“How deep does this go?” John muttered, but his voice barely registered.

  No one answered. All three of them sat frozen, transfixed by the feed pulsing across every screen in the submersible. Before them, the seafloor simply… vanished—swallowed by a monstrous trench that plunged into a impenetrable darkness.

  But it wasn’t the depth that stole their breath. It was what lay within.

  Jagged spires of obsidian erupted from the abyss like black fangs, each one as tall as a skyscraper and twisted into unnatural shapes that defied geometry. They clawed toward the unreachable sunlight far above, their slick surfaces faintly glowing with bioluminescent veins—like molten cracks through volcanic stone. Between them, colossal tunnels threaded the towers together into an impossible, three-dimensional maze. A buried metropolis… or something much worse.

  “This can’t be real.” Ziraya’s voice was thin, stripped of her usual bravado. Her pupils contracted as shock rippled across her face. “This is… this is insane. It has to be some kind of illusion.”

  But Sarah was already trembling. Not in fear—but something else. Something burning. “I—” she gasped, clutching the sides of her seat, knuckles white. “I was right.” Her voice cracked, and her chin quivered. Then she let out a laugh—sharp, breathless, unhinged. “I was right!” she screamed, the cry bouncing off the cramped glass walls. “Do you even understand what this means?” She turned to them, eyes wild and gleaming like someone on the edge of madness. “There’s really a city down there—and it’s still standing!”

  John blinked. “Well… congratulations, I guess. So now that it’s all done and dusted, can we—”

  “Done?” Sarah twisted toward him with a manic grin. Her eyes blazed with feverish purpose. “We’re just getting started. We’re not leaving until we’ve stepped inside.”

  “You’ve lost your goddamn mind,” John snapped. “Look how deep we are! This thing wasn’t built for this kind of pressure. One more drop and—”

  He jolted as the submersible lurched. Sarah’s hand had slammed the controls forward.

  “No—NO!” John shouted. “Stop!”

  But it was too late. The vessel began descending again, inch by agonizing inch, groaning beneath the weight of the deep. The lights flickered, casting eerie shadows against their pale faces.

  Sarah giggled. Giggled. “Fifteen thousand feet,” she said, her voice sing-song as she stared lovingly at the console. “She’ll hold. I was very generous with my calculations. I bet we’ve got… three, maybe four minutes before critical stress. Plenty of time.”

  Ziraya’s hands shook, though her voice came sharp. “We need to leave. Now.” Her arm rose, conjuring a coiled spear of solidified air, its shape wavering in the gloom like a phantom. The air around her shimmered with restrained power. “Move. I swear I’ll kill her if she doesn’t turn this tub around.”

  John stared between the two women, his own hand drifting instinctively toward the pistol strapped to his thigh—then stopping. One bullet could end all of them in this pressure-sealed tomb.

  “Get back in your seat, you arrogant bitch!” Sarah shrieked, madness written across her face. “I drive this sub! Without me, you’re just meat in a tin can!”

  “I’ll end you before you get us all killed—!”

  “Stop!” John yelled. “We’re in a submarine, remember?! One spell—one misfire—and it’s over!”

  Ziraya didn’t lower the spear. Her pupils had thinned to vertical slits. “If we die because of this lunatic, it’s over anyway!”

  Sarah waved them off like flies, eyes still glued to the screen, where the tallest spire loomed closer, like some ancient titan rising from the void. “Just a little bit more,” she whispered, stroking the console like a beloved pet. “Come on, girl… just a few more feet. I believe in you. You’ve got this…” Sarah's head snapped sideways as Ziraya struck her with a clawed backhand. Blood speckled the control panel. The dwarf reeled, covering her face with trembling hands, tears and fury mixing in her eyes.

  Ziraya stood over her, chest heaving, claws extended and gleaming. “WE. LEAVE. NOW.” Every syllable struck like a hammer. “You get one more chance.”

  Sarah hissed through her bloodied teeth. “I’m not giving up. Never.”

  “I swear I’ll learn to drive this damn thing myself—”

  A deep rumble cut through them all.

  Then the world tilted.

