Sebastian appeared in a cloud of golden smoke and floated between them, ready with his notepad. "Oh good, another princess of the sea."
"Rick, the variety of ecosystems in your harem is really cool. You have people, demons, dragons, and now water royalty."
"What cos next, a dryad?"
Rick’s gooner brain turned on right away. "Ocean dweller MILF with a huge tentacle mount, coral armor, and those eyes..."
"STOP IT, YOU STUPID FUCKING BRAIN!"
"GOD! WHY DO I ALWAYS HAVE TO ALWAYS HAVE THIS KIND OF THINKING!?"
"But... she’s not the main harem, you fool."
"I know." Sebastian nodded.
He was able to give a fairly normal introduction out loud. "Hey. Yo, I’m Rick Rolland and people know as the Hero of Mature Hearts."
"We’re here to help your mom with the corruption problem."
Myrissa looked at him for a long ti, her head tilted to the side. "You’re also the Demon King of the Eastern Wastes, right?"
Rick blinked. "How did you find that out?"
"Your evil aura can be seen from kiloters away underwater."
"There’s no mistaking the magical signature." She pointed at Zara, who was still partly a demon and had blood on her from the fights that had happened earlier. "Plus, there’s a real Demon Queen next to you who looks like she just bathed in monster guts."
Zara smiled and showed her teeth. "Yo, nice to et ya, fish princess."
Myrissa crossed her arms and floated in the water, which must have been ocean magic. She went from angry to serious.
"You need to know what you just went through before we get anywhere near the citadel."
"That Blob that almost ate you? That was Charybdis, one of the Five Astral Deep Guardians."
Carmilla’s grip on the hilt of her sword got tighter. "That thing was the guardian?!"
"It tried to eat us!"
"That’s actually confusing," Natasha said, her ice-blue eyes sharp. "The word ’guardian’ ans protection, not random predation."
Myrissa’s face grew furious. "Mother and Father made the Five Guardians together six hundred years ago, when they still loved each other." The word "loved" ca out with a lot of sarcasm.
"They were supposed to keep threats from outside from getting to the ocean’s borders."
"They are huge creatures that were given Mother’s oceanic magic and Father’s strength when he used it for sothing useful."
She pointed to the purple wisps that were all that was left of Charybdis as they floated away. "Charybdis was the first Guardian."
"Her original purpose was to eat anything that threatened ridia and dissolve it in her acidic core."
"She could grow forever, taking in anything organic and adding it to her strength."
"What happened to her?" Liora asked softly, and the divine energy kept the Sanctified Sphere around them.
"Corruption," Myrissa said. "When Mother stopped maintaining the Guardian network after Father’s betrayal, Charybdis lost her discrimination."
"She used to be able to tell friends from enemies, and she kept small fish safe by letting them live inside her mass."
"Now... she was just a mindless machine that ate everything in her area, and killing her was rcy."
Thalor’s voice was low. "She used to allow to hide in her when I was younger, during gas of hide-and-seek with the other children."
Rick’s chest felt like it was twisting. If left alone, even guardians tasked with keeping people safe can succumb to corruption.
The effects on Nerissa’s ntal health hit him harder than he thought they would. Myrissa went on, looking at the galodon that was carrying them, "The second guardian is Scylla."
"You’re on her right now."
Everyone’s attention turned to the huge shark below them with a new sense of understanding.
Myrissa said, "Scylla’s original purpose was speed hunting."
"She stopped threats that were moving quickly before they could get to ridia’s borders."
"She has the speed like no other, an armored hide, and the ability to heal naturally."
"She attacked Tidebreak Port because the corruption made her a berserker."
Liora’s eyes got bigger. "That explains why I felt strong magic during the purification, with residual spells running through her whole body, but I didn’t know how big they were."
"You got rid of six hundred years of magic residue and corruption in one casting," Myrissa said, and there was real respect in her voice now.
"That’s great work, surfacer."
