I woke to an unfamiliar silence. Elvindor and Lucida sat perfectly still, their mana presence barely detectable—they were practicing that very concealment we’d talked about yesterday. Riza noticed me stir and instantly sprang up, rushing toward me, forgetting everything in the world.

  “Riza. Control,” Elvindor snapped строго, without even opening his eyes.

  She gasped, froze, and—focusing—“collapsed” her aura again. Only after that did she walk up to me slowly, trying to breathe evenly.

  We set off. When the forest finally opened, we didn’t see a small fishing village.

  We saw a massive, noisy port city. White stone walls gleamed in the sun, and above the harbor rose a forest of masts.

  “Whoa!” Riza stopped, staring at that stone sea. “This is the village?”

  “Well…” Elvindor rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “A century ago it definitely was a village. Seems humans multiply and build faster than I can remember place names.”

  The city smelled of salt, seaweed, and fish. Fish was sold everywhere: dried, fried, packed in barrels, laid on ice.

  We went into a harbor tavern. The menu—unsurprisingly—was fish. Fish, fish, and more fish.

  “Do you have anything besides fish?” I grumbled, studying the menu. “Meat? Poultry? At least some vegetable that wasn’t hauled up in a net?”

  “Why do you hate fish so much, Zen?” Riza asked, peering curiously at the display.

  “Because it has more bones than the meaning of life,” I said flatly. “By the time you pick them out, you’re twice as hungry. And the taste… well. Specific.”

  Elvindor smirked. “Zenhald simply lacks patience for delicate table work.”

  In the end I ordered scrambled eggs. But these weren’t ordinary eggs—they brought ones taken from some kind of underwater nests. The smell was odd, the taste was… for enthusiasts. Not disgusting, but not inspiring either.

  Riza, meanwhile, crunched through her fish bones and all. A demonic stomach turned everything into dust.

  “Really tasty!” she said happily, chewing.

  To my horror, Lucida and Elvindor ordered some kind of sea snakes—or slimy creatures. Watching them eat was beyond me.

  “Ugh… How can you even put that in your mouth?” I turned away.

  “It’s very refined, Zenhald,” Lucida said with dignity as she swallowed a piece of snake meat. “You should broaden your culinary horizons.”

  While we ate, people at nearby tables loudly discussed “Untouched Lands” on other continents. I asked Lucida whether she knew about them.

  “Once, thriving kingdoms stood there…” she gave a cryptic smile. “But modern humans have no idea what ancient evil sleeps there. Soon they’ll be fleeing faster than their ships can raise sail.”

  At last we reached the shore. Sand squeaked under our feet, and waves crashed noisily against the pier. Riza ran to the waterline, scooped up a handful, and tasted it.

  “Zen! The water is salty! It’s COMPLETELY salty!” She stared at me like I was personally responsible for its chemistry. “And it’s… it’s so endless.”

  “I told you,” I smiled.

  We decided to swim. It was hard for Riza—she had to stay in her cloak to hide her wings, and the soaked fabric dragged her down. Eventually she clambered out to drip on the sand, while I—missing the water element—swam farther out into the depth.

  This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  The water was cool and clear. I dove, enjoying the silence and weightlessness.

  And then something slick and strong wrapped around my leg.

  A huge tentacle lined with powerful suckers yanked me down—into dark abyss.

  Well, I thought, not even trying to resist. Looks like the underwater tour starts earlier than I planned. Let’s see who’s so brave.

  I closed my eyes and let the creature drag me deeper. After all, I’d always wanted to know what lived where the sun never reached.

  The octopus dragged me through the deep for about thirty minutes. The hulks of sunken ships drifted past, crusted with glowing polyps, and strange deep-sea creatures whose eyes shone in eternal darkness. Separating oxygen from water was routine for me—magic itself formed a paper-thin film of air around my face.

  At last the monster spat me into a huge cave and, judging by its hungry eyes, decided it was time for dessert.

  “Bad idea, buddy,” I muttered.