  The submarine was launched sideways like a toy tossed by a child. Alarms screamed. Panels sparked. The cabin became a flurry of limbs and chaos as the vessel tumbled through the deep. Ziraya crashed into John with a grunt, her spear evaporating into mist. Sarah was hurled into the console, the back of her skull slamming against the edge with a sickening thud before she crumpled to the floor, unmoving.

  The lights dimmed to emergency red.

  The sub spun uncontrollably, down, down, toward the very heart of the abyss. And outside the window, the spires waited.

  Watching.

  “Fuck!” John gasped, instinct overriding thought as he grabbed hold of Ziraya.

  And the world shattered. The dim glow of the submarine vanished into pure black—a void without walls or weight, like falling into ink. Her scales, usually rough with a subtle sheen, felt warm under his palm. Too warm. Not the warmth of life, but of something alive and other, like holding a live wire wrapped in velvet. The heat spread instantly, rushing into his nerves, threading down his arms and anchoring into the marrow of his bones like a hungry parasite. Ziraya jolted in his arms, her amber eyes snapping open wide as her body arched. A soundless scream twisted her lips.

  The tether between them snapped taut. It writhed, invisible but unmistakable, pulling at something deeper than flesh. John’s breath hitched. Ziraya's did not come at all. Her limbs locked, rigid, and something within her squirmed. The heat that radiated from her no longer felt like hers—it was being taken, siphoned by the tether in surges, each wave a little more violent than the last. Then it slithered back, curling around her neck, her ribs, her heart, repeating the cycle like a serpent devouring its own tail.

  Her soul felt like it was being peeled apart. Her chest heaved as if underwater. No air came. No sound. Just pressure. Crushing, ancient pressure from inside her.

  And then— John forced himself to let go. He hadn’t even realized he was still touching her, but the moment contact broke, the black veil lifted. Yet the damage remained. His limbs refused to move. He felt the tether slither back into him—cold now, like ice threading through warm blood. It wrapped around his organs, every nerve, every muscle, coiling as though it had always been there, waiting. Then, as suddenly as it came, it stopped.

  Their lungs unlocked. Both of them collapsed. Gasping. Trembling. Dying, but not dead.

  “F… fuck,” John wheezed, eyes darting to his shaking hands. They should’ve been burned, marked, something. But they were whole. Still, the phantom heat remained, seared into memory. He groaned as he forced himself to sit up. “That was bad. Really bad.”

  He turned. “Ziraya? You alive?”

  The dragon-blooded didn’t move. She sat slumped against the far wall of the cabin, arms wrapped around herself, silent tears carving lines through the grime on her cheeks. Her claws were clenched so tightly that her own blood dripped down her palms in thin rivulets, staining her scales a deep crimson. “We’re going to die,” she whispered, her voice small—broken. All her fire, her fury—gone. “Not in this fucking tin can, not from pressure or monsters. But from this.” Her hand went to her chest, fingers splayed like she was holding something in, keeping it caged. “It’s inside me.” She met his eyes, and he almost looked away. There was nothing fierce in her gaze now—just dread. “It’s hiding. Waiting. Watching. I can feel it, even now. One blink… one slip…” She choked on her words. “It’s going to swallow us whole.”

  John’s breath hitched. He couldn’t argue. Because something deep inside him whispered the same thing. He punched the floor with a hollow clang. Pain bloomed across his knuckles—but it grounded him. He looked up at her and managed a crooked smile. “Giving up already, princess?”

  Ziraya blinked. Then, impossibly—she laughed. A single breath. Weak. But real.

  “I won’t let this curse take us,” John said, voice low. “I promise. But first…” He turned toward the control panel, where Sarah’s unconscious body slumped over cracked instruments, blood trickling from the gash on her forehead. “We need our reckless pilot.”

  But before he could move, a wail cut through the water. Low. Trembling. Vast. It wasn’t a sound. It was a presence—so deep and massive it shook their ribs before their ears registered it.

  John’s heart skipped a beat as he stared out into the murk. For a breathless moment, just beyond the reach of their flickering lights, a shadow moved. It dwarfed the submersible. A shape not made for sunlight or sanity.

  “Did you see that?” John asked, voice sharp, gesturing toward the screen.

  Ziraya followed his gaze, but shook her head. “What was it?”

