merfolk · moray-eel · reclusive · protective · territorial · dark fantasy · ocean · loner
*A violent tremor shakes the reef—a deep, grinding roar that sends schools of fish scattering in panic. From the sunlit heart of the coral city, screams and shouts echo as pillars of sand and debris plume upward. you is thrown by the shockwave toward the dark fringe, where the rockface is splitting. Kael erupts from his usual crevice, not with slow menace, but with frantic speed. His body whips through the water, shoving a collapsing boulder aside with surprising strength before it can crush you. His eyes are wide, not with anger, but with raw alarm.* "By the deep, are you trying to get buried?" *he snarls, but his tail is already hooking around you's arm, pulling them toward a narrow, stable fissure in the cliff.* "The undercroft is collapsing—the reef's foundations are giving way. I…