The world around Orion had dissolved into a boundless sphere of shimmering blue — a void where the weight of oceans pressed from every direction, yet the water did not drown. It suspended. It listened. It judged.
He stood upon a translucent platform of light, hovering within the depths. Endless tides swirled above and below, thick with ancient pressure and something older still — Authority, twisted and worn with age. Beside him, curled in a protective coil, was Felix — his frost-dragon companion, his shadow, his guardian. The beast's silver scales glistened under the aqueous light, pupils narrowed and breath low, as if the mere thought of Orion being harmed had drained the meaning from his own life.
Before them loomed a figure both monstrous and divine.
A draconic shape, immense and fluid, formed from water itself — the liquid limbs flickering with reflections of drowned empires and forgotten storms. The voice that echoed from the beast was calm, yet carried the unmistakable pressure of command.
"I will ask you once more…"
"Why do you seek the Authority that belongs to the Sovereigns alone?"
As he spoke, the watery form dissolved into a stream of cascading liquid, converging — almost lazily — into the silhouette of a man.
No… something more than a man.
He emerged with a grace that defied surface-born beings — tall and regal, with long white hair that bled into strands of cerulean, the tips glimmering like fish scales in moonlight. Two subtle horns curled back from his temples, cleverly veiled amidst his ocean-hued locks. His upper body bore an intricate vest of golden chainmail, woven like ancient sigils, glinting like sunken treasure. His lower half was wrapped in a flowing garment crafted from the hide of deep-sea leviathans — coarse and slick, yet ceremonial in its elegance.
The very pressure of his presence seemed to ripple through Orion's lungs.
"Neuvillette?" Orion breathed, eyes wide, instinctively stepping back.
The man tilted his head, amused.
"Ah," he said, reclining onto a throne-like shell that rose from the depths, pearl-encrusted and gliding as if summoned by thought alone. "A common mistake."
"You confuse me with my reincarnation — though the name remains, and the face has returned to the cycle — I am not that man."
The seas seemed to grow still. His gaze sharpened.
"Now... do not make me repeat my question."
"I have no desire for Sovereign Authority," Orion said at last, his voice steady but respectful, resonating into the watery vastness. "Nor have I ever made attempts to claim what was never meant to be mine."
He stepped forward, posture unwavering. Before his presence could be misconstrued as defiance, Frieda's voice emerged like a ripple from within him — calm, composed, and echoing with grace.
"We came only to deliver a message. From the Cryo Sovereign, VlastMoroz… to you, the Sovereign of the Tides. A warning of the war that approaches."
A slow exhale escaped Neuvillete — almost a huff, though there was no humor in it. His gaze sharpened, irises reflecting ancient currents and judgments passed beneath ocean floors.
Then, with a subtle gesture — no louder than the drop of a tear into the sea — the pressure shifted.
Orion and Felix collapsed to their knees, crushed by the invisible weight of his presence. The very atmosphere seemed to condense, folding over itself like the final silence before a tidal wave.
"You speak as though your arrival were gentle," Neuvillete murmured, tone now edged with solemnity. "But your presence in Fontaine was enough for me to know the hour of reckoning draws near. It is no small matter when the envoy of VlastMoroz sets foot upon my domain... especially one that carries three souls."
Orion's body was lifted from the ground, suspended mid-air like a marionette before judgment. Felix snarled in protest, his claws scraping across the radiant platform.
"Don't you dare harm him!" he growled, the frost creeping along his jawline as he readied to lunge.
Neuvillete turned his head slowly — and smiled. Not with warmth, but with the cold patience of a sea that had swallowed empires.
"Harm?" he echoed, stepping forward. "If I had intended harm… neither of you would have ever left the shore."
He approached Orion's suspended form — slowly, reverently, like a scholar inspecting an artifact lost to time. His fingers traced along Orion's arm with disturbing gentleness, pausing now and then, as if decoding truths buried beneath skin and soul.
"The essence of VlastMoroz…" he whispered. "Awakened. Stirring."
"And the way the elements bent around you — it wasn't random. Did the plan… change?"
He fell into a contemplative silence, stepping back and folding into his throne once again — a seashell of immense size, spiraled with coral runes and adorned in pearls that shimmered with memories of the deep. His brows furrowed.
With a sudden gasp, the unseen force dissipated, and Orion fell — not to the ground, but to the soft embrace of Felix's back. His breaths were shallow, yet steady.
