The abyss is a crushing, silent weight. Poseidon stands upon a brittle lip of the Mariana Trench, his divine gaze piercing the absolute darkness of the void below—the place he first met the beast.
As his foot settles on the rock, the impact sends a cloud of ancient sediment blooming into the water. Poseidon draws a deep breath, and his voice thunders, a command woven with divine energy and the very essence of the ocean. "LEVIATHAN! COME OUT AND FACE ME!" The words echo through the silent trench, shaking the water itself.
For a heartbeat, a silence deeper than any tomb hangs over the trench. Then, it shatters.
ROOOAARR!!!
A thunderous roar erupts from the depths, a sound so potent it vibrates through the trench walls and shakes the sediment loose. From the deep abyss, two golden suns ignite, locking onto Poseidon.
Leviathan's blade-like, jagged maw unhinges, glowing with a terrifying golden radiance. Without warning, it releases a concentrated ray of pure energy. The water along its path vaporizes instantly, pulverizing stone formations into nothingness.
Poseidon acts. His body flares with sapphire radiance as he channels his ocean divinity. Currents and tides bend to his command, and he blurs sideways, the golden ray scorching the space he'd occupied. Leviathan's head tracks with unnerving precision, the beam following and carving a deep, glowing scar into the trench wall that weeps molten rock.
But Poseidon is swifter, a ripple in the current, and the beam dies. Silence falls again, heavier than before. Heat clings to the walls, making the water shiver with tension. Poseidon's gaze remains locked on the abyss where the golden eyes still hover.
Then the Leviathan rises.
Its body uncoils from the darkness with a slow, dangerous force that shifts millions of tons of water. Scales the size of shields shimmer faintly.
Poseidon's grip tightens on the trident, the familiar metal a cool anchor.
'Stay sharp.'
Leviathan lunges first.
Its body surges upward in a violent whip, compressing the water ahead of it into a shockwave that rattles the trench walls. Poseidon reacts, twisting the currents around himself.
'Tidal Shift.'
He shoots sideways, a silver streak through the dark. Leviathan's jaws clamp shut where his torso had been, the impact crushing a pillar of volcanic rock into swirling gravel.
Poseidon turns sharply, thrusting the trident forward.
'Aqua Lance.'
A spear of condensed water pressure slams into Leviathan's upper jaw. Scales fracture with a sharp crack. The beast recoils, but only for an instant. Its answering roar is a physical vibration that shakes Poseidon to his core.
It learns. Instead of another direct charge, it sweeps its massive tail, not at him, but at the water itself. The current becomes a solid wall that slams into Poseidon's side before he can brace. The hit launches him across the trench. The world spins. He slams back-first into a forest of brittle, crystalline hydrothermal vents. The structures shatter, releasing plumes of superheated, toxic water that scald his skin even through his armor.
Pain, hot and sharp, floods his ribs.
'Move. Now.'
He forces himself upright just as Leviathan charges again, its maw glowing with rising heat.
Poseidon spreads his palm.
'Aqua Shield.'
Water compresses into a thick, spiraling barrier. Leviathan's heat blast erupts against it. The shield holds for two seconds before the overwhelming temperature bursts it apart in a wave of boiling water. Poseidon crosses his arms, the heat searing across his skin, his armor hissing in protest.
He grits his teeth, the sting of the toxic vents still on his skin, and pushes forward through the boiling current.
'Stronger. Faster.'
He channels raw divinity into his legs. The water bends, and he rockets upward through the steam, closing the distance in a heartbeat.
He twists mid-movement and drives a heavy kick, reinforced by tidal force, into the side of Leviathan's head. The impact sends a dull shock through his leg. The beast's neck snaps sideways.
Poseidon doesn't slow. He grabs a horn-like ridge on its snout and pulls himself toward its eye. He thrusts the trident down.
'Pressure Spike.'
The tip crashes into the already fractured scales. Leviathan roars in pain and is driven downward, its body spiraling uncontrollably. The trench floor shatters beneath its weight, a new crater born of its impact.
Poseidon inhales sharply. His lungs burn. Sweat mixes with the frigid seawater cooling his skin.
Leviathan rises again. Slowly. Deliberately. Its one good eye narrows, glowing with a colder, more calculating fury.
'It's adapting,' Poseidon realizes. 'Good.'
Leviathan's chest expands—an inhale deeper than before. The water around its jaws begins to boil instantly.
Refusing to give it range, Poseidon darts forward. He closes the gap and swings the trident in a sharp arc. This time, Leviathan anticipates the move, thrashing its head aside. The weapon misses. The beast snaps its jaw at him in a counter he hadn't expected. He jerks back, feeling the searing heat of its breath scrape his cheek.
He grinds his teeth, a spike of frustrated anger piercing his focus.
'Too close.'
Leviathan lunges again. Poseidon spins, dragging the current around his body.
'Whirlpool Edge.'
The water spirals into a rotating barrier of cutting force. Leviathan crashes into it, and the grinding current tears sections of scale loose. The beast roars in frustration, shaking violently. Poseidon pushes with both hands.
'Pressure Lock.'
Gravity-like force presses the serpent downward. Its head slams into the trench floor, sending up a storm of sand.
Poseidon leaps above the creature, winding the trident back for a final blow.
He strikes down with full force.
The trident plunges toward Leviathan's skull—
A surge of heat explodes from its throat. A point-blank blast, a desperate, close-range gambit.
