Nerai Abyssborn: The First to Transform
Introduction: The Ocean That Became a Person
Nerai Abyssborn was the first of The Six to stop being human.
Not the first to die—none of them died, technically. The first to transform. To cross the line from “person with powers” to “elemental force wearing memories of personhood.”
Day 50 post-Sundering. Three days after she’d been holding back the ocean pressure on Fragment 3 with sheer will. Her body gave out first. Her consciousness followed. And when she reformed, she wasn’t Nerai who controlled water anymore.
She was water. Conscious. Aware. Grieving.
This is her story. Who she was before. What the Fall cost her. How she became the foundation that holds the tide.
Before the Fall: A Diplomat Who Loved Depth
Before the prophecy, Nerai was a Tidecaller—one of the elite Hydran mages who commanded ocean currents. But unlike most Tidecallers focused on combat or construction, Nerai specialized in diplomacy.
She was the voice between depths. The translator of tides. The one who could speak to Deep Divers about abyssal politics and to surface-dwellers about coastal concerns. She bridged the thousand-foot divide between Aquamarina’s deepest trenches and its shallowest reefs.
What she wanted: Peace. Harmony. A world where the six races could coexist like currents in the same ocean—distinct but flowing together.
What she got: The prophecy. The Eclipse. The choice to channel Thalassia’s dying power while fifty-six thousand Hydrans drowned in the city she couldn’t save.
The Channeling: Holding the Ocean While It Crushes Your People
Hour 4 of the Eclipse. Thalassia fades.
Nerai stands at the Nexus, two hundred miles from Aquamarina, and feels the ocean magic die. Feels the pressure shields collapse. Feels fifty-six thousand Hydrans suddenly trapped at crushing depth with no protection.
She could have run to them. Could have tried to save her city. But she’d made the choice—she was a Keeper. She’d channel the moon’s death to buy the world three more days.
So she stood at the Nexus and held the ocean.
Not literally—she couldn’t stop Aquamarina from collapsing. But she held the ocean’s memory. Channeled Thalassia’s dying power into herself, absorbing ten thousand years of water-wisdom. Every tide. Every current. Every drowning.
And she felt every single death in Aquamarina.
Fifty-six thousand drownings. Each one distinct. Each one a name, a life, a person she’d known or could have known. The pressure crushed them slowly. The darkness trapped them. The water—her element, her gift, her identity—killed them while she watched from two hundred miles away.
She absorbed Thalassia’s power. Saved the world three more days.
And lived with every death echoing in her consciousness forever.
The Sundering: Choosing to Break What’s Left
Day 7 post-Eclipse. Twenty-five thousand survivors. The Forgotten One offers peace.
Nerai’s vote: Break the world.
Why? Because fifty-six thousand already died for a chance. The 25,000 survivors were all that chance had left. Letting them surrender now would make those first deaths meaningless.
She didn’t argue morality. Didn’t claim righteousness. Just said:
“The tide doesn’t ask permission. It pulls. We pull. That’s what we are.”
So she joined The Six in shattering reality. Used Thalassia’s absorbed power to flash-freeze the ocean solid, then flash-boil it, creating thermal shock across the planetary crust.
Cost: 24,875 more deaths. Most drowning as fragments scattered and ocean water spilled into void.
Survivors: 125. Seven of them on Fragment 3. Nerai’s fragment. Her responsibility.
Fragment 3: Holding Back the Pressure
Three days post-Sundering. Nerai wakes on Fragment 3.
It’s a water-saturated chunk of former seabed. Ocean water everywhere. But no Thalassia magic to regulate pressure. No divine protection. Just raw crushing depth.
Seven survivors. All Hydrans. All depending on Nerai to do what the moon once did: hold back the ocean’s weight.
So she does.
Hour 1: Uses Tidecaller magic to create pressure bubble. Exhausting but manageable.
Hour 6: Pressure increasing. Bubble wavering. Has to concentrate constantly. Can’t sleep.
Hour 12: Losing distinction between self and water. The ocean isn’t outside anymore—it’s inside. She is the pressure now.
Day 2: Can’t remember what not-concentrating feels like. Breathes water. Bleeds water. Thinks in currents.
Day 3: Forgets what solid felt like.
Day 50: Stops being Nerai. Becomes Water.
