The dragon's harem

Gojo could feel it creeping into his mind, the Ice Brood Mother’s insidious will, beckoning him to give up, surrender, and become her obedient slave. This was the call of the Brood, the Queen’s orders, and the way she dominates the swarms of briders and monsters.

The clash of magic taking place in the real world was nothing more than an outer shell of the real war, the tug of war between Gojo and the Ice Brood Mother. Each of them pulled on the strings of the other’s mind, trying to slip in and take hold like an incurable disease.

Any regular being would’ve been brainwashed and dominated ages ago. Just getting close to the forest without ample mental protections was deadly, and by the time Arad and Gojo heard the Ice Brood Mother’s voice first, they should’ve already been enslaved.

The Ice Brood’s survival tactic was simple. The Queen will always try to spread her will, and those who fall for it are enslaved, forced to approach the forest, and then promptly eaten.

Those who manage to resist the Queen’s will, though, are usually chased, captured, and brought to her. She would then decide whether to eat or breed with them to create more of her kind.

But there was a third option, a harrowing one. If the prey happened to be large enough, the Queen might choose to use them as a live nest for eggs and lay her brood inside their bodies, so the larva can eat them from the inside out, while they are still paralyzed, and conscious.

So now that the Queen has all of her mental capacity focused on Gojo alone, it is quickly becoming harder and harder to resist her brainwashing.

In his mind, she took several shapes, trying to trick him every way possible. Lucy being in harm’s way, Liliana’s demonic beauty, his kingdom’s fragile state, and Yog’s unfathomable library of knowledge. Knowing that all of that was a mere illusion didn’t help, as it all felt too real to be fake.

All he could do was ignore and keep focusing on his magic.

At one moment, Gojo was at the Ice Brood Mother’s feet, begging and kissing her feet. Then, in the next moment, she was getting shunted away, kicked, and slapped out of his mind with an iron will. His blue eyes were glaring right back at her, hidden away behind a smile, and endless waves of sapphire magic.

The Ice Brood Mother was both baffled and amazed. Gojo didn’t just reject her mind control, but actively fought back and tried to brainwash her instead. His wish jolted her right back, spreading through her mind, conjuring countless illusions and emotions that shouldn’t exist.

What was more horrifying about him wasn’t that he tried to fight her on the same ground, but that he was improving with each attempt. Unlike her, who used an innate ability, he was a mage, a wizard, a man who bent mana to his will and could create spells to suit his needs.

Gojo didn’t stop at trying to brainwash her, but threw in several other annoying spells in the mix. Ones that taunt, induce fear, lust, confusion, pain, or straight-up spells that made her sleepy.

The war of minds between them was still far away from its end, and it was the same outside; their clash grew fiercer. Gojo wanted to maim her hard enough to weaken her mind, and she was getting sick of him and wanted him dead.

At first, she entertained the idea of keeping him alive for years to breed with him thanks to his strength. But now, she already given up on that. He was too dangerous to keep around, and even knowing that her brood would become far stronger magically if she used Gojo, it was still not worth the risk.

She’ll kill him. No, she will paralyze him, breed with him once, then kill and eat him. That was a good plan. Fight him until he gets exhausted, then strike. Simple, but effective.

To achieve her desired result, she increased her output far beyond what she used before, and Gojo started using the residual lightning from his movement spell to break down her ice into oxygen and hydrogen, then blow them up in her face.

It was both strange, terrifying, and unbelievable. She tried to hit him hard, but he ended up hitting her right back, and even harder than before. Where did he get those flames from? She was certain that they were ice before, but right now, she had neither the intelligence, mental capacity, nor time to think it over.

But at that point, the clash between them seemed to have reached a stalemate. Gojo couldn’t break through her defences, and she couldn’t catch him. Neither of them could take hold of the battlefield and dominate, and that was bad for Gojo, whose lungs weren’t going to endure any more abuse.

He had to come up with something to break that balance, and he had just the trick. Using his own ice magic, he started trying to interfere with her ice magic. The Ice Brood Mother didn’t seem to understand why it suddenly became harder to use her magic, but she still kept pumping spells out.

At this level, Gojo was already operating at 100% of his mental power, finding it almost impossible to focus or think about anything else besides what he was already doing.

His mind was in pain, and so was his body. Both burned like fire, and his lungs hurt the most. His limits were already calling him, and he knew he wouldn’t be surviving for long fighting like this. He had to come up with something, and quickly.

Dodging the Ice Brood Mother’s black threads, poisonous fangs, and rain of ice spears, he circled around her, thinking of doing something a bit stupid.

“I guess you were right. Vars, let’s play a bit unfairly.”

At that moment, the battle changed, and the shift happened too quickly to be stopped. Gojo reached his limit, the Ice Brood Mother got the advantage, and everything turned for the worse. Gojo’s plan was insane, crazy, and a deadly gamble no sane person would take. But the best people are crazy.

Standing atop the Ice Brood Mother’s net, Death herself stared down, her purple eyes fixed on Gojo and the Queen’s battle. She frowned and then sighed. “The same magic.”