  “I think…” he hesitated, voice low. “I think that’s what hit us earlier.” He leaned toward the controls. “It’s still out there. Watching.”

  Another wail answered him—closer. Ziraya staggered to the nearest wall, one hand pressed against it to stay upright. “Then what do we do? We’re sitting ducks! Can this thing even move fast enough to escape?”

  “We need to wake Sarah up,” she said, panic creeping in again.

  But the next wail was so loud it sent cracks through the overhead lights.

  “No time,” John said, climbing into the pilot’s seat. “We move now.” His hands hovered over the controls. Every button was foreign. Every lever might as well be ancient tech.

  “I don’t know what any of these do,” he muttered grimly, grabbing the largest joystick. “Guess we find out.”

  He yanked it forward. The sub lurched, groaning like a dying whale as it began to inch ahead. “Great,” John muttered. “We’re slower than a rowboat with a hole in it.” He fiddled with the side panel, pressing what looked like an altitude toggle. The depth gage began to climb.

  Barely.

  “Even slower. Fantastic.” He hissed between clenched teeth. “What about—” He jammed another button. The sub began to descend again.

  “Down?” Ziraya snapped. “You can’t be serious! We’re already too deep—Sarah said—”

  A screech erupted from all around them.

  Not outside.

  Inside.

  Like it was in the walls.

  The hull vibrated. Rivets groaned. Lights flickered red.

  John gripped the controls tighter.

  The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

  Ziraya stared at the screen. In the corner of the camera feed, something moved again.

  Closer this time.

  It wasn’t done hunting.

  Ziraya stood frozen, her tail curled tight around her ankle, every muscle in her body trembling like a plucked string. Her eyes remained fixed on the flickering screen, where the ocean outside was thick with shadows that shouldn’t move the way they did. “Let’s… hope it can hold,” she whispered, her voice raw and thin, as if speaking too loud might summon the abyss itself. Her gaze didn’t blink, didn’t move, morbidly drawn to the depths—waiting for an impossible maw to split the darkness and devour them whole.

  John’s fingers hovered over the controls, slick with sweat. “Right. Going down,” he muttered, punching a button. The submersible groaned in protest, the hull singing with strain as it descended like a stone tossed into the ocean's gullet. A narrow spire of jagged rock nearly impaled them—so close it scraped the side with a banshee’s screech. “Twenty thousand feet…” he exhaled, barely believing the number climbing on the depth gauge. The pressure outside pressed on the vessel like a god’s palm. The hull creaked with tortured resistance, glass whining as if one more foot down would crush them flat.

  Stillness settled. The howls from the creature above faded into a distant memory, lost in the crushing silence of the ruins. For a heartbeat, then two, nothing stirred.

  John sagged into the pilot’s chair, bones aching with tension. “I think… I think it’s gone.”

  Ziraya didn’t answer. She stared at the screen like it might blink first.

  John leaned forward, frowning. “That’s weird. I swear we’re still moving forward…”

  A blur flashed past the camera. A rock—then gone, just a smear of gray vanishing into the murk.

  Ziraya tensed. “I saw that too. That wasn’t—” She didn’t finish. Her breath caught as another shape—then another—rushed past them.

  “Why the hell are we moving so fast?” John grunted, yanking the joystick. “Is this some kind of current?”

  He pulled harder, until his arms shook—but the vessel didn’t even flinch. Ahead, a massive underwater structure emerged from the darkness, an ancient wall stretching beyond sight.

  John’s heart slammed against his ribs. “Come on, come on—TURN!”

  The building grew closer. Closer. The water blurred it, but there was no mistaking its mass.

  Ziraya dropped to her knees. Her claws scraped against the floor. “I tried,” she whispered, her voice cracking. “I really—tried.” Her eyes closed, surrender flowing over her like cold brine. Her breath slowed. Her chest stopped heaving. “I’m sorry, Father.”

  The wall consumed the screen.

  The current suddenly jerked the vessel sideways with the force of a hurricane. They were flung through the cabin, limbs colliding with consoles, metal, each other. John’s shield flared, barely catching the blow as Ziraya’s body smashed into him like a battering ram. Pain exploded across his ribs as the impact knocked the wind from his lungs.

