The dragon's harem

They returned to the cave, all three of them. Arad, Gojo, and Ice Brood Mother, now called Crawler by Gojo.

While they walked into the cave, Crawler’s brider guards split into two groups. One stood guard at the entrance, while the other half spread through the area to hunt for food. Their queen was starved and famished, so it was their job to feed her.

As much as Gojo didn’t like having more uncontrolled monsters around, the Yetis on their own were enough of a worry, he was glad that they won’t need to go out and hunt to feed Crawler.

Right now, the only somewhat safe brider was Crawler herself, and so, everyone else had to stay out of the cave where the vulnerable Liliana and Haru were. While Arad and Gojo could easily survive an attack from Crawler or almost any monster around, Haru and Liliana were fragile enough to die quickly, which was strange, considering that Liliana was the second strongest person physically here after Arad, thanks to her demonic blood.

Walking into the cave, Liliana rushed in to check on Gojo, and Haru remained in her place beside the fire. “Bring them to me. I’ll do a better job healing them than Arad.”

Haru didn’t mean it in an insulting way, but just stated the literal facts. A paladin can never be as good a healer as a cleric, simply because their roles weren’t the same. Paladins were fighters, so their healing abilities worked best on themselves; so, they weren’t good at healing others. Clerics, on the other hand, can barely heal themselves but are good at healing others.

Which only made the fact that Lydia was a better healer than any cleric they ever seen even crazier. How did she even get entangled with Amaterasu to get such power?

Liliana and Haru worked together to get Gojo patched up nicely, and the two of them never expected the extent of injuries he suffered. It was something that would be extreme even for Arad, let alone the much squishier Gojo. It was a miracle he was even alive.

But thinking about it, it might not be a miracle at all. Death herself said that she won’t take their lives, so Gojo might’ve survived thanks to that, which was scary.

“You burned yourself from the inside out. How were you even able to breathe?” Liliana grabbed Gojo by the neck and shook him. “You… Your whole lung was burned to a crisp!” And that wasn’t the only damage he suffered. Many of his organs were on the verge of shutting down thanks to Crawler’s poison. Gojo didn’t tell anyone, but his heart had stopped several times, and he was forced to keep it beating with necrotic magic so his brain wouldn’t die.

“You’re over exaggerating. It wasn’t my whole lung, but 90% of it. I left some space for me to breathe, albeit at that capacity, I can’t really run or live for long.” Gojo smiled, then gave Arad a thumb-up. “He patched me well enough to survive.”

Liliana sighed and let Gojo go, then turned her attention toward Crawler… “Now, you…” She growled. This spider was the one behind all of Gojo’s ghastly injuries, and Liliana wasn’t going to take that silently. If she didn’t think Gojo had a plan for Crawler, she would’ve already attacked her.

Gojo tapped her on the shoulder, “Calm down. We need her.”

She sighed and looked at him. “Enlighten me.”

“Honestly, she won’t be useful in this world. But we need her back in the mortal world.” He sat down beside the fire to warm his cold bones. “Briders are rare, almost extinct, and as savage as any other monster. But with her, we can tame them.” He smiled. “Just think of that, they can travel the snowy lands with ease, so we could use them as mounts, mules, or even rescue soldiers. Even if a man was ten meters deep in the snow, a brider would smell and dig them out with ease.”

Gojo didn’t need Crawler herself, but her authority as an Ice Brood Mother. Even here, Gojo was thinking of his kingdom first, and even knocking on death’s door to make sure other commoners won’t die buried in the snow there.

This was the Gojo she loved and respected, and so, she had to bear with Crawler being around for a while longer. And to achieve that, Liliana had to think of a way to use her as well.

Liliana looked at him with a smile. “Ah, yeah. I see. But I had some not-so-fun plans for her here in this sad and frozen world.” She grabbed them both and dragged them to their private section of the cave. “Arad, Haru, take care. See you in the morning.”

Liliana closed everything after them and then glared at Gojo and Crawler. “Now… You’re going to help me a lot.” She reached into her bag and pulled out a few sticks and several empty leather jugs.

Gojo stared at her. “What are you about?”

Liliana pointed at Crawler. “Of course… I’m going to extract silk and poison from her to use in my traps. I already made enough tools with the brider materials, but she is of a higher calibre. An upgrade before I could even use what I made.”

Liliana then looked at Crawler with a smile. “Now, say AHHH. We’ll start with the poison.” The process was the same as extracting poison from a snake. She just had her bite the leather jugs and fill them with poison, one after another. Liliana soon found herself now sitting on a trove of deadly poison.

She wasn’t an alchemist, but she knew enough about poisons to tell that Crawler’s poison was unique in its own way. The Ice Brood Mother could change the composition of her poison based on her need. She had digestive poison that could melt the organs of her prey, so she could suck them like a smoothie. She had her harrowing neurotoxin that could flatline anyone in seconds, and even had a diluted version that could paralyze people.

But what interested Liliana was that the poison could also numb pain. That would be extremely helpful for soldiers on the front lines who need to sew their wounds shut with needles. It would also help adventurers a lot. They could sell it as a painkiller, and she wasn’t going to waste such an opportunity.

Crawler was going to be a Golden Goose for them if they treat her well.

“Now…” Liliana stared at Crawler with a smug grin, “Give me some silk.”