  I simply snapped my fingers, releasing a weak electric discharge. In salt water, the effect was spectacular: the octopus convulsed so hard it forgot hunger entirely and fled like a cannonball.

  Electricity underwater is cheating, I thought as I drifted out of its lair.

  But I hadn’t gone ten meters when I saw something strange: my would-be eater was being chased off by beings carrying tridents. Mermaids? Atlanteans? They moved through the water with dolphin-like grace. Seeing me, they froze—then two of them swam up and shamelessly grabbed my arms.

  I tried to speak, but only bubbles came out—blub-blub. They replied with strange clicks and whistles, like whale-song. Another half hour of travel—and light began to glow ahead.

  It was unbelievable: a huge underwater city under magical domes, shining with thousands of lights. Coral towers, bridges of translucent pearl, and schools of tamed fish. Guards met us at the entrance. I didn’t lose my composure—I just smiled and waved. A soldier in scaled armor looked at me like I’d grown a second head… but let me through.

  They brought me into a building with a magical air layer inside. Water stayed beyond the threshold. I stood in the middle of a hall with water streaming off me, while my escorts confidently walked on two legs.

  “Hi! Hi! Hi! Are we saying it right? I think it’s right!” A young Atlantean girl with sea-green skin ran up to me.

  “You understand us, right?” added a man behind her, his eyes glowing with genuine excitement.

  “Yes, I do,” I said, wringing out the hem of my shirt.

  They were ecstatic. Questions poured out over each other:

  “We’ve never seen a human breathe underwater! How did you get here? What’s the surface world like? Why are you so small? What? Where? When?”

  “Sorry,” the man finally slowed his sister down. “We’re just excited. It’s the first time we’ve seen a human in the deep who didn’t drown—and such a young one at that. I’m Arbir, the elder son of King Atlant. And this is Finnayn, my sister.”

  “Zenhald,” I introduced myself.

  “You’re a strange human, Zenhald,” Finnayn narrowed her eyes. “You’re not surprised by our city at all. Why?”

  “I read a lot,” I joked. “Books describe worse.”

  “Ohhh, your books!” Arbir clapped his hands, delighted. “They’re amazing! Every time a ship sinks, we collect them before the pages soak through. They’re so interesting! Come on—you must be hungry.”

  We entered a room with no tables. Arbir snapped his fingers, and fish swam into the hall with trays strapped to their backs. The food looked… specific. Something slimy, raw, and glowing.

  “I’m not hungry, thanks,” I refused politely, staring at a wriggling seaweed salad.

  Arbir and Finnayn’s faces suddenly fell.

  “Zenhald… we have many questions,” Arbir began. “But we don’t know if we can let you go. You now know our location. That makes you a danger to our people.”

  “Seriously?” I raised my brows. “You dragged me here first and then remembered security?”

  “We’ll ask Father to let you go,” Finnayn added quickly. “But for now… you need to tell your friends you’re alive. What are their names?”

  “Elvindor. An elf.”

  They quickly scratched something onto a scale and handed it to a messenger fish. Seeing my confused look, Finnayn explained:

  “Our city secretly cooperates with this human port city—and with the elves. We exchange technologies, help your ships during storms, and increase fish populations in your nets. In return, you don’t hunt us and you don’t interfere in our affairs.”

  “I see. Regular politics,” I yawned.

  “You’re kind of boring, Zenhald!” Finnayn puffed out her cheeks. “Aren’t you curious how we live? This is an underwater kingdom! A secret civilization!”

  “Honestly,” I looked at her with my “thousand-year” gaze, “your world doesn’t interest me much. Water, rocks, fish… I’ve watched empires rise and collapse on the surface. An underwater city is just a basement with good lighting.”

  Arbir laughed. “There’s great power in you, boy—I can feel it. You look like a weak child, but your aura is still as the ocean floor. Well then—enjoy our ‘exotic food’ while Father decides your fate.”

  I sat on a pearl pouf, wondering how Riza was doing. She was probably trying to dry her cloak and cursing the salty water. And I still had a few more hours of underwater hospitality to survive.