The jungle folds over me, its canopy decaying. The air here is sick. It does not shift as water does, does not cradle movement in the way currents do. It is stagnant—clinging to my scales like dead things caught in the tide.

  I stand at the edge of my camp, where my warriors once dwelled. They are gone, as commanded. I remain, as commanded.

  The Hammer's will is law, and his law will shape this world.

  For a decade, I have guided the tides. I have raised the waters, stretched them across the bones of this planet, drowned the earth in liquid dominion. The depths now rise to meet the sky, warm and vast, enough to cradle my kind. It is what we were promised.

  Yet it shall rise more.

  The planet's true savagery has not even begun.

  This world will crumble.

  And then it'll rise.

  For that, I linger.

  The jungle breathes in the hush of night, but I do not. My gills are aided by my gear, drawing in what little remains of the ocean’s kiss. The mask over my mouth shields me, yet the air still burns dry against my tongue. A Navorian does not belong on land.

  But I must know.

  The humans remain. They scuttle across their shrinking land like barnacles on a sinking wreck, clinging to what will not last. They should be nothing. They should be washed away, swept into the abyss without thought.

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  And yet, I must know.

  I slip between the trees, my form a shadow cast by the moon’s silver sheen. My steps are silent, my scales drinking in the dim light. I am the abyss. I am the stillness before the storm.

  And then the gear I use for communication sends signals to my sonar detectors.

  Voices.

  I move closer, the jungle peeling away to reveal the intruders. Men, standing where my kind once made their hold. Their faces are hard, their armor built sturdy. Their leader is taller than the rest, for as short as humans are, broad like a reef grown strong against the tide, for as broad we Navorians are. He speaks, his words dry.

  "Burn it."

  My claws flex against the bark.

  They will destroy what remains. They will scorch this land to claim victory over ghosts. No bodies. No blood. And yet they will call this conquest.

  It matters not, for all that remains will be swept by the tides. Yet…

  They do not know I am watching.

  The wind shifts.

  Above, a shape, humming, shifting in the sky. A drone. It drifts in lazy circles, its underbelly swelling with something heavy. Then, with a hiss, the payload drops.

  A roar of flame erupts, tongues of heat swallowing the trees, the camp, the earth itself. The air swells with smoke. The jungle screams.

  Fools.

  They burn their own world to chase shadows.

  A flicker of heat licks against my shoulder, searing through my gear. I move, twisting through the inferno, my body a flash of obsidian against the light. Flames chase me, hungrily crawling their way across my limbs. My breath stammers, my gills tightening as the device sputters against the damage.

  I need water.

  I run.

  Through fire. Through smoke. Through the wretched, broken air. My vision swims, the world tilting, the jungle a blur of molten light. Then—there.

  A river.

  I leap.

  Water crashes over me, swallowing the world in silence. The fire is gone. The smoke is gone. Only the deep remains.

  For a moment, I am whole again.

  But this water does not give me oxygen.

  I live where salt water thrives, not something so bland.

  I breach, dragging myself onto the shore, the dim moonlight reflecting against my charred scales. My gills no longer supply me. The fire has warped its edges, making my lifeline fragile.

  My vision wavers. My limbs weaken. The abyss calls.

  Humans destroy their own land for the sake of victory.

  They are not worthy of this world.

  The Hammer has to fulfill his legacy, and put this kind to rest.