Ruin lay all around them.
Two beasts, both abominable in power and appearance, were wounded to the point of near death.
But there was one standing above the other.
A large black dragon that seemed to have multiple heads in origin, but a few seemed to have been ripped or bitten off.
There were an egregious number of holes in his chest and torso, and even one of his arms was missing.
But he had done it.
The wounded dragon let out a single, defining roar that traveled through even parallel universes.
His greatest victory achieved, the creature finally plunged it's remaining heads into it's fallen enemy's chest, swallowing it's heart and obliterating it's soul from existence.
But the being's memories and knowledge were absorbed by the dragon.
There was so much hatred and insanity, but beneath that mess there was knowledge.
So much knowledge that it made the victorious dragon's head spin.
Things began to make sense...he began to learn all that was being kept from him.
He wasn't a god at all...
But something much, much greater.
He held out his remaining arm and created two, distinct energies.
One was heavenly, magical, and full of life.
The other was dark, sinister, and overflowed with permanent, transcendent, death. The end of all things.
He tried to fuse the two energies together.
To create something that was all his own, and could be a haven and paradise for his people, his parents, his sisters, his children, and his darling wives.
The two energies started to fuse together with great difficulty.
They started to form something in their swirling midst.
Something both good and bad.
Euphoric and detrimental.
Yin and Yang.
Soulful and Soulless.
Existence.
Just as a second 'Big Bang' was about to come into bloom, the dragon vanished like he was never there.
There were no traces of him, no remains of his body or powers, he was just gone.
Completely, and totally, gone.
-
"NOOOO!!!!"
Lailah woke up screaming bloody murder.
Her entire body was wracked with sweat, and there was a deluge of tears flowing from her eyes.
Needless to say, she woke up everyone who shared a bed with her.
Abaddon sat up instantly without even knowing what was happening.
He required but a few nano seconds of observation before he flung his arms around Lailah in an attempt to stop her from seizing.
"Lailah, stop!"
Unfortunately, she had a lot to say that didn't all make sense.
"You bastard! You left me! How could you leave me!? I needed you!"
It was easy to tell that the magic goddess wasn't in her right mind, as she was continually thrashing about while she continued to scream.
Audrina: "Sister, stop!"
Lillian: "What has gotten into you??"
Tatiana: "None of us have gone anywhere, please calm down!"
Even the pleading and sobbing of the other wives could not fully bring Lailah back to herself, and it left the family with no other options.
Abaddon simply held Lailah firmly in place and spoke to her calmly, over and over without end.
He told her how much he loved her.
He did it so many times that he ended up getting tongue tied more than once.
He gently ran his fingers through her hair in the way that she liked, and made sure that he held her firmly, but not hard enough to cause bruising or discomfort.
Pushing her hair to one side, he gave her a series of small, delicate kisses on the nape of her neck.
At some point, Lailah was able to come back to normal and she regained clarity in her eyes.
All that it took was her seeing the crying faces of the disrobed women around her for the embarrassment to set in.
"Ah... S-Sorry..?"
Immediately, their faces cracked into small, happy smiles.
"What are you apologizing for, love? None of us are upset with you."
Abaddon delicately wiped away any lingering tears as he tried to get her emotional wellbeing in check.
"You gave us all quite the scare though… You want to tell me what that was?"
Lailah opened her mouth to give a full, truthful explanation without holding anything back, but at the last moment she just ended up blurting out a lie.
"It was… just a nightmare."
She felt sick as soon as she said it.
She wasn't the kind of woman who lied to her husband.
On the contrary, she told him everything.
Which foods bothered her stomach the most, the books that she was reading currently, even every random thought or calculation that popped up in her mind throughout the day.
Having to lie to him truly killed her inside.
Abaddon knew that his wife wasn't being fully honest with him, but he had no idea why.
His eyes narrowed as he went to question her once again, but she straddled him before he could ask anything else.
