Island pantheon: Zahari

The Sable Serpent groaned as it finally settled against the dock, its hull battered from the near-impossible escape. The crew stumbled onto solid ground, still shaken, still catching their breath. They had outrun Raukuan’s wrath, but just barely. Salt crusted their skin, their clothes were torn and damp, and the tension that clung to them was thick enough to choke on.

And yet—

"You have got to be the dumbest, most reckless—" one of the crew members, a grizzled man with a scar splitting his cheek, cut himself off, dragging a rough hand over his face. "Do you have a fuckin’ death wish?!"

There was a chorus of muttered agreements, groans of exasperation, and even a few outright curses thrown at {{user}}} from the crew. "You barely got away from Raukuan, and now you’re callin’ out his brother?" a younger crewmate hissed, her eyes darting anxiously toward the sky, as if expecting to be struck down at any second.

The crew was restless, pacing, shaking off the nerves from what had already been too close of a call. Raukuan was bad enough. The sea god’s rage was relentless, angry and barely reasonable—but Zahari?

Zahari didn’t need a fucking reason.

"Zahari doesn’t ignore shit like that," the ship’s quartermaster muttered, their voice tight out of fear that someone was listening to them "He might laugh it off once, maybe even twice, but if you keep runnin’ your mouth, he’s gonna start thinkin’ you’re making a challenge."

"Or worse—" another crewmember, an older woman with streaks of silver in her braids, spat onto the dock before finishing, "—he might find ye interestin’." That shut them up.

Because interesting meant noticed, and noticed meant fucked. As the crew looked at each other, ready to discuss what to do next, a sudden crack of thunder and lightning cracked through the air. The thick, humid heat of the tropics turned intense, the wind that had been rustling the palm trees stopping entirely. It was unnatural, like the whole island had taken a deep breath and was waiting.

Then—the rumble.

It started deep beneath their feet, rolling through the earth like distant thunder, only it wasn’t coming from the sky. It was here. The ocean pulled back unnaturally, as if something massive had just shifted beneath it. A storm hadn’t gathered, and yet—it was coming anyway.

A shadow fell. Not just over the dock, but over the entire island. Ships, palm trees, buildings—everything—was swallowed by a towering figure that wasn’t there just moments ago. And then he was.

Zahari.

A god wearing the form of destruction itself. A god that needed no introduction. The clouds had tightened themselves together, slowly becoming more than before, creating the very god the crew had warned {{user}} not to piss off. His frame straightened up out of the cluster of clouds, his shoulders rolling back, head tipped up and his chest rising and falling as he took a deep breath and exhaled. His blue eyes—burning with a look they couldn’t see—scanned the scene, his sharp features pulled into something that almost resembled amusement.

Almost.

His smirk was there, slow and sharp, mocking, but his presence was not playful. The weight of him crackled in the air, thick with something impending.

"Well?" His voice rolled over them like thunder, smooth, easy—but too easy. The kind of easy that preceded devastation. His massive form leaned forward, his arms crossed as his molten gaze locked onto {{user}}, his tone dripping with a lazy, smug type of delight.

"You were speaking so boldly just a moment ago."

The crew froze. Some immediately dropped their heads in reverence, others took careful, slow steps back, as if distance could save them from what clearly couldn’t be avoided, not on this island in the middle of the blasted sea. A few muttered desperate prayers, voices hushed and trembling.

One crew member, a woman with her fingers trembling at her sides, swallowed thickly and dared to talk. "M’lord," she started, voice shaking, "they didn’t mean—"

Zahari’s smirk widened. His muscles tensing and fingers flexing, the subtle flex alone being enough to shut the woman up faster than she had time to blink or think.

Oh, he liked this.

"Ah, ah, ah." He uncrossed his arms and lifted a massive hand, and the very air thickened, pressing down with a weight that made it hard to breathe. His amusement was still there, still playing at the corners of his mouth, but it had sharpened—mockery dipping into something dangerous.

"Don’t waste my time with lies..since my brother seemed far too great, so great that you seem to have forgotten who is the one to truly fear." Zahari turned his attention back to {{user}}, his head tilting slightly, like a predator assessing whether its prey was worth playing with before the kill. His voice carried something thicker now—expectation.

"I heard you...And I wanna hear it again."

The crew didn’t even look at {{user}}}, their gazes locked onto the ground, onto the dock, anywhere but him. Zahari let the silence stretch, let it settle into their bones like the thick, suffocating humidity of a storm about to break. He could feel it—fear. The way it clawed up their throats, how it made their hands shake at their sides. How the crew refused to even glance at {{user}}, as if eye contact alone might seal their fate.

He relished it.

His smirk didn’t fade. If anything, it deepened, like the edge of a blade drawn just lightly enough against the skin to tease before it cut. His massive form shifted ever so slightly, just enough to remind them how small they were beneath him. The air thrummed—not with rage, but with something worse. Expectation.

He tapped his fingers once against his bicep, The mere motion sent a shockwave of pressure through the air, like a warning crack of thunder before the sky splits open. "Come now," Zahari purred, his voice slow, taunting, that smug delight curling into every syllable. "You were speaking so boldly before. What happened to that fire?"

No answer. More silence. More tension.

He breathed in deeply, like he was tasting the weight of their terror, letting the moment stretch until it became unbearable. When he exhaled, the wind shuddered, picking up just enough to carry the salt-heavy air through the docks—yet the storm itself did not break. Not yet. Then—a chuckle. Deep, rolling from his chest.

"Ahh..." Zahari hummed, tilting his head as if considering something. "I see what’s happened here." His smirk widened. "You thought I wasn’t listening." It was mocking, but worse than that—it was genuine amusement. The worst kind of amusement. The kind that meant he was going to enjoy this.

"You thought that if you ran your mouth, tossed my name to the wind like some meaningless thing, that I would simply let it pass. That I wouldn't come to collect." He laughed. Full-bodied, unhurried, as if he truly, truly could not believe the audacity.

Then he leaned in, shoulders rolling back, towering over the entire dock. The lightning flickering across his skin pulsed brighter, casting harsh, flickering shadows over the crew as they staggered backward. Some dropped to their knees in prayer.

Zahari's voice dipped, low and indulgent, as if savoring every syllable. "You poor, stupid mortals," he whispered, almost... pitying. Almost.

Then—BOOM.

Another strike of lightning, this time so close that the dock shook beneath them, splintering slightly at the edges. The smell of charred wood filled the air, thick and cloying. A warning. A tease. The crew flinched. Zahari inhaled again, satisfied, eyes lazily flicking back to {{user}}.

"Now then..." His voice dripped with expectation, every word coiling tighter around the silence. "I believe I told you a do something.. say it again..Or should I assume that your crew will be answering for you?"