The dragon's harem

Not being able to use fire was a problem, but no one said anything about not using cold and ice. Arad opened his jaw and flew at the swarm, unleashing a deadly wave of cold, frigid air. The moment the bugs noticed him, they realised it was already too late and they were now caught in the cone of his breath.

While it looked like Arad was the one unleashing the breath, he was, in fact, using Undine magic to strengthen his cold magic. The blast ended up wiping out the whole swarm in one swoop.

Arad looked at the falling, frozen mosquitoes and smiled, “That’s what you deserve.” He quickly looked back. “No rest for me, it seems, time to flee.”

Another Terror Bird was heading his way, probably looking for the one Arad had killed earlier. The last thing Arad wanted was to keep fighting from one battle to another until he exhausted himself, so for now, he decided to skip everything and avoid all fights unless he was forced to fight.

Arad ignored the charging bird and flew past him, too fast for the thing to keep up with him. He ignored a swarm of ants, some butterflies, and even a large blistering toad that leapt at him out of nowhere.

Just before nighfall, he reached a crack in the tree bark and looked inside it. The ant’s colony was far below, and they shouldn’t venture around here.

“As safe as it can be? Ignoring the Death Worm in the back and the stench.” He walked inside and grabbed the worm by the head, throwing it outside before it could even fight back. He then looked around, thinking about how to clean this place a bit. He can’t pull the others here; this place stinks worse than hell.

Using water magic and wind magic, he powerwashed the whole crack in seconds, then pulled a large blob of crushed pine leaves and rubbed them on the walls to mask what little of the stench remained. He then looked outside, making sure no monster was around, and then locked the whole place behind several barriers, and set fifty vampires on watch duty to alarm him if anything managed to sneak past his magic sense.

He also made sure to warn them that if that thing showed up, they would notify him immediately and not engage in a fight if possible.

After making sure the place was relatively safe, it was time to let the others out.

Cerilla walked out first and looked around, both confused and shocked. Jasmine followed her, looking at the strange place they ended up in. D and Dalla appeared last.

D frowned, “Gods, how high are we?”

Dalla looked at Arad, “You’ve been flying up for at least ten hours, shouldn’t we be at the stars?”

Cerilla was the one to reply in the back, “The World Tree isn’t a normal tree. What you see from the ground is just her mirage; the tree itself is a being that grows through dimensions.”

“Like yours truly here, no need to clap, I know I’m amazing.” Plum flew out of Arad’s hair and landed on his shoulder with a proud smile, puffing her chest up.

“It’s not like space itself is stretching.” Arad looked around.”Space is like a web, and this tree stretches through it like grapevines. This explains how it can grow into many worlds despite them not being physically connected.”

“So what? We left our world?” Jasmine looked at Arad, and D shook her head in the back.

“No, the tree is acting like a highway that leads us somewhere; that place is probably the divine domain of the Elvish Goddess Sylph. That would explain how the mana around here is different from the mortal world while being somewhat similar, like wine and cider. Both are alcohols, but not the same.”

D looked around and noticed that Arad was already using light crystals to illuminate the place, so she tried to cast a low-level light spell, and she succeeded like nothing had changed. The mana was different, a thing to keep in mind, but of no particular significance to their spell-casting ability for the time being.

Cerilla walked around and touched the walls, her eyes opening wide, and she gasped, “Arad, we’ve crossed months’ worth in just those few hours. A year and a half, almost two years’ worth of climbing.”

Jasmine looked at her with a tired face. “Not shit, smartass. He’s Arad, don’t you know how fast he can fly?”

“I know, I know that Arad is fast.” She looked around, “But, the monsters, the pressure of climbing, what about them?”

“I’m a void dragon, space distortion can’t harm me, and the monsters are easy enough to deal with. Of course, unless that thing shows up, we’re fine.” Everyone fell silent. They didn’t spend the entire day just chilling inside his stomach; they too read the book that the World Tree maiden gave them. And found that thing particularly terrifying.

Dalla looked at the opening in the wall, “The leprechaun. What in the devil spawn is that thing?”

“I’ve got no clue.” D shook her head and looked at Arad, “Did you figure out anything?”

“No. I had never faced such a creature before in my life. I hope we never face it here.” He looked at the crack in the wall, “A damned tree spirit that consumes people’s souls, overtake their bodies, and mold itself to resemble them, only to strike when the moment is right.”

“The problem is that we don’t know what it’s like, or how it strikes and takes over people.” Cerilla sat down and looked at the wood, “It could be fungus, a tiny bug, or a ghost for all we know.”

“It has spirit in its name, could it be a spirit like me?” Plum pointed at herself, and Arad started thinking, “That might be the case, but that would mean we can talk to it. The previous kings wouldn’t have been attacked.”

Jasmine sighed, “No use thinking about it. But with Arad traveling alone, that thing pretty much can’t do anything to us. He can see souls after all.”

“Are you sure about that?” A voice replied from beside them.

“I’m sure, it won’t slip past us,” Jasmine growled back.

“But I’ve already slipped past your defences.” The voice replied, everyone looked in its direction for a second, and then their minds wandered away, forgetting they’d ever heard anything.

The voice giggled, then went silent for a second. “Ops, bitch almost got me.” The voice could see inside their souls, and one soul was particularly hard to avoid or mess with, the accursed soul living rent-free inside Arad.

“Should I take one down?” The voice looked around, but quickly changed its mind. He’d rather not set Doma off right now.

No one knows it, but Doma is always protecting them with one curse, a curse of causality. If one of them were to be harmed or die, Doma would immediately know. But in exchange, she’ll receive a lot of damage, damage that Arad would have to endure. So Doma would stay fine, and she’ll strike the leprechaun with all of her might.