A massive swirl erupted from the ocean floor, twisting violently upward. The very water screamed as the currents bent and tore apart, spiraling into a colossal vortex that seemed to devour everything in its pull. The roar of the sea became deafening a deep, thunderous rumble that echoed across the endless abyss like the sound of the ocean itself wailing.

The pressure crushed down as the light itself dimmed.

And at the very center of that chaos ..Razeal's group stood, caught in the calm very eye of the storm itself. For a single fleeting moment, the world seemed to hold its breath. The currents froze, the air stilled… and then the ocean swallowed them, anything and everything around whole.

In the blink of an eye, they.. No everyone was gone.. taken into the swirling maw of the wormhole, consumed by the sea as though the ocean itself had decided to take them somewhere..

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After what felt like only a few seconds ..though it could've been minutes or hours in that timeless spin.. Razeal's eyes suddenly snapped open.

His body jerked slightly as if waking from a nightmare.

Cold water pressed against his skin; the sensation of the deep still wrapped around him. His mind reeled for a moment before clarity crept in. The first thought that surfaced was sharp and immediate:

Where am i?

He blinked, adjusting his vision to the murky light that surrounded them. His dark eyes swept across the space and his expression hardened.

All around him stretched an endless expanse of the deep sea.. but not the same one they'd been in. This place felt different. The energy in the water wasn't alive; it was heavy, oppressive and rather weirdly suffocating. Every current carried with it the faint metallic taste of blood, the stench of something ancient and dead.

Razeal.. could feel it.

Due to very close with killing intent that it had almost become familiar. and all he felt killing aura all around.. The simply the presence of death.. No it was the echo of countless killings layered upon each other.

The very water felt weirdly haunted.

He looked down, his gaze falling to the ground below. It wasn't sand.. not really. It was a deep, unnatural red. Not coral and definitely not rust… but the red of blood that had soaked into the ground for don't know how long. The seabed seemed to have drunk it in, staining itself permanently with the memory of slaughter.

Weapons littered the ground.. Ancient old blades, spears, and shattered pieces of armor corroded by time but still glinting faintly in the dim light. The remnants of war's lay scattered in every direction.

Razeal slowly moved forward, crouching to examine one of the swords half-buried in the ground. The metal was brittle, eaten away, but the shape still held the elegance of something once forged for a master.

"This place…" he muttered under his breath.

He lifted his gaze again and saw bones massive skeletal remains, some humanoid, others too large to belong to any human. Ribs the size of trees, skulls of sea creatures half-consumed by coral, fragments of beings whose identities had long been lost to history.

It was weirdly like a graveyard.

A battlefield frozen in time.

Razeal exhaled slowly, the weight of the place pressing against him. "Hmmm…" he hummed softly, expression unreadable as he took it all in. His senses stretched far, picking up faint disturbances in the distance.. But no.. Found no living beings.. Except two he was already familiar with..

So

Finally, he turned his head. Beside him, both Neptunia and Maria were on the ground, struggling to recover from the violent spin of the vortex.

Maria was the first to move. Her face was pale, her breathing heavy. "Arghhh…" she groaned, clutching her stomach. "That thing spun everything inside me… feels like it mixed my organs and brain together…"

Her voice came out low and strained, her tone half complaint, half disbelief. The whirlpool they'd been dragged through hadn't been just physical.. it had twisted energies and literally everything inside her.. Only she knows how it feels when mana, elemental energies get fucked up.. Its bad.. Terrible

Razeal didn't answer, simply watching her in silence for a second before shifting his gaze toward Neptunia.

"So," he asked evenly, "what is this place?" He asked remembering as she was talking like she knew something before all this happened.

Neptunia was still steadying herself. One hand pressed to her head, she rose slowly, her movements graceful despite the dizziness that still lingered. Her normally yellow eyes flickered uneasily as she scanned their surroundings.

"I can't identify it for sure…" she admitted softly, her tone carrying a weight of unease that didn't suit her usual composure. "But…" She paused, her brow furrowing deeper as her gaze swept across the ground.. the weapons, the bones, the faint shimmer of blood sand drifting in the heavy water.

"I have a very bad guess about it."

Razeal tilted his head slightly, saying nothing, letting her continue.

Neptunia took a slow, measured breath and looked around again. Her voice lowered, almost reverent, as she spoke. "This…" she gestured toward the blood-red seabed and the countless remnants of death "…I think we are standing inside the Ocean's Ancient Battlefield."

Her words echoed softly in the water.

"Ancient Battlefield?"

Neptunia nodded faintly. "Yes. It's… a place forged by Mother Thalassa herself. A divine construct. Whenever the Atlantians wanted to wage war.. whether between seas, noble houses, or sea lords.. Or even worse ones the battle would always be held here."

She turned, her gaze distant, her tone growing heavier with every word.

"This was her gift to Atlantis.. a place where pride, honor, and strength could decide fates without destroying the world around them. Here, no cheating can exist. No outside interference. No harm to the innocent or to the seas above. Only pure combat, witnessed and judged by the Mother Sea herself."

