The sea does not forget. It carries memories older than mountains, older than stars.
In the abyssal silence, Poseidon sat upon his throne of coral and obsidian, watching the currents of time swirl before him. The mortal world above glittered with laughter and firelight, but he felt the tremors of corruption beneath it, like cracks spreading through the ocean floor.
This was not the first time.
The sea god remembered. Civilizations had risen before Atlantis—proud, dazzling, unstoppable. And each had fallen the same way. Each had drowned in its own pride.
There had been the Kingdom of Fire, where men tamed living flame. They built towers of molten glass that blazed against the heavens, claiming even the stars would bow before their brilliance. For a time, they thrived. But their fires grew too fierce. Their towers collapsed into rivers of magma, consuming even their kings. Ash blotted out the sun, and the land was left as blackened stone.
Then there was the Empire of Stone, who mined the bones of the earth until the mountains themselves were hollowed. Their halls ran so deep that they touched the molten heart of the world. Riches poured from their mines, and their kings crowned themselves with jewels heavier than their souls. Yet greed was their undoing. The mountains collapsed, burying them in endless night. Their cities became tombs, sealed forever beneath their own weight.
And there were the Sky Lords, a people of wind who raised their cities upon floating platforms, drifting like clouds. They boasted of their dominion over the heavens, laughing at the mortals below. But they reached too high. The winds betrayed them. Storms tore their palaces from the sky, hurling them into the sea. What little remained was scattered as dust among the clouds.
Others had risen too—the Keepers of Light, who tried to bottle the sun in crystal, and the Singers of the Deep, who bent the voices of whales and spirits alike. All of them, mighty in their age. All of them swept away in judgment.
Each had flourished. Each had fallen.
The Creator had erased them, cleansing the world with disasters so vast they became legend. Firestorms. Earthquakes. Floods. Every age bore the mark of judgment. Mortals whispered of them as myths, stories to frighten children. But Poseidon knew better. They were not stories. They were resets.
The cycle of the world, he thought, his gaze darkening. When humanity strays too far from balance, the Creator wipes the slate clean.
Atlantis trembled now at the edge of that cycle.
Poseidon could feel it in the restless tides, in the tremors beneath his temple's foundations. The currents carried visions to him—mountains splitting like broken teeth, cities vanishing beneath waves, skies torn with fire.
And in his heart, he felt inevitability.
Above, the Ten Kings feasted in golden halls. They raised cups of wine heavier than the bread their people begged for. They quarreled over borders while their canals overflowed with rot.
Prayers had grown faint. Once, hymns filled his temple like the roar of the surf. Now, silence lingered, broken only by hollow rituals spoken by priests who sold blessings for coin. Poseidon, who had walked among mortals, was forgotten—reduced to a statue, a symbol invoked without devotion.
"They have forgotten the sea that gave them life," Poseidon murmured, his voice like the groan of shifting tides.
The heavens shuddered. Lightning split the sky over Atlantis, though no storm had been summoned. The Creator's wrath was stirring.
Poseidon closed his eyes. In darkness, visions came—walls of water higher than mountains, flames bursting from the earth, cities collapsing into dust. The cries of mortals echoed and then fell silent, drowned beneath the roar of the flood.
It was not just memory. It was prophecy.
The Reset was coming.
The world would be scoured clean once more.
Poseidon gripped his trident, its weight pressing like destiny into his palm. He was not the Creator, but he was guardian of the seas. If the Reset could not be stopped, he must decide how it would fall.
Could Atlantis be spared?Could humanity redeem itself?
His heart wavered. He remembered Cleito, the woman he had loved. He remembered her laughter, as bright as sunlight on the water. He remembered his sons—Atlas with his proud brow, and the younger boys chasing one another across the temple steps. They were both divine and mortal, blood of god and flesh of man. Was all of that to be washed away like sand before a tide?
For a heartbeat, Poseidon wished to believe. He wished to believe that the kings would change, that the people would remember the reverence they once held for the sea. But as his gaze reached across Atlantis, what he saw was arrogance. Men weighed down by crowns heavier than their wisdom. Women draped in gold thicker than their hearts. Priests laughing as they sold the name of gods for coin.
No… the balance is broken beyond repair.
Rising from his throne, Poseidon's form loomed like a storm given flesh. His eyes burned with the light of the abyss. The ocean quaked, sensing his resolve.
"If the Creator's Reset must come, then let it come. But let the seas bear witness to who was faithful and who was false."
The ocean roared in answer. Waves slammed against the shores of Atlantis. Whales sang in mourning, their cries echoing through leagues of water. Even the coral reefs trembled, shedding fragments of their ancient bones.
Poseidon turned toward the heart of his temple, where veins of crystal carried the ocean's eternal power. It was there he would act. It was there he would prepare.
The Reset was coming.
And Poseidon would not flee.
He would embrace it.