The blast hits him squarely.
His armor flashes red and fails. The heat drills straight through, a lance of pure agony through his torso. He is thrown upward, flipping uncontrollably, his divine blood clouding the water.
'Too close—damn it!'
He catches himself mid-spin, but his arms shake from the shock. His chest feels raw, each breath a struggle against fire in his lungs.
He forces another breath.
'Focus. It's not done.'
Leviathan charges again. Despite its wounds, its speed is undiminished. It moves in a tight, unpredictable spiral, its tail whipping currents around its body, distorting the water and his senses.
Poseidon prepares to evade. The tail hits first. It is a feint. The real attack is a sudden twist of its body, and the tail slams into his hip with brutal, crushing force. Something cracks. His vision flashes white. He is thrown sideways into a solid basalt outcrop. The stone splits. His world dissolves into pain and swirling dust.
He tries to inhale, but the breath sticks. His ribs are a cage of broken glass.
'Don't stop. Don't slow.'
Leviathan follows, jaws wide for the kill.
Poseidon reacts on pure, pained instinct.
'Aqua Burst.'
A shockwave of water detonates from his palm. It slams into Leviathan's face, knocking its head off-line. Its teeth scrape his shoulder instead of crushing his chest, but they tear through armor and flesh, sending strips of divine metal drifting away.
Pain shoots down his arm. His vision wavers, the darkness of the abyss seeping into the edges.
He forces himself upright.
Leviathan circles him, its movements tighter, more efficient. It has learned his rhythm. Its golden eye tracks every flinch, every labored breath.
Poseidon's grip tightens on the trident. The metal feels strangely cold.
'Need something heavier. One final blow.'
He raises the weapon. Blue lines of divinity ignite across its length. He surge the trident with his divine energy and ocean essence.
The currents of the entire trench groan, collapsing inward to form a spiraling cyclone of power around the trident. The pressure condenses until the water itself vibrates, screaming.
He lunges.
The thrust collides with Leviathan's midsection. The pressure burst detonates on impact. The shock tears across its scales, snapping them apart. Leviathan's body buckles sideways. Cracks spread across its ribs. A pained, furious hiss vibrates through the water.
Poseidon exhales heavily, chest heaving.
'I'm wearing him down.'
Leviathan thrashes, its tail carving gouges in the seabed. Poseidon moves to follow up—
Suddenly, the serpent twists with a burst of reserved speed. Its maw, ignoring the trident's prongs, clamps onto the weapon's shaft.
The pressure spikes.
A sharp, sickening crack pierces the water.
Poseidon's eyes widen.
Crack! Snap!
The trident, an extension of his will for millennia, splinters.
The sound is final. A bone-breaking snap that echoes in his soul. Half the weapon is wrenched away, trapped in Leviathan's jaws. The shock jolts through Poseidon's arms, leaving them numb. He stares, for a single, catastrophic heartbeat, at the broken shaft in his hand.
Leviathan lunges again, jaws opening wide for his torso.
He is too slow to dodge. The water feels like tar. His breath locks. The exhaustion, the broken ribs, the burned skin—it all crashes down at once.
The beast's maw fills his vision.
Closer.
Closer.
His fingers loosen around the broken weapon.
For the first time in an age, his mind sinks into the abyss.
'I can't win.'
Darkness closes in, not of the trench, but of surrender. The ocean's pressure, his birthright, now feels like a shroud, eager to bury him.
A memory, vivid and gentle. A voice, faint and soft, yet clear as a bell, echoes in the stillness of his heart.
"Don't stop here."
'…Amphitrite?'
It is an illusion, but it still cuts through the despair sharper than any blade.
"Keep going. You said you'll reach the throne."
His heart slams against his broken ribs, a defiant, living drum.
'No. Not here. I am not done.'
His grip on the broken trident tightens until his knuckles are white. Divinity does not reside in a weapon. It resides in me. It surges from the core of his being, from the promise he made.
The water around him stills, then begins to vibrate with a new, profound power.
The ocean bends to its true King.
A sphere of pure, dark blue light gathers in his palm. It is not fire, but condensed authority. Particles of water, light, and his own unbreakable will swirl, fusing, hardening. The light sharpens, lengthens, and solidifies.
A new trident forms—no longer metal, but solidified divinity, glowing with the abyssal blue of the deepest sea, humming with the raw power of the ocean's heart.
Poseidon's vision clears.
His stance steadies,the water itself bolstering him.
His aura erupts outward,a wave of absolute dominion.
Leviathan's jaws close in.
Poseidon swings the new trident upward.
The clash does not create a sound, but a vacuum of silence, followed by a shockwave that splits the seabed for miles and blasts the water back into a temporary wall of nothingness.
Poseidon's eyes, burning with renewed focus, meet the Leviathan's golden glare.
Perfect.
The ocean floor vibrates again, but this tremor is different. It become more deeper, older and heavier. 'It isn't Leviathan.' The water pressure drops precipitously. The temperature plummets to near-absolute zero. 'It's something else…'
From the ruptured seabed beneath them, a shadow rises, a form of impossible scale, so vast it makes Leviathan seem manageable. A mouth larger than the trench walls begins to open, a portal to a darker, more ancient abyss.
The fight is forgotten. Leviathan's remaining eye widens with primal fear.
Poseidon slowly turns his head, his new trident pulsing with cold light, to face the new, unimaginable threat.
"Megalodon…"