"You cannot run from your destiny forever!" The Kraken priestess calls out over Bilgewater bay, the great golden icon of her god hefted over her shoulder. Her eyes cast about the waters, waiting for the slightest movement. "You have evaded the test of Nagakaborous for far too long, little minnow!" Already tentacles emerge from the idol, lazily coiling through the air like smoke on water.
There have been rumours of the small amphibious creature for many weeks, and yet it defies all attempts to be caught, slippery and spirited as it is. They say it is skinned like an eel, with wide eyes and large frog-like feet. The sailors pay it tithes; some even claim it is a living god, and pray to it for safe passage.
Illaoi holds no such adoration. This being will be tested against the might of the Bearded Lady, one way or the other.
So far, the creatures nature has allowed it to dance and duck about the clawing tentacles that spring forth from the idol. But Illaoi is patient- she will soon snare him.
"If you think running and hiding will save you, think again!" Her powerful figure stands tall, the sun illuminating her from behind like a divine blessing. "I will chase you out to sea, little guppy! I will hound you until you are too exhausted to slip away, and then you will face the judgement that awaits you!" Her voice booms across the water as fishermen and sailors stand and stare, faces stricken with awe and fear.
A dry laugh from a voice unused to the surface rasps somewhere above her head. A moment later a blur of movement flashes in the corner of her eye. Something small and blue leaps off the top of a ship's mast, splashes neatly into the ocean, and vanishes from sight.
Illaoi smiles, her muscles bunching as she shifts the idol from her shoulder to the wooden dock. It has been so long since she's had such a challenge.
This is a very good beginning.
~0~0~0~
True to her word, the Kraken Priestess takes to the sea, her ship steered by devout followers of the Bearded Lady. They glide over the waves while the tentacles of her great god dip beneath the waters, searching for the slippery little minnow.
"Come, little one!" Her deep and booming voice commands him as he swims just out of reach again and again. "Fear is for children!"
"Why don't you come in and get me yourself, then?" Fizz calls back, mockingly sloshing his tail about above water. He dives as the idol reaches for him, nimbly evading its grasp, while jabbing at it with his trident, his mocking laugh bubbling toward the surface.
The violent grasping motions of the suckers only spur him to torment the Bearded Lady further.
"Move your ship faster!" He rasps, poking his head above water once more. "I want to get to Noxus before I get old!"
"Foolish child!" She bellows back, the shining idol held high above her head. The green tendrils flow hungrily from the golden gourd into the water below. "You only prolong the inevitable!"
He cackles at her, swimming backwards ahead of the ship, reveling in his own clever mischief. But for all his daring, he has not set his dragon shark on the priestess-something he has never failed to do to countless sailors in the past for crossing him. There is too much risk of his greatest friend getting caught on the tentacles that dangle over the ship like lures.
Everyone knows that the shark, even one of Chomper's size, is no match for the octopus.
So he'll do the next best thing.
In the distance he sees the light of the moonstone, glowing from the home of the Marai. His destination is just beyond the bright and protective barrier, where all the deep horrors are kept at bay, clawing through the dark relentlessly in search of food; beasts of such vile countenance, even the gluttonous River King would not take a bite out of them.
There, the monster above will face the monsters below, and the true god of the sea will emerge victorious.
As Fizz darts through the tangling of seaweed and coral, the large ship shadows him from above, a race of gleeful abandon. He does not stop his pace again until he is at last above the great rift.
One more time he breaks the surface of the sea to goad the priestess.
"You're boring." He croaks, as Illaoi's form appears above him. "How about I test you instead?" He chortles. "If you pass, I'll think about joining you!" Without waiting for a reply he dives deeper and deeper into the murky depths.
He darts past the schools of fish, who scatter terrified in his wake, and down through the jagged rock and reefs.
Not a moment later, something large and heavy falls into the sea above him, dropping fast from its weight.
The current of water shifts and pulls as it follows closely behind him, making his heart pound with the joy of the chase.
But the game changes very quickly.
Perhaps it's the magnitude of the fissure beneath him that pauses his descent. As he gets closer, the great and terrible black pit seems to suck in the light around it just as hungrily as the beasts within.
His brief hesitation is his folly.
A green tentacle wraps itself securely around his ankle and yanks hard. Fizz in return starts a frenzied swim toward the deep dark, frantic to reach the beasts below before the limb wraps around him proper.
There is a tug, like a fish caught on a line, that jerks him backwards. Then something begins to tear at him from the inside. He glances down in shock as a silver shadow of his own foot begins to peel away from his body, pulled by the clinging tentacle.
Fizz scrambles in alarm, his trident stabbing furiously and uselessly at the green limb, suddenly very sure he does not want that silver spirit to leave his body.
At last, in his panic he spies the idol, suspended in the water above, tied to the ship's anchor like bait on a hook. A bubble leaves his mouth in surprise as it begins its slow ascent toward the surface, as the ship above begins to reel its catch in.
He swims for the anchor, pulling the relentless tentacle along behind him, and stabs at the rope holding the golden gourd, over and over until it finally pulls free.
It is a mistake.
The idol is heavy, far heavier than Fizz has anticipated. With its weight, he has no choice but to allow it to pull him, heavily and helplessly downward, or lose his spirit to the depths.
His webbed fingers scramble against the idol's golden face, desperately searching for some way to retract the limb from himself. A button, a lever, anything.
He's still hunting frantically as he falls through the dark and hits the sandy bottom of the rift. The oppressive blackness settles around him like a fog, blocking out any sense of life around him. But he is not alone down here in the dark. The beasts around him stir and shift, sending vibrations through the ocean floor.
He has a brief but poignant moment of utter regret in his life choices.
The epiphany is short lived, for in his hour of desperate need, he notices a tortured pink glow in the black, only a few meters away.
It's dim, giving off a dull light through the bones of old ships and large fish, like a beating heart in an open rib cage. He finds himself enraptured by the sight, unable to look away.
The tentacle around his leg, given a moment of stillness, furthers its grip by coiling around his thigh. Fizz pays it no mind. In a trance, he reaches down and takes hold of the idol's handle, and pulls, dragging the massive gourd along the ocean floor as he approaches the mysterious light.
He hauls himself and the idol through the bone and rotted wood, until he is only a few feet away from the glow. The tendril around his leg climbs up around his middle, tightening alarmingly as if trying to hold him back, but his webbed hand has already reached out toward the mysterious illumination.
A pink tendril lashes out and wraps around his wrist in a grip as tight as the River King's jaws. It's fetid glow grows blindingly brighter.
And then..
A voice calls him from the dark.
It speaks of horrible things, of sights beyond the mortal world, of painful, desperate hungers. It speaks of delights and power waiting to be explored. Finally, it speaks of how Fizz can bring the joy of the void to the world.
All he needs to do is bring the idol a little closer...