Born as a Phantasmal Species, the massive dragon that had taken root on the leyline of Colchis Island might have been easily shattered, bones broken and tendons torn, by Alaric's enhanced "Almighty Push," yet its formidable regenerative powers still allowed it to recover after some time.
However, Alaric was no frail man like Uzumaki Nagato.
He was a legendary time-space dragon, and this was the Nasuverse, a world where he could fully harness the power of the Root, the very ether that flowed through the world itself.
Techniques like "Almighty Push" and "Universal Pull" might have left Nagato exhausted after only a few uses, but for Alaric, tossing them out ten times in a row was hardly worth mentioning.
And so, the dragon's misery began.
No sooner had the wounds from the previous Almighty Push healed than it was caught in another Universal Pull, pulled straight toward Alaric.
The dragon had thought to seize this chance, to close in and strike the time-space dragon while within reach, but before it could get close, another Almighty Push hurled it away.
The inertia of Universal Pull, layered with the repulsive force of Almighty Push, nearly crushed the dragon under the overlapping gravitational waves.
In the end, it was Almighty Push that sent it flying once more, battering its body with fresh injuries.
And so the cycle repeated.
From afar, Pandora stared blankly at the sight before her, no, at the time-space dragon, manipulating gravity and space with effortless cruelty.
The dragon itself hadn't moved from its spot, yet the emerald-scaled giant was toyed with as though it were a mere ball: pulled close, swatted away like in a game of baseball, pulled close again, hurled away, over and over without end.
This was a dragon, one of the apex Phantasmal Species, its body powerful, its resistance to magic formidable.
Even Pandora, who wielded mighty evocation magic, would have had to struggle to defeat it.
Yet Alaric toyed with this monster as if it were nothing, leaving it utterly powerless.
As expected, her man was terrifying.
After being ravaged by "Universal Pull" and "Almighty Push" seven or eight times, the dragon could endure no longer.
No matter how great its regenerative power, it could not withstand such endless torment.
Covered in wounds, it finally collapsed onto the ground like a whimpering dog, pitiful cries rising from its throat as it offered its submission to Alaric.
Seeing the dragon at last bow its head, Alaric nodded in satisfaction and returned to his human form.
He had not yet tested the time-space dragon's ability to manipulate time, but that was hardly urgent, there would be other chances.
Then, Alaric walked toward the dragon.
The closer he drew, the more violently the creature trembled, even trying to retreat to put distance between them.
Though it could not understand how a time-space dragon had turned into a man, it well remembered that it was this very human who had transformed into the terrifying dragon earlier.
To the beast, this small human was now the embodiment of a devil.
Oh, but devils it did not fear.
Still, it dared not approach him, terrified he would unleash yet another "Almighty Push" the moment it drew near.
"Stay right where you are!"
At Alaric's thunderous command, the dragon froze in place, shivering.
This was one of the many offspring of Typhon, progenitor of all monsters, and the serpent Echidna.
Its intellect was not particularly high, but it was more than capable of understanding speech.
So Alaric stepped forward and laid a hand on its rough-scaled snout, assuring it that he would torment it no further.
Sensing his intent, the dragon responded with something like relief, releasing a rumbling croon, even nudging him gently in a show of goodwill.
Its reaction, so much like Stockholm syndrome, made Alaric chuckle.
As expected, to deal with such a creature, one had to beat it into submission before taming it.
Thus, Alaric naturally established a master-servant contract with the dragon.
The terms were simple: the dragon would serve Alaric, while Alaric in turn would grant it protection and allow it to remain on Colchis Island, sustained by the leyline's energy.
With that, the guardian beast of the magic academy was secured.
With the dragon subdued, Alaric and Pandora set about constructing their academy.
Of course, neither of them was foolish enough to start building by hand.
Even with magic, constructing such a vast institution was not something worth wasting their own time on.
Their first task was to prepare a workforce.
Naturally, they had no intention of recruiting ordinary villagers.
To them, common folk were weak, unskilled, incapable of endless labor, and prone to accidents, a poor choice for laborers.
If this were the world of Warcraft, Alaric would have summoned earth elementals to do the work, or like the mages of Dalaran, created elemental constructs to serve.
But this was the Nasuverse, not Azeroth.
Here, there was no Elemental Plane bound to the Material Plane, no naturally born elementals as in Warcraft, though there were countless nature spirits and mountain gods, Alaric could not command them.
Had it been earlier in his journey, this might have troubled him.
But now, why else had he researched the creation of energy-materialized lifeforms?
Soul materialization was the art of using a soul's perpetual energy to shape a perfect body.
As its lesser derivative, the creation of energy-materialized lifeforms lacked perpetual energy.
But in exchange, the body could be arbitrarily shaped, and intelligence could be granted without the use of a soul, only through certain spells that bestowed artificial personalities.
Such personality-granting spells were to true souls what basic AI was to true artificial intelligence.
And these spells existed in every magical world.
In the Harry Potter world, for example, alchemy created countless "living" magical objects. In Warcraft, there were spells to animate weapons and tools.
Though they did not create true life, the personalities they produced carried enough potential.
With sufficient interaction and care from their master, these personalities could even evolve into true lifeforms, the awakening of a weapon's spirit being a prime example.
Once they had chosen the site for the academy, Alaric and Pandora moved their "home" from the remodeled cave to the area, then began programming the core codes for their new "workers."
Next came the infusion of artificial personalities, followed by the casting of the energy-materialization spell.
And just like that, the workers were created, mass-produced as easily as one might manufacture robots.
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