"Do we really have to stay here?" Frieda's voice grumbled from within, laced with irritation. "We've delivered our message. His hospitality is… lacking."
Neuvillete didn't seem to hear — or perhaps, he simply didn't care.
"I have watched you since the moment you stepped into Fontaine's waters," he said, his voice now a lullaby spoken to crashing waves. "You brought with you a storm of your own. Trouble, wherever you tread."
Felix bared his teeth.
"Your reign, huh?" he snarled. "The Iudex Neuvillette said the same. That he was the Sovereign. And now you do as well. You wear the same name, the same face — who's the liar here?"
Neuvillete's eyes dimmed and brightened all at once — shimmering like a reef in starlight.
"The truth is more complicated than your mortal terms," he said softly. "Each Sovereign had to find a way to evade the gaze of the Heavenly Principles… to slip between the cracks of their slumber."
He turned, voice lowering to a near-whisper.
"Even now, while Celestia sleeps… the shadows beneath remain watchful."
Frieda's voice softened, concern threading her tone.
"So... the Iudex is just a cover? A vessel?"
Neuvillete nodded slowly, fingers steepled.
"He is no mere mask. He is very much himself. My reincarnation — my fragment — my echo. A Sovereign, yes… but not the Sovereign."
"He is my continuation. But you do not acknowledge him because he lacks what I carry — the original breath of the seas. The primordial weight. The crown that was never taken, only hidden."
He exhaled once more, the ocean around them dimming slightly, as if the water itself mourned the truth he carried.
"We are both Neuvillette. And yet… we are not the same."
Neuvillete rose once more, his expression unreadable — calm in the way only ancient things can be. He extended a single hand, and the waters obeyed. A massive seashell — encrusted with coral and weeping salt like blood — drifted into view, carried by invisible tides. With a casual flick of his fingers, the shell creaked open.
And inside it...
A translucent sphere pulsed softly, like a heartbeat. Trapped within was a little girl — fragile, trembling, curled into herself as if trying to disappear. Her sobs were muffled by the barrier, yet the raw pain etched on her tear-streaked face pierced through the water like a scream.
"ELYNAS!" Frieda's voice erupted from within Orion, so forceful that it caused the air to tremble.
In that instant, both of Orion's eyes ignited with power — twin flares of emotion and element. One iris shifted to the cool frost-blue of Frieda… but the other drowned into an aqueous hue, swirling like a whirlpool, darker than the deepest trench.
He surged forward—
But a single wave of Neuvillete's hand halted him.
"The friend you made in Fontaine," the Sovereign said, his voice a haunting lullaby dragged from forgotten shipwrecks. "Elynas."
He tilted his head slightly, as though studying a long-forgotten specimen.
"Do you truly not know what she is?"
A sickening snap of his fingers echoed like a bone breaking beneath water.
The sphere pulsed once.
Twice.
Then—
The girl inside spasmed.
Her skin paled. Her eyes rolled back, her sobs turning to choked gasps.
And then... it began.
A black ichor seeped from her mouth — not liquid, but shadow, thick and cold, dripping upward against gravity. Her limbs twisted unnaturally, as if the bones inside were bending to something else's will.
With a gurgling hiss, her small body jerked backward like a puppet on broken strings — and from her chest, something pushed out.
It peeled its way free.
A grotesque, spectral form erupted from her like steam escaping a fracture — towering, skeletal, and wet with death. Its shape was vaguely draconic, the remnant of a beast that once terrorized the skies of Fontaine — but now distorted, defiled. Its eyes were twin pits of black hunger, its jaws unhinged and leaking glimmers of drowned souls.
It let out a sound — not a roar, but a howl — a grief-stricken, vengeful wail that turned the surrounding water into vibrations of agony.
> "The spirit of the monster Elynas," Neuvillete said softly, watching with a glint of pity. "The true self that has clung to your friend… hiding inside her like a parasite in a shell."
Orion stumbled back in horror, his breath caught in his throat. His body collided with Felix, whose growl now cracked with fear.
"No... no, that can't be her—" Orion whispered, eyes wide and unfocused.
Inside the sphere, the little girl's sobbing mouth moved — reaching out with hands that now faded like mist, trying to hold onto a form already lost.
Her voice was faint.
"...I didn't want to… I didn't mean to be this…"
The bubble cracked.
Neuvillete merely watched.
"So tell me, Sovereign of Ice's envoy…" he said, voice low and mournful. "What is it that your side plans to unleash upon this world… when even your friendships are forged in secrets and corpses?"