Chapter 1, I’ve Returned (1)

Ten-thousand meters underneath the sea, at a depth where few creatures could be seen, and the few that could occasionally be spotted, were often silently minding their own business. In these still frigidly deep waters, a sole figure could be seen shooting up from the depths towards the surface, leaving behind a bubbling wake. Propelling herself using her fishtail, Zhao Xiaokui, determinedly looked towards her destination above while clenching her teeth.

Higher, higher, and yet higher still she swam. She knew not what depth she was at, but the discomfort in her chest caused by the drop in pressure told her she was growing closer to the surface, and her goal.

After swimming for a further unknown amount of time, and when Zhao Xiaokui began to tire, she noticed that the surroundings had grown brighter, meaning she had finally reached a place where the sun could penetrate through the heavy waters above. At this depth, Zhao Xiaokui was able to see schools of fish swimming nearby, avoiding the predators that would attempt to eat them. However, she merely spared them a single glance before continuing her journey up towards the sun she desperately wished to see again, high above the waters she lived.

Before the accident, she never imagined that she would long for the sun as she does now. Just like a fish is drawn to water, and a hungry babe is drawn to its mother’s breast, she continued her journey. Despite the blood that started to seep out of her body, and the building pain in her chest from the lack of pressure, her eyes only grew more determined.

During these past five years she spent under these waters, Zhao Xiaokui herself couldn’t have imagined that what she missed the most were not the phones or computers of the modern day, but the sun. After-all, only those who have lost sight of the sun, were fully able to appreciate its beauty. She missed the warmth and dryness that would envelop her as she walked underneath the sun on two legs. She even dreamed of throwing herself into the sun to be embraced by its flames.

The water pressure continued to drop as she started to see the clouds above through the surface of the water, and with an exclamation of wonder, her arms broke through the surface of the water, followed by her head and shoulders covered in her algae-like hair. Raising her head, Zhao Xiakui stared at the sun above with an intensity like she would sprout wings at any moment and jump into the flames above.

She was finally seeing the sun once again, and to her, it was as warm and bright as she remembered. As she stared at the sun hanging in the sky, she began to laugh aloud with tears streaming down her face. She couldn’t remember the last time she had been able to laugh and cry like this. Deep down under the water, even if she felt like crying, she wasn’t able to feel the tears that would stream down her face. As her tears fell down into the water around her, so too did the blood that continuously poured  from her face.

It wasn’t that mermaids like Zhao Xiaokui were unable to leave the deep waters below, but there also weren’t any mermaids who would so recklessly charge straight towards the surface like she had. Even though a mermaid's body was much stronger than that of a human’s, their internal organs were still just as fragile. So a sudden drop in pressure would inevitably cause an internal injury.

Drawn to the blood that filled the water around her, predators began to draw closer to the floating Zhao Xiaokui, ignoring that the one they marked as food was a mermaid, a creature who was unmatched in the water. After all, this was the ocean, where even a creature at the top of the food chain has to be careful in case it itself becomes the prey. Yet even with the approaching predators, Zhao Xiaokui didn’t react. She had already abandoned all hope for survival, else she would not have started her reckless ascent from the deep.

“Turns out your life does flash before your eyes as you die…” she muttered to herself, as she drifted on the waves. As her consciousness began to drift and weaken, she recalled her 23 years of life, before and after becoming a mermaid. She recalled her birth for the first time, in a cramped hospital with peeling green walls and lights above as the nurses carried her out the delivery room. She recalled her first day of elementary school, carrying her backpack behind her as she repeatedly looked back to her grandmother waving by the gate. She recalled partying at a KTV with her friends after finishing the college exams. Indulging in alcohol and singing, she blacked out.

When she awoke again, she found herself in the body of a mermaid in its infancy. However, before being able to make sense of what had happened, she had to start fighting for her survival in this new world, even having to pull a harpoon out of her tail that was stuck there before she awoke within her new body.

The life of a mermaid in the deep sea was much more cruel than what is written in the fairytales found on earth.  Mermaids, like humans, are intelligent creatures, but unlike humans, mermaids don’t ever pay attention to traits like morality or benevolence. Nor do mermaids care about their own offspring, cruelly refusing to raise the children themselves. Once a mermaid is born, they are quickly given to the high priest to be raised and protected. But this protection is only from external threats, not from other mermaids like themselves.

