Darkness. Cold. The limitless deep ocean to explore. That is what has been Deya’s home for as long as she remembers. Her family is what some would call royalty, being the first born mermaid daughter of the founder of the Trident Queendom. But being royalty comes with a lot of pressure and the weight of protecting the queendom is growing more heavy by the minute. During her weekly evaluations she noticed both the deep-water corals and the shallow tropical corals are turning white. Something is wrong and the sea speaks it in ways only some can understand. 

Deya decides to hold a meeting with the council to discuss what could be causing the corals to die; what could cause such harm to their waters. Her mother, the Queen, is skeptical about this new possibility of a harmful effect on their home because after the long hundred year war against the Hippocamp Colony they are finally in an era of peace and reconstruction. The council members' opinions are divided, two of the younger members completely support Deya by not doubting her worries and agreeing it might be a new problem for their home, but the other three members of the council make a convincing point by reminding themselves that the war is over and therefore they are now safe.

“Let me make a proposition mother.”, said Deya telepathically to each of their minds, a language not quite common. As the times pass the most common language in their Queendom is now sign language but every mermaid in Trident Queendom learns multiple languages in their youthfulness, telepathy, signs, and the language of the above.

“In this meeting I am not Mother, I am Queen”, said the Queen forcefully.

“Permit me access into the Archive Caves and grant me a group of four to five constituents to accompany me to search for possible answers that explain the sudden change on the corals, Queen.”, replied Deya staring right at her mother with a decided expression.

“Fine. I will grant you access but when you don’t find anything and waste your time don’t get angry when I say ‘I told you so’”, answered the Queen in a sarcastic tone.

Deya turned without responding to her mother’s comment and swam away, her scaly teal green tail making bubbles along the water as she thought to herself : “I know there is something wrong, I just know. I can feel it”.

Later, Deya arrived at the Plaza to meet with the group the Queen had granted her. The Plaza was a common place formed of underwater sand dunes where the younger folk like to reunite. There, four young fellows approached her. 

“Greetings princess, what can we help you with?”, said the tallest of the group.

“Grab your gear, we are only going to investigate but we never know what could cross our paths”, Deya ordered.

“Yes, princess”, the four of them said in unison and grabbed their silver tridents.

“Let’s go, we are going to the Archive Caves”, said Deya as she led the group. 

After swimming away from the underwater sand dunes, they had to swim through slow currents and a labyrinth made from algae. The labyrinth was designed to secure the Archive Caves so no other species could find the entrance and whoever tried would get lost trying. But Deya knew how to get to the entrance because she liked to wander off to the caves to explore ancient texts carved on stone tablets. She hadn't read all of the texts at the caves, just a small part that was specifically designated for those learning to fight and defend themselves. Deya took her role as princess very seriously and knew someday she would have to take her mothers crown as the Queen and protect her Queendom. 

Then, having arrived at the Archive Caves she tells her companions to divide into two groups and search for any text related to corals, changes on the water or anything that could be associated. She starts to search herself, sees a stone with the title “Acts of War”, a second one titled “Curative Guidance” and another stone below those titled “Safe Navigation”. Deya swims further into the cave, seeing mountains of stone tablets sitting on top of each other as she swims through. In some parts, the walls had writings that were almost completely unreadable. 

As she came closer to the right side wall trying to make sense of the symbols on the wall that haven't completely faded off, she heard Tyno, the tallest of the group, calling for her from far away: “Princess! Princess, I think I found something!”

Deya swam towards his direction following the sound of his voice until she arrived where he was. Next to a pile of carved big stone tablets, there was a boulder dressed in algae. On the wall there were strange symbols and unreadable text just like the other ones she had seen previously on the other part of the cave but with the distinction that in this wall there were also downward arrows symbols towards where the boulder sat. Sea shells surrounded the boulder making a perfect circle around it. Curious, Deya came near the boulder and took some of the algae away from the boulder to see if there was something beneath it.

“Look at the arrows, there must be something there right princess?”, said Tyno excited.

“Let’s find out”, replied Deya while she took the rest of the algae away.

Beneath the algae, a small stone tablet laid hidden right in the center on top of the boulder. The carving on the stone tablet had some letters in a language once used by the ones that live above, the two-legged. It readed: “ profiteía tou télous ”. 

Which meant “Prophecy of the End”, below it had another 3 lines of text:

“First will come The Whitening,

Then the sand will Mark and the Tremors will start and never End,

The Deep will growl and nothing will be the same nor safe.”

Startled, they looked at each other with worrying looks. 

“No, it can't be. The Whitening could be referring to the corals, the corals are dying and turning white.”, said Deya as she reaches her webbed hands towards the stone tablet to grab it.

As she came into contact with the carved stone tablet, Deya’s head tilted upwards and her alluring gray eyes grew bigger. Her body and tail went limp and started to descend.

“Princess! Princess what happened? Princess!”, screamed Tyno as he grabbed her between his arms and the others quickly swam towards where they were after hearing him.

“Tyno what happened to the princess?!”, said one of the mermaids when she saw Deya still and limp like she was unconscious but with her eyes open, the rest of them surrounding them.

Deya’s vision blurred and went dark until she suddenly saw a dream where all the coral reefs, algae, shells and even the turtle’s shells and clams had little by little turned white. It was coming like a wave, turning everything small and near into a lifeless sea of white. Then, the sand began to have ripple marks, but what had started in just a small area near their home had expanded to the vast deep ocean. In mere minutes all of the sand was covered in marks in some areas worse than others, the marks combining to make symbols. While every species, small or big, every living organism in the ocean was getting covered in white, even the mermaids, and all of the sand was covered with marks where heat started to fume from the openings cracks, the earth began to shake. When the remaining mermaids sensed the vibration in the water, they grew wary of what came after, an intense seismic wave that would unstabilize them wherever they were. They could hear something faraway whining, almost like a growl. Each time the seismic waves would happen more recurrently and all the remaining living creatures were in pure chaos, desperate while seeing everything they knew and everyone they loved frozen like a statue when they got consumed by the White. The Queendom and all of the different communities were falling. 

Deya’s tail erupted to life and she pushed Tyno away from her, terrified as she regained consciousness. She did not only read it on the carved stone tablet, she had seen the prophecy in a dream, or as the two-legged called it, a vision. She had felt every bit of destruction and despair that was coming their way and knew she had to do everything in her power to save them. Save everyone.

“Princess, are you hurt?” “You worried me princess” “What just happened?” “Princess! Are you alright?”

The group swarmed her with questions as soon as they saw her move.

“We have to return home, quickly! We have to warn them”, said Deya clearly distraught.