The light swallowed them.
Dominic stumbled as his feet hit something solid—not water, not stone, but memory. It felt strange beneath his soles, like walking on a dream that was just barely holding together.
Aegirion stood beside him, blinking fast. "We’re inside the memory."
Or rather, it had turned into sky.
Above them stretched a vast ocean of clouds, swirling slowly in gold and violet hues. Below their feet, a temple floated in midair—intact, beautiful, as if untouched by time or war. Giant statues of sea beasts lined the marble steps, and a glowing river flowed through the air beside them, looping endlessly.
Then they heard it—a voice.
Familiar. Deep. Wounded.
"I gave everything... and they still turned on me."
Dominic turned sharply.
Not as a crumbling statue. Not as a memory in fragments. But whole. Towering. Dressed in robes of tide-blue and silver. His trident shimmered in one hand, and his eyes burned with power and exhaustion.
He stood at the center of the temple, facing a council of shadows. Their faces were hidden. But their voices rang clear.
"You went too far, Poseidon."
"The mortals fear the sea now."
"You stirred something that should have stayed buried."
Poseidon’s voice cracked the air. "I protected the realms! While you bickered over sky and sand, I held the abyss shut! I bled to seal Thalorin!"
A murmur from the council.
"And yet... Nearida walks free."
Dominic’s blood ran cold.
Poseidon’s grip on the trident tightened. His face twisted in grief. "Nearida was like a daughter to me. I didn’t see her betrayal until it was too late."
The memory flickered.
Thunder rolled across the dream-sky.
Then—a flash. The temple shook. A scream echoed.
A young woman—dark-haired, sharp-eyed—stood at the edge of the temple stairs. Queen Nearida. But younger. Before the crown, before the war. She held a blade made of coral and shadows.
"You’re weak, old god," she hissed. "Your era is over. The ocean does not need a king. It needs a storm."
Poseidon didn’t move. "You don’t understand what you’re awakening."
"No," she said, stepping forward. "You don’t understand what you’re keeping from us." ᴜᴘᴅᴀᴛᴇ ꜰʀᴏᴍ NovᴇlFɪre.nᴇt
The memory shattered.
Dominic gasped as the world splintered around them. Pieces of light and sound fell like broken glass. Images flickered—Poseidon falling. The Trident sinking. Chains wrapping around the sea god’s body as Nearida walked away, her eyes glowing with power not her own.
Aegirion grabbed Dominic’s shoulder. "We need to go. This memory is collapsing."
"Wait!" Dominic shouted. He reached for the shards. One floated close—a final whisper from Poseidon:
"The vessel... must choose. Not just power. But purpose. Or the sea will drown again."
Then it all went dark.
The temple ruins returned. Cold. Silent.
Dominic knelt on the floor, breathing hard. Aegirion looked shaken, too.
"You saw it," Dominic muttered.
"She killed him. She was the one."
Aegirion’s eyes narrowed. "And she was already using something ancient. Something worse than her."
Dominic stood slowly, his voice low. "We need to find the rest of his memories. And we need to reach the Trident before she does."
A rumble echoed from the depths below. The sea was changing again.
And something was rising.
Far from the ancient vault where Dominic and Aegirion wandered through the tides of a dead god’s memories, the skies above the Crimson Reef had shifted. The waters darkened beneath the moonlight, and the salt-scented breeze turned bitter.
Inside the obsidian halls of the Deep Citadel, Queen Nearida stood still as a statue. Her eyes, like twin pearls soaked in blood, opened slowly.
A chill swept through her chamber.
The Vault had been touched.
She turned, robes flowing behind her like tendrils of ink in water. A single name escaped her lips, almost inaudible, but it echoed like thunder through the empty palace.
Her hand reached out toward the black mirror in the center of the room. The surface rippled, revealing a fractured vision—Dominic, standing amidst the glowing stones of the vault, Poseidon’s memories blooming like fireflies around him.
Her lips curled into a thin smile. "So the boy found it... and the dragon follows."
She waved her hand, and the image vanished. Nearida turned to face a woman seated in the shadows.
"Awaken the Abyss Choir," she said.
The woman, pale as sea foam and draped in barnacle-threaded robes, bowed and disappeared through the veil of shadow.
Nearida walked toward her throne of bone coral. She placed one hand on its armrest, the other upon her stomach—a subtle, unconscious motion.
"Let him dig," she whispered to the dark. "Let him see everything. And when the Trident calls, he will come to me."
Beneath her feet, a pulse throbbed in the stone. The ocean answered.
A colossal gate creaked open in the lowest depths of the Citadel. Chains groaned. Salt water rushed through the channel. And from the depths of a forgotten trench, the Abyss Choir emerged—six masked sirens clad in robes woven from serpent-skin and sorrow.
Their songs had once silenced empires.
Now, their voices would call to Dominic.
Far above, Nearida stood on the Citadel’s highest spire, the wind weaving her white hair like ghost threads.
"Come, vessel," she said.
"Come, Poseidon’s shadow."
She stepped off the ledge.
And the ocean caught her like a lover.