Chapter 17: “The Depth of the Ocean”

As the crack of dawn arose along the horizon of the vast sea ahead. Everyone slowly awoke, readying themselves for the long travel. They switched over to swimwear as it would be hours until they saw land again. Everyone’s swimwear was tame compared to Arachnia’s swimsuit. It consisted of a 2-piece with laces around her chest and slits along her thighs.

“How does it look?” Arachnia asked everyone.

Everyone was visibly left speechless.

Sabrina felt that everyone’s lack of a response was a little strange. Arachnia was a beautiful young woman and deserved a little acknowledgment.

“It fits you perfectly,” Ziggy complimented with misplaced enthusiasm. “It’s making all the fellas speechless!”

“That doesn’t include you, does it?” Sabrina whispered into Ziggy’s ears. He turned over to find a cold look of death.

“I-I mean, it does look good,” Ziggy tried in vain to redact his statement. What was said was said.

For once, Verona wasn’t the center of attention. Arachnia, drawing away attention from her, made her feel quite insecure of herself. Verona wore a tube top and a skirt that wasn’t too revealing, form-fitting on both accounts. However, she only cared if a specific individual noticed, but he couldn’t remove his eyes off either of them.

“Say something,” Victor in tropical trunks nudged Odrian on his shoulder with his elbow. Odrian wore blue swimming trunks with a single black line through it and hexagons printed on it.

Odrian wasn’t sure who to compliment first. He could no longer look at either as his eyes wandered between both.

“It’s attractive,” Odrian admitted. Odrian felt ashamed of not being able to be upfront. Victor knew this was such a long-running problem for him.

“You both look great,” Landon put in his two cents. His swimwear was rather simple. All black, no designs.

“No one’s gonna compliment me, huh,” Sarah was ready to be the star of the show and grab attention. However, that notion was dead on arrival. She wore boy shorts and a white teeshirt. No one could tell if she was wearing it for swimwear or had something else underneath.

“Are you planning on flying the whole way like your father and me,” Sabrina asked, questioning her attire.

“I’ll only show off my swimsuit if they ask nicely,” She smiled as she lifted her shirt halfway, completely ignoring her mother’s question.

Although they were all curious as to what she picked out, no one was trying to encourage it. But, Victor wanted to make up for the other day, so he encouraged her.

“I wanna see it!” Victor became incessantly energetic in front of her parents.

Sarah decided to push boundaries.

“Say, please,” Sarah teased, inching her shirt up a little higher. “Actually, pretty please.”

“Pretty please.” Victor swallowed his pride for this once. Sarah admittedly liked the attention she was getting.

“Well, seeing how you’re so eager.”

Sarah tore off her top and bottom, instantly disappearing into the air. She had on a top that had a small string tied in the middle, holding everything together and little cuts in an x shape at the top. The bottom crossed over her waist with the same x shape. It was a little revealing. It was a bold move for Sarah that no one saw coming. Everyone was impressed, but Ziggy.

“Nah, not my daughter,” Ziggy grabbed a towel and threw it at her wrapping her up almost like a burrito. “Nah, uh.”

Sarah was left embarrassed by her father’s overprotective actions.

“That’s a good look too,” Landon, who usually doesn’t say much, broke out laughing. Victor wanted to laugh but couldn’t he knew better at this time. Arachnia, Verona, and Odrian placed their hands over their mouths while holding their breath. Ziggy realized he needed to fix his wrong, but Sabrina intervened.

“She’s not a baby anymore, Ziggy,” Sabrina walked over and undid the towel. “She can dress cute if she wants.”

“That’s our daughter,” Ziggy contested in a whisper.

“Remember how I was when I was her age?” Sabrina winked. Her demeanor changed momentarily.

Ziggy blushed, a rare sight for all to see.

“She’s bold like her mother, but I was the wild one.”

“The show is over, kids! Let’s go!” Ziggy flew off first.

“Make sure you apologize later.” Sabrina pulled up next to him.

While all of them now traveled across this vast sea, they had over 2000 miles to cover. Victor decided to swim while Arachnia was alongside, skating above the water. Verona used her wings to fly just above the water above Odrian, who was also swimming with Sarah. Landon had decided to run on top of the water.

After 1 hour, the 1000-mile mark had just barely been passed. No one was tired since they were used to worse. Their training and combat burned much more energy.

Eventually, they slowed down, and switched to hovering above the water. Everyone wanted to enjoy the scenery of the flying Bassion fish, jumping in and out of the water. It was a beautiful spectacle as the sunlight bounced off their scales, giving a rainbow sheen to the fish.

A massive shadow was submerged behind them as they continued forward. You could see this colossal silhouette of a sea serpent following behind them. Odrian could feel the ominous presence as they were traveling at high speed, and it had caught up to them without fail. Odrian stopped, hovering in place as he checked behind them. Sabrina noticed that Odrian felt the same energy.

“Oh, don’t tell me-” Sabrina muttered as she saw the shape approaching Odrian.

“Babe, everything alright?” Ziggy came next to her. Everyone else had stopped in their tracks to see what was going on.

“No, Ziggy…”

Through the water, a pair of golden eyes glowed through the surface.

“Everyone, keep your distance!” Sabrina immediately recognized what it was. “It’s- a Celestial Sea Serpent!”

Noticing the massive object breaking the surface, everyone kept a fair distance as it thrashed along the surface. Odrian was tossed to the side by the crashing waves. The creature was finally visible as a long tainted blue body and the golden underbelly, coiled throughout the violent waves. The serpent opened its gaping mouth delivering an ear-piercing hiss that rattled their eardrums. It flew even higher into the air than everyone else with its crimson pectoral fins expanding to keep it in place. The violent gust was holding it steady as it looked down on them.

Ziggy grabbed Sabrina and retreated further away.

“This is an S-class deity,” He told her. “We’ll see how the kids handle it.”

“Have you lost your mind? They’ll die” Sabrina pushed away from Ziggy.

“We’ll step in before they do.”

“But they can’t win right now.”

“It’ll be fine!”

The serpent opened its mouth again, gradually drawing energy from all directions. It brought in so much energy, they couldn’t fly out of its view. The ball of energy grew massive, drawing in strong winds along with light particles. The red horn-like growths along its head began to glow, illuminating the area with a blood-shot tint.

“Ah, this isn’t good,” Landon yelled out to the others. “We’ll die if we don’t move!”

A giant, spiraling beam of light shot from its mouth, delivering devastating winds that followed. The expansive blast was hard for any of them to dodge as the wind pulled them in. However, they were barely able to move out the way of its devastating attack. The blast impacted the water they hovered above. It left a crater that forced the water out. The water wasn’t able to settle as it fell through a seemingly bottomless hole due to the unstable air pressure that kept it out.

They all looked down into the depth of the hole and was unable to see anything. The area surrounding the hole was steaming hot as if it was still boiling, killing any life that was there. As they looked back up at the great serpent, it spoke with an earth-shattering voice:

“SABRINA!!!!!”