Urban Plundering: I Corrupted The System!

Olympus was burning.

Not literally—though at this point, that might've been less destructive than what was actually happening. The realm of the gods, usually pristine and perfect as a postcard from heaven, was cracking at the edges. Marble columns showed stress fractures. Golden fountains ran dry. Even the fucking clouds looked pissed off.

The gods sat in their great hall like children who'd just been told Santa wasn't real, except instead of presents, they'd lost access to their favorite playground: Earth.

"This is bullshit!" Zeus roared, his voice making the entire mountain shake like a bass drop at a rave. "We are GODS! We don't get locked out of anywhere!"

He slammed his fist on the table, and lightning crackled across the walls like angry graffiti.

Hera, looking like she'd aged a thousand years in the past few hours, didn't even flinch. "And yet here we are. Cut off. Isolated. Like fucking prisoners in our own realm."

"Language, dear," Demeter said dryly, but her heart wasn't in it. The goddess of harvest looked wilted, like flowers left too long without water.

Poseidon crashed his trident against the floor, sending tremors through the realm. "I can't even sense the oceans anymore! Do you know what that's like? It's like being blind and deaf at the same time!"

"We get it, you miss your fishies," Ares muttered, sharpening his blade with movements that suggested he wanted to stab something. Preferably someone named Parker.

Apollo sat slumped in his chair, his usual golden glow dimmed to something that looked like a dying lightbulb. "I can't see the future anymore. Not on Earth. It's like there's this... void where everything used to be."

"Because there is," Athena said, her voice sharp as broken glass. "He didn't just cut us off. He erased us from Earth's timeline. Retroactively. We never existed there."

The words hung in the air like a death sentence.

Hestia, goddess of the hearth, spoke up from her corner. "The mortals don't even remember us anymore, do they?"

"Oh, they remember us," Hermes said bitterly. "As stories. Myths. Fake shit people made up to explain thunder and why crops grow."

Zeus's face was turning that particular shade of red that usually meant someone was about to become a smoking crater. "Billions of years! BILLIONS! We've been connected to that realm for billions of years, and this little shit just... severs it? Like cutting a fucking rope?"

"Careful, husband," Hera said quietly. "That little shit is stronger than all of us combined."

"I don't care!" Zeus exploded. "I don't care if he's omnipotent! I don't care if he can unmake galaxies! We are the gods of Olympus! We have pride! We have—"

"You have jack shit," a new voice said from the shadows.

Every head in the hall turned toward the sound. The voice was soft, feminine, and carried the kind of casual authority that made even gods pay attention.

She stepped into the light like she owned the place.

The woman was... stunning. Not in the way gods were stunning—all impossible perfection and divine radiance. She was something else entirely. Long blue-black hair pulled up in an elegant high ponytail that cascaded down her back like liquid midnight. Her skin was porcelain-smooth, and she wore a flowing dress of deep blue silk with intricate golden embroidery that caught the light like captured starfire. The dress hugged her curves in all the right places, with a slit that revealed long, graceful legs.

She looked like royalty. Like someone who'd stepped out of an ancient painting and decided the modern world needed her attention.

But her eyes. Her eyes were wrong. Not evil wrong, just... displaced. Like they'd seen things that existed in the spaces between reality and had decided to stick around for the show.

"Who the fuck are you?" Ares demanded, jumping to his feet with his sword already half-drawn.

She smiled, and somehow that was more terrifying than any threat. "I'm someone who wants to help. Someone who knows exactly how to beat Parker Nyxlith Black."

The hall went dead silent. Even Zeus stopped radiating murderous intent. "Hah, how convenient, just exactly when we needed help. Child, what do you want?"

And why," Athena on the other hand asked slowly, "would you want to help us?"

The woman shrugged. "Because he's in my way. Because he thinks he can just rewrite the rules of existence whenever he feels like it. Because someone needs to remind him that there are consequences to playing god."

She walked further into the hall, her footsteps echoing in the silence.

