Parker exhaled, dragging a hand down his face before pointing at everything in the cave that wasn't nailed down.
Erebus blinked. "Take what?"
There was a pause. A deep, heavy, 'this guy didn't just say that' kind of pause. Then Ere's tail flicked, and in the blink of an eye, she was already moving. No questions. No hesitation. Just absolute servitude.
Pockets of void-black space tore open around her, swirling hungrily. She moved like a shadow, her sleek form barely making a sound as treasures, gold, weapons, and artifacts vanished into the pockets one after another. It was instant. No fumbling, no need to inspect—just gone.
She was getting fast.
The more she grew, the more she discovered more uses of her own powers and now she was using the dimension to create pockets that she could use as storage spaces and can even store living beings. Parker wasn't sure what she'd be capable of next, but he had no doubt that she was only inches away from breaking into Tier 5—just like him.
He knew she could do this, even though she hadn't told him yet.mErebus stole a glance at him mid-pocketing, narrowing her one eye.
"How long have you known?"
Parker smirked. "Longer than you, apparently. Get this Ere,. you've been with me for seven lives now so don't be surprised that I know you so much about your powers."
She grumbled something under her breath but didn't argue. Instead, she kept working—faster, sharper, cleaner. And in mere moments, the cave was empty.
Only three eggs remained.
Erebus approached, her ears twitching, and opened another pocket. This one wasn't just space—it was different. Deeper. Meant for living things. Parker stepped closer, watching as the eggs slowly slipped inside, vanishing into the void like they had never existed in the first place.
And when it was done?
Parker stretched, rolled his neck, and smirked.
It was time for the outside world to meet its troublemakers.
The moment Parker and Erebus vanished—the cave knew. Like a dying beast taking its final, rattling breath, the entire structure shuddered.
It wasn't slow. It wasn't graceful. The cave fucking gave up...
The jade-like walls, once pristine and glistening, cracked—veins of pure light spider-webbing through them like shattering glass. Golden stalactites that had hung for centuries groaned—before snapping free. They speared into the ground like divine javelins, each impact shaking the chamber like it was having a damn heart attack.
A deep, bone-rattling rumble, like the whole place was screaming its death knell.
The entire cave went nuclear.
A chain reaction tore through the foundation, grandeur turning to ruin in an instant. The once-sacred altar? Split in two like a crushed fortune cookie, its divine surface swallowed by a void of destruction. Dust and debris exploded outward, a suffocating wave that snuffed out the last remaining glow.
And at the heart of it all?
A single black scorch mark and the only trace that Parker and Ere had ever been there. By the time the dust settled? Nothing. Just a deep, gaping wound in the core of the Nexus Forest, where the cave had once stood in all its stupid, dramatic glory. And somewhere in the outside world, far away from the wreckage?
Parker was staring at three eggs.
Anyway, the same cave that his Eighth life had used to keep two mischievous phoenixes? Yeah, instead of finding his old troublemakers, he'd stumbled onto something even worse. Their goddamn eggs.
Which meant one thing.
They were gonna hatch.
There was no undo button, no "return to sender" option, no "Oops, wrong delivery." The second he stepped into that cave, the process had started. And there was no stopping it now.
And just to really drive the headache home?
That creepy-ass Eighth Parker, laughing in his face from across time.
Parker had stared at the note and then at the eggs, then back at the note then at Ere, who had been very much not helping by trying to hold in her laughter. He had exhaled. Long. Slow. Painfully.
"Yeah, okay. No. Fuck that guy."
Parker woke up with the kind of deep exhale that belonged to people who had seen some shit. Like a man who had escaped something ridiculous, only to remember he had just walked into something even worse. There was a weight of something warm and familiar beside him. Before he even opened his eyes, he knew.
And, of course, the moment he shifted, she moved too. A soft rustle of sheets, a barely-there vibration in the air, and then— boom.
Ere appeared right beside him, perched like she'd been there the whole time, sharp golden eyes staring straight at him. And for a moment? Parker swore she was about to say something dramatic—like some ancient guardian watching over her slumbering king.
Her ears flicked. And then, she straight-up froze.
Like someone had dumped a bucket of cold water over her.
Or rather—something was different.
Ere's entire body tensed, her tail puffing out slightly. It wasn't fear. It was realization.
She could feel it—the fabric of this dimension they were in wasn't what it was before. Not even close. She had noticed it earlier, in the Dream, but this? This was a full-blown "from McDonald's playground to fucking Disneyland" kind of change.
She didn't need to move, didn't need to stretch out her senses. The moment she existed in this space, she understood it.
Like, Titanic-sinking-wasn't-even-that-big kind of big.
But there was an upside. The change wasn't just about the new bedroom or the ridiculous expansion of space they now occupied—it was deeper than that.
Ere could feel it. Not just the room, not just the mansion, but the very fabric of the Dimension itself.