The transition from the desert's dry heat to the salt-heavy air of the Varuna Coast felt like shifting from one executioner's block to another. The Submerged Capital of Varuna lay miles beneath the surface of the Azure Sea, a place where the pressure was enough to turn a Tier 1 beast into a diamond.
I stood on a jagged cliff overlooking the ocean, my new humanoid form—the Ashura's Avatar—feeling strangely light. Beside me, Meera adjusted her azure robes, her eyes fixed on the horizon where the sky met the sea in a line of dark, metallic clouds.
"They're here," she whispered.
I followed her gaze. Breaking through the mist were the prows of the BlackRabbit First Fleet. These weren't mere wooden ships; they were "Dread-Fortresses," massive ironclads powered by captured Dom cores, their hulls etched with runes of suppression. Leading them was the Sovereign's Wrath, Arjun Pandit's personal flagship.
[System Notification] Event Triggered: The Iron Tide. Enemy Force: BlackRabbit First Fleet (12 Dread-Fortresses). Commanding Officer: Admiral Vane (S-Rank Tamer). Objective: Reach the Varuna Trench entrance.
Internal Monologue: Arjun isn't just trying to capture me anymore. This is a scorched-earth policy. He'd rather boil the ocean than let me reach the fifth shard.
First Person POV: The Descent
"We can't fly over them," Meera said, her Blue Phoenix aura flickering as it sensed the fleet's suppression field. "The anti-air runes will pluck us out of the sky like sparrows."
"Then we go through them," I replied. I felt the fourth shard in my chest pulse—a cold, rhythmic beat. "I've spent my life being stepped on. It's time to see how the 'First Fleet' handles a Calamity that doesn't care about their iron."
I stepped off the cliff.
I didn't fall; I plummeted. Mid-air, I shed the human skin of the Avatar. My body expanded, the obsidian chitin plates slamming into place as I reverted to the PatalLok Devourer. I struck the water like a depth charge, the impact throwing up a wall of spray a hundred feet high.
[Status]: Submerged. Passive Activated: Pressure Adaptation. New Skill Unlocked: Void-Currents (Manipulate water through shadow-dom).
Underneath the waves, the world was a silent, blue-black void. I could see the glowing hulls of the fleet above, their sonar-runes pulsing like mechanical hearts. I moved with a predatory grace I never had on land, my serrated tail propelling me through the water like a torpedo.
Third Person POV: The Sovereign's Wrath
Admiral Vane stood on the bridge of the flagship, his mechanical eye zooming in on the dark mass moving beneath the waves. He was a man of steel and scars, a veteran of the Dom Wars who had tamed the Kraken of the North.
"Target sighted," Vane growled. "He's coming straight for the Trench. Launch the 'Harpoon-Ghouls.'"
From the bellies of the ironclads, hundreds of cylindrical pods were ejected. They hissed through the water, opening to reveal undead constructs—beasts stitched together with Dom-wire and programmed for one purpose: suicide-binding.
"Activate the Depth-Charge Mantras," Vane commanded. "I want that water so thick with explosion-dom that he can't even breathe."
First Person POV: The Graveyard of the Deep
The Harpoon-Ghouls swarmed me. They were fast—mechanical monstrosities with spinning blades for limbs. One latched onto my shoulder, its silver claws digging into my chitin. Another gripped my tail, its runes glowing as it prepared to detonate.
You think death scares me? I've died once already.
"Calamity... Burst!"
I didn't fire a beam. I released a 360-degree shockwave of necrotic energy. The water around me boiled instantly as the Ghouls were vaporized, their soul-essence being sucked into my scales.
[Essence Consumed] Evolution Points: 15/40. Warning: The First Fleet is firing "Soul-Piercer" Torpedoes.
The water above me turned bright white. Twelve torpedoes, each tipped with a shard of purified Dom-crystal, streaked toward me. They were designed to ignore physical armor and strike the soul-core directly.
"Meera! Now!" I roared into the mental link we had forged through the Shard.
From the surface, a streak of blue lightning hit the water. Meera wasn't swimming; she was diving in her Phoenix form, her body encased in a bubble of absolute-zero ice. She struck the lead torpedo, the impact freezing the Dom-crystal before it could detonate.
"Keep going, Ray!" her voice echoed in my mind. "I'll handle the ordinance! Find the gate!"
The Gateway: Third Person POV
As Ray and Meera fought through the blockade, the Varuna Trench began to glow with a sickly, bioluminescent green. This was the "Eye of the Deep," the location of the fifth shard and the most unstable seal in the Dominion.
Deep within the trench, a massive shape stirred. It wasn't a ship, and it wasn't a beast. It was a guardian of the Old World—the Sunken Sentinel, a Tier 7 Colossus made of coral and the drowned bones of gods.
Bali's voice hissed through the water, vibrating in the marrow of every living thing in the sea. "The Iron Tide brings the meat... the Ashura brings the key... but the Sentinel brings the end."
First Person POV: The Threshold
I reached the lip of the trench. The pressure here was immense, even for my Tier 4 body. I looked back. The Sovereign's Wrath was directly above, its main cannon—the "God-Slayer"—charging with a golden light that could be seen even at this depth.
"Target locked," I heard Vane's voice through the vibrations of the hull. "Fire."
A beam of pure, golden destruction tore through the ocean, vaporizing millions of gallons of water in a split second. It was heading straight for me.
I looked at the Trench—at the green, swirling vortex of the gateway.
I have to trust the Shards.
I didn't dodge. I opened my arms, the four Shards in my chest spinning in a violent saffron circle. I absorbed the impact.
[System Notification] Critical Damage! Resilience: 1/50. Energy Absorption: 400% (Overload!)
The golden beam didn't kill me. It pushed me. It acted like a propellant, slamming me into the mouth of the Varuna Trench at Mach speeds. As I breached the gateway, the world turned from blue to a dark, suffocating purple.
I had left the Dominion. I was in the Threshold of PatalLok.
And standing there, waiting for me with its hand outstretched, was the Sunken Sentinel.