The return journey through the narrow passage felt even longer and more claustrophobic than the entry.
The cold seemed to seep deeper into their bones, and every shadow appeared to writhe, every glint of their lights on the rock face seemed to reveal an eye. Anya and Ben, though bravely leading, frequently glanced back as if expecting the colossal figure to rise from the depths behind them. David, despite Tian Sheng's earlier warning, managed a few more hurried flashes of his camera, unable to resist documenting the retreat from the mysterious chamber, much to Tian Sheng's silent frustration.
Finally, a faint, almost imperceptible grey light appeared ahead – the dim, murky glow of the open ocean.
They pushed through the last stretch of the constricted tunnel, emerging into water that was still disorienting but felt like freedom. The current was weaker here, thankfully, but their air gauges were all dangerously low. With practiced efficiency born of countless dives, Tian Sheng signaled for a slow, controlled ascent.
Breaking the surface felt like being reborn. Gasping for the crisp, clean sea air, thet the rapidly darkening sky. Above them, a small speck on the horizon gradually resolved into their boat, the "Sea Serpent," its navigation lights blinking frantically. The emergency beacon hay blinked ad worked! Captain Ren, a weathered old sea dog with a fisherman's eyes and a lifetime of ocean lore etched onto his face, stood by the rail, his initial worry dissolving into immense relief as he spotted them. He helped them aboard, offering warm towels and mugs of steaming tea.
On deck, the exhaustion was palpable. Maya and Ben were visibly shaken, their eyes still wide with the echoes of what they'd seen. Anya, ever stoic, looked pale but composed, her gaze drifting back to the dark water as if searching for something. David, however, seemed to have forgotten the fear entirely.
He was hunched over his camera, a manic grin spreading across his face as he scrolled through the images."Tian Sheng, you won't believe these shots!" David exclaimed, shoving his camera in front of him, oblivious to the others' lingering trauma. "This is huge! An undiscovered, ancient underwater civilization! We're talking about the archaeological find of the century!"Tian Sheng looked at the glowing screen, at the clear, undeniable images of the colossal mermaid-like statue.
The unsettling aura he'd felt in the cave returned, prickling his skin even in the open air. "David" he said, his voice low and firm, "delete them." David froze, his grin vanishing.
"What? Are you crazy? This is my career! Our story!""This isn't a story, David. This is something ancient, something protected. You felt it down there, didn't you? That feeling of being watched, of intruding? That place felt… alive. Like we stumbled into a sleeping god," Tian Sheng's voice was quiet but held an undeniable authority. "We're lucky to be out of there. We don't go back, and we don't tell anyone." He looked at the others. Anya nodded, her eyes reflecting a profound understanding. Maya and Ben, still reeling from the ordeal, were quick to agree.
The raw fear they had felt still overshadowed any excitement.
David initially protested, but the starkness in Tian Sheng's voice, coupled with the shared trauma of the near-disaster and the unholy chill of the cave, eventually quieted him.
He looked from the camera to the darkening sea, a shiver running down his spine that had nothing to do with the cold.
They had surfaced, yes, but the weight of what they had seen, the monumental secret they now carried, felt heavier than any dive tank.
As the "Sea Serpent" cut through the waves towards home, leaving a phosphorescent trail in its wake, Tian Sheng gazed back at the vast, dark expanse of the Andaman Sea.
He knew the ocean always held secrets, but this one felt different. It felt like it had chosen them, briefly, to witness its timeless mystery.
And he couldn't shake the chilling thought that perhaps, for some secrets, being discovered was merely the first step... not the end. The feeling of being watched hadn't completely dissipated, even under the vast, open sky. It was as if the ancient eyes of the statue had followed them, observing their retreat, waiting.
Months went on, i was still trying to forget what had happened that day. "hah... " i sighed, then a sudden call from David rang from my phone.
"mgrrfmfm...mshphh!!!!" a sound of gurgling transmitted on the speaker.
"!?" i stood up from my chair.
"David!?..." i shouted, then the call ended.
"Shit....what's happening?" i questioned.
then i remembered, the captain gave each of us a tracking device that let you know the members location, in case if someone in the group got lost in shore.
"He was in water maybe he was using his diving suit" i thought and hoped.
i opened my computer, while my finger danced on the keyboard.
"Yes..." there is a red mark "huh?"
My hands trembled as I stared at the blinking dot on the screen.
David's tracker pinged from the exact location we'd sworn to forget, the accursed cove we'd left behind months ago after... after what happened.
The sea roared in my ears, the rhythmic pulse of its waves a mocking reminder of the silence that had followed that dive.
"Why... why that location?" I whispered, the words catching in my throat.
It felt like a cruel joke, a nightmare I couldn't wake up from.
