CHAPTER 217: PRIMORDIAL SEALS

The sky above the mortal world was no longer the gentle dome of blue mortals prayed under—it was split, a jagged seam of light and shadow where Olympus strained to contain the tide that Poseidon had unleashed.

Lightning broke in the clouds, but it was not Zeus’s will alone. The gods had called upon the Primordial Seals, and their combined wrath shivered across heaven and sea alike.

And yet, in the heart of the storm, Poseidon stood unbowed.

The sea around him rose higher than mountains, coiling upward into shapes that mocked the very statues of the gods who sought to kill him. Each wave was a spear, each current a blade. His trident pulsed with abyssal light, resonating not only with the ocean—but with Thalorin’s deeper hunger.

Three gods had come against him.

Ares, the Warbringer, clad in crimson fire and iron. His spear bled endless sparks, each one a battlefield’s worth of rage.

Hera, Queen of the Pantheon, her crown burning with silver fire, her hands weaving chains of fate as heavy as eternity itself.

And Apollo, the Sun Prince, with his bow strung from sunlight, every arrow a hymn sharpened to pierce through eternity.

They came not as rivals but as executioners.

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The Clash

Ares struck first. The sea split as he charged across it, every step detonating waves in his wake. His spear descended in a crimson arc meant to break mountains.

Poseidon raised his trident, catching the blow. The impact rippled the ocean for leagues, a boom that shattered ships and leveled coastal cliffs. Spray exploded into the heavens.

But Poseidon only smiled. His voice rolled with the tide, low and unshaken.

"Your war has always depended on land to soak in blood. But here... you fight in my cradle."

The sea beneath Ares betrayed him. Water hands, colossal and scaled with salt, seized his legs. The god of war snarled, wrenching free, but the tide surged higher, wrapping his chest, choking the flames of his armor.

Before Ares could free himself, Apollo loosed a volley.

Dozens of arrows shrieked across the storm. Each one blazed like a newborn star, so bright that mortals shielded their eyes on distant shores.

Poseidon swept his trident in a wide arc. The sea rose as a single wall, a mirror of water, swallowing the arrows whole. For a heartbeat, the ocean glowed with sunlight, pierced through—then the wall shattered outward, exploding into spears of rain that hissed like molten silver.

Hera moved next. While Ares and Apollo distracted, she whispered threads into existence. Silver lines lashed around Poseidon’s arms, his chest, his throat—chains of fate, meant to bind not flesh, but essence itself.

"You are not eternal," she hissed. "You are a crack in order. A mistake we will erase."

The chains pulled tight. For a moment, even the sea froze.

But then—Poseidon laughed.

Saltwater surged from his skin itself, hissing against the divine bindings. The chains groaned, fraying. His trident struck the waves, and the ocean answered with a roar so loud it shattered the moonlit reflection above them.

Hera staggered, her crown flickering.

"You call me a mistake?" Poseidon’s voice thundered across realms. "Then know this—mistakes are what drown empires."

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The Tide Turns

Ares bellowed and tore through the rising hands of water, slamming into Poseidon’s flank. The War God’s spear drove into the sea king’s side, piercing through his shoulder. Saltwater and ichor spilled, boiling together.

Poseidon gritted his teeth, but instead of retreating, he grasped the spear shaft and dragged Ares closer.

"Then bleed with me!"

The ocean surged, forming a spiral maelstrom that dragged both of them into its throat. The roar of it shook Olympus itself, a whirlpool devouring light and sound.

Apollo streaked overhead, sunlight cutting through stormclouds. He fired again, this time one single arrow—pure, focused, absolute. It carried not just light, but prophecy. It could not miss.

Poseidon broke the surface of the maelstrom just as the arrow fell.

He lifted his trident. The arrow struck.

And for the first time, Poseidon staggered. The prophecy’s power dug deep—not into his flesh, but his fate, writing his death across the sea. His vision split. He saw flashes of chains, flames, and silence.

Apollo’s golden eyes narrowed. "The sea cannot hide from the sun."

Poseidon bared his teeth in a grin, bloodied but defiant. "But the sun drowns every night."

He wrenched the arrow from his chest and cast it aside. The prophecy shivered, breaking, rewriting itself as his will bent the current of fate.

The sea rebelled against Olympus itself.

The Crashing of Crowns

Hera’s fury broke. She summoned her full divinity, her voice echoing like thunder. "Kneel!"

Every mortal near the sea collapsed to their knees. Ships cracked, sailors wept blood, and even Apollo faltered in his flight. Ares roared, pushing his spear deeper into Poseidon’s flesh.

But Poseidon did not kneel.

Instead, he rose higher. The sea lifted him, bearing him upward on a tower of water that blotted out the horizon. His silhouette stood against the storm, terrible and sovereign.

"I am not your subject. I am not your pawn. I am not your drowned prisoner."

His trident flared. "I AM THE SEA."

The tower collapsed outward. A wall of water the size of Olympus itself hurled against the three gods.

Ares was swallowed whole, torn from his spear, dragged into the abyssal churn.

Apollo’s wings burned as he shot skyward, but the wave clipped him, snapping golden feathers from his back. He fell, crashing into a reef with enough force to split it in half.

Hera alone remained aloft, her chains spreading wide, binding the very storm to hold her place.

"You cannot fight us all," she spat. "For every wave you raise, ten gods will answer."

Poseidon’s gaze burned like deepwater lightning.

"Then let them come."

And as the wave receded, Poseidon stood alone, bleeding, trident dripping with ichor and salt, but unbroken.

The crowns of three gods had cracked against him. And Olympus had heard.

The mortal world lay in ruin. Shores were remade, harbors erased, cities reduced to lagoons. Survivors whispered his name not in prayer—but in awe and terror.

Poseidon’s name had returned to mortal lips.

Above, Hera dragged the battered Ares and Apollo into the light of Olympus. Her crown flickered, cracked, but her voice was still iron.

"He must fall," she declared to the council. "Or Olympus itself will drown."

But even as she spoke, a new tide rose in the distance.

Poseidon was not finished.

He had only begun to claim what was his.