The dragon's harem

Chapter 1979: The Shrine of the Stars

Kory was the one to stare at Neptune with a puzzled face. ”So, what does it means?”

She then pointed at him. ”I know, with magic or senses, you can tell that you and Gojo are brothers. But I can assure you of one thing, if we were to test your flesh, each of you would be a different kind of void dragons, maybe even as different as dark elves are from the high elves and wood elves.”

”I’ll give you another example.” Neptune smiled, ”Kali’s mother died giving birth to her, and her father Asura got weakened so much when transforming the power of destruction to her that he was killed by a god called Talos.” She pointed at him, ”She isn’t an Asura demon, she is a Brahman Deva. A creature that belongs to ultimate reality of the universe.”

”So, we’re similar.” Arad mumbled for a moment, and Neptune blinked, ”Similar in what?”

In reality, Arad had realized something important about himself. He has four souls now. Human, draconic, Nymph, and AO’s soul. The human soul is related to father, but not his mother. The same for his draconic soul which is related just to his mother. Yet Arad himself, the soul that keeps him alive is AO’s soul.

Arad suddenly looked up. ”Merlin, can you try sealing all of my power like you did before? Use the Labyrinth and try to seal everything.”

After a few seconds of silence, Arad felt the Labyrinth’s tendrils closing on his body and soul, trying to lock away all of his power, but then, what he presented forward was AO’s soul, not his other ones.

[... Yeah, it shouldn’t be doing...ah fuck!]

Arad laughed, ”Don’t worry, I just learned a trick to solidify my soul. I was trying to think of a way to prevent someone like Entropy from sealing my power as she did before, but this still needs some work.”

Arad laughed, ”I’ll make it up to you later. Sorry for the surprise.”

As Merlin went back to her work, Arad looked at Neptune with a smile. ”So, let’s put that matter aside. Tell me more about this place, this shrine, and how it works.”

”The labyrinth is inside my stomach, so my soul should look a bit bigger for you here.” Arad brushed it off and quickly changed the subject as he pointed across the room. ”Now, is that the heart of the shrine?”

She looked at him, and then at Kory, ”Shall we go?”

^She seems nervous and worried as well.^ Arad replied, ^I bet she also want us to just focus on the shrine and not ask too many questions unrelated to it.^

If he reacted positively, then Amaterasu can claim sending Neptune for that and get closer to him, but if AO reacted negatively and killed Neptune, then Amaterasu would’ve just lost a single angel, and could claim countless reasons and wipe her hands clean.

As they climbed the stairs, they finally reached the room. Inside, they found an offering box with two massive bells above it, a small cabinet behind with something enshrined inside, and the pillar seemed to have branched into countless smaller pillars that surrounded the offering box, supported the bells, and connected to the roof.

Neptune approached, ”If you want extra power, throw an offering into the box, state what you want as a prayer, and then ring the bells. The bells’ job is to forward the request directly into Amaterasu instead of going through her archons.”

”Do as you wish. Amaterasu said that you’re free to use anything and anyone in the shrine, however you see fit. So I guess that is included as well.”

”What... divine treasures?” As she cried, Arad looked back at her, ”Do you know what those are?”

”Mummified mortal shell?” Arad lifted an eyebrow, and Neptune had to scream. ”Yes! When AO created the stars, that was the first star born, and Amaterasu’s first body. But now that she had grown stronger and older, she had long since discarded it.”

”Even so... Three divine treasures are too much. Usually, a thousand archons would be stationed to guard each, and I’m pretty sure the mummified body was being protected at her inner palace by over a million archons; more than a quarter of her entire army just sat there protecting her dead body.”

It was then that news reached Arad. Amaterasu had left the church and headed for the frontlines of the war.