"No… I'm not being honest with you. And I know that you know that. But I need you to just keep trusting in me…"
"Lailah, I-"
"P-Please…!" She begged.
Abaddon could see that she was on the verge of breaking down again, so he quickly softened his demeanor as cupped her face in his hands.
"Lailah, listen to me, my love. I have never once been the kind of man who is content to leave heavy lifting to any of you. If something is going on, then I need to know as well."
"I-I know that you aren't, but trust me when I say that I wouldnt keep anything from you if I were not absolutely certain that something terrible would happen if I didn't!"
"Terrible like my leaving? Is this why you cried for me as if I was not here?"
Lailah did not answer, but she wrapped her arms around her husband's neck and began to hold him tighter as she rested her head on his shoulder.
"Please, dear… I beg you to just trust me."
Abaddon said nothing as he held on to Lailah like his very life depended on it.
He glanced at the women filling his bed and hoped that they would yield some sort of explanation.
Unfortunately for him, they were all giving him the same tired, regrettable looks.
It was at this moment that he realized that they were all in on it.
He could question them all until the sun came up, but he knew for certain that they would not divulge any sort of information to him.
As he thought about this, he suddenly felt Lailah move within his grasp again.
His first wife usually slept in a black lace nightie if she slept in anything at all.
She currently was reaching behind her back to remove the thin piece of fabric and letting it fall into the bed.
"Lailah..?"
"I dont want this to be our first memory of our wedding day… s-so can you please… hold me so I don't feel like I've ruined everything..?"
In an instant, Abaddon was mentally transported back to a little over a year ago.
It was his first day in a new world, and he was nothing but a wide-eyed young prince who was still trying to wrap his head around everything.
After Bekka had attacked him and confirmed what he'd always known about assertive women being superior, Lailah came into his room with an egregiously thick robe and next to nothing underneath.
Nervously, she asked him to take her.
And even a virgin like him who was seconds away from bursting his first nut that wouldn't end up in his palm, knew that it wasn't the right thing to do.
It was then that he learned about his first wife's tendency for self sacrifice.
And he promised himself then and there, that he would never let her feel like she had to.
As she asked, he would trust her.
And he wouldn't lay with her, not like this.
So he needed something else to take her mind off of everything that had just happened.
"…Actually, I'm kinda hungry. You hungry, babe?"
"I… what?"
"I know we're going to be eating cake later, but I kind of want something sweet right now. Are you interested?"
Lailah's stomach immediately betrayed her and grumbled audibly.
"I-I guess I could eat a little something…"
"What are you hiding in the secret stash you keep from the kids?" Abaddon started to re-dress Lailah and lifted the two of them out of bed together.
The rest of the wives watched Abaddon pull some sweatpants on before carrying her towards the door.
Abaddon looked back and smiled at them all lovingly. "Are you all coming with us? We'd certainly enjoy the company."
The wives quietly looked amongst each other and thought about it before coming to a decision.
Most decided to go back to bed, but Bekka and Lisa understandably decided to follow behind them out of their bedroom.
As the original group of four walked through the dark hallway of their home, Lailah bit her husband hard on his left trap.
"What's that for?" He asked with a laugh.
Still feeling embarrassed, Lailah rested her head on his shoulder.
"Don't think I don't know what you're doing.…"
"Hm? I have absolutely no idea what you are talking about. All powerful dragons of destruction get hungry too, Y'know?"
Lisa and Bekka giggled cutely at his side while Lailah only smiled softly.
"Honestly… why do you have to be so… considerate.."
Finally, the group arrived in the dining room and realized that they weren't the only late night snackers.
Little Mira and her oldest brother Apophis were already in attendance; facedown on the wooden table and reeling from a case of the sugar dizzies.
Sitting between them was an empty pan of what Lailah knew to be her cinnamon roll casserole, which she had hidden with magic in the back of the fridge.
But apparently, that was not enough to protect it from her ravenous children.
"NOOOOOOOO!!!!!"
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