“You think I'm not a goddess?

Try me.

This is a torch song.

Touch me and you'll burn.”

― Margaret Atwood

"Let's see how well you do against my true body, you disgusting barbarian!"

The sound of her shout faded, and the water below froze in place. A slow rumble built, focused miles beneath the sea. A crescendo that unsettled the world. It carried the water with it, compacted into a solid, without the need for cold.

A vast wall ripped the air as it closed on Verander. A thousand miles of ocean, mouth open in a roar that folded the space between its jaws. Water surged, lifted, and warped as it rushed toward Fallun.

The ocean, deeper than most could believe, left its bed. Out poured a wingless dragon, a serpent of stars crafted from the sea. Each scale shone brighter than a diamond, formed with pressure alone. A beast, the tip of Kalina's finger that could swallow the world. Horror spread across Verander's face, his smug arrogance stifled as Kalina forced reality down his throat.

Your smelly avatar might be a peak Earth Deity, but I'm more than that.

The ocean was her body, while the reef was her womb. The place where she brought life into the world, nurtured it, and set it free.

She burnt this place, the cradle where she'd placed countless centuries of cultivated energy, and drew life from her beloved children.

Verander raised his war-pick, a swing that divided the world. Split in twain, the snake parted, ground sundered beneath its weight. The fall, and the slash, meant nothing. The dragon spiraled and reformed once more.

"You're not the only one who has a connection to the concepts, Verander," Kalina spoke, voice contained within the water itself. "I AM the ocean in this place."

Her words fell and countless dragons crossed the horizon, driven by her power to surround the arrogant god. They surged in knotted twists, unopposable in their advance.

"Behind this cursed barrier, I AM THE SEA!"

Her rage reached a crescendo. The serpents reared up, their heads meters from the vast seal around the earth. Ten thousand dragons roared in fury, an unavoidable tide that crashed toward the avatar of change. Water to drown worlds, all focused into a vicious swarm of teeth and scales.

"I'LL BE BACK FOR YOU WITCH!" Verander bellowed, his massive war-axe striking in all directions. "The child of the titan must die, Fate has decreed. My avatar's death will not save him!"

Thick barrels of lightning cascaded with each attack, drawn into the mouths that threatened to consume him.

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Mighty currents of electricity flowed into Kalina's serpents and burnt her consciousness with its insidious reach. Nails slid along her nerves, trapped under the skin of her mind like acid.

She forced yet more power through the shining core that stood within her soul. Her inner world, an ocean forever tinted rose by the rage in her heart, began to boil.

Something snapped, torn free deep inside, but she pressed on. The water dragons twisted, a mighty vortex that snagged the weapon from Verander's grasp. They pressed and overlapped, formed into a single, gargantuan dragon. Kalina possessed a pair of wings that reached beyond the horizon. A true dragon, her soul opened to the air.

The light of her core faded, then shattered, spread throughout the body of the mighty beast like stars on the clearest night. The loss carved endless lines of black flame into her heart. Nestled deep within the beast, Kalina's spirit vomited its lifeblood. As the dragon gained greater detail, she faded to darkness.

The ocean of the world looked down on the damned god and opened her mouth wide. She poured against his fists, the lightning meaningless against her scales.

Jaws slammed shut and muscles worked, the bones of her enemy minced to jelly in her mouth. Her control faltered, but she could still hear the wrathful screams of his soul.

Weariness held her, whispered in her ear to rest, yet she continued. The water dragon deformed and flowed. Kalina compressed herself, tighter and tighter, until a ball of luminescent, heatless ice floated in its place.

"It's now or never, you useless Turtle!" The threads of Kalina's mind wound beyond her limits as she crushed Verander's cells in a planet-killing embrace. "This freak is still fighting me!"

Ooulin floated forward from where he'd protected the ramshackle guild hall. It stood sturdy in the air, as if the ground still rested below.

"Apologies Kalina, I am ready."

His empty eyes flickered, one black, the other white, as he approached the embattled pair. He spread his sealed palms, and silence reigned over the world. Revealed there, was a small wooden brush, its tip steeped in heavy ink.

"I name you villain, and I banish you!" Ooulin raised his tool, the bristles pointed toward Verander and Kalina. "Change, King of Evolution, Keeper of the Dark Path, and Jester of Hope."

He scrawled each word on the air, a shining runic script that released a pale white flame. From the depths of Kalna's grip, the True God roared, wordless venom and hate, but the turtle-kin continued.

"The world rejects you, as it rejects the void!"

Surrounded by runes, the ancient turtle raised his long neck, head faced toward the sky as his hands rapidly constructed a cage of light.

"I cast you out," Ooulin thundered as the last rune appeared, and his brush turned to ash. "Return to the cursed lands beyond the veil!"

His shell glowed, and the lancing warrior carved on its surface pulled free. It merged into the script that filled the air, and Ooulin turned his empty gaze to the imprisoned god. The runic letters reshaped, formed into a simplistic word that hung in the air.

"BANISH!" Ooulin breathed out the word as the color in his body faded to a pale grey, his eyes still held on his target.

With a slowness that tested Kalina's resolve, the vast spell woven from the true words of the universe fell towards her. Compressed as he was, Verander still thundered against her grasp, a grasp that she could only hold for so long.

Damn turtle, everything he does is slow.

The lightning filled most of her consciousness as it flayed her inner world, whipped against the walls of her soul without mercy or concern. It shaved layer after layer from the core of her, it no longer took skin, but meat.

Ooulin's great seal bore down on her as she gripped tightly to Verander, a skeleton that clasped the sun in her hands. It tore from her, the flesh of her soul stripped bare to the dark.

Death circled, a predator, a last breath held firm in her lungs, her denial that kept it at bay. She could no longer see. Trapped within her mind as she clenched, her smoldered bones held in place.

What was it again?

Memory failed her, torn into the windstorm that ravaged her soul. In the dark around her, a word approached. Silver and glacial, it crawled closer. Its light touched her hollow eyes, the empty skull drawn to its face.

Mist rose around her. Shaped into the form of a woman it wrapped Kalina until she stood whole again, but thin, a shadow.

"I remember..."

Kalina tightened her waining grip, anger gone from her eyes, replaced by the stillness of water. As the bones beneath the ghost ground to dust, still pressed firm around Verander, a thought came for her little fish.

That idiot better be worth it, or I'm going to kick his ass.

The great seal finally stood before her. Kalina's face bent in a smile. She leaned her lips close to the imprisoned god and breathed out a whisper.

"Tell your master to be afraid barbarian," Her words caused the man to still, a respite in the struggle as the inevitable approached. "His prison was built too well, he can't get in."

The towering symbol, the banishment of the world, pressed against her, and the mist of her body pulled away into the void.

"This poisoned jar will be his end, Verander. It will be the end of you all."

The hands of death closed around her and Kalina smiled. She stood below the waves of the past, young and new to awareness. Fish swam around her stony body, and life grew from her flesh. A small turtle nestled its sleepy head on her surface as little bubbles popped and flowed from its snores.

"Wake up little Ooulin! Every day is a gift, don't waste it!"