The deep did not stir like the surface did, for the sea did not welcome change, and in its lowest reaches even time felt reluctant to move, yet something shifted in the blackness where light had never been meant to touch.
Cold currents dragged slow fingers through the buried trenches, brushing against stone older than kingdoms, older than bones, older than the myths whispered by those who had forgotten their origin.
Pressure pressed down with a weight no mortal body could withstand, yet the ruins beneath it did not collapse, for they had been built to endure what the world above would never survive.
Darkness pooled like ink in the crevices, but it was not empty, for something within that blackness held still, held shape, held memory, as though the sea itself feared disturbing it.
"…awaken…"
The whisper did not come from a mouth.
It did not rise from lungs.