Her eyes flickered toward the ground again, toward the bones buried in red sand. "Every great war of Atlantis has been fought here. Every victory that shaped our world… every fall of sea lord. The greatest warriors of Atlantis history have bled into this ground."

Razeal listened silently

Neptunia continued quietly, "It's a sacred place.. but In simple words its a prison. Once summoned, it locks those within. No one leaves until the battle is decided. There's no escaping the arena once you've been chosen by it."

So… we're trapped?"

"Yes," Neptunia confirmed, her tone grim. "This battlefield has no known end. No horizon. It stretches endlessly.. an illusion of infinity or maybe it is i don't know. And no one does as no ove ever escaped it without finishing the war they were bound to."

Her voice softened a little, as if speaking to herself more than them. "You can't run. You can't hide. You can only fight."

The silence that followed felt heavier than the water around them.

Razeal finally broke it, his tone quiet but thoughtful. "So," he said slowly, piecing it together, "we're trapped in a battlefield that won't end… until one side loses or admits defeat."

"Yeah Sighh," Neptunia said, glancing at him with a solemn nod.

Razeal exhaled, rubbing the back of his neck as he looked around again. "And the ones who declared war against us…" his dark eyes narrowed "that would be Antonio's son. And maybe his all step brothers too, right?" Getting somewhat what actually is going on in here.

"This isn't just the wild sea anymore," Neptunia said, voice low, rubbing her temples as if she could knead some sense back into her head. The air.. or rather, the water around them felt different here. Deadlier. Endless. "It might be Antonio's whole army. We aren't crossing a stretch of sea. We're in a place that has no edge."

Maria pushed herself up despite the nausea curled in her gut. The whirlpool's spin had left her hollow and unsteady, but the moment she heard Neptunia's words her dizziness took second place to shock. "So you mean… we have to kill all of them now.. Right?" she said aloud, the words tasting absurd and absolute.

Neptunia's mouth flattened. Her fingers worried the string of her bow as if it could lock her thoughts back into order. "Yes.. Killing every single one," she echoed, the idea hitting her like a physical blow. "Or making them admit defeat. But can we? If we were only trying to cross the wild sea, we might have some chance. Now… we're in a battlefield that loops. There's no leaving unless we win. We're three FUCKING peopleeeee." She threw the bow hard to the ground, the action sharp with panic. "We might not be able to win. We're fucked. Really.. really fucked." Her voice cracked at the end; she pressed a flat palm to her face, breathing fast, furious at the helplessness.

Maria moved without thinking.. a hand on Neptunia's shoulder, steady, small and firm. "Hey. Calm down," she said, though she was shaking inside too. "There's no point in losing our heads. We'll find a way." Her words were softer than they should have been; they were more an anchor than a strategy. Maria knew the value of Neptunia's knowledge: the woman was their map here, the only one who knew what Ways, rules, or boundaries governed this place. If Neptunia gave up, they were blind as newborn fish. Maria felt the responsibility like a stone in her gut knowing.. If she didn't handled it and Razeal will.. Which she knows won't be better.. Because he's fucking crazy.. So she is taking responsibility to keep Neptunia together; keep a path forward.

Neptunia's shoulders rose and fell. She refused to be consoled into passivity. "It isn't simple," she said after a long moment, the stubbornness returning to her face. "How long can we even fight? Antonio's army.. it's said to be larger than the whole population of Atlantis combined. Even if lets say Razeal is strong, Lets say he can kill thousands.. lets say.. even millions but what's a few millions kills against an army like that gonna do and.. How long can he keep going? Forever? It's impossible." She shook Maria's hand off with a motion that was full because of stressfulness..

Razeal, who had been standing still all this time, spoke in his usual blunt, unnervingly calm way. "So… how big is the population of Atlantis?" he asked as if naming the number would shrink it to something manageable.

Neptunia looked at him as if he'd asked whether rain was wet. "You're not serious," she snapped. Her voice had an edge now. "I don't know the exact number. But it's going to be in the billions.. Like really Billions. Can you handle that alone?"

Razeal didn't flinch. He shrugged as if the scale of civilizations didn't faze him. "We'll see about that..." He bent, picked up Neptunia's bow from the sand, and handed it back to her. The motion was casual but decisive. "First," he added, "I need to see where this army is. I can't fight what I can't see."

He looked at her squarely, and whatever the words lacked in tenderness, they made up for in clarity. "Hold yourself together. Crying doesn't do anything. Dying in battle is far better than dying from fear." There was no malice in it only a hard practicality, almost clinical. "Kill as many as you can. Leave the rest to me. I have given my word that I will take the lead and protect you both, so there's no need to be afraid. I just need the direction that was your job from the very start."

"So just tell me," Razeal said, his voice calm yet sharp enough to slice through the tension pressing against them. "If we kill every single one of them… will that take us outside this place?"

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Thanks for reading, everyone! 💖

Oh, and I forgot to mention unlike yesterday, I won't be putting any privileges this time. Also, I've added a discount on the chapters! And for those who thought I was being greedy for never adding one before just know i never knew this existed some days ago!🤣🤣

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