The memory of the chilling discovery, the oppressive darkness, the feeling of being watched – it all flooded back, erasing the months of carefully constructed normalcy.
I knew I couldn't call the others.
The captain was retired, haunted by his own demons from that day.
Ben had moved across the country, seeking escape in a new life.
Maya couldn't even stand to look at the ocean anymore.
The burden, the responsibility, fell squarely on my shoulders.
Fear clawed at me, a primal instinct screaming at me to stay away.
But a deeper, more insistent voice argued that I had to go.
I couldn't let whatever had drawn David back there hurt anyone else, especially not because of me.
Because I was the one who had pushed for that dive in the first place, the one who had ignored the locals' warnings.
My heart hammered against my ribs as I gathered my gear. The familiar weight of the wetsuit and tanks usually brought a sense of calm, a connection to the underwater world.
Now, it felt like donning a suit of armor for a battle I didn't understand.
The drive to the coast was a blur of nervous energy.
Every signpost, every flash of light from oncoming cars, seemed to amplify my dread.
The closer I got to the cove, the heavier the air felt, thick with a suffocating sense of foreboding.
As I pulled up to the desolate beach, the moon cast long, skeletal shadows across the sand. The cove was shrouded in darkness, the water reflecting the starlit sky like a bottomless abyss.
I could hear the faint lapping of waves, a mournful sigh whispering secrets I didn't want to hear.Taking a deep breath, I started preparing for the dive.
The cold seeped into me, mirroring the icy dread that settled in my stomach.
I checked my oxygen, my gauges, my knife – anything to distract myself from the growing conviction that I was walking into a trap.
As I stepped into the water, the cold shock stole my breath. The darkness enveloped me, and the silence of the underwater world pressed in, amplifying every creak and groan of my equipment. I switched on my dive light, the beam cutting through the murky depths.
Following the tracker's signal, I descended slowly, the familiar sensation of weightlessness offering little comfort. The seabed was eerily still, devoid of the vibrant life I usually found on dives. It felt barren, desolate, like a graveyard.
Then, in the distance, I saw it – the ominous opening in the rock face, the mouth of the underwater cave we had investigated months ago. It loomed before me, a dark and silent invitation. David's tracker pinged from deep within.
My blood ran cold. This was it. I was going in.
The entrance was a jagged tear in the rock, narrower than I remembered, a maw waiting to swallow me whole.
I squeezed through, my tanks scraping against the stone with a sound that grated on my very soul.
The moment I was inside, the faint ambient light from the moonlit water behind me was gone.
After a long swim.
The world was reduced to the tunnel, my light beam, and the frantic, mechanical heartbeat of my own regulator. The umbilical cord to the world above was severed. The passage was short. It opened into the main cavern, and the sight stole the air from my lungs all over again, just as it had months ago. My light beam trembled, illuminating the impossible.
It wasn't a natural cave. The walls were too smooth, carved with geometric precision that defied erosion. And in the center, rising from the seabed floor, was the reason we'd fled in terror. It wasn't rock. It was a single, seamless obelisk of a material like polished obsidian, but it drank the light from my torch, giving nothing back. Its surface was covered in glyphs, symbols that seemed to writhe just at the edge of my vision.
They pulsed with a soft, internal, sickly green luminescence, writing and rewriting themselves in a language that made my head ache to look at.
And there he was.
David wasn't floating, lost or injured. He was kneeling on the cavern floor before the obelisk, his helmet and tank discarded beside him as if they were trivial things.
His head was bare, his short blond hair waving gently in the current. His eyes were wide open, staring, unblinking, at the shifting patterns on the stone. He was breathing.
Somehow, impossibly, he was breathing underwater. "David!" I screamed, the sound swallowed by the water, emerging as a muffled gargle of bubbles.
I swam to him, my fins kicking up silt that swirled around the base of the obelisk. I grabbed his shoulder, ready to shake him, to drag him away.
He felt cold, rigid as stone. He didn't react to my touch. He just kept staring. That's when I heard it. Not with my ears, but inside my skull. A whisper, layered and ancient, like the grinding of tectonic plates. It wasn't a voice; it was the idea of a voice, a thought that wasn't my own, planting itself directly into my consciousness. He has returned. The glyphs on the obelisk flared brighter. The oppressive silence of the cave was replaced by a low, resonant hum that vibrated through my bones, through the very water around me. You should not have come back.
The first one felt our call and was wise. He ran.The captain.
It was talking about the captain.
The second hid from the sky and the shore. He knows. Ben.
The third fears the mirror of the deep. She broke. Maya
My blood turned to ice water. It knew about all of us.
It had been watching, waiting. The whisper in my mind grew stronger, more insistent, laced with a chilling curiosity.
But you... you are the one who listened. The one who brought them. You carry the guilt like a stone. You have come to offer it to us.