sprinkling it on Arad’s head. Mary began chanting, and the nuns beside the benches repeated after her, filling the church with an echoing chore.

The priests walked behind the statue in a clean line, and they split into two groups of two while the rest joined the nuns in chanting. The two groups of priests manned the strange pipe organ at the back of the church and started playing on it.

After about a minute, pale white feathers of divine magic started dropping from the church’s ceiling as two angels floated down, each holding a semi-transparent scarf in their pale hands. The two angels took the form of two boys who looked no older than thirteen wearing an ancient Greek outfit. Before landing, they dropped the scarves on Arad’s head, and all of his wounds disappeared without a trace.

The divine healing spell was ending. The holy light and feathers had started to disappear. Mary looked at the two angels, “Thanks for…” She went silent, the two angels were supposed to be slowly flying upward toward the heavens, yet they were floating looking down at Arad.

Mary’s brain started panicking; did she mess up the spell somewhere? If she got two angels stuck in the mortal world, the goddess would pull them back, but at what cost? Mary would be the one paying for that failure.

The two angels started floating down, and the whole church panicked. The nuns tried to step back and tripped on the benches, and the priests messed up their play by making the pipe organ shriek like an animal. Mary found herself stuck at the statue’s side, terrified.

Arad looked at the two angels as they set foot on the mortal world, looking him in the eyes.

“What? Got a problem?” Arad spoke first, and the two angels shook their heads. “No.” They spoke in unison.

The two angels proceeded to kneel silently and stayed like that for a second. They then lifted their heads, looking at Arad’s face.

“What now?” Arad was as confused as everyone else, but the angels refused to elaborate. They stood and started floating up. “We’ve served Yog since she was born before time itself, before the concept of souls, let alone mortals were even a thing.” The angels’ glares shifted toward Mary.

“Over a billion angels, the divine army of the first overgod. Each one of us is blessed with enough power to erase this whole world with a single strike.” One of the two angels pointed at the sky, “All of them are kneeling on the sky as they’ve been doing for eons, only lifting their heads to work.”

The church’s roof disappeared, and the two angels rose to the sky, their wings blotting the sun and expanding to cover the entire world. “Their faces are stuck to the sky, looking down upon you. The blessing you’ve been given only fills their hearts with jealousy.” The two angel’s eyes were fixed on Mary and the nuns.

“Mess this up; even if the goddess Yog is against it, they shall fly down to rend this world into ash. Mark our words, mortals.” With a single flap of their wings the two angels disappeared from view, and even the church returned to normal.

Mary was shaking, all the nuns were terrified, and only those in the church saw what happened. Like an illusion, no one outside managed to spot the angels.

[Arad, you can ignore them. They won’t come down or do anything.] Yog’s voice immediately boomed in Arad’s head. [Giving a threat is their way of giving people motivation to work. But they weren’t lying; they were indeed too jealous.] She laughed, [I sent two women down, but I found out that those two boys caught and tied them to take their place.]

^Take that more seriously; angels are too powerful to be left going around like that.^ Arad sighed, [Don’t worry, I can at least guarantee that they won’t harm you.]

Arad looked back at Mary, “Sorry about that, you can ignore them.” He thought they were talking with him, about his mission and how he treated Yog before.

“What?” Mary was still confused, barely able to speak or stand. The exhaustion of the spell coupled with what just happened had drained all the energy from her limbs, making it hard to even stand straight. She looked at Arad with a pale face, “Yeah…the spell is over…it wasn’t supposed to be like this.”

Arad stood and gave her a helping hand, assisting her up. “Can you walk?” He asked.

“Yeah.” She replied, and he guided her inside the church to a private room where she lay on the bed, exhausted. “Thank you.” She said, looking at Arad, “That took more out of me than I

expected.”

“Those two brats were acting on their own.” Arad pulled a chair and took a seat. “Don’t stress it out. I bet Yog won’t allow them to harm anyone; they serve her after all.” He started playing with earth magic. Getting it right now was crucial for his plan.

Arad wasn’t just sitting idly as Mary healed him; he was thinking of a plan to reach the other side of the world in less than a month. First, he’ll master the basics of magic to kill monsters and defend himself. He’ll then create a stone carriage propelled by fire and wind magic that uses magic crystals as fuel.

Mira is the one who came up with the plan for that carriage. The driver would need to sit lying down on his stomach with his feet protruding from the back. He’ll cast fire and wind magic out of his feet to move forward, and out of his hands to turn left and right. The main body should be made of something like steel or enchanted wood, but since that will take a lot of time; Arad is thinking of using earth magic instead.

The plan is still incomplete and might change, but that’s the best he can come up with now. He considered learning storage magic to store the crystals and potions so he wouldn’t need the stone carriage and could fly on his own, but when he remembered how complicated it was, The thought the stone carriage was easier.

Slowly, Arad started thinking rationally about magic, how to use it, and what he could and

couldn’t do at a certain time.

[You’re a wizard, Arad!]