The huge demonic core glowed with power. Behind it, thick glass tubes fed it an odd, green metallic substance that bubbled in viscous, sloshing movements. The Green. It used to be the most valuable thing in the known universe, and something that kept me awake at night. Now, it was barely an afterthought.
"It's useless," grumbled Vespera.
The demon woman was on her tiptoes, reaching up towards the ceiling of the underground room while glowing forcefields made of radiant light, made of gold and azure magic, kept her from losing her balance.
She was holding a thick set of chains tightly, while I swung a massive sword at them. The link I was trying to break glowed red with heat and magic, and the sword was coated in silver fire. Despite our best efforts, however, all we could achieve was barely a dent in the metal, and then the magic dissipated. The silver fire turned grey and dull before evaporating, and the metal cooled down and repaired itself quicker than I could blink.
"See?" Vespera said snappily. "Sol, we gotta find another way."
Elyra dismissed her shields and shook her head. "I disagree," she said. "He was actually causing some damage to the chain. It is the Nephilim state that ran out."
Nephilim state, I thought. The girls, Elyra in particular, insisted on calling that way the strange state I reached when merging their magics with mine, while also using [Aspect Manifestation].
"All we need to do is figure out how to merge our magics for longer," she added.
The demon shrugged and retreated. Zery, the dragon captive, watched her go for a moment before stretching her neck.
"Unfortunate," she said, moaning when one of the joints popped in just the right way.
"We'll try again," I said. "I just need to hold the transformation for longer."
"Don't strain yourself for me," she replied. "I can see you are fatigued."
Vespera laughed. "Trying to make Sol stop? Now that's useless. He's not going to quit, you know?"
The dragon smiled.
"And something tells me you like it," the demon added as she went to fetch something from the backpack. She smiled when she saw all the stuff I bought back in the city, most of it food.
"Who wouldn't?" Zery asked. "Truthfully, I am rather sick of these chains holding me captive. So what if a handsome man and two pretty women want to free me from my bindings? I certainly will not complain."
"You have a point. Well, while we wait for Sol's refractory period to be over…" she said in a sultry voice. I glared at her but said nothing. "Our silly man here was thinking that the damsel in distress might be feeling hungry. Even though you clearly don't need to eat."
"I would like some food, yes," the dragon said, her voice less regal than a moment before. "The magic in the chains has been broken, and whatever kept me fed no longer works."
"Good, because he bought you all sorts of things. Let's see…"
She started to take out the items one after the other. "Sweets, cookies, cake, more sweets, cinnamon rolls, banana bread… Sol, do you want her to get diabetes? This is not proper nutrition."
I looked away when Zery turned towards me, a slight blush on both our faces. "I didn't know what she might like!" I said in my defense.
Vespera, clearly amused, shook her head. "Yeah, so let's just buy everything, right? Look at the meat! An ice-enchanted pack full of steaks, sausages, ribs, tomahawks, some of the wolf wagyu from our hunts… oh, is this a Tigerhorn tartare? Sol! I mean, Elyra and I make a mean BBQ, but this? Too much, I say. Too much."
She was having a lot of fun, I could tell. At my expense, though, which needed rectifying. I walked over, gently shoving her out of the way. "So you say, but you were with me when we went shopping."
"Was I?" she asked. "I don't recall."
"Don't you? I seem to recall a certain someone insisting we stop at the bakery. Elyra, can you confirm?"
"I confirm," the angel said.
The demon stood her ground. "Nope, wasn't me. You two must have been under the influence of something or another."
"Okay. I suppose you are not interested in the sweets at all, then, are you? Zery, do you like sugary treats?"
The dragon woman blinked. "Me? Now that I think about it, my hunger has faded. I am not sure I want to be dragged into this."
"Lies," I said. "Besides. The demon doesn't want any."
Vespera narrowed her eyes at me, and I heard a faint grumble rise from her throat. Surely I must have imagined it, just like I was imagining the feelings of danger coming from the bond I shared with her. From the other side of the bond, I felt Elyra watching us with interest and a hint of a smile.
