Chapter 301
We fight like hell.
Axel, Wake, and I push forward through the mass of Swarm, the ruined chamber behind us now a graveyard of twitching bodies and glinting limbs. My arms ache. My lungs burn. The orb in my hand pulses weakly now, its light dimming with every strike.
But they just keep coming.
They slip through cracks in the stone and pour from vents in the ceiling, moving like one terrible mind—spindly limbs catching the dim glow of the orb like wet blades, eyes glowing green as venom. The water is thick with blood and ink, with the shredded remnants of the ancient trench. Every heartbeat is another chance to die.
Wake is a blur beside me, slicing through their ranks with the ease of someone who was born to battle beneath crushing pressure and darkness. His movements are fluid, violent poetry. His blades leave streaks of silver through the murky water, marking every life taken. His body cuts tight circles in the current, every turn of his tail throwing a burst of speed or force.
But even he’s starting to slow.
He grunts as a claw rakes across his ribs, and though he barely flinches, I see the strain in the tension of his shoulders.
We round a sharp outcropping of stone, swimming under a rusted archway encrusted with barnacles, and that’s when I see it.
The eggs.
Dozens of them—lining the tunnel walls, pulsing faintly in the gloom, half-hidden behind coral outgrowths and ancient metal scaffolding. Their surfaces glisten like oil, translucent enough to show the things coiled inside. Some twitch. Some ripple.
And they’re hatching.
One cracks open with a sickening pop, spilling fluid and chitin into the water. A creature unfolds from within—half-formed, all rage. Its body is slick and skeletal, eyes glowing like emerald fire, mandibles twitching.
Then another cracks open.
And another.
“Oh no,” I whisper.
“Fall back!” Wake yells, spearing two Swarm through the torso with a single sweep. “They’re coming from the walls!”
The water churns around us. Screeches rip through the trench like underwater lightning. Hatchlings pour out in all directions—faster and smaller than the full-grown Swarm, but twice as vicious. They come in swarms of their own, biting and tearing like they don’t even need to see to kill.
A hatchling barrels toward Axel and he slams his blade through its chest mid-spin, but he’s forced to drop his momentum to block two more. I try to get to him but am intercepted.
I barely get my arm up in time. One latches onto my shoulder from behind, jaws snapping into the muscle. I scream as fire rips down my arm, the sudden sharpness robbing me of breath.
“Phoebe!” Axel’s voice is ragged, desperate.
But it’s not Axel who saves me.
Wake barrels into the hatchling from the side, slamming it against the trench wall with enough force to crack the stone. The wall caves in slightly with the impact. He doesn’t stop—doesn’t even look at me. Just keeps slashing, his body moving with impossible speed, slicing through a half-dozen more before they reach me.
“Go!” he shouts. “Get out!”
“No!” I lunge toward him, catching his shoulder. “I’m not leaving you—”
More Swarm pour in from the tunnel ceiling. They’re everywhere, rising like the trench itself is birthing them. The darkness comes alive with snarling mouths and grasping claws.
Wake shoves me so hard I spin through the water, disoriented.
“I said GO!”
Then he turns to meet the charge.
He dives into the thickest part of the horde, blades spinning, tail whipping through the water in furious bursts. He’s fighting like a man who’s already decided how this ends.
“No!” I cry out, pushing toward him. “Wake—WAKE!”
Claws rake across my leg. Axel grabs me before I can retaliate, dragging me backward.
“Phoebe, we have to go!”
“But he—”
“He chose this!”
The tunnel shakes. More eggs crack. The trench is alive with screams and skittering limbs. The walls themselves feel like they’re breathing, expanding with the pulse of Leviathan’s ancient memory.
I can’t move. Can’t think.
My heart is shattering in my chest.
“Electra,” I whisper, voice barely audible. “Please. Please help me. Help him.”
The orb in my hand gives a faint pulse.
Then nothing.
Emptiness.
I press my forehead against it, straining, sobbing, begging. “Don’t do this. Don’t take him. Please—”
And then I hear her.
A voice. Not external. Not loud.
But clear. Resonant.
This fight isn’t yours to win.
The words settle in my bones like prophecy.
And then the world explodes.
The rock beneath the trench buckles and heaves. A thunderous rumble splits the water like a war cry. Shards of stone erupt upward in a geyser of jagged, spiraling spikes—piercing through the Swarm with brutal force. Bodies scatter, torn apart mid-lunge, tumbling end over end into the abyss. The pressure blast alone sends Axel and me tumbling backward.
The light changes.
Silver.
Brilliant.
I look up—
And there he is.
Wake hovers at the center of the shattered tunnel, surrounded by impaled enemies and swirling sediment. His body blazes with silver energy, skin etched with glowing patterns that twist like tidal runes across his arms and chest. His eyes burn—not with fury, but with purpose.
He’s not just fighting now.
He’s commanding.
The water bends around him like it recognizes his dominance. His silhouette is still, unmoving, while the trench swirls in chaos around him.
The Swarm hesitate. Even the hatchlings reel backward, their limbs twitching like they no longer know who they’re facing.
Axel exhales sharply behind me. “By the trench…”
Wake isn’t just a warrior anymore.
He’s something more.
And I know. Deep in my marrow. As certain as I’ve ever been of anything in my life.
He’s Dagon’s Heir.
The trench—the Keep—the very ocean knows it too.
The light pulsing from Wake reaches the remaining Darklite veins in the surrounding stone. They shimmer, crackle, and begin to resonate. The sound is low, harmonic, like the deep song of a god stirring in his sleep.
The Swarm begin to retreat—not in chaos, but in instinct. They feel it.
They fear it.
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