Chapter 305
Deep below the ocean, in the world of Nana, deeper than where Tide and Flowus built their kingdom, a demon they believed they had purged still lingered in the depths.
At this very moment, the demon Aska was grappling with its own existential problems. During the last battle with Tide and Flowua, it had managed to secure the blessing of Jaws’ counterpart, which it believed would be useful in boosting its strength.
Aska’s research had mostly succeeded, largely due to its new body. The form of a leviathan was more suitable for receiving the blessing of a sea god, even if it was from a counterpart.
Aska coiled his massive form in the deepest trench of the ocean, his scales gleaming faintly in the abyssal dark. The pressure of the water was a familiar comfort, one of the few sensations that grounded him. The cold currents swirled lazily around his body as they always had, but now they felt different—tainted. The blessing that he had believed would make him invincible in the deep was slowly turning against him.
The whispers were louder here, far beneath the surface, where the boundary between the real world and the upside-down thinned. It was a place of power, where he once felt the pulse of the sea in his veins, commanding its flow and strength. But now, the gods from the upside-down had found him. His mind had become a battlefield, the voices worming their way into his thoughts.
He tried to close his eyes, to rest, but the moment he did, the whispers intensified. They filled his mind with half-formed words, promises of deeper knowledge, of ruling all seas—not just his own. At first, Aska had been intrigued. The power of a leviathan was vast, but the idea of unlocking even more secrets of the ocean had tempted him. When the whispers began, he had listened, straining to understand them, hoping to gain more control over his strength.
That was his mistake.
When he focused on the words, they seized him, yanking him from his watery throne and dragging him into the dark waters of the upside-down. It had been a terrifying experience—one moment, he had been surrounded by the familiar depths of his domain, and the next, he was sinking into the black sea of the upside-down, the waters corroding his powerful scales. The sting of that corrosive water had been unbearable, but it had saved him. It shocked him awake just before the massive jaws of Jaws’ counterpart could swallow him whole.
Since then, he had been haunted by the experience. Now, every time he heard the whispers, his body instinctively wanted to return to that cursed place. It was like a call he couldn’t ignore, an instinct imprinted on his very being. But he knew that going back meant certain death.