"I do not remember the taste of sugary treats," the dragoness said, catching on. She had had time to observe our interactions and was beginning to get used to us. "I suppose I am not against trying something new. However, there is a little problem."
She wiggled her arms, and the thick chains rattled against each other.
I smiled. "Ah, well, see, we thought about it."
"Exactly!" Vespera said quickly, interrupting me. "Sol, you will have to feed her."
I paused. "Wait," I said, blinking. "That wasn't the plan."
"Sol, my love," the demon began. "How are you supposed to grow your harem if you won't make her fall in love with you?"
"What?" I asked.
"And to do that, you need to be the one feeding her sugary treats, get it?"
I looked at her. "You're having fun, aren't you?"
"Well, you were having fun throwing me under the bus, outing me as the sweet-treats buyer in front of Zery! You should have let me throw YOU under the bus and said nothing like a true gentleman."
"Ah, so that's what this is about!" I retorted. "Might it be that you care about—Elyra?"
While we bickered, the angel had walked over where we had arrayed all of the treats on a cloth on the floor, and was pointing at each one while watching Zery's reaction.
"That one," the dragon said. "It looks interesting."
Smiling, Elyra picked it up and strolled over to her. She smirked at us, leaving both Vespera and me rather stunned. When the demon finally managed to stammer something out, she simply shrugged.
"I suppose I will have to… take one for the team, since you two were too distracted to realize that you were completely ignoring Zery here. That is not how one goes about adding girls to a harem, I will have you know."
Despite her words, there was no denying the furious blush on her cheeks when she finally stopped in front of the tall woman with the sweet roll in her hands. She fidgeted for a moment, unsure how to proceed. Zery was kneeling on the ground, but she was so tall that her head was a bit further up than Elyra's face, even though she was the one standing.
"As the two bickering lovebirds said," Zery smirked. "You will have to feed me, little angel."
The nickname made her blush even harder. Meanwhile, the dragon enjoyed the power reversal and simply opened her mouth, revealing her sharp teeth and her long, bifurcated tongue. She watched Elyra and then us, exhaling ever so slightly so that her breath tickled at the angel's skin and made her shiver in place.
"She didn't need to open so wide," Vespera whispered through the bond.
Elyra was squirming. She was forcing herself not to close her eyes or avert her gaze, instead staring down Zery's open mouth. Her hand inched up, glacially, delicately depositing the sweet roll inside the dragon's mouth.
"She knows of our bond," I whispered back. Elyra let go of the pastry, but her hand lingered. "She knows we can see and feel everything."
A shiver was running through the poor angel's body. The moment her hand retreated, the dragon snapped her mouth shut.
"Roar," she said cutely, chewing twice and then swallowing the pastry whole. "Beware, little angel. I am dangerous. I suppose it can serve as an appetizer for what's to come once Sol finally conquers me, what do you say?"
She looked at me again, grinning.
"I…" Elyra stammered.
"Worry not, I am already head over heels for you. It's the other two"—Zery looked in our direction—"that have yet to woo me."
"M-me?" the angel asked.
"You are just too precious and cute. But also not the prize I am after," the dragon said, looking at me.
I looked at her. Then my eyes were drawn by the sight of a single crumb of crust at the corner of her mouth. Following my gaze, she realized she was dirty and blushed, looking away and turning her head. Even though I could see her tongue darting out to remove the offending crumble through Elyra's eyes, Zery was making sure I couldn't see it through my own. After she was done, she went back to staring at me, but her confident grin was gone. She looked vulnerable, self-conscious.
"You're cute when you are flustered," I blurted out, and she blushed even harder. Then, with more confidence, I added, "I like how different your two sides are, and how quickly you switch from one to the other."
That shook Vespera out of her daze. "Too much unexpected stuff," she said, blinking as if to reboot her brain. "But then again, silly me for expecting anything else from a situation like this."
I had to agree. "Sure," I said. "But let's own it, now. Zery clearly enjoyed it, and I think a single tiny pastry only left her wanting for more, didn't it?"
"I mean, it surely did," Vespera said. "She's so big and muscular and tall, it's like if you were to eat a single cookie while being denied the full jar. Would that be enough to sate hunger that's been brewing for millennia?"
