Safe water landing

If you are the son of Poseidon,’ Echidna hissed, ‘you would not fear water. Jump, Percy Jackson. Show me that water will not harm you. Jump and retrieve your sword. Prove your bloodline.’
Yeah, right, | thought. I’d read somewhere that jumping into water from a couple of stories up was like jumping onto solid tar. From here, I’d splatter on impact.

| turned and jumped. My clothes on fire, poison coursing through my veins, | plummeted towards the river.

I'd love to tell you | had some deep revelation on my way down, that | came to terms with my own mortality, laughed in the face of death, et cetera.
The truth? My only thought was: Aaaaggghhhhh!
The river raced towards me at the speed of a truck. Wind ripped the breath from my lungs. Steeples and skyscrapers and bridges tumbled in and out of my vision.
And then: Flaaa-boooom!
A whiteout of bubbles. | sank through the murk, sure that | was about to end up embedded in fifty metres of mud and lost forever.
But my impact with the water hadn’t hurt. | was falling Slowly now, bubbles trickling up through my fingers. | settled on the river bottom soundlessly.

TLT ch.13-14