Midnight Diver stopped shaking only after he exited the building. Soon, depressing thoughts took their place. He replayed the events of his fight with Mistress Stunlock over and over again, feeling a little more inferior each time.
"Talk about heroic. I've done everything I can to avoid that beast, and she attacks it on her very first trip. Wasn't she scared? Can I ever be like that?"
Unable to shake this funk, Midnight Diver headed to his favorite spot in the city: the wharf. There, he swam until the sun set. However, the inky black waters reminded him of earlier that day. Unable to relax anymore, he climbed onto a nearby pier and stared into the night sky.
"Maybe I should just turn in my badge; stick to Olympic swimming, like my father always wanted."
He said this aloud, not expecting to receive a response.
"That'd be a waste of talent in my book, boy."
Midnight Diver turned his head to see an old man fishing next to him on the pier. He nearly fell back off the pier in shock.
"Shit! You scared me, old man! Did I interrupt your fishing or something?"
"Ha ha ha! Well, now you did!"
The old man's laughter was interrupted with a coughing fit, so he pulled in his line.
"Hey, I'm sorry if I did bother you. I hate it when people interrupt my swimming, so I could totally understand wanting to prank me. How about I help carry that tackle box for you?"
"Sure; I'm just heading to my boat, anyway."
"You're going night fishing? Not by yourself, I hope."
"Are you offering to join me? Lovely! I haven't had a fishing buddy since my grand-kids stopped coming."
Not giving Midnight Diver time to regret it, the old man practically dragged him to the boat. It, perhaps coincidentally, looked just as ancient as him. It still had oil lanterns instead of electric lights, and the floorboard creaked with each step.
They sailed until the shore disappeared, and then the old man stopped the boat.
"Are we here?"
"Not yet. The best fish come out at midnight."
Finally sensing something wrong, Midnight Diver chuckled nervously.
"You aren't one of those creepy old men, are you?"
"Ha! So earnest! No lad, I am a hero just like you."
He fished out a silver license from his shirt pocket. Embossed on the front was a letter A.
"Have you chosen a mentor, yet? Might as well pick me, since I don't intend on letting you run into anyone else from shadow world studies"
The old man's eyes burned with a fierce desire to show up his work colleagues.
"Ah... Maybe you should drive me back then, sorry. I don't know if I am cut out for this hero stuff."
"Why? Because you weren't dumb enough to jump into Leviathan's mouth?"
"You know that beast!?!"
"I'm the old man in the sea! I've fished almost everything there is to fish in those shadowy waters. You made the right choice back there; no promotion is worth your life, nor is it worth the guilt of having another person's life on your conscious."
"But what if I don't want to run?"
"It's never a bad idea to have a white whale. Hell, I got a display case full of them below deck."
"Really?"
"Come look, see for yourself."
They stepped below deck, although it felt more like stepping into a museum. The walls were filled with taxidermied fish, each more strange than the last.
"This right here is a world tree snake; those Norse bastards thought I couldn't fish it, but I showed them!"
"Wow."
"And this here is a skyfish. I had to make a custom net and rent a hot air balloon for that one."
"Wow."
"And this one was why I wanted to mentor you," he said while pointing to a black dolphin with a serrated nose. Midnight Diver recognized it instantly, as it was the form he took when midnight diving.
"Was that a person!?!"
"What? Lord, no! I call it the ice breaker dolphin, and its a native there. I suspect you can transform into other fish from that sea and, if you become my sidekick, I will let you have access to all my trophies from there!"
"Fine, I'll do it. But I have one request... I want a rematch against Stunlock!"
"So long as you let me show you off to the others at work, I can pull some strings..."
Just like that, another entrant prepared themselves.