After the screens appeared and were read, they were expelled from the soul realm and sent back to the real world.
Dex's body, before the evolution, was still lying on the bed without any change. But as they returned to it, something shifted: his body began to change rapidly. All across the room came the sounds of bones twisting and cracking; the body that had been only one split into two distorted halves. When they were fully separated, each began to grow on its own, and after an hour or more the process was complete—there stood two Twins, a man and a woman, flushed and dressed in garments that could only be described as divine.
Dex and Echidna opened their eyes and faced each other. For an instant there was no surprise or fear, only the intimate certainty that every beat of the other's heart also pulsed within themselves.
Seeing her before him—not in a realm where he saw only her soul, but in a body he could touch and show to the world as his—Dex wrapped her tightly in his arms.
For the first time in a very long while, Echidna felt she had a true body; even when she was an apostle of the Usurper, the body she possessed was never fully hers. Now she could feel everything.
For both, it was a completely new experience: the weight of a new body, the strength, the heat, every heartbeat like thunder, the awareness of two consciousnesses in the same room and bed but at different angles, and the crystalline clarity of each other's thoughts.
Sensing the tension hanging over them, Dex cracked a joke. "I guess the realm didn't want to give us one last quickie."
Echidna laughed and answered with a teasing smile. "Besides these clothes, nothing is stopping us."
As if the clothes could hear them, they seemed to vanish from their bodies and became simple earrings that settled on their ears.
Still surprised by the sudden nudity, they smiled and moved closer.
And so, they went for another round.
Thirty minutes later, they lay on the bed, breathless. "Losing your virginity a second time is thrilling," said the demonic dragon woman. Dex could only agree.
Panting, Dex asked, "What do you think these earrings are—and what happened to our clothes?"
Echidna laughed. "I don't know, but if the clothes disappear whenever we want to make love, I'm a fan."
As if in response, they quickly cleaned the sweat and the fluids they had released and put on the clothes they had been 'wearing' before the act.
Dex wore loose black satin pants with an elastic waistband and an open black satin robe draped over his arms, leaving his torso fully bare.
Echidna wore a short satin romper with a deep V neckline plunging below the bust, shaping her waist and curves with a mirrorlike sheen. At the waist, a wide integrated sash patterned with spirals and runes glowed gold; beneath it, fitted shorts of the same material; and, like Dex, a lightweight black robe with wide sleeves, worn open and fallen around her arms.
Surprised by the sudden appearance of such beautiful outfits, Dex and Echidna looked at each other. "You look great in that," they both said at the same time.
"Think we got stylist earrings as a wedding gift?" Echidna joked, admiring the style.
"Could it be an artifact?"
Hearing her husband, Echidna did the most rational thing. She grabbed a fold of Dex's robe and used the mark on her hand to appraise what it was.
System of the Ruler of Sins — Items
Name: Adam/Eve Earrings
Condition: Severely Weakened.
Description: The Adam and Eve Earrings are mythical items from tales of the Original Sin. Beyond simple earrings, they are a battle armor and a weapon—or rather, they were before their decay; now they only function as a clothes‑creator for the wearer.
Reconstruction: (—Locked—)
Abilities:
Transformation — Allows the earrings to become any clothing the user desires.
Indestructible — Both the earrings and the clothing are indestructible, though they provide no physical protection.
Remaining abilities unavailable due to weakening.
"It really is an artifact—sharp eye as always, my love!"
Seeing the screen, Dex grew pensive. "Clothes…"
"Echi, didn't I promise to buy some swim trunks with Erica?"
"Yes." She blushed slightly at the cute nickname.
Dex looked at the digital clock on his nightstand. |09:07| Seeing the time, he jolted up from bed.
"Damn, she probably woke up to the sound of your moans!"
"Relax—if she hasn't knocked yet, she's likely still asleep and heard nothing. Besides, if she truly is Pride, she'll want to hit the beach when it's most crowded—so probably this afternoon," Echidna said, sitting on the bed.
Dex calmed down, but there were still problems. "How are we going to explain this?" he asked, pointing to himself and to Echidna.
"We can say I'm a passive ability of the subclass; they won't be able to contradict it, since the Ruler of Sins is unknown. The real problem is the evolution."
"It won't be easy to explain why we changed so much."
"Dex, try to think of something the original Dex might have known that could justify a bloodline awakening in you tied to the ThunderBird family."
Dex searched through the memories he had gained by occupying Dex Thunderbird's original body, but nothing came that could justify a bloodline. "Echidna, there's nothing on my father's side that fits."
The moment he said "father," a deeply buried memory surfaced in his mind. On a particular day, one of his "mothers" seemed extremely tense and angry. Then, in the dining room where the new Dex had met them, something happened that left an emotional scar on the old Dex. Everyone was seated except the young lady still in her mother's womb. Naelle, Marcus's mother, looked ready to explode every time her eyes fell on young Dex.
"Why?" she said under her breath.
Leon, a few years younger and with sharpened senses, heard his wife. "Is something wrong, Naelle?"
"Yes, a lot!" she shouted. She pointed to the woman across from her—the heir's mother and the one currently carrying a child. "Since I had Marcus, I've tried for years to have another child. She, even after years since her first, never tried—and now, after all this time, she decides to try and gets pregnant in two months."
"Are you ashamed of me—so much that you won't let me bear your children?"
She pointed to young Dex. "Or would you rather I keep suffering while you knock up white‑haired sluts and make bastards to rub in our faces that a mere maid is better than us?"
Leon flared with thunder and roared, "Watch how you speak of her!"
"See? Even now you still love her, even after she abandoned you without a word. You're the most pathetic man I know, Leon!"
She picked up Marcus and left the hall.
As she went, Marcus could be heard humming in his mother's arms: "Bastard, Bastard, Dex Bastard!"
Unconsciously, back in the present, Dex let a few tears slip.
Echidna sensed his sadness and saw the tears. "What's happening—why are you crying?"
Dex wiped them away and spoke. "It's okay. I think I might have a way to justify my bloodline."
Echidna listened closely. "I really can't have a bloodline from my father's side—but I can from my mother's. It's public knowledge I'm a bastard on my mother's side, but no one truly knows she was a maid. We can simply say my father had me with a beast‑woman of strong draconic lineage, and at my first soul awakening, the dormant bloodline… awoke."
At the end of the explanation, an airborne Echidna launched herself from the bed into Dex's chest; he caught her, confused.
"You really are my genius husband!"
Dex set her down with their bodies close and looked into his beautiful wife's eyes. "It's great to see you this excited—but there's still a big problem."
"Marcus, like me, doesn't know what my mother looked like—but my father and my stepmothers do."
Echidna understood at once. "So this plan only holds through the first year; when we return home for the holidays, we'll be exposed."
"But it's still a good plan until we find a better one," Dex said.
Much calmer, they finally turned their thoughts to today's hunt.
"We need to talk about our two goals," Dex said. "Win Erica's love—maybe even be won by her—and get that ring."
Hearing his serious tone, Echidna laughed. "Coffee first—or I'll fall asleep."
Dex glanced at the clock again. Afternoon was coming fast. And with it, Erica.