Voice in the Sea — Nerites

Water Dragon

The return to Ashray begins with another search interrupted. The Hero had come to learn whether Captain Rhubarb had been found, but Lady Celestia has received word from the Order of Dragonlords about a stolen egg. It is believed to belong to Hyonix, the Great Dragon of Water. Celestia considers Hyonix calmer than Akriloth, though her comparison with an apocalyptic meteor does little to diminish the stakes.

Captain Reida Karst learned the egg’s location and claimed she would hatch it into a new Great Dragon. The Hero asks whether Hyonix has died. Celestia says she is alive and reclusive, having left Greenguard with others when Chaos reached it. According to their knowledge, Great Dragons’ eggs normally wait until the parent’s death and then require a special safe hatching process. That protection has failed here: the newborn was forced into life.

At the murky sinkhole, the Hero sees evidence of something bursting out. Celestia says the corrupt water reaches deep enough to connect with the seafloor. The Hero reconstructs a possible sequence: the pirate touched it, became corrupted, stole the egg and dropped it into the pool. The creature inside rapidly grew, in what the God of the Depths’ followers might call evolution. This is the Hero’s explanation of the events, not a witnessed account of every step.

Celestia reports that villagers saw the beast destroy Karst’s nearby ship and consume the captain and crew, making them part of itself. The Hero asks whether naming the newborn would make the loss more bearable. Nerites was the name Celestia had already chosen for a safe hatching. Her use of it keeps the dragon from becoming only an unnamed monster.

Sigrid Sunshield announces the Lightguard’s arrival. Celestia has not called them to help the Hero fight: she asks the Hero to attend to Nerites while she deals with the order herself. She once cared for orphans and trained paladins alongside them, but they still hold belongings and records identifying Hyonix’s brood. Asked whether they informed the pirate, Celestia says yes, while distinguishing possible participants from the whole order and raising a possible connection to Artix’s disappearance. These are suspicions she intends to confront, not a completed investigation.

Light over the Sinkhole

The presence called The Depths offers another version of the theft. It claims merely to call those willing to answer, and says both it and the pirate saw a Light tell her about an egg fit for an offering. Its influence, it insists, did not create that Light’s madness, which it attributes to the arrogance of saviors. It asks whether blame lies with the Depths, the Light or the Hero, claiming satisfaction regardless of the answer. The account redirects responsibility without identifying the Light or proving the speaker innocent.

Sigrid’s answer to Celestia is an equally firm defense of her own side. The Lightguard’s purpose, she says, is pure: to fight Evil and destroy Darkness. She rejects collusion with pirates as a baseless accusation and suspects a framing. In her explanation to the Hero, she calls Celestia hysterical with grief despite her calm manner. Her assurance that no paladin would betray the priestess is a claim about the order, not evidence resolving the missing records.

Sigrid identifies herself as one of the Lightguard’s leaders, guided and strengthened by Astero, the Emissary of Light. Only missions Astero approves receive their attention, a policy she presents as preventing wasted resources and lives. Her account of dragons is less sympathetic: the notorious ones bring mayhem, while others are too aloof to care about mortals. She regards the loss of the stolen Water Dragon as potentially a blessing, a threat put down early as Water becomes as volatile as Darkness.

Celestia’s concern remains the newborn rather than a convenient justification for its death. She fears that escape and further feeding would propagate its altered form, and plans to investigate how Karst learned of the egg. The competing explanations therefore leave two tasks: relieve Nerites’ suffering and find how a secret entrusted to protect it became an invitation to a pirate.

Mercy for Nerites

The cached quest account preserves four requests around the disaster, without declaring them a linear once-only chain. Sanity Filter calls for eight Brine Buckets from Water Elementals that Celestia fears may be tainted, before villagers begin following the urge to descend. Celestia says she will summon Undine’s clerics to cordon off and purify the sinkhole. Even the Hero’s unusual mental strength is no reason to dismiss its whispers. This is a proposed response, not proof that purification has succeeded.

Canned Ashray Delicacies addresses the Ghostly Eels drawn to the wreck of the pirate ship. Eight Glowing Eel Livers are requested while the scavengers are exorcized. Celestia’s plan to make dragon treats from the seafood briefly recalls her ordinary care of young dragons: chow and minced meat for some, liver and tripe for craftier appetites. The detail sets the task beside the life Nerites should have had.

Dragon of the Depths, listed for level fifty and above, asks for one Nerites Shell Shard. Celestia wants the fused newborn and pirates put to rest before another coastal catastrophe. The completion reply remembers a clam-ridged egg holding a little pearl, now tarnished by greed, and says Nerites has returned to ooze within an egg sinking into the depths. It does not establish a permanent death or undoing of the fusion.

Secure the Egg follows the danger still attached to the remains. Pirates continue to patrol, and even a hatched shell can fetch a fortune. The objectives record Nerites dazed once, six Ghostly Eels dazed and six Stagnant Water dazed; the listed item is a Hatched Water Dragon Egg. In the reply, Celestia is relieved it is away from Ashray and asks the Hero to find a hiding place, since carrying it back to Sunbreeze Grove herself would be a long journey. The text leaves its final refuge to the Hero.

What Was Entrusted

Celestia describes the routine protection that the theft has violated. Proud dragons entrust her with eggs so their young can hatch beside aspiring heroes, and she has cared for eggs recovered from pirates. The black-market value can rival a small country’s wealth. Her own kidnappings have sometimes ended with angry dragons rescuing her because she missed tea. Karst’s theft, influenced by a new force, has turned that familiar danger into an unfamiliar grief.

The egg’s location and emergency transport plan were known to very few. Neso’s attack made a move by ship necessary, and Karst struck during that transfer. Celestia wrote the plans while sheltered by the Lightguard, which has not returned them. This gives her a specific reason to suspect a leak from its ranks. It does not identify the person responsible, prove that Sigrid arranged the theft or turn every claim made by the Depths into a reliable explanation.

The torn page found here is the earlier Ashray account again, its current readable field matching that previous source exactly. Children call for Aquella while intruders pressure hidden Water Elves to open their doors; the writer refuses to wait helplessly for a promised Champion’s power and considers sending a plea toward the surface. It is not Karst’s confession or a new report of the theft. Returning to that page places another appeal for rescue beside Nerites’ fate, while leaving the old siege’s intruders and the result of that plea unresolved.