"I… could eat more, yes," the dragon said timidly. "Can… Sol… feed me next? And can someone explain to me what it means to throw someone under a… bus?"
We looked at each other. Elyra was still beet red, while Vespera was grinning. Through the bond, I felt her amusement and echoed it with my own. It looked like our mighty dragon had exhausted all her bravado teasing us earlier.
She had no idea, the three of us thought. She really had no idea how much teasing we could dish out. What she said earlier? Cute and hot, Vespera supplied, but also not even close to a normal teasing session between us.
"Of course," I told the dragon while Elyra began to explain Earth idioms to her. "What would you like to taste?"
Zery's gaze lingered on me for a moment. Her eyes went down towards my pants, then she looked away and at the stuff on the ground, a deep crimson coloring her aquamarine scales.
"See?"Vespera sent through the bond, making it known that she too was looking at the same area of my body. "She is no match for us."
"I suppose she did watch us… do it… right in front of her," Elyra supplied. She was red in the face, but through the bond she added: "yet another reversal. I am liking these strange dynamics."
"Angel!" the demon said, pretending to be surprised. "Look at you, how bold. Ah, never mind," she looked at her. "You just refreshed your status effect: crimson blush of little shy, embarrassed angel. So cute."
After teasing Zery a bit more, we moved from the sweets to the meats, and things became much more professional.
"We got carried away," I said. "I apologize if we made you uncomfortable, Zery."
Her eyes shone gold in the faint electrical light of the room. We had fed monster cores to the demonic battery that kept the place powered, and it was more than enough to keep the lights on at all times.
"I…" she said, pausing. "I was into it myself, but thank you for worrying, Sol. It feels very… nice, to be cared for, and even teased a little."
"Still," I said, not breaking eye contact. "Tell us if it becomes too much."
She smiled softly, but the tip of her canines poked out of her lips. She immediately realized this and covered them, but then I fed her another chunk of delightfully roasted meat.
"You don't need to hide the fact that you're a powerful, dangerous, mighty dragon from us, you know?" I said as she opened her mouth. "You might have noticed that I like women with sharp teeth."
"Yes," she said after swallowing. The change in subject allowed her to regain some composure. "And you seem to like sharp tongues as well. It takes a man of a certain caliber to appreciate these things."
She must have seen something in my expression, because her eyes turned sad.
"I am a dragon, though," she said. "I am taking humanoid form right now, but I am still a dragon. You are a human. Do I not revolt you?"
"The girls are an Angel and a Demon, and I don't know if you noticed, but I quite like them," I said.
I felt the spike of emotions through the bond. Even Vespera, for all her teasing.
"They look human enough," Zery said. "I don't. I need you to be honest with me, Sol Nightguard. Teasing about me joining your harem is one thing, but now I am being serious. Look at me, and tell me what your eyes see. Not the eyes of the demon, nor the eyes of the little angel. Your eyes, and yours only."
I shook my head slowly, walking up to her until our noses were almost touching. "You're gorgeous," I said.
Then I pulled away.
"Then why do I feel conflict within you?" she asked.
I grimaced, thinking about it for a moment. "It's all the teasing and stuff. I know the bond has changed us, changed me. I don't normally flirt with the first naked dragon lady I happen to find just because she's hot and all. Especially if she's been imprisoned for millennia and I am the first person she sees."
"He's worried about suspension bridges in Stockholm," Vespera said dismissively. "It was the same with us. See, back then I was the naked one. Elyra was clothed. Her loss. Sol's loss too. He's not lying when he says he's not one to flirt around. He was all business. Were it not for me…"
"Enough, Vespera!" I said in desperate defense.
Zery laughed. "Is this it?" Zery asked. "I feared there was more. You said it yourself, Sol. I am a powerful, dangerous, mighty dragon. My muscles are like steel, and I am twice as tall as you are. Little human, do you really think you'd be able to tease me, were I not to allow it?"
I gulped. She blushed. I looked at her. Why was she blushing?
"I hope you liked that," she said shyly. "I am still practicing. I am learning that I like to tease and be teased in equal measure. In all seriousness, though. I do not go around blushing like a virgin maiden to every male I encounter."