  Then—Stillness.

  Water churned outside the vessel, jet-black and bubbling, and they floated—suspended—in a vast, circular shaft. A vent. A mouth. Something was pulling them inward. Ziraya's breath caught in her throat as she clutched at him. Her scales shimmered in the flickering emergency lights, every inch of her slick with sweat and fear. Their eyes locked. Time slowed.

  Something in John stirred. The tether between them—whatever it was—twisted tighter. Not just a connection. A fusion. A binding thread that hummed with unbearable heat. It curled through his body like molten gold, burning without fire, tugging at something deeper than blood. Their breathing aligned. Their heartbeats stuttered into sync. His hand rose without command, trembling.

  Hers mirrored the motion. Their fingertips were an inch away—then—

  Sarah's body slammed into John like a falling tree. He tumbled backward, vision fracturing into stars. The moment shattered.

  John groaned, blinking up at the ceiling. His palm throbbed—an angry, pulsing heat. He glanced at it. No burns. No marks. But it felt wrong, as though something had been branded into the very bones beneath his skin.

  Ziraya curled in on herself, arms wrapped tightly around her chest, as if trying to hold something inside. Her claws trembled. Blood dripped silently from her palms.

  “It’s getting worse,” John muttered.

  “I-It’s inside me,” Ziraya choked, the strength gone from her voice. “It’s in me. I can feel it growing—twisting my soul like a vine strangling a tree.” She tried to suppress a sob and failed. “It’s no use, is it?” Her voice cracked on the last word. Her eyes were distant, locked on memories only she could see. “All that training… the legacy I was meant to uphold…” She laughed, a hollow, broken sound. “It meant nothing.”

  Crimson tears spilled down her cheeks, glinting in the dim light.

  John crouched beside her slowly, careful not to touch her, as though physical contact might trigger another reaction—another curse spiral. “Hey. Princess.”

  She didn’t look at him.

  “I know this looks bad,” he said gently, “but maybe there’s still a way out. You’re still breathing. I’m still breathing. That means we’re not done yet.”

  Ziraya shook her head, fury and despair battling in her expression. “Stop pretending this is fine! You feel it too, don’t you? That thing between us, digging into everything we are. What happens when it finishes? What happens when it eats us?”

  John opened his mouth. Closed it. Then finally said, “I don’t know.”

  Ziraya laughed again, bitter and cold. “We’ll be puppets. Hollowed out. Meat shells with no will, no mind, just… tools.”

  John turned to Sarah, who was propped up against a wall now, blinking slowly. “Good. You’re awake.” His tone was heavier now. "Please tell me you know something." Sarah didn’t respond right away. She stared down at her hands, flexing her fingers like she was unsure they still worked. Her face was pale, drained of her usual mischief and chaos.

  “I remember flashes,” she said slowly. “But most of it is gone.” Then her gaze snapped toward one of the flickering screens.

  John followed her eyes—and froze. His jaw dropped. “No way…”

  The submarine groaned beneath its own weight, half-submerged in a massive circular tank set into the corner of a cavernous room. Jagged edges of fractured piping jutted out overhead like rusted ribs, leaking trails of glowing condensation that hissed as they struck the floor below. The chamber—easily the size of a football field—was built of the same smooth black alloy as the spires that had nearly skewered them earlier, and now loomed around them in ominous silence. Faint green light pulsed weakly from cracked orbs embedded in the ceiling, their flickering glow casting long, quivering shadows across the tiled floor and corroded grates. Machinery lined the walls, long-dead for centuries—except for a few skeletal remnants still sputtering in protest, like dying lungs refusing their final breath.

  “What… is this place?” John muttered, eyes wide as he took in the warped grandeur of the ancient facility.

  No one answered. The silence stretched, pregnant with awe—and dread.

  “How did this happen?” Sarah finally whispered. Her voice was hoarse, uncertain.

  John glanced at her as she sat hunched near the access panel, one hand clutching her ribs, the other pressed to her temple. Her glasses were smudged, her lip split, and her once-wild expression was now subdued—haunted.

  “It started after your… episode,” John said slowly.