"This is the third Guardian." Myrissa pointed behind her to the huge Kraken. "The original goal was to defend strategically by using smart fighting and magic."
"She has oceanic magic, superhuman strength, and problem-solving intelligence that rivals that of most intelligent species."
"Why isn’t she like the others who are corrupted?" Rick asked the obvious question.
Myrissa’s face relaxed a little. "Because I’ve been with her for two hundred years. My oceanic magic flows through her all the ti, going through every cell."
"Corruption can’t take hold where royal magic is actively moving through a body." She sounded sad. "Mother used to do the sa thing for all five Guardians."
"She kept in touch with each one of them personally and kept them pure and focused, but she stopped after Father let her down."
"She said she didn’t have the heart for it anymore."
The effects were heavy in the water. Nerissa had basically left her guardians open to corruption because keeping those ties alive made her think of Typhon.
"What about the other two?" Natasha asked, always wanting to know everything.
Myrissa’s face got a lot darker. "Leviathan is the fourth Guardian."
"The original goal was to be the ultimate deterrent, with the power to end the world kept in reserve for apocalyptic threats, like making storms, tidal waves, and earthquakes, as well as having an almost indestructible body."
"When you look at it, Charybdis and Kraken seem small."
"We think it’s more than two hundred ters long."
"Where is it now?" Carmilla asked.
"No one knows about that, not even my mother, because the Leviathan has been gone for fifteen years." Myrissa’s hands turned into fists. "The last ti anyone saw it was thirty years ago, when it was patrolling the Abyssal Trenches."
"We’ve sent search teams to every part of the ocean, and the result is nothing."
"It’s like Leviathan just disappeared into thin air without giving any farewell to us all."
"Or she’s hiding," Thalor said quietly. "Leviathan was always the smartest Guardian."
"If corruption ca for her and she couldn’t fight it, she might have gone to places that even we can’t reach."
Rick felt a sense of dread settling in his stomach. "What will happen if Leviathan gets corrupted?"
Myrissa looked him straight in the eye. "Then we evacuate every coastal city and pray to any gods that will listen."
"A corrupted Leviathan could sink whole continents."
"Great, it’s nice to hear sothing so destructive coming from a strong creature." Zara said under her breath. "Another possible end of the world to add to the list."
"And what about the fifth Guardian?" Rick asked even though he doesn’t want to hear what’s stronger than the Leviathan.
Myrissa’s voice got so low that it was almost a whisper. "Cthulhu."
"The original purpose was a forbidden weapon, a horror that changed reality and was never ant to be released."
"Its power includes making people crazy, changing dinsions, and corrupting magic itself."
The water around them seed to get colder, even though the Thalassic Crystal was supposed to keep the temperature stable.
Sebastian’s usual sarcasm was gone, and his little face was serious. "Hold on..."
"Cthulhu, like the Old One from the Forbidden Texts?"
"That son of a bitch... Cthulhu?!"
"You know about it?" Myrissa looked shocked.
"All old magical beings know about it! It’s a warning about pride and the risks of acting like a god!"
"There’s no way a re mortal like Typhon made that thing?"
Myrissa nodded sadly. "Six hundred years ago."
"The biggest mistake father made."
"He tried to make the perfect guardian, but instead he made a monster. Mother almost divorced him because of it."
"They put Cthulhu in a magical prison at the bottom of the Astral Deep, more than eight thousand ters below the surface."
"They promised never to talk about it again."
Zara said, "Let guess," and her evil intuition was clearly at work. "The corruption is attempting to breach that protective barrier."
Myrissa’s silence spoke volus.
Zara went on, "That’s exactly what I’d do if I wanted to end the world."
"Find the biggest, strongest weapon and let it go."
"The seal is still holding on, and there’s not a single life near it," Myrissa said, but she didn’t sound sure.
"Once a month, Mother always checks it herself."
"That is the only ti she leaves the throne room for now."
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