The Rift in the Deep

The Rift in the DeepRonan steadied himself, palms pressed against obsidian rock slick with algae, as if the solidity of stone could anchor him against the storm inside. He narrowed his eyes, forcing his intent to sharpen into a spear. He would find it—the source of this wrongness.But the moment he reached outward, he faltered.It was like trying to clutch smoke in a gale. The energy slid through his grasp, vast and ancient, swirling beyond his comprehension. It was not the familiar pulse of current, not even the fury of storm. It was alien.And it was hungry.It pressed against his senses like a cold, insidious tendril, slithering into cracks he hadn’t known he carried. It sought to unravel the very fabric of the sea, to twist the ocean’s power into something monstrous. The salt itself seemed to sour, the water’s purity leeching away beneath its touch.The ocean was bleeding.Then the vision struck.It hit him with the force of a rogue wave, shoving him backward until his spine slam

Last Updated : 2025-09-25

Breaking the Surface

Breaking the SurfaceThe sea creatures screamed in silence.Ronan felt their terror ripple through the currents like knives. Schools of fish darted and spun with no direction, their bodies colliding in blind panic. Larger predators lashed at shadows, their instincts unraveling, unable to read the ancient maps etched into tide and current. Even the smallest creatures—sprats, krill, the hidden plankton that lit the dark with secret luminescence—twitched and dimmed, their pulses erratic, confused.They spoke to him, though no words passed. Their distress was a chorus threaded through the water. They cried of fading light. Of emptiness spreading through their veins. Of currents that no longer led them home.And because he was Ocean Witch, their despair cut him open as if it were his own.The sea’s suffering was his suffering.He remembered lore whispered in foam and salt: stories of the Veil. A fragile barrier, elders had said, separating this world from realms where chaos frothed. He had

Last Updated : 2025-09-25

The Shore of Suffering

The ocean’s agony clung to him like a second skin.Ronan stood on the shore, water pooling around his ankles, the foam stained with that unsettling bruise of purple. The sand beneath his bare feet was too warm, gritty where he had always known the smooth embrace of current. The air was sharp, too dry, lacking the heavy salt-thickened weight of the deep.Everything about the land felt wrong.And yet, he could not retreat to the sea—not when it screamed.The agony was in his bones now, carried upward from the soles of his feet into the marrow of his spine. His connection to the water, once a clear, resonant chord, was frayed. It no longer hummed steady and sure, but snapped and crackled like broken wires, each tremor another jolt of pain.And beneath it—he felt them.The leviathans.Ancient, slumbering beings, cradled for millennia in the abyssal plains, wrapped in shadows and veils of phosphorescence. They had been his comfort as a boy: the knowledge that something older and mightier t

Last Updated : 2025-09-26

The Fevered Grove

The grove should have been serene.Sunlight streamed in broken shafts through the canopy, painting the mossy ground in golden lace. Blossoms should have been open, their petals vibrant with dew, the song of sparrows rising and falling like a hymn. This had always been her sanctuary—the place where the forest gathered its voice, where the roots of ancient trees hummed like deep-toned drums and the spirit of the oak whispered wisdom into her marrow.But today the music faltered.The vibrant energy that usually pulsed through root and leaf had grown discordant. The hum of life was replaced by a fevered thrum. Blossoms wilted before their time. Saplings curled in on themselves, bark cracking as though aged decades in minutes. The sweet perfume of growing things soured, carrying a faint tang of rot.It was as if a sickness had settled over the land, and it breathed through every leaf.Mirra sank to her knees, auburn hair falling loose around her face. She pressed her palms into the soil, s

Last Updated : 2025-09-27

The Silver Thread

The plains shimmered beneath a pale wash of light.Selene stood barefoot in the grass, the blades cool and slick with evening dew, the night air brushing against her skin like a lover’s sigh. Her silver gown whispered in the wind, its hem catching the damp earth, the fabric clinging to her calves as though reluctant to let her move. The horizon stretched wide and endless, unbroken by mountain or wall, only the gentle curve of meadow and stone bathed in starlight. The land cupped a lake at its heart, a hollow carved for reflection, its glassy surface mirroring the moon in perfect symmetry.This was her domain.A world of silence and reflection, of serenity woven from light and shadow. Here, every star was etched in water. Here, every breath aligned with the slow pull of the moon’s cycle. The very air seemed to hum with it, steady and familiar, as if the cosmos itself leaned down to cradle her.Selene closed her eyes and inhaled. Normally she would feel her magic thrumming steady in her

Last Updated : 2025-09-29

Threads in the Dark

Ronan reached, not with hands, not with words, but with something older—an instinct woven into his blood and bones. His magic stretched outward in widening circles, rippling like sonar through the vast body of the sea. He expected to find the familiar symphony: the steady migration of currents, the murmurs of kelp forests, the soft songs of whales. Instead, he found chaos.The deep-sea creatures trembled, their signals sharp and broken, a chorus of terror. The coral reefs, once vibrant with polyphonic life, groaned with agony, their dying colors sending up a silent scream. All of this, he knew. All of this, he had already felt. But beneath it, deeper than even the trenches, something else stirred.A hum.Faint at first, like a vibration carried along a forgotten current. It resonated not through water, but through his very core, bypassing the usual channels of tide and salt. It was not oceanic. Not marine. Something entirely other.Loneliness.It pressed against him like a tide that r