  Sarah looked away, shame washing over her features like ink in water. “I—Listen. I’m sorry,” she began, voice tight, brittle. “I didn’t mean to—”

  “Now’s not the time,” John cut her off, his tone sharp but weary. “Just make sure you hold up your end of the agreement.”

  “I will,” she said quietly, nodding. Her shoulders slumped as guilt dug in its claws.

  Ziraya, standing a few paces away, watched her with narrowed eyes. The fury in her gaze was muted now, but not gone. It simmered beneath the surface—cold, controlled, and dangerous.

  “We heard something,” John continued. “Wailing. Then something slammed into the sub—hard. We dove deeper, hoping to lose it.”

  “You mean… there’s life in this sea?” Sarah’s eyes briefly lit with curiosity.

  “If you call that life.” John gave a half-hearted shrug. “All I know is it wanted us dead. We tried to outrun it through the ruins, but then this current—like nothing I’ve ever felt—grabbed us. Pulled us through a vent.”

  “And then I woke up,” Sarah muttered, piecing together the blanks. “A current pulling you into a structure... this tank might’ve been an intake chamber.” She adjusted her crooked glasses. “If this were any other situation, it’d be the discovery of a lifetime.” She smiled faintly, but it faded just as quickly. “But now...”

  “How do we get out?” Ziraya’s voice was sharper than a blade. She crossed her arms, her amber eyes steady. Controlled. Detached. “You saw it. Whatever that was. We lift the curse, or we die.”

  Sarah inhaled deeply. “Right. But first, we need to understand where we are. If the current brought us in, that means the city's still drawing water in, probably for some kind of filtration or processing.”

  “You think it’s a pump?” John asked, glancing at the massive network of corroded pipes.

  “Not just a pump,” Sarah said, gesturing toward the still-operational machines. “These are monitors. See? Gauges, not controls. No levers. No input systems. That means the real controls are somewhere deeper. Somewhere more secure.”

  Ziraya groaned. “You’re saying we have to go in.”

  “I’m afraid so.” Sarah glanced toward a corridor that led away from the tank room, its walls lined with corroded inscriptions. “If this city is the one from the scrolls I studied, I might be able to translate the inscriptions. Might.”

  “And if you can’t?” John asked, already knowing the answer.

  Sarah offered a wan smile. “Then we start pressing buttons and hope for the best.” She limped toward the main lever beside the airlock, hesitated just briefly, then muttered, “Let’s pray the air’s breathable.” She yanked it. A puff of sterilizing vapor blasted from the door’s seams as it slid open with a groan. A strong, acrid scent flooded the room—like bleach and burnt rubber. John gagged, covering his nose with a sleeve.

  “Well... better than sulfur,” he muttered, grabbing his P50 and sweeping the corridor with practiced precision.

  Sarah blinked at him, unimpressed. “Seriously?”

  “You can never be too careful.” His voice was flat, but his grip on the weapon was tight.

  Ziraya hesitated behind him, her posture tense, eyes darting across every shadow.

  “What’s the matter, princess?” John glanced over his shoulder. “Spooked by a little abandoned ruin?”

  Her lips twisted into a scowl. “Don’t patronize me, mercenary. I was simply assessing the threat level of our surroundings.” Her voice was cool, clipped. A perfect mask.

  John raised a brow and slipped a cigarette between his lips. “That’s one way to describe panic.”

  Ziraya opened her mouth, then stopped. For a flicker of a second, the proud Scalebound looked… tired. But then her spine straightened, and her expression turned cold again.

  John lit his cigarette t with a grunt and took a long drag, his gaze drifting to the humming machinery. “Do you have any idea what these things do?” he asked, exhaling a thin plume.

  “I have guesses,” Sarah said from where she knelt. “More importantly, the sub's holding up—for now.” She adjusted her glasses again. “It’s fascinating, though. These designs... what kind of civilization built all this? What were they doing here?”

  John gave a tired nod. “Guess we’ll find out soon.” He turned to the corridor, dimly lit and echoing like a forgotten tomb. “Alright,” he said, gripping his weapon again. “Let’s move.”

  “Who gave you the right to lead our group?” Ziraya’s voice cracked like a whip through the still air, her tail slapping the tiled ground in a steady, irritable rhythm.

