CHAPTER 158: SO... THEY’VE NOTICED.

The sea no longer whispered. It thundered.

Poseidon stood upon the black ridge of a half-drowned temple, seawater dripping from his shoulders as though his very flesh was part of the tide. Around him lay the ruins of the harbor—a graveyard of shattered ships, drowned bells, and corpses tangled in seaweed. The city that had defied him for centuries was no more than an outline beneath the waves.

And still, he was not satisfied.

The mortal world had only tasted a drop of his will. The depths within him, the legacy of Thalorin coiled with his reborn divinity, were still pressing outward, demanding more. The ocean wanted to surge. The abyss wanted to rise.

Poseidon’s hand touched the waterlogged stone at his feet, and the ruin shuddered. The tide obeyed instantly, slithering back across the shore, revealing streets clogged with salt and bodies, only to crash forward again in a mockery of breath. Each motion carved his claim deeper into the land.

He exhaled slowly. "This world has forgotten me."

The sea answered with silence—and then with the distant cries of gulls circling above, unsettled, as if even the sky feared his name.

---

The First Signs of Olympus

From far above, lightning split the horizon. Not the chaotic kind that came with mortal storms—no. This was precise, jagged light, cast deliberately. Poseidon felt the sting of it immediately, like a needle driven into the edge of his domain.

Olympus was stirring.

He raised his head, narrowing his eyes at the sky. The air shimmered faintly, runes of binding descending like pale threads too thin for mortal sight. It was a ward, a net the Olympians cast to measure his reach, to test how deeply he had rooted himself in the world.

Poseidon’s lips curled. "So... they’ve noticed."

The water within him pulsed, and he let it bleed outward. The runes dissolved as soon as they touched the waves. The sea itself became his answer: No chain holds the abyss.

But deep within, he felt the echo of what came next. Olympus would not be content with scouting. They would send envoys, weapons, and eventually war.

---

The Drowned Survivors

In the flooded city, among broken beams and sinking homes, a handful of mortals still clung to life. Poseidon’s gaze flicked over them—not with pity, but with calculation. Their voices rose in fractured prayers, not to him, but to the gods of Olympus who had abandoned them.

"Zeus, save us..."

"Hera, shield us..."

"Athena, guide our hands..."

Each name stoked an anger older than mountains.

Poseidon clenched his fist, and the prayers drowned in a sudden swell of brine. But he left some alive—not out of mercy, but because he wanted them to see. To carry his name back to other cities, to other harbors. To whisper in the streets:

Poseidon has risen.

---

The Abyss Within

For a moment, the hum of the ocean fell away, replaced by something darker—a pressure gnawing inside him. Thalorin’s hunger.

Take them all, the voice whispered in his blood. Drown not the city, but the land. Let the mountains drink salt, let the rivers choke, let mortals remember their place beneath us.

Poseidon stood still, his jaw set. Thalorin’s essence was not wrong. The hunger aligned with his wrath. Yet Poseidon was no mere vessel anymore. He was not Dominic, the fragile boy. He was not Thalorin, the abyss unchained.

He was both—and neither.

"No," he said aloud, his voice booming over the restless surf. "This is not hunger. This is reclamation. The sea does not consume for desire. It consumes because it must."

The waves calmed at his words, though the hunger never truly receded.

---

The Mortals Who Watched

On a crumbled watchtower at the harbor’s edge, a young woman pulled herself onto the broken stones, coughing seawater. Her hair clung to her face, her body scraped raw, but her eyes... her eyes burned with clarity. She had watched the god rise. She had felt the shift in the harbor, the tilt of the sea.

And she whispered his name—not in fear, not in prayer, but in recognition.

"Poseidon."

Her voice carried strangely, echoing farther than it should have, reaching his ears even across the flood. His gaze shifted, locking onto her.

For the briefest moment, he saw her not as a speck of mortality but as a spark—someone who could witness, someone who could spread the truth of his return.

He let her live. For now.

---

Olympus Watches

Far above the clouds, on Olympus itself, the gods gathered. The marble courtyards trembled with divine agitation. Zeus stood at the center, lightning crawling across his knuckles, his beard shadowing a mouth carved into perpetual fury.

"Poseidon defies the seal," he declared. His voice rolled across the hall like thunder. "He walks again upon the earth."

The gods shifted uneasily. Athena’s grey eyes narrowed, her spear tip resting against the floor. "This is not simply Poseidon. The sea moves too unnaturally. There is... something else inside him."

"Thalorin," Hades intoned from the shadows, voice deep as the grave. His black robes stirred though no wind touched them. "The drowned abyss whispers in him. If left unchecked, it will unmake more than cities. It will unmake the balance we swore to uphold."

Zeus slammed his staff upon the marble, sparks erupting. "Then we destroy him."

Not all gods nodded. A murmur of dissent rippled—some feared Poseidon, some pitied him, and some, like Aegirion, remembered him not as monster but as brother of the tide.

But the decree was inevitable. War was stirring.

---

Poseidon’s Resolve

On the mortal shore, Poseidon straightened, his eyes burning like whirlpools. He felt Olympus’s decision before it was spoken. The sky tasted of iron, of judgment, of familiar betrayal.

"They will come," he murmured, his voice carrying across the drowned ruins. "My so-called kin. My jailers. My executioners."

The waves rose higher, kissing the remnants of rooftops, coiling around his ankles as if to say: Then let them come.

Poseidon’s hand traced the horizon where the sea met the sky. His power bled outward, seeding every current, every tide, every droplet in the air. The oceans of the world bent slightly toward him, waiting for command.

"They will call me tyrant," he whispered. "They will call me drowned god, abyss-spawn. Let them. For when the horizon tilts, mortals and gods alike will see the truth."

He closed his fist.

"The sea does not kneel."

And far out in the depths, something ancient stirred—a shape vast enough to blot out the stars, answering his call.

The first of his armies.