The gate of the Sunken Cradle was not designed to keep out armies. It was designed to keep out the impure.
Kael Light stood on the ocean floor, the silt swirling around his boots like a cloud of dark smoke. The massive golden doors, etched with the pre-Academy runes of Aethelgard, hummed with a resonance that vibrated through the water. Beside him, the Abyssal Bell bobbed gently, tethered to an obsidian pillar. Inside, Ignis watched through the reinforced porthole, his mechanical eye zooming in on the intricate carvings.
DO NOT TOUCH IT, the God whispered, its voice sounding small and terrified in the vastness of the deep. THE GATE REMEMBERS ME. IT REMEMBERS THE DAY I TRIED TO FORCE IT OPEN WITH SHADOW. IT WILL BURN YOU, KAEL. IT WILL JUDGE THE VOID IN YOUR BONES AND FIND YOU WANTING.
"I am not you," Kael thought back, his hand hovering inches from the gold. "And I am not here to conquer."
He reached out. He didn't use force. He didn't use the density of the Star-Core. He used the "Blessing."
He channeled the silver-blue light of the Goddess Aura into his palm. It was a frequency of "Faith"—a signal that said, I belong here.
"Ancient Art: The Key of the Returning Son."
He pressed his hand against the center of the seal. The gold didn't burn him. It grew warm. The runes flared with a soft, welcoming bioluminescence, turning from a dormant grey to a vibrant, pulsing teal. The massive doors groaned—a sound like a whale song—and slowly began to swing inward.
Water rushed into the antechamber, carrying Kael with it. He signaled to Ignis, grabbing the tow-cable and dragging the Abyssal Bell inside before the doors began to close.
As the heavy gold slammed shut, the water in the antechamber began to drain. It wasn't pumped out; it was transmuted. The seawater turned into breathable air in seconds, the salt falling to the floor as fine white dust.
The Abyssal Bell settled on the stone floor with a heavy clank. Ignis popped the hatch, gasping as he inhaled the ancient, sterile air.
"Atmospheric transmutation," Ignis whispered, climbing out and looking around the hall. "The Sultanate has theories about this, but... to see it work on this scale... it's impossible."
The hall was a cathedral of obsidian and pearl. The ceiling was a mosaic of glowing gemstones that mimicked the night sky as it had looked a thousand years ago. Statues of the "Gardener-Kings"—the Sun-Blooded ancestors—lined the walls, their hands outstretched as if offering gifts to an invisible crowd.
But Kael wasn't looking at the art. He was looking at the floor.
Scattered across the polished obsidian were piles of dust. Armor. Weapons. The remains of those who had tried to enter without the "Key."
"The defenses are active," Kael said, his voice echoing in the silent hall. "Stay close to the pod, Ignis. If the temple senses your mechanical arm, it might mistake you for a weapon."
"I'll stay right here," Ignis agreed, patting the hull of his makeshift diving bell. "I'm not going anywhere near those statues."
Kael walked deeper into the temple. The "Stable Agony" in his chest was quiet here, soothed by the ambient mana of his ancestors. But as he approached the inner sanctum, he felt a new sensation. A pulse.
Thump-thump. Thump-thump.
It was the heartbeat of the Source-Vessel. But unlike the woman in the mountains or the boy in the woods, this heartbeat was incredibly fast, fluttering like the wings of a trapped hummingbird.
He pushed open the final set of pearl doors and entered the Sanctum of the Tides.
It was a circular chamber dominated by a massive, fluid-filled sphere suspended in the center. The sphere was connected to the floor and ceiling by thick cables of "Liquid Gold"—pure, liquefied mana that acted as a conduit.
Inside the sphere floated an infant.
He was tiny, curled into a fetal position, his thumb near his mouth. His skin was glowing with a blinding, white-gold radiance. He wasn't sleeping; his eyes were wide open, staring at nothing, his small chest heaving with every rapid breath.
Kael stepped closer, his heart breaking. "A baby..."
THEY FOUND HIM IN THE STASIS-PODS, the God revealed, the voice thick with disgust. THE LAST BORN OF AETHELGARD. HE HAS NEVER SEEN THE SUN. HE HAS NEVER FELT A MOTHER'S TOUCH. FOR A THOUSAND YEARS, HE HAS KNOWN ONLY THE COLD AND THE CURRENT.
Kael placed his hand on the sphere. The vibration was intense. The infant was regulating the pressure of the entire ocean trench. His mana pushed back against the millions of tons of water above them, keeping the temple from being crushed.
"If I take him," Kael whispered, "the pressure field collapses. The temple implodes. The trench collapses."
AND THE OCEAN RUSHES IN TO FILL THE VOID, the God added. THE TSUNAMI WOULD WIPE OUT STORMHAVEN. IT WOULD DROWN THE CAPITAL.
Kael looked at the baby. The infant's eyes shifted, locking onto Kael's face. The child didn't cry. He simply reached out a tiny hand and pressed it against the glass, mirroring Kael's pose.
A psychic image flooded Kael's mind. It wasn't a thought; it was a feeling. Cold. Heavy. Lonely. The baby didn't know words, but he knew he was holding up the sky.
"I can't leave him here," Kael said, tears of violet blood beginning to well in his eyes. "But I can't kill the city to save him."
"Then don't kill the city," a voice said from behind him.
Kael spun around. Ignis was standing in the doorway, holding a device he had salvaged from the Abyssal Bell—the central capacitor bank.
"I ran the numbers," Ignis said, walking toward the sphere, his eyes fixed on the liquid gold cables. "The pressure field is maintained by a constant output. If we remove the source, the field fails. But... if we replace the source with a localized loop, we might be able to trick the temple into thinking he's still here."
"A loop?" Kael asked.
"We use the capacitor," Ignis explained. "You charge it with your own 'Dawn-Mana.' We rig it to the conduit. It won't last forever—maybe an hour at best. But it will hold the water back long enough for us to get to the surface."
"And then?"
"And then the capacitor burns out, the temple implodes, and the trench collapses," Ignis said grimly. "But by then, we'll be topside. The tsunami... well, that's a problem for the surface."
Kael looked at the baby. He looked at the capacitor.
"An hour," Kael said. "We have one hour to outrun a collapsing ocean."
Kael took the capacitor. He poured his mana into it until the metal glowed white-hot. He handed it to Ignis, who began to wire it into the conduit ports at the base of the sphere.
"Ready?" Ignis asked, his hand on the release lever of the sphere.
"Do it."
Ignis pulled the lever.
The sphere hissed. The liquid gold drained away. The glass parted.
Kael caught the baby as he fell. The infant was warm, impossibly warm. As soon as he touched Kael's skin, the baby let out a wail—a loud, piercing cry that shattered the silence of a millennium.
The temple shook. The "loop" engaged, the capacitor humming violently as it took on the burden of the ocean.
"GO!" Ignis screamed.
They ran. Kael cradled the crying infant against his chest, shielding him with his cloak. They sprinted through the Hall of Kings, past the statues, and back to the antechamber.
They scrambled into the Abyssal Bell. Ignis sealed the hatch. Kael dumped mana into the tow-cable mechanism, reversing the winch.
"Up!" Kael roared. "Get us up!"
The pod shot upward, leaving the Sunken Cradle behind.
Below them, the capacitor hummed in the dark, counting down the minutes until the weight of the world came crashing down.