📍 Setting: Tide woven Pavilion – The Chamber of Ever shade Tide
A sacred meditation chamber woven from living seaweed, glowing pearl glass, and flowing water-veils. Here, Pavilion elders attune their senses to the undersea leylines of spirit, tide, and blood.
Tonight, the water's pulse twists.
🐚 Elder Murael
The matriarch of the Pavilion, veiled in a translucent shimmer of ancient water qi, jerks upright mid-trance. Her breath mists into the air, as if struck by cold:
"The Vault's seal… shivered."
Around her, the Ever shade Pool glows black — a thin ripple like oil spreading across the sacred water.
🌊 Other Elders Stir:
Elder Ro'sun: Warden of Bound Currents, thick-browed and distrustful of Feng Xian's lineage.
Elder Silin: Master of Shell forge, calm yet sharp-tongued.
"Disturbed… or heard? There's a difference, Ro'sun. One may redeem."
Elder Liyu: Keeper of the Drowned Names, blindfolded and pale.
She speaks softly: "Two pulses stir in the deep… but one is not his."
Silence hangs. Then:
"An imposter. Or a returning shadow."
💧 Elder Murael's Decision:
Though she gave Feng Xian her silent blessing, Murael now walks a dangerous line. She declares:
"The Vault is sacred — even to those seeking answers."
She sends for:
High Disciple Tahlon, the Pavilion's enforcer and martial blade.
Cold, exacting, secretly fearful of what the Crown's resonance may awaken in himself.
A search group to the Spine's entrance: mixed disciples, spiritual beasts, and hydromancer trained to seal memory echoes.
Orders a quiet lockdown of the Pavilion's lower reefs. The Crown must not be seen as stirring openly.
"Not until we know whether it sings of truth… or calls for war."
🌌 Interlude: In the Lower Reaches…
A low-ranking attendant — Lan'Fei, apprentice to the Pavilion's beast wardens — carries coral scrolls through a flooded passage.
As she passes the gate to the Vault Seal Echo, she pauses… unaware that her shadow lingers behind her a second too long.
The sleeper agent, eyes hollow, watches from the rippleglass — a faint burn upon their neck shaped like a spiral fang: the mark of the Bleeding Salt.