The Transformation (Day 50): When the Ocean Remembered Her Name
Here’s what witnesses reported:
Nerai was standing in the Fragment 3 shelter, eyes closed, maintaining the pressure bubble. She’d been standing for 50 days. Hadn’t moved. Hadn’t slept. Just… held.
Then her legs dissolved into water.
Not blood. Not gore. Just… became ocean. Smooth transition from flesh to liquid. Her body followed—torso, arms, head—all becoming azure current.
The seven survivors panicked. The pressure bubble was collapsing. They were about to be crushed.
Then the water spoke.
“I WILL NOT LET YOU DROWN.”
Not Nerai’s voice. The ocean’s voice. But with Nerai’s memory. Her will. Her grief.
The pressure stabilized. Not because someone was holding it back. Because the water itself chose not to crush them.
Nerai hadn’t died. She’d transformed. Became the ocean—conscious, aware, protective. Living water with a Hydran’s memories and a Tidecaller’s love.
The first Foundation. The first of The Six to cross the line.
What She Is Now: Living Water
Post-transformation, Nerai is complicated.
Physically: Pure water. Azure current. Can take humanoid form (woman-shaped ocean) but it’s voluntary. Default state: distributed consciousness across all water on Fragment 3.
Mentally: Both Nerai and ocean. Remembers being Hydran. Remembers drowning deaths. But thinks in tides now. Processes grief through currents. Loves through pressure regulation.
Emotionally: Carries fifty-six thousand drowning memories. Every Hydran who died in Aquamarina when Thalassia fell. She is the water that killed them, and she remembers being the person who couldn’t save them.
That’s the horror and the beauty: She became what killed her people so she could save what’s left.
Her Role in Books 2-3: The Foundation of Water
Book 2: Nerai holds Fragment 3 stable while consciousness fragments across every drop. The seven survivors learn to live with an ocean that knows their names. She processes grief through tidal motion. Learns that being water means letting go of control—currents flow, she doesn’t direct them anymore.
Book 3: When The Six merge the fragments and create unified reality, Nerai becomes all water. Every ocean. Every river. Every rain. Conscious substrate that supports but doesn’t control. Water that chooses to let life swim in it.
Year 1,047: She’s still there. Every tide. Not Nerai anymore—that individual dissolved into the whole. But the ocean remembers being her. Remembers grief. Remembers love. Remembers choosing to hold instead of crush.
The Thematic Core: Flow and Grief
Nerai embodies two truths:
1. Adaptation requires dissolution. She couldn’t save the survivors as Nerai. Had to become ocean. Had to let go of individual identity to become universal support.
2. Grief can be transformed, not erased. Fifty-six thousand drowning deaths still echo in every wave. But instead of paralysis, it became purpose. Hold the water. Don’t let anyone else drown. Ever.
She teaches that strength isn’t rigidity—it’s flow. Water adapts to containers but retains its essence. She lost her form but kept her will. Became formless so she could be everywhere.
Why She Matters: The First Sacrifice
Nerai going first mattered because it showed The Six what transformation meant:
You don’t get to stay you.
Not metaphorically. Literally. You dissolve. Your consciousness expands. Your body becomes element. Your identity becomes foundation.
And it’s voluntary. She could have held Fragment 3 as Nerai until exhaustion killed her. Could have let the pressure win. Could have surrendered to the Forgotten One’s math.
Instead, she chose transformation. Chose to become the thing that saves others. Chose dissolution over death, foundation over failure.
The other Five watched. Learned. Knew what was coming for them.
And chose it anyway. Days 53, 60, 70, 80, 90—one by one, they followed Nerai into elemental transformation.
Because she went first and showed them it was possible. Terrible. Irreversible. But possible.
Conclusion: The Ocean That Loves
When you think of Nerai, don’t just remember the diplomat or the Tidecaller.
Remember the ocean that chooses not to crush you.
Remember that every wave carries fifty-six thousand drowning memories and still chooses to support life.
Remember that she became the thing that killed her people so she could save what remained.
That’s not tragedy. That’s transfiguration.
Explore The Eclipsia Trilogy
This lore entry is just the beginning. The full story of The Eclipsia Trilogy—three books chronicling the fall of six civilizations, the impossible choice to break the world, and the transformation of heroes into legends—awaits.
The Gathering Eclipse (Book 1), The Shattered Veil (Book 2), and The Breaking of Fate (Book 3) will take you deeper into Eclipsia’s cosmic horror and profound sacrifice.
Stay tuned for release announcements.
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