The dragon's harem

Chapter 1451: The Spider and Rot

Cerilla and Jasmine came out first, followed by Grace, Merida, Dalla, and D. Plum was the last to show up, and she landed right on Arad’s head as she did before. For a second, she froze in place, sniffing the air. ”Smells like blood.”

Plum looked around, noticing the terrified face on everyone except Mathilde in the back, and she looked down at Arad below her.

Arad usually healed in seconds after getting hurt and never needed to carry his wounds for long, but now, he was still wounded. Sitting like a bear, while his torso and legs were all slashed to the bone, dripping blood as he bandaged them. With one glance, she could count more than thirty gaping gashes on his arm alone.

Seeing Arad wounded like that reminded her of the time when Mary told her about how she met Arad in the wild lands of Yog’s world. He was severely injured with a massive hole in his chest, and still boxed a bear. She doubts Mary had seen that, but apparently it was the story the adventurers who met him told her.

If a human showed with as many wounds as Arad now had, they would’ve been long dead from blood loss.

”What did happen?!” Plum gasped and flew down, looking at Arad’s face, his massive chest, and wide shoulders. ”It looks like you’ve been mauled by a bear!”

”I’ll be fine. The wounds inflicted by the threads of space are hard to heal because of their nature. The spot itself is unstable, and it’ll take a while to stabilize.” He reached into one of his wounds with a finger, and the tip of his finger got cut.

Merida approached, looked at his wounds, and then looked back at Cerilla. ”You’re the warlock of Sylph, can’t you cast any healing magic?”

Cerilla looked at Arad’s wounds, wondering why he didn’t heal himself with Kali’s divine magic.

”Arad.” Cerilla approached, ”Did you try Kali’s divine magic?”

Arad nodded, ”Nothing works for now. I can heal a wound or two, but it’ll waste a lot of energy and blood. I’d better wait for a while so those spots stabilize before healing them.” He pulled a large backpack from his stomach and put it on the floor. ”It’s been a while, but I could do with bandaging those wounds better.”

The bandages he had already pulled before were all out, soaked in blood.

”I’ll help.” Merida picked the bandages, and so did everyone else. Plum even formed a brace and looked at Arad, ”Having any broken limbs?”

Arad chuckled, ”No, my bones are durable. I drink enough milk.”

Merida immediately grabbed one of his nerves and pulled on it, causing him to flinch. ”Aella said to smack you on the head. But this should be enough.”

Plum laughed a bit, flew around, and then pulled a large bouquet of flowers and herbs, created a mortar and pestle from wood, and started crushing them into paste while humming.

After she finished crushing everyone, she waved her fingers and created a wicker basket, one that she then used to drain the oils from the crushed herbs and fill a wooden bucket that was almost as big as her.

”Use this on him.” She approached Cerilla, ”A herbal oil, it should keep his wounds clean, drive away bugs, and protect the bandages from moisture and the wind.”

As the girls bandaged Arad, Mathilde sat down and looked around. Arad had managed to get them away from the shattering space; he carved his own path through the deadly threads of space and survived. No normal dragon could’ve done such a thing.

She had tried to measure his strength before, but she seemed to have missed the point. Arad wasn’t all powerful; he had many strengths, but many more weaknesses as well. He might’ve lost to her, but when facing the space disaster they just met, he did a far better job, and if they were both asked to survive there, Arad would’ve lived, and she would’ve died.

But at that moment, she lifted her head and looked back. A massive spider that could topple mountains approached.

Thanks to Arad’s last move, they had flown far above the area that Arad had cleared before, and monsters were now a threat again. That spider, especially, was a pain to deal with.

Judging by size, shape, and marking, it was a tarantula, a bird hunter. This monster built massive nets to catch the bald eagles Arad had killed before.

”It’s a mother tarantula, stay back. I’ll deal with it.” Mathilde stood. The mother tarantulas were known for being malevolent, powerful creatures. They won’t listen to her threats, so she must kill them.

But at that moment, Mathilde froze; something felt off, very off. An ocean of bloodlust flew past her, almost cracking the branch they stood on. She looked back and saw Merida glaring at the spider, her sword drawn, and Arad sitting behind her.

It was a clear threat to the spider, and Mathilde felt it better than anyone. Merida wasn’t joking, and she was ready to protect Arad.

Of course, Merida lacked the power to scare the titanic spider; in fact, Mathilde could bet that the spider didn’t even flinch at her blood lust.

But that was a mistake, even Mathilde missed it. Merida rarely threatened anything; she always acted first. The branch they stood on started cracking, and crimson mushrooms bloomed, radiating demonic magic. The sky burned red and green, and the spider froze in place.

Merida pointed her sword at the spider and growled, ”Now, Rot!”

It was just then that Mathilde realised the horror of Merida’s power. That wave earlier wasn’t bloodlust, but demonic magic, the spores of her fungus spreading forward, taking root in the branches and the spider’s harrowing body.

Now, they started to rapidly multiply, infecting both the living and the dead, eating them from the inside out. Spiders don’t have lungs to breathe from, just tubes that passively filter air, meaning they could even hold their breath if they wanted.

The mother spider was dead before it could attack, resting on the branch with fungus blooming all over its massive body. Then, something harrowing happened. The corpse moved, coming back to life as a zombie controlled by the demonic fungus.

But what terrified Mathilde more wasn’t that the spider got infected and died. That was only a matter of time, and Merida was a demon lord after all. What horrified her to the bones is that the fungus infected the branches of the World Tree and ate them from the inside out.

”Kill anything that gets close, bug.” Merida returned to bandaging Arad’s wounds as the harrowing, zombified spider started patrolling the area.