The "Manta-1" was less of a submarine and more of a pressurized bullet.
Inside the cramped cockpit, the air felt heavy. Leon sat in the pilot's chair, his hands glowing with a soft blue light as he "spoke" to the currents to guide us. Elizabeth was meticulously checking her quiver; her new arrows were tipped with pressurized bubble-charges designed to explode underwater. Avan was vibrating, his static making the interior lights flicker.
"I hate the ocean," Avan muttered, rubbing his arms. "Water and electricity are supposed to be a 'one-time-only' deal, you know? If this hull cracks, I'm a toaster in a bathtub."
"The hull won't crack," Leon said without turning around. "But the Trench is deeper than anything West Corp has ever mapped. We're entering the Midnight Zone. No sun. No rules."
I looked at the Watch. The violet metal was cold, but the green light was swirling restlessly. "The Watch is sensing something. It's not just the pressure. There's a frequency... like a heartbeat."
The Ambush from the Deep
Suddenly, the sonar went red.
"Contact! Multiple targets!" Elizabeth shouted, grabbing her bow.
Massive, serpentine shapes emerged from the darkness. They weren't animals. They were Abyssal Wraiths-Dementra's shadow soldiers, but fused with bioluminescent, deep-sea armor. They carried tridents that hummed with red Dark Matter.
THOOM.
One of the creatures slammed into the side of the Manta-1. The metal groaned. A hairline fracture appeared in the reinforced glass.
"Avan, stay in your seat!" I yelled as the sub began to spin. "Leon, get us out of here!"
"I can't! They've hooked the thrusters!" Leon gritted his teeth. "Victoria, we have to go out there. If they break the sub, we're all dead. My people can breathe, but you three..."
He pulled three translucent spheres from a compartment. "Atlantian Breath-Orbs. They'll give you an hour of oxygen and protect you from the pressure. Use them. Now!"
The Battle in the Blue
We exited the airlock into the crushing weight of the Atlantic.
It was terrifying. The silence was absolute, broken only by the muffled thump of my own heart. But then, the armor responded. The violet metal sealed tighter, and the green energy plates flared, creating a personal "light-source" in the pitch black.
"V-Team, Formation Delta!" I commanded over the internal comms.
Elizabeth fired first. Her arrow streaked through the water, trailed by a stream of bubbles. It hit a Wraith's chest and expanded into a Shadow-Net, tangling the creature in solid darkness.
Leon swam with the speed of a torpedo. He didn't use a weapon; he used the ocean itself. He twisted his hands, creating a localized whirlpool that sucked three Wraiths into a spinning vortex.
Avan was the most dangerous. He stayed close to Leon. "Ready for the big one?"
Leon nodded. He sent a massive jet of pressurized water toward the cluster of Wraiths. Avan grabbed the stream, sending a contained high-voltage bolt through the jet. Because Leon was controlling the shape of the water, the electricity didn't dissipate-it acted like a laser-focused lightning strike.
The Wraiths shrieked, their shadow-forms evaporating into black ink.
The Leviathan Awakens
But as the last Wraith fell, the "heartbeat" I felt in the Watch grew deafening.
The sand on the sea floor shifted. A massive eye, larger than our submarine, opened beneath us. A voice, ancient and distorted by the water, echoed in our minds.
"The Prince returns with a thief... and a Relic of the Stars."
"That's not a Wraith," Leon whispered, his voice trembling for the first time. "That's the Kraken-Guard. And it's been corrupted by Dementra."
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