The journey to the Ouros Trench was a feat of logistics that only the vast resources of House Volkov could accomplish. Anya procured a deep-sea exploration vessel, a marvel of GAMA and private-sector technology named the Nautilus, and had it discreetly moved to a private port. The official story was that she was embarking on a deep-sea Aetheric survey, a passion project that was well within her known eccentricities.
For two weeks, they traveled south, the Observatory's sterile white walls replaced by the cool, grey metal of the Nautilus's interior. The vessel was another of Anya's wonders, a fusion of a high-tech laboratory and a miniature military submarine.
During the journey, Ren's days fell into a new rhythm. His mornings were spent in deep meditation, consolidating his power. The flawless channels now allowed his Aether to circulate with an efficiency that was ten times greater than before. He was still a Rank 11 Apprentice, but the sheer quality and density of his power had reached a terrifying new plateau.
His afternoons were spent with Anya in the ship's primary lab, engaged in their strange, symbiotic partnership. He would use his unique connection to the "Heart of the Tempest" shard to access and decipher the fragmented Raijin memories within, while Anya recorded and analyzed the Aetheric fluctuations his efforts produced.
"It's fascinating," she noted one afternoon, watching a holographic display of his brain activity. "When you access the artifact's memories, your neural pathways fire in patterns that are not your own. It's as if another consciousness, a ghost in the machine, is temporarily co-piloting your mind."
"This girl is too clever," Zephyrion's voice was a low grumble. "She does not see me, but she sees my shadow. Be careful, boy. Her intellect is a weapon as dangerous as any Pagoda rifle."
Ren, for his part, was learning more about his own heritage than he ever thought possible. He saw echoes of Raijin life before the fall: their mastery of resonance technology, their ability to forge armor from solidified lightning, their deep, almost religious reverence for the storms that were the source of their power. He was not just an heir to their power; he was becoming a scholar of their lost civilization.
On the fifteenth day, they arrived.
The Nautilus slowed, its powerful engines humming as it held its position above the coordinates they had recovered.
"We're here," Anya announced from the bridge, her voice filled with a quiet excitement. "The Ouros Trench."
Ren joined her on the bridge. The view from the main screen was a crushing, absolute blackness. They were floating above a part of the world that had not seen sunlight in millennia.
"The pressure at this depth is immense," Anya explained, her fingers flying across her console. "The Nautilus can handle it, but we will be the first humans to ever lay eyes on this place. Deploying deep-sea drones."
Small, squid-like drones detached from the ship's hull and descended into the abyss, their powerful searchlights cutting through the oppressive darkness. The main screen split into multiple views, showing the drone's camera feeds. They saw a world of alien beauty and terrifying pressure. Strange, bioluminescent creatures drifted through the dark, and the seafloor was a jagged landscape of volcanic rock.
"The coordinates from the shard point to a location within that massive underwater caldera," Anya said, highlighting a vast, circular formation on the seabed. "But there's nothing there. Just rock."
"The vault is shielded," Zephyrion stated. "The ancient Raijin did not build doors of wood and stone. They built them of perception. The vault is there. You simply cannot see it."
"The entrance is hidden," Ren said aloud, echoing the spirit's wisdom. "It's a perception filter. A cloaking field woven into the fabric of space itself."
"A perception filter of that magnitude would require a power source larger than this ship," Anya countered, her scientific mind struggling with the concept.
"It has one," Ren replied, his eyes on the screen. He pointed to a specific spot in the center of the caldera. "There. It's drawing power from that geothermal vent."
He could feel it now, a faint, familiar hum buried beneath miles of water and rock. The hum of a Raijin power source.
"If the door is made of perception," Anya mused, her mind racing, "then it cannot be opened with force. It must be tricked. It needs a key. A specific Aetheric frequency."
"The same frequency as the Storm Beacon," Ren said, the pieces clicking into place. "The same frequency as my soul."
Anya looked at him, then at the abyss on the screen. "You would have to project your Aetheric signature through three miles of crushing water pressure and solid rock. The power required would be immense. The precision needed would be… impossible."
Ren met her gaze, a calm, determined look in his eye. "Let's find out."
He walked to the ship's main laboratory, to a chamber that housed a massive, spherical Aetheric amplifier, a tool Anya used for deep-space communication.
"This will be our broadcast dish," Ren said, placing his hand on the sphere.
"The boy learns," Zephyrion hummed with approval. "He is beginning to think like a Raijin. Not with brute force, but with the elegant application of overwhelming power."
Ren closed his eyes. He drew upon his own Aether, the flawless, powerful river in his new channels. He did not gather it for an attack. He shaped it, molding it into a single, pure, perfect note—the song of his soul.
And with the help of the Nautilus's massive amplifier, he began to sing it into the deepest, darkest abyss in the world.