"He cut you off from Earth, but he can't cut you off from everything. There are other realms. Other realities. Other versions of that precious little planet he's protecting."

Poseidon leaned forward. "What are you suggesting?"

"I'm suggesting you stop thinking small," she said. "Parker Black rules all Earths but he only controls one Earth. One reality. The Prime Earth. But there are infinite Earths out there. Infinite versions where he never existed. Where he never a system from Aphrodite, never got his powers. Where he's just another mortal who can bleed and die like the rest of them."

Zeus's eyes lit up with something that looked like hope mixed with homicidal rage. "Go on."

"Find one of those realities. Conquer it. Make it yours. Then use it as a staging ground to hit him where he least expects it." Her smile widened. "Through his family."

The word 'family' hung in the air like blood in the water.

"His daughter just came back," Hera said slowly, then paused, looking confused. "Wait... what daughter? Why did I just say that?"

The gods looked around at each other with the same bewildered expressions, like they'd all just tried to remember a dream that kept slipping away. They had been seeing Parker before he cut them off, but the memory of his daughter never settled in their minds or so long. It was even impressive that Hera remembered for this long.

But when she disappeared they couldn't see earth. So how did Hera know? Of course it was this very woman's doing.

"Exactly," the woman said with a knowing smile. "You can't remember her, can you? Every time she appears in your eyes or near your consciousness, her existence just... slides away. Like trying to hold water in your hands."

Zeus frowned. "What the hell are you talking about?"

"Parker Black has a daughter. Nyxavere. Omniscient, reality-bending, daddy's little princess. Ring any bells?" She went into deeper explanation from who Nyxvare was, her mother until now in this lifetime, to disappearing and appearing back to Parker leaving a few details out.

The gods stared at her blankly.

"Of course not," she laughed. "That's her gift. Selective existence. She can make herself forgettable to anyone she chooses. Very convenient when you want to spy on gods without them knowing." She couldn't tell them everything of course.

"So, his daughter has just appeared and..." Demeter started.

"Has she now?" the woman continued, and her tone suggested she knew exactly where Nyxavere had been. "How... convenient that she's back just when things are getting interesting."

Athena's eyes narrowed. "You know something."

"I know lots of things. Like how Parker's about to have four children. Like how his precious little family is about to face challenges that'll make the Titan War look like a playground fight. Like how we can use this time when he is distracted to hit him. We prepare when he's playing family man, then we strike. "

She stopped walking and turned to face them all.

"I'm offering you a chance for revenge. A chance to remind the universe that gods don't get dismissed. But I need partners, not servants. Are you interested?"

Zeus looked around the room, seeing the same hunger for payback in every face. The same wounded pride. The same need to prove they still mattered.

"What's the catch?" he asked.

Her smile turned razor-sharp. "No catch. Just a simple trade. I help you get your revenge on Parker Black. In return, when this is all over, you help me collect something that belongs to me."

"Which is?"

"His daughter's soul."

The words dropped into the hall like stones into still water, sending ripples of shock through every god present.

"Nyxavere?" Demeter asked, the name feeling foreign on her tongue. "Who's that?"

"Oh no," the woman said, her eyes sparkling with malicious joy. "Not the daughter you can't remember. One of the others. One of the unborn ones."

She turned toward the exit, her work here clearly done.

"Think about it. But don't think too long. Every moment you spend wallowing in here is another moment he gets stronger. Another moment his hold on reality becomes more absolute. I will be back to get your answer and if you agree, I will give you power so that you can match him when we face him."

She paused at the threshold.

"Oh, and Zeus? You might want to check on Aphrodite, Artemis, and Nyx. I have a feeling they're not quite as isolated as the rest of you."

And then she was gone, leaving behind only the echo of her footsteps and the scent of something that might have been roses or might have been blood.

The gods sat in silence for a long moment, processing what they'd just heard.

Finally, Zeus spoke, his voice quiet but filled with the kind of rage that could reshape worlds.

"Poseidon, Ares and Hephaestus. We're going hunting."