Deya felt guilty knowing she had to compete with the little sea turtle she had met on her journey. She wanted to help him but she also had to accomplish the Queen’s orders. Her first priority right now is to do whatever she needs to do to make a Protection Barrier around the Trident Queendom. This will be a race against time and The Wise Crab didn’t make it easy either. She had to find a Tear Pearl, the Light Coral sounds the easiest to find only if they are not already dead by the Whitening, and lastly the drop of Hippocamp blood which would definitely be the hardest to find specially after the hundred year war with the Hippocamp Colony. Deya couldn’t help but wonder how she would acquire a drop of their blood without disrupting the peace between them, or how she even would get near enough. 

But Lucas, the little sea turtle, also had it quite challenging. They both had the Tear Pearl on the list but it was more easy to acquire by a mermaid than a sea turtle. Deya had learned from an old folktale her mother used to tell her when she was a youngling that a Tear Pearl is formed by the tears of a mermaid's first heartbreak. And the biggest disadvantage for him must be the Anglerfish scale, because Anglerfish are huge and live on the deeper zones of the ocean and Lucas is such a small sea turtle he is not used to being in the deep for such long periods of time. Deya didn’t want to imagine it, she was torn between what she knew she must do and her heart telling her to help little Lucas. After parting ways in front of The Wise Crab’s home, he had only said to her “I hope to see you again miss” and went his way repeating the list of items to make the cure for his father.

Deya tried to stop thinking about him and focus on what item on her list she would go searching for first. On her way home to update the Queen on the mission at hand, she decided it would be best to go for the easiest item on the list to find, the Light Coral. 

When arriving at her home she went straight to her mother, the Queen, to tell her everything that The Wise Crab had told her and explained the items that she needed to find in order for the Trident Queendom to successfully have a protection barrier. The Queen was glad that Deya had found The Wise Crab and how well she was managing this responsibility. But she still insisted that Deya should take at least two companions on her search for the first item. Deya liked going off alone but agreed with her mother and thought about who she would take as companions. 

Deya selected Tyno and Alissa, both had accompanied her to the Ancient Archives where they found out about the prophecy and knew the importance that accomplishing this mission had for their home. She met up with them and headed out to inspect the area where she first noticed that the corals had turned white. To their surprise the Whitening had spread way more faster than they thought it would. More corals had died and turned white even farther than the area they had seen before. It had spread to almost all the different corals in that zone. If they were going to find the Light Coral they had to go to another coral filled zone because this one had sadly perished. 

They decided to head east, where the coral reefs had started turning white but not all of them were fully dead. There were still colorful corals thriving. 

“How do we know which one is a Light Coral?”, asked Alissa with a confused tone. For her all the corals look kind of the same.

“Alissa, didn’t you pay attention when they taught us about the diversity of corals and algae?”, said Tyno visibly annoyed. 

“Of course I did but it’s not the same to be told about them than seeing them in person and identifying them. They look the same!”, replied Alissa.

“Believe me, there aren't Light Corals here. Light Corals have a multicolored luminescence and I don’t see any glowing ones here.”, said Deya while looking closely at the corals.

“Alright princess then let’s keep searching.”, said Tyno.

They kept swimming until they saw a shimmering glow nearby. They went faster to reach it but were disappointed when they saw enormous amounts of glowing algae surrounding what seemed like parts of a broken net. There were various types of small fish swimming around the algae. The net had pieces of trash stuck to it, a plastic bag and a dented bottle could easily be visible. 

Glowing Algae… Deya remembered this was part of the little sea turtle’s list of items and wondered for which item would little Lucas search for first.

Deya was lost in her thoughts when she heard a scream.

“Aaaak!”, Alissa screamed when she noticed that there wasn’t only trash stuck to the net and glowing algae. Carcasses were stuck to it. Remains of sea turtle and crab shells lingered there. 

Alissa was startled at seeing the carcasses and swam erratically from side to side trying to get away from there but her movements made her tail get caught with the net and glowing algae. She was struggling to get out, but Deya and Tyno acted fast and started to use their tridents to cut through the glowing algae. They managed to free her but noticed the glowing algae they had cut had stopped, in fact, glowing. Deya was confused to see the glow disappear but relieved at the same time. 

“Alissa what happened? Why didn’t you use your trident?”, Tyno questioned Alissa.

“I dropped it okay?”, said Alissa, still breathing heavy.

“What do you mean you dropped it? When?”, Tyno replied.

“When I saw the carcasses, I was so startled that I dropped it and now shut up and help me find it.”, Alissa said to Tyno.

“Yes, everything is fine so let’s just go find it.”, said Deya.

They descend towards the sand floor below them to see where her trident could've ended up. While searching, they see a glowing bed of corals. A coral reef so big the zone was thriving with a diversity of fishes that used the corals as their homes. The trident had dropped directly into what they were initially looking for. This coral reef was still untouched by The Whitening and was formed entirely by Light Corals.