Because of this, mermaids have been struggling to survive since birth, and if a mermaid wasn’t strong enough, it would be abandoned. The weak mermaids could only pray for a swift and easy death. The body that Zhao Xiaokui found herself inhabiting was such a mermaid, one that should have died. But after losing everything from her past life, she had nothing more to lose in this one, so she fought and barely managed to regain her right to live in this world. But only her right to live. Not only was her body still weak, but the harpoon had also left her disabled. Because of this, Zhao Xiaokui only had two choices for the coming battles that were a part of the coming of age ceremony. She could forgo the battle and become the exclusive property of a more powerful mermaid and live a life of slavery, or she could attempt to fight back in the coming of age ceremony and die.

However, she did not wish to be the property of another, much less one of the cruel mermaids, nor did she wish to fight and die, practically sacrificing herself for one of the mermaids that tormented her. Instead, she would rather die while staring at the sun she so dearly missed.

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So on the day of the coming of age ceremony, taking advantage of a small opening, Zhao Xiaokui quickly made her escape from the other mermaids, and swam towards the surface, struggling to swim with her crippled tail. During her journey, she would repeatedly question if her struggles were worth it. But as she reached the surface and once again saw the sun for the first and final time in this world, she knew that it was worth it. The sun above proved that the 18 years she spent in her previous life weren’t a fantasy or a dream she created herself, but were real.  Her memories were real, and they were happy memories.

Underneath the shining sun, Zhao Xiaokui’s eyes began to slowly close shut. In a trance, she felt like she had returned home, to a time when she lay in the living room next to her grandmother, hearing the cicadas chirp as she felt the warm sun on her skin alongside the cool breeze of her grandmother’s paper fan. As this final memory dissipated, so too did Zhao Xiaokui’s consciousness go with it. Her body, laying there, floated in the sea, seemingly asleep with a smile on her face.

Not too far away, a predator carefully approached her floating body. Seeing no response from the mermaid, it opened its maw wide, and with a crash, it’s teeth smashed together. Yet it did not feel the body of the mermaid in its mouth, as Zhao Xiaokui’s body that had been drifting in the waves moments before, had broken into foam, slowly rising towards the sun.

————

Within S-City, surrounded by office buildings, stood a café. In the café, the sun could be seen shining through the floor-to-ceiling windows, illuminating the tables scattered about. The quietly humming AC unit brought the temperature inside to a comfortable level, as white-collar workers sat around the tables, clacking away at their laptops, or enjoying a coffee with a dessert. In a corner booth of the café, sat two women face-to-face. One of the women, Shen Zhifei, began to talk.

“Ms. Zhao, I’d like to believe that you’re an intelligent person, and intelligent people don’t beat around the bush. I know you’re with Rong Zhen because of the Rong family’s wealth. So here, I’ll give you these eight hundred thousand dollars on the condition that you break up with Rong Zhen. Consider this as me being sincere.”

As Shen Zhifei was talking, the other woman, Zhao Xiaokui, sat in stunned silence, barely registering what the other person had said.

“Sorry,” she began blankly, “I think I might need to go to the bathroom for a sec.”

Caught off guard, Shen Zhifei paused before quickly continuing, “… these are my conditions miss Zhao, take your time to think about it if you need.”

Disregarding the attitude of Shen Zhifei across from her, Zhao Xiaokui hurriedly rose from her seat and looked around the café before heading towards the bathroom. Originally believing that Zhao Xiaokui’s request to go to the bathroom was only an excuse, Shen Zhifei couldn’t help but think otherwise as she saw Zhao Xiaokui race towards the bathroom.

Inside the small café bathroom, Zhao Xiaokui didn’t enter any of the 4 cubicles inside, instead heading towards the large mirror that covered the wall above the sinks. Pressing her hands against the marble countertop, she closed her eyes and took a deep breath. After bracing herself, she raised her head and looked into the mirror, within which she could see a familiar face reflecting back at her. Wetting her hands in the sink, she roughly wiped away the concealer under the corner of her left eye, exposing a little tear shaped mole. Seeing the mole, she quickly exposed her right ear that was hiding behind her hair and removed a little swan earring hanging there, hiding yet another small mole.

It was her body. She couldn’t care less about the situation with the woman in the café outside. Zhao Xiaokui’s only focus was on the reflection within the mirror, confirming that after five long arduous years, she was again in her own body.

She had returned. She was back home.

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