Calder’s spear of shadow tore through the water, but this time Marco didn’t flinch. The whisper of the sea grew into a roar inside him, flooding his body with its rhythm.

  Light surged across his skin—tattoos, glowing faint blue, spiraling like waves etched by the ocean itself. His eyes burned the same color, piercing and alive. The water wrapped around him, not as a shield, but as part of him.

  Calder lunged, faster and stronger than before—but Marco moved with the tide. His body bent with the current, sliding just out of reach, his counterstrike snapping like the crack of a whip. A blade of water carved into Calder’s side before he could even react.

  The Flow Tide State had awakened. Marco’s every motion flowed, each dodge seamless, each strike precise. He was no longer fighting the current—he was the current.

  Calder snarled, shadows flaring, but for the first time his blows were met in equal rhythm, Marco reading him as if the sea itself whispered his next move.

  Inside the palace, chaos shook the walls as the kraken’s roar split the hall. Colby clenched the pearl blade tighter, every muscle trembling as he forced his flame deeper, harder, against the suffocating weight of the sea.

  At last, it answered.

  The blade glowed red-hot, steam hissing violently as the water boiled around it. Cracks of heat lanced through the black pearl, turning it into a searing beacon in the depths.

  Atlas struck a tentacle aside, giving Colby the opening. Jax cleared the way with a knife hurled into the beast’s eye, making it thrash in rage.

  Colby roared with every ounce of his father’s will burning in his chest and launched himself forward, the molten blade raised high.

  Outside, Marco’s glowing tattoos blazed brighter as he parried Calder’s shadow-spear, his counterstrike snapping like a tide against the rocks. Their weapons clashed, water exploding outward as the corrupted prince howled in fury.

  Inside, Colby’s molten blade met the kraken’s massive head, driving deep into its armored hide with a hiss that lit the entire chamber red.

  The water churned violently as Calder, wrapped in shadows, lunged once more, his spear of corruption thrusting toward Marco’s chest. But Marco was no longer the boy who had faltered under his brother’s skill. The Flow Tide State coursed through him, tattoos glowing bright blue, every movement a dance with the sea itself.

  Sapphire and King Nerios arrived just in time to witness it—the heir of land moving like a son of the tide.

  Marco twisted, his body flowing with Calder’s strike, his arms sweeping in a spiral. The ocean surged at his call, compressing into his palms until the pressure was unbearable. His tattoos blazed brighter, water roaring into a concentrated sphere of deadly force.

  He thrust forward.

  “Tide Strike: Water Cannon!”

  This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

  The blast erupted, a torrent of compressed water surging like a cannon shot. It struck Calder square in the chest, shattering the shadows that writhed around him and hurling him through the current. The corrupted prince’s body slammed into a coral wall, his eyes rolling back as he finally fell unconscious, the darkness bleeding from him like ink.

  Marco hovered, chest heaving, his glowing tattoos pulsing faintly as the Flow Tide State began to fade.

  In the palace hall, Colby’s searing blade pressed deeper into the kraken’s skull. At first, it resisted—the monster’s hide thick as ancient stone, his strike slowed, halted, as though the abyss itself held him back.

  Colby gritted his teeth, every muscle straining. It’s not enough… I can’t—

  And then something snapped within him.

  Heat surged—not from flame, not from fire, but from somewhere deeper. His body tightened, his vision sharpened, his will condensed into raw, overwhelming force. For just a heartbeat, he touched the same rare strength his father once carried—King’s Will.

  The blade roared with sudden, unstoppable power. With a cry that shook the water, Colby drove it through, splitting the kraken’s skull with a blinding burst of steam and heat. The beast convulsed, then went still, its massive tentacles falling limp and crashing through the ruined hall.

  Silence followed.

  Marco floated in the open sea, tattoos still glowing faintly, Calder unconscious at his feet. Sapphire watched in stunned awe, Nerios’s eyes narrowing—not with disdain, but with something closer to recognition.

  Colby stood amidst the wreckage of the hall, the molten pearl blade still clutched in his hand, steam rising from his body. Atlas and Jax rushed to his side, but even they paused, struck by the sight of him.

  The two brothers—one glowing with the tide’s chosen power, the other wielding a spark of their father’s King’s Will—stood tall against the ruin, heirs of fire and water, sons of Gerald, unbowed.

  The waters of Coralyth still trembled with the echoes of battle. The kraken’s corpse sank slowly, guards swarming around its limp tentacles as if to prove to themselves the beast was truly dead. The palace hall lay shattered, coral arches broken, pearl walls cracked.

  Calder, stripped of his shadows and still unconscious, was dragged forward by guards who bound him in chains of glowing reefstone. Beside him, Caspian, dazed but alive after being struck down by rubble, was also restrained—his protests weak, his eyes full of bitter defeat.

  Sapphire stood beside Marco, her glow steady but her face stricken with sorrow at the sight of her brothers bound. Yet her gaze lifted with pride as she looked to the surface princes—Marco steady despite his wounds, Colby scorched but unshaken, Atlas and Jax braced at their sides.

  King Nerios rose from his throne, his long hair drifting around him like the mantle of the sea. His eyes moved first to Calder and Caspian, hard as stone. “My own blood,” he said, his voice a deep rumble, “nearly destroyed my kingdom from within. Their hunger for vengeance and power blinded them to honor. For this, they will answer to me.”

  He turned then, slowly, to the brothers of the land. His gaze lingered on Colby’s scorched frame, on the pearl blade still glowing faintly in his grip, then on Marco—whose tattoos had dimmed but still traced faint blue across his skin.

  “You have done what my own sons could not,” Nerios admitted, his tone weighted with reluctant respect. “You fought not for conquest, but for Coralyth itself. And for that… I give you my thanks.”

  The court murmured, stunned at the admission. Nerios raised a hand, silencing them. His eyes met Marco’s directly. “Perhaps the sea did not lie when it whispered of you.”

  Marco stepped forward, chest still rising heavy from battle, but his voice clear. “We didn’t come to conquer you, King Nerios. We came to stop war before it drowned both our kingdoms. If peace can be built, then let us build it together.”

  Nerios studied him for a long moment, then extended his hand. His massive palm, weathered and scarred from years of battle, hovered between them.

  Marco looked to his brothers, who gave the faintest nods of approval. Then he clasped Nerios’s hand, the two gripping firmly, currents swirling around them like the seal of the sea itself.

  “Peace will not be easy,” Nerios said, his deep voice steady. “But we will talk. Tomorrow, you and your brothers will stand before my council, and together we will decide the course of tides to come.”