Cold water swept over him, a roiling expanse of black depths and white bubbles. He thrashed against it, still clawing at his throat, gasped —

And felt the water enter his neck. It was a strange feeling, that first breath through gills, but it came with a surge of relief. He heaved another breath — if it could even be called that — and blinked his eyes.

He couldn’t see very clearly in the water; everything ahead of him was blurry and dark, a deep well of ruined stone and ancient carvings. He looked down, kicking himself afloat, and saw his feet dangling above an abyss with no bottom. Beneath him, he saw stone walls that descended infinitely, pocked with glowing green sacs. They looked like shark’s egg sac, nearly translucent, illuminated by their own interior light. But within each was the figure of a finfolk, merely a silhouette in the dark water.

These are Kal’ech’s followers, he thought, they’re kept here in some kind of stasis. Why?

Just then, something grabbed his ankle. He looked down to see a webbed hand wrapped around his leg, pulling him down. A finfolk's beady black eyes stared hatefully at him.

The finfolk pulled a knife from its teeth and slashed it through the water. Theo felt the blade slide his thigh, pulling away just as the bone-blade would have severed his femoral artery. He kicked the finfolk in the face, sending a torrent of green blood through the water. It screeched as Theo’s foot crunched into the bones of its face. He wondered briefly if finfolk even had bones, or if it was cartilage, like fish and sharks…

Not the time for comparative anatomy, he thought. Instead, he jammed his staff into the creature’s neck, feeling the trachea crushed under the wood. The finfolk struggled, clutching its neck, and then sunk to the endless deep.

Theo thrashed back to the surface just as a new notification flashed.

You have defeated Seabass Finfolk! You have absorbed some of this creature’s universal power.

Your Path of Evolution ability has been activated. You have learned: Silent Swim (Remedial)!

Silent Swim, Theo thought, probably a sneaking ability, just in the water. Could be useful. He felt the power and knowledge watch over him, and suddenly knew the way to move through the water without making a sound. His thrashing ceased, and he glided to the surface. It amazed him how quickly the powers came when in a battle. It was like, kill by kill, he was becoming better suited to the environment. But would he be better suited to any environment?

He grit his teeth and surfaced, taking in a gasping breath.

The air entered his lungs, and his gills flared painfully. After a few breaths, he fell into a rhythm and was able to breathe the air without pain. But it still almost felt like holding his breath; the longer he breathed air, the more his gills screamed for water.

Well that’s certainly an evolutionary drawback, he thought. He tried not to imagine being bound to the water forever, forced to live like a fish person. He shook the thought away. If he didn’t focus, he might not even get to live as a fish person.

Ahead of him, on the stone platform, Blake, Alice, and Tiberius stood in a triad, amidst of a pile of scaled corpses. But on the whole, they were winning: only two finfolk warriors remained. Blake stabbed into a charging finfolk, electrifiying his blade. The blade pierced the creature’s chest, sending burnt blood into the air. Theo watched Blake’s face twisted into a grimace as he stabbed, already caked in blood and ash. Alice peppered the last finfolk with two flaming blades, one in each eye. It fell dead to the stone, and the room was briefly silent.

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Theo swam to the edge of the pool and clambered out. Blake and Alice ran to him, heaving exhausted breaths. “Theo, what…” Alice started. Then her eyes bulged.

“What the fuck is on your neck?” Blake finished.

Theo raised a hesitant finger and touched his left gill, which flared in response.

“Path of Evolution,” he said. But he couldn’t take his eyes off the corpses that surrounded them. They looked so human, face down — not different from a person in a costume. “We killed them,” Theo said, “we killed all of them.”

“They tried to kill us,” Blake said. He stepped forward and put a hand on Theo’s shoulder. “If we hadn’t, we’d be dead.”

“They’re people,” Theo said, “they might not look like it, but they are. I can feel it. They’re sentient. They have language. We just slaughtered people.”

He wanted to be sick. He wanted to keel over and cry, or throw up. He’d understood that the finfolk were people just like them, to a degree, but he’d fought back anyway. Killed them, anyway.

“They’re enemies,” Alice said. She wiped blood from her lips. “At the end of the day, it’s us or them.”

“I just don’t—“ Theo started, but was interrupted by a crashing sound. The thunder of breaking stone echoed throughout the cavern, and the trio turned to see the source: at the top of the pyramid, the lid of Kal’ech’s sarcophagus has burst open, and chunks of stone crashed down the terraced sides of the monument.

From within, a howling scream sounded. Theo saw a thin, dark hand raise from the sarcophagus, its fleshy fingers webbed with fins and tipped with silvery claws. An arm followed a hand, followed by a robed body, nearly corpse-like in its desiccation. The thing rose from the sarcophagus, floating in the air.

And Theo stared at Kal’ech, God Priest of the Deep Ones.

The first thing that Theo noticed was the priest’s eyes: they surged with greenish power, like sunlight seen from underwater. He was finfolk, but tall and lean rather than muscular like his warriors. His scales were blackish and oily, interspersed with dark gray skin. Instead of scale armor, he wore robes of gauzy green, like cloth made from seaweed. They floated around him as if underwater, whipping with green light. In his left claw, he held a staff of polished driftwood, as white as bone. Runes in some unknowable language traced the side, curving and curling like shells and waves.

Theo quickly used his Druidic Knowledge.

Name: Kal’ech, God Priest of the Deep Ones

Species: Deeptouched Finfolk (Greater) (Projection)

Class: Wizard/Cultist/Sorcerer

Level: ???

A projection, Theo wondered, what does that mean?

He snapped back from the thought as the God-Priest screeched, sending a shockwave of energy through the room. Dust cascaded from the domed ceiling above them, and ripples of sound moved across the pool surrounding the pyramid. Theo saw a flash of light as the egg-sacs beneath the pyramid broke open, sending more finfolk warriors to the surface. He watched as they climbed out of the pool, spears and blades gripped in dripping claws. Soon, fifteen more finfolk stood at the lip of the pool, defending their master atop the pyramid.

“Okay, so there goes the sneaking plan,” Alice grumbled, “any other ideas?”

Blake swung his sword. “Fight our way through.”

“Was worried you were going to say that,” Alice said. There was an awkward standstill as the finfolk waited for a command. They bobbed on their toes, crouching, knives and spears drawn. Kal’ech looked down at the intruders, his black eyes hovering on each of them. As Kal’ech appraised him, Theo felt the weight of his power, his raw mana, pressing down on him. That’s when Kal’ech spoke, sending a single, guttural word of command out to his soldiers.

“She’leth!”

And he pointed his staff forward, commanding his legion on.

Theo stood straight; his gills were beginning to ache for water, but he ignored them, focusing on the warriors approaching him. They ran in a line, spears drawn, and he readied to fend off the first wave.

“Up the pyramid! If we kill Kal’ech, he can’t awaken any more warriors!” Theo said. Blake and Alice nodded, readying their weapons, and charged forward as well.

And were instantly blown away.

Theo could only blink in disbelief. One minute they were racing towards battle, the next they were blow backwards, flying past him and colliding with the back wall. A lightening bolt collided with the stone before them, sending a thunderous boom throughout the chamber. He turned to see Blake and Alice, covered in suit and crackling with electricity, slumped on to the floor.

“Oh shit,” he whispered, looking up at Kal’ech. The God-Priest’s staff still smoked, blue power swelling in the runes, electricity tracing along the sides. He could almost see the wizard smirking. The God Priest began to chant, summoning up more mana, readying for another lightning strike. And the finfolk warriors screamed their battlecry, and rushed at Theo with raised blades.