Chapter 585: Storm (Part. II)
The corridor began to distort.
“Stay together!” Ouroboros roared, but it was too late.
A wall of wind hit them like a collective punch, separating Monica, Samira, and Beatrice from the rest of the group. Daniela and Bellatrix tried to turn to help, but a sudden, heavy rain fell from nowhere, each drop like an icy needle against the scales.
Yennifer, on Strax’s back, held on tightly, her hair plastered to her face with moisture. “We can’t hold this formation!”
Frieren, even with her usual calm, narrowed her eyes. “This storm isn’t just conjuration… it’s alive. It’s reacting to us.”
Krissia looked around at the dark void and realized there was no horizon, only an endless swirl of clouds, lightning, and wind. “So it won’t let us out.”
Scathach roared in frustration.
“I need more space!” But with each flap of her wings, she felt heavier, as if gravity itself were being manipulated to pull them down.
A clap of thunder shook everything. The flash illuminated for an instant sothing colossal moving within the clouds, a silhouette of unreal proportions.
“There’s sothing in there!” Monica shouted, but the sound was lost.
Suddenly, the corridor ruptured completely. The group was swallowed by the stormy darkness, each struggling not to collide with the other or be swept away by the current. The wind no longer ca from a single direction—it swirled, sucking them toward an invisible center.
The sea below had disappeared, shrouded in the dense mass of clouds. There was no longer up, down, front, or back.
Strax roared, trying to maintain steady flight, but Cristine nearly lost her balance and was pulled to the side. Rogue leaned in quickly, grabbing her arm and pulling her back.
“It’s going to tear us apart!” she scread.
Scarlet appeared to Strax’s left, fighting the force of the wind. “We can’t go this far! We’ll have to dive!”
Ouroboros heard and shouted back, “Dive to where?! We have no reference!”
Another flash revealed, once again, sothing moving within the storm—closer now. The sound that ca imdiately after wasn’t thunder. It was a roar.
Samira, even far from the center of the group, recognized it. “That’s not weather. It’s a guardian!”
Beatrice strained her wings, gaining height to try to see sothing, but the force pulling her down was so brutal that she felt her joints nearly give way.
“It’s pulling us toward the center!” she scread.
With each passing second, the suction sensation grew stronger. The air swirled faster, the clouds closed in tighter, and the darkness beca almost solid.
Frieren, even with a tight grip, spoke loudly to be heard: “If we reach the eye of this storm… whatever it is, it’ll be waiting!”
Scathach finally looked back at everyone. “Then let’s force our way through NOW!”
She concentrated energy in her palms, creating a circle of runes that expanded like a ring of light. The impact was enough to push the air a few ters, creating a temporary gap.
Monica, Samira, and the others took the opportunity to reconnect, but the effort took its toll—the ring was swallowed within seconds, and the pressure doubled.
A different sound began to erge beneath the roar of the wind—a deep crack, like ice breaking underwater.
Tiamat, her eyes narrowed, understood before anyone else. “The sea is rising.”
And then they saw it. A wall of water began to erge from the clouds below, rising as if the entire ocean had been ripped from its place.
“This is impossible,” Cassandra muttered, but there was no ti for disbelief.
The wall of water advanced, swirling with the wind, a liquid cyclone about to swallow them.
Strax looked at Scathach. “If you have a plan, it’s now.”
She gritted her teeth. “No plan. Just brute force.”
The roar of the cyclone swallowed all voices. The world beca only wind, water, and lightning. And then, as if soone had pulled a rug out from under them, they all felt the air disappear.
They were sucked in.
Their vision distorted, the sound grew distant, and the last thing they saw before they were swallowed completely was a deep glow within the eye of the storm—not gold, not blue, but black, as if it were inverted light.
And then… nothing.
The impact wasn’t like falling into water or being thrown against the ground. It was like being torn apart and scattered in different directions before the body could even comprehend what was happening.
The wind vanished. The pressure on his wings vanished.
Everything beca a suffocating nothingness.
Strax still felt the weight of Cristine and Yennifer on his back, but only for an instant—then the connection was lost, as if reality had severed the thread that held them together.
A cold current enveloped him, so icy it burned. The vision was a whirlwind of flashes: Scarlet’s face disappearing into darkness, Ouroboros roaring sothing inaudible before being swallowed, the glow of Scathach’s runes shattering like glass.
He tried to flap his wings, but there was no air. He tried to orient himself, but there was no up or down, only an invisible weight dragging him away from everything.
And then… silence.
When consciousness returned, it was accompanied by pain.
Pain in his muscles, in his bones, even in the mbranes of his wings.
Strax slowly opened his eyes, and the first thing he saw was… sky. But not the sa sky. This one was a deep blue, almost purple, and the sun—if it was a sun—seed more distant, colder.
The second thing he felt was the movent of his body—he was floating.
The sea around him was a blue so dark it looked like ink, but strangely, it reflected little light. The waves were gentle, as if there were no wind, but the salty taste was familiar.
He slowly raised his head, feeling the weight of the water dripping from his scales. He took a deep breath and realized he was alone.
There was no Cristine, no Yennifer, no Xenovia… not the slightest sign of
Monica’s golden wings or Samira’s silvery glow.
The silence was almost oppressive.
Strax straightened, flapping his wings to gain height—just a few feet, enough to look around. What he saw made his stomach sink: sea, only sea, in every direction. Not a scrap of land, not a ship, not a shadow on the horizon.
He roared, not to call out—but to confirm he still had a voice. The sound echoed and died quickly, as if the air had… deadened.
Looking down, sothing caught his attention: the water wasn’t just dark—there were patches of an almost black glow moving below, slow, like living currents. They weren’t normal shadows; they writhed as if sensing his presence.
Strax took a deep breath and dipped his head for a mont. Down below, the patches weren’t patches… they were cracks.
Like scars in reality itself, opening and closing irregularly.
He recoiled imdiately.
His heart pounded, not from fear of drowning—but from the instinct that told him these things shouldn’t be touched.
The sound of the sea changed. A strange ripple began to co from far away, not from wind or storm, but from sothing large moving beneath the water.
Strax narrowed his eyes and adjusted his breathing.
If he was alone, then he had two options: try to fly and waste energy without knowing the right direction… or wait and risk whatever was coming.
He chose the forr.
He spread his wings and gained altitude, trying to reach a wider vantage point. But even dozens of ters above the sea, he saw only blue and more blue—until sothing broke the surface, far away, but large enough to be seen.
It wasn’t a ship.
It wasn’t an island.
It was… an eye.
Giant, pale, pupil-less.
And it was staring directly at him.
Strax maintained his flight, but his primal instinct scread for flight.
And then, without warning, the sea below him parted, revealing a huge mouth, rings of curved teeth like blades.
The water rose as if the entire ocean had decided to swallow him.
He dodged at the last mont, but the impact of the wave hit him sideways, throwing him back into the water.
The salty taste filled his mouth, the weight of his soaked wings made movent difficult, and as he surfaced, he realized sothing even worse: the creature hadn’t disappeared.
Around him, circles of water began to form, as if sothing were slowly circling him.
And, in the distance, the sa eye appeared again, fixed on him.
Strax clenched his fists. If he was separated from the others, then survival was his priority. But the feeling was clear: he wasn’t just lost.
He was being hunted.
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