Dominic’s breath hitched.
The light from his trident dimmed.
The abyss cracked further—wider than any mortal eye had seen—and that shimmering glass hand reached through the sea like a forgotten god returning to reclaim its throne. Thɪs chapter is updatᴇd by ɴovᴇl_Firᴇ.ɴet
Ka’dryn backed away, limbs quivering in terror, not at Dominic—but at what lay beneath.
Dominic floated there, heart pounding, feeling something ancient staring up at him.
> "What... are you?" he whispered.
The hand paused, mid-climb. As if it was listening.
Then it withdrew—slowly—leaving only a pulse behind. A soundless note that vibrated through his bones.
And Dominic understood something terrifying:
That hand didn’t come for Ka’dryn.
Flashback – Faint Memory in the Vault
A flicker jolted through his head—images from the vault he’d once walked through.
A broken mural. Words half-erased by time. A prophecy etched in kraken’s blood:
> "When the tide bleeds flame, and the sky no longer weeps for the sea, the Deep Mirror shall rise..."
Dominic clenched his fist.
The mirror. The hand. It wasn’t just a creature.
It was a replacement.
For him? For Poseidon?
If that thing rose completely, nothing in this world would be left untouched.
Athena’s spear snapped in her grip.
"That thing is not of our world," she said flatly.
Apollo looked pale, his lyre silent in his hands.
Only Hades, watching from a shadowy corner, spoke with any clarity.
"That’s not a god," he said. "That’s a memory of what came before gods."
Because they could feel it now. The sea wasn’t just rebelling.
Back in the Deep – Ka’dryn’s End
Ka’dryn lunged forward—desperate, dying, sensing its end—but Dominic was done playing the mortal game.
With a flick of his hand, the trident screamed to life, its prongs spinning with cyclone-like velocity.
He hurled it, and it tore through Ka’dryn’s chest, pinning the beast to the cracked sea floor.
The monster writhed one last time before falling limp, the ocean itself mourning in silence.
Dominic retrieved the weapon—though it now pulsed faintly, unsure of its own power.
But he didn’t celebrate.
He turned toward the black chasm where the hand had appeared.
Cut to Naerida’s War Council – Reaction
On the floating war citadel, Queen Naerida dropped to her knees.
"He did it..." her voice trembled. "Ka’dryn is gone."
"No," Maelora muttered, eyes wide with dread. "Something else took its place."
They looked to the trench.
The ocean currents twisted unnaturally around it.
And then... the currents stopped.
But froze—locked in place mid-motion, as if the sea itself were afraid to breathe.
Cut to Lyrielle – In the Choir Hall
The siren priestess stepped back from her echoing pool. Even the Deep Choir behind her had fallen silent.
> "The Abyssal Mirror... It has seen him."
A shiver passed through her.
"The Mirror wants him..." she whispered, eyes darting toward the trench.
"And he’s too broken to know why."
It wasn’t the ocean that surrounded him—it was the past, living and breathing with each pulse.
Dominic’s scream had long since faded. Now there was only silence. A deafening, endless silence that pressed against his ears like a scream yet to be born.
But not the kind he knew.
It was ancient—silver-blue, cold and alien. It shimmered like the surface of a shattered mirror, wrapping around him in shards.
Each shard reflected a different version of himself.
One with red eyes and a broken trident.
One crowned in gold, with the world burning behind him.
One kneeling, hands chained, a sea of corpses at his feet.
A figure emerged from the light. Its form was ever-shifting—sometimes a man, sometimes a wave, sometimes a corpse draped in kelp.
> "Dominic Black. Poseidon reborn. Do you think you understand the sea?"
The voice rippled—not through ears, but through his mind, scraping against memories like coral.
Dominic stood, chest heaving. "You’re not real."
> "Real is irrelevant," the figure said. "You’ve tasted power. But you’ve yet to drink truth."
A shard of the mirror peeled away and hovered between them.
> "The gods lied to you."
The shard pulsed—then showed him a vision.
Vision – The First Poseidon
A man stood at the edge of a great sea—skin cracked like drought, hair flowing like foam.
He raised his hand, and the ocean obeyed.
But behind him... the Mirror watched.
It whispered. It taught him. It gave him dominion over tide and storm.
But when he refused to become its vessel—
Split his name across centuries. Scattered his soul.
Poseidon was never one man. He was the refraction of a deeper will.
He dropped to his knees.
The figure leaned in. "You are the last piece. The final shard. Once you fall, I will be whole again."
> "No," Dominic gasped. "I’m not your reflection."
> "No," the Mirror said. "You’re my prison."
And with that, it struck.
The space around them shattered. Dominic raised his trident just in time—blocking a surge of dark tidal energy. It burned like liquid ice.
He countered, unleashing a pulse of raw divine power, cracking the mirrored space—but it reformed instantly.
Poseidon versus his origin.
Power versus purpose.
Each blow Dominic landed cost him a piece of himself. Memories bled out with every strike—his mother’s face, his first death, Aegirion’s sacrifice.
"I’m not your echo," he shouted, eyes glowing. "I’m the wave that breaks you."
The Mirror laughed. "Then drown me."
And the abyss swallowed them both.
Cut to Olympus – The World Trembles
Zeus turned to Athena. "It’s begun."
She nodded. "We must call the Council."
"But if he fails—" Apollo began.
"He won’t," said Hades grimly. "He can’t. Because if Dominic loses..."
He looked toward the sea.
"...the Abyss will rewrite the world."
Cut to the Sea Surface – Naerida’s Palace
Queen Naerida stood at her balcony, staring at the spiral of light forming above the trench.
"It’s happening, isn’t it?"
Beside her, Maelora trembled.
"The Mirror is waking."
Naerida clenched her fists.