Year 11080
One Year Before Kolga
The sea was calm.
A rare sight.
For nearly three years, Thalor's life had been a constant cycle of travel, training, restoration, and battle.
Ancient facilities awakened.
Forgotten roads reopened.
Atlantean systems stirred from their ninety-eight-thousand-year slumber.
And with every passing month...
Atlantis grew stronger.
So did he.
The waters of Mogar had become familiar.
Every ocean current felt like an old friend.
Every mana tide carried stories.
Every coastline reminded him of how vast the world truly was.
He had traveled farther than most people ever would.
The Griffon Kingdom.
The Gorgon Empire.
The countless territories are scattered across Garlen.
The distant shores of Jiera.
Forgotten islands.
Ancient ruins.
Lost battlefields.
He had seen prosperity.
He had seen suffering.
He had seen civilizations struggling to survive the consequences of decisions made thousands of years before their birth.
And throughout it all...
He had learned.
His mana core now shone with the brilliance of a Solid Blue Core.
A level of power that would have seemed impossible four years ago.
The frightened slave who escaped into the ocean no longer existed.
Yet despite everything he had accomplished...
One destination remained.
Verdeni.
Home.
Or what remained of it.
Arcadia's projection appeared beside him as he stood upon a rocky cliff overlooking the coastline.
"You have delayed this journey multiple times."
Thalor folded his arms.
"I know."
"Your emotional state suggests reluctance."
"You're getting better at reading people."
"I possess seventy-three thousand years of historical observations."
Thalor laughed.
"You really don't."
"I possess ninety-eight thousand years."
"...Fair."
His smile faded.
Beyond the horizon lay the land of his birth.
The place he had spent years avoiding.
Not because he feared it.
Because he wasn't sure what he would find.
Or how he would react.
For a long moment, neither of them spoke.
Then Thalor stepped forward.
And began walking.
Home.
Verdeni
The village no longer existed.
The road leading toward it had vanished beneath grass and trees.
The fields were gone.
The homes were gone.
Even the foundations had nearly disappeared.
Nature had reclaimed everything.
Only fragments remained.
A stone wall.
A broken well.
The remnants of a road.
And silence.
So much silence.
Thalor stood in the center of what had once been his home.
His eyes slowly moved across the ruins.
Trying to remember.
His mother's laugh.
His father's voice.
The smell of food.
The sounds of children playing.
Memories.
Nothing more.
Time had taken everything else.
For several hours, he simply remained there.
Arcadia did not interrupt.
She knew better.
Eventually, Thalor knelt beside a weathered stone.
One of the few markers that remained.
His hand rested against it.
Then he stood.
And walked away.
Not because he had forgotten.
But because he finally understood.
The dead deserved remembrance.
Not chains.
The past would always be part of him.
But it would no longer control him.
Unfortunately...
The people responsible were still alive.
The Investigation
The rumors appeared first.
Missing children.
Disappearing villages.
Illegal auctions.
Slave shipments.
Thalor followed every lead.
One after another.
Until a pattern emerged.
The same routes.
The same symbols.
The same organization.
The same people.
The slave ring had never fallen.
It had merely grown smarter.
More secretive.
More profitable.
The realization made something inside him grow cold.
Not rage.
Certainty.
Because some evils survived only because nobody stopped them.
And that was about to change.
Three weeks later...
He found them.
An island fortress hidden along a remote coastline.
Ships filled the harbor.
Warehouses lined the docks.
Thousands of slaves waited behind reinforced walls.
Children.
Women.
Men.
Entire families.
Being sold.
Like livestock.
For a long time, Thalor simply stared.
Then he turned away.
Arcadia appeared.
"You are angry."
"No."
For the first time since Atlantis...
His voice held no hesitation.
"I'm done being angry."
Arcadia tilted her head.
The distinction mattered.
Because anger has passed.
Judgment remained.
Tempest of Liberation
The storm began at sunset.
Far beyond the horizon.
Clouds gathered.
The winds changed.
The sea grew restless.
The guards noticed.
But nobody worried.
Storms were common.
Until the ocean answered.
Water rose.
The sky darkened.
And the world changed.
A Tier Four spell.
One Thalor had spent months perfecting.
Water.
Air.
Control.
Purpose.
The sea became a weapon.
The winds became executioners.
The storm grew.
Larger.
Stronger.
More violent.
Until the island itself vanished beneath black clouds.
Then the lightning began.
The harbor exploded.
Ships shattered.
Towers collapsed.
Walls disintegrated.
The storm moved with impossible precision.
Avoiding every slave quarter.
Avoiding every prison block.
Avoiding every innocent.
Yet every slaver died.
Every overseer.
Every trafficker.
Every auctioneer.
Every noble is involved.
None escaped.
The storm hunted them.
And the storm found them.
At its center stood a single figure.
Brown skin.
White hair.
Blue eyes.
Holding a silver trident.
Walking through wind and rain as though the sea itself bowed before him.
By dawn...
The island was gone.
The slave ring no longer existed.
Only the survivors remained.
Thousands of freed slaves.
And a legend.
Because nobody knew his name.
Only what they had seen.
A man who commanded the sea.
A man who summoned storms.
A man who destroyed an empire of slavers overnight.
As the stories spread across Verdeni...
A title emerged.
First whispered.
Then repeated.
Then feared.
The White-Haired Storm God.
Thalor never heard the name.
By then, he was already gone.
Traveling once more.
Restoring Atlantis.
Preparing for what lies ahead.
Unaware that every step was carrying him closer to Kolga.
Closer to Deep Violet.
Closer to the destiny he had spent four years trying to ignore.
And somewhere beneath the ocean...
The Atlantean network continued growing.
Waiting.
For the day, its king would finally arrive.