Hava was a small underwater town located close by a ravine. Deep sea creatures were beginning to pop up more frequently, and it was obvious that they came from those depths. At first, it was thought that they were coming near the surface, despite them not being adjusted to the gentler pressure, because the citizens would throw trash down there. The trash would consist of fish bones, seaweed parts that the mermaids could not digest and stones. The beleif held until a deep sea mermaid clawed her way up. She had to crawl, her tail had been bitten off. Acropora, a young girl at the time, was wittness to this event, and she would flee town only days before news spread about Hava being scrubbed from the face of the ocean floor. There was not a trace left but the few inhabitans that just so happened to be away at that point. Acropora grew fearful of deep and dark places, she was swimming around shallow waters aimlessly. Furcata, queen of a large kingdom, had noticed her around the city and decided to take her under her wing (fin?) before adopting her. Acropora met a girl her age named Ane, and the two formed a close friendship.
Years passed, Acropora had beautifully adjusted to her life in the kingdom and as heir to the throne. One day, the bright capital was flooded with black ink. People paniced, such a thing had never happened before ever. The ink was not directly harmful to adult mermaids, but it seeped into the gills of babies and young children and choke them to death. Furcata fully planned on investigating the matter herself, but her advisors told her, that the people would be afraid that she would die in the proscess. Reluctantly, she made a public announcment; whoever would go on a royal investigation to the source of the ink, would be greatly compensated for the rest of their lives. But people did not voluenteer. They were too afraid. Ane was the only one who chose to go. She had always loved the placed of the sea she wasn't meant to see. She was reckless when it came to the deep dark, Acropora was greatly concerned about her going alone. She was scared of whatever it was, more than the regular person, but if she could defy her fear, as crown princess, it would inspire hope in the hearts of the common folk. Furcata did not want her to go, but she respected her intention, so she let her anyway. The trail of ink led them to a ravine identical to the one Acropora knew all too well. It was not logically possible, Ane dragged her onwards anyway. With the building pressure, she wondered if she, like Ane, had lost her mind. She kept seeing visions of a mermaid with legs of a human. Scattered pieces of Hava stuck out from the darkness, but every time Acropora reached out to touch, it had never been there. Ane kept going with a smile on her face.
A light could be seen at the end of the cave they had found themselves in. The ink just stopped, no, rather, the ink just started there. The girl with human legs set on a ledge, her eyes were darker than the ink, and Acropora froze at the sight of her. Ane sighed in happiness, she swam towards the mermaid with arm open, ready for an embrace. Ane approached as she was invited to. Her head was directly ripped off her body, the stranger had opened her ribcage up and swallowed.