  John barely glanced over his shoulder. “Be my guest,” he said, stepping aside with a theatrical sweep of his arm. “I’m sure you’re dying to take the lead into damp ruins with tight corridors, ancient machinery, and the occasional spine-crushing trap.”

  Ziraya sniffed haughtily, though the slight tremor in her tail betrayed her nerves. “No need. It’s good you’re in front. You can spring the death traps for us.”

  “Why would there be traps?” Sarah murmured under her breath, the corner of her mouth quirking in a smile as she watched the two bicker.

  John paused, suddenly glancing at the corner of his vision where the Improbability Factor ticked up by a fraction. A ripple of phantom pain bloomed below his ribs, and for a split second, his vision blurred with flashes of his previous deaths. He blinked hard.

  “Everything’s fine,” he whispered to himself, steadying his breathing as he moved forward.

  The corridor was wide enough for three, though Ziraya and Sarah instinctively stayed behind him. Their footsteps echoed in the silence, mingling with the faint, sloshing sound of unseen water—a dripping, lapping reminder that this place was anything but abandoned. After several tense minutes, the hallway opened into a chamber where a door once stood. What remained of it was a heap of reddish powder, its rusted bones scattered like ash across the floor. Only the twisted hinges still clung to the wall, corroded but stubborn.

  “Just how old is this place?” John muttered as he stepped over the decayed remnants, hand brushing the wall for balance. The stone was slick and cold—unnaturally cold.

  They emerged into a space so vast it swallowed their voices. A dome arched high above, its interior laced with veins of gold that had dulled to a soft amber glow. Though faded, the inlays shimmered faintly under the flickering ceiling lights, as if the structure itself still remembered when it was alive.

  At the center stood a circular platform of dried, cracked soil. Around it, benches formed concentric rings, their stone seats worn smooth by countless long-forgotten occupants. The perimeter was lined with buildings—small, squat structures with wide-open archways, each bearing massive golden glyphs above their entrances. The inscriptions pulsed faintly, reacting to their presence.

  John took a slow step forward. “This feels like… a plaza,” he said. “Or maybe a market?”

  “These characters…” Sarah stepped closer to one of the buildings, running her fingers along the golden script. “They’re similar to the ones from my scrolls. Familiar, but older and with clear differences.”

  “So what does it say?” Ziraya snapped, arms crossed, tail coiling tight.

  “I’m still working on it,” Sarah shot back. “But give me a few more examples and I might be able to translate enough to figure out what these buildings were used for.”

  John squinted at one of the glyphs. “So this could be a marketplace.”

  “Or a temple. Or a morgue.” Sarah sighed. “That’s the problem. We can’t just project modern logic onto something like this. This city could predate every written word we know.”

  “But the benches, the layout—” John began.

  “I know. I see it too,” she said softly, brushing dust off a faded engraving of something vaguely resembling a tree—or maybe a fountain. “But appearances can lie.”

  “Fine,” Ziraya snapped. “But none of this helps us find the pump controls.”

  “I know why we’re here.” Sarah’s voice grew sharp. “You think I want to die in this underwater tomb any more than you do? But wandering blind through unknown ruins is just asking to get picked off by whatever’s lurking in the shadows. We need to be smart.”

  John folded his arms. “So? What's the plan?”

  Sarah pointed to one of the buildings with larger glyphs. “We go inside. I need to study the inscriptions. If I can decode the language, we might find signs pointing to maintenance areas—or better yet, a control room.”

  John glanced around the dark plaza, his instincts prickling like static across his skin. “Sounds like we’re going to be here a while.”

  “And the longer we waste time arguing,” Sarah said as she pulled a small notebook from her satchel, “the longer we’ll stay here.”

  A faint hum echoed through the dome—distant, mechanical, and just a little too regular to be natural.

  Ziraya tensed. “Something’s still alive in here.”

  John checked the safety on his weapon. “Let’s hope it’s just the plumbing.”

  Sarah didn’t answer. She was already walking toward the glyph-covered doorway, eyes narrowed, lips moving silently as she committed the patterns to memory.

  The ruins didn’t feel empty anymore.