Admittedly, it didn’t end quite so well the last time. A disaster of a fight, in fact, brought on by a difference in views. Yanfei thought it was inevitable; two people with very different backgrounds — different species in fact! Sooner or later they were sure to disagree on something. The matter laid in the fact that this was the first time it ever happened and she wasn’t sure how to move on from here. After all, their only form of contact was through exchange of letters or Hu Tao’s scrying glass. However, after a few weeks of thinking and looking through books for similar experiences, Yanfei finally had her Eureka moment.
If Hu Tao didn’t believe that she could do it, then the best course of action was surely to prove her wrong, right?
The two first things Yanfei noticed when she emerged from the water were: the sun was blinding and the air was fresh. The ocean splashed around her in no way she’d ever experienced before, akin to the dangle of a cage opening and she, a bird that finally left its nest. She took a large gulp of air and relished in the way she didn’t choke. It felt magical. It was. Her moment of grace was ruined by a familiar voice:
“Having fun?”
Hu Tao grinned at her with crossed arms, lounging on the beach like it was her home.
Yanfei furrowed her eyebrows. “What are you doing here?”
“You didn’t think I’d forgotten my promise, did you?”
Hu Tao was a lifelong friend of hers, a traveling witch who returned to the ocean once a year. Her return was always brief but lively, and for every week she was away, a letter was sent and received between them. Truth to be told, their relationship was a bit complicated. While the interest in romance was very obvious, neither entertained the idea of a long-distance relationship, so they’d just been doing this song and dance where they playfully flirted with each other and held the pain with their own two hands.
This year, Yanfei turned twenty and Hu Tao had promised to bring her to a tour. She would have left earlier if not for her overbearing family. The Adepti had always been way too traditional for her liking. It wasn’t like mermaids couldn’t come up here, anyway. Last she heard, a merman in Fontaine was working as a pool lifeguard and a mermaid in Liyue was a seafood chef—how cool is that!
Yet… that was also where their disagreement stemmed; the reason why Yanfei thought their tour was canceled.
It seemed like Hu Tao wasn’t very keen on the idea of revisiting that for now, so Yanfei would ignore it in favor of getting her tour. Besides, this might be the eye-opener she’d been waiting for to finally decide.
Hu Tao brought her to all kinds of places, places she never knew needed to exist, places she’d only heard of and could never imagine. For example, libraries; they didn’t have books under the sea, so she never thought that so many of those rectangle-looking things could exist in one place, neatly organized based on topics and titles. Moreover, the papers humans used apparently were different from the one Hu Tao used to send her letters, for they weren’t waterproof and would simply rip. Restaurants; she knew that mers could work as chefs, but she never understood what those two words really meant. After all, to eat, she only needed to catch some fish and that was already a fulfilling meal.
Inexplicable warmth filled her as she looked at them from afar; humans who only lived no longer than a century, yet their lives were filled with so much joy, surrounded by the people they loved. She could only imagine what they were talking about that incited laughter and lit up the room. She had heard that humans liked updating others of the occurrences in their daily lives. She had never done such a thing. Life as a mermaid was long, yet boring. Each day was filled with the same activities over and over, with the same people from the same place, with the same ideals that needed no discussing. There was no way to evolve within such communities, if it could even be called as such.
Earlier, they’d entered the library despite Yanfei not knowing how to read human letters. Hu Tao needed to return a book, so she brought her along, while also explaining ‘genres’. She had borrowed a book from the potions section, but she brought Yanfei around to explain what history and non-fiction was. Yanfei thought it was neat how the humans recorded their lives as such; the merpeople’s ‘history’ was simply recorded through speech… Although there wasn’t much history to speak of; nothing ever changed, so there was no past to learn from.
Another thing was bothering her. The genre of ‘fantasy’ sounded very complicated, despite the lengthy explanation. Hu Tao explained that mermaids used to be part of the fantasy world before they found out that they actually existed, along with other species that sounded incredible as well. Species she couldn’t even imagine about, despite seeing the covers. Finally, they gave up on the topic and left the library.
As they returned to the inn Hu Tao was staying at, Yanfei couldn’t help but groan, “I still don’t understand.”
“Okay, okay, so you know how there are many different kinds of fishes in the sea?”
“Yeah?”
“It’s like that, but with humans. So there are many kinds of humans, some of which are vampires, werewolves, fairies, and so on.”
“I see… Tell me about vampires then!”
"They wake up when the sun sets and drink blood."
"There are legged-men like that?" She called them this way because she felt like they couldn’t be called ‘humans’.
"Yes. I suppose what you meant by legged-men are us humans."
"What differentiates you?"
"Humans are the most normal version of men who live on land. No super powers like vampires and fairies."
Silence reigned for a few moments. Yanfei raised an eyebrow.
"Oh, come on. You have no right to judge me like that—you can’t even walk!”
Yanfei sat by the window, looking at the sky. Perhaps it was out of her own ignorance, for she knew that the sun came and went, but she never expected the sky to change colors so beautifully. A mix of orange and pink, with clouds decorating it, creating abstract shapes that she somehow found beautiful. It was art, she realized, a new discovery for there was no such thing underwater.
“It’s a curious thing,” she said with her head propped on her hand.
“What is?”
“I suppose I thought most humans were like you; travelers. The world is vast, and it’s much more varied than the boredom that exists underwater. Everyone seems much more joyous and open-minded, always looking to evolve, unlike the Adepti. I didn’t expect they would have a home as well.”
“Ah…” Hu Tao hummed. She must know that Yanfei was trying to bring up the topic of their taboo argument, but in the end she relented and said, “yeah, I’m not really bound to any one place.”
“I’d love to live that way too. It’s very boring in the sea.” As she said this, she looked up to see Hu Tao’s expression, but she was predictably looking away, busying herself with setting the dinner table. Yanfei had wanted to help, but the fragile porcelain intimidated her shaky hands—she never had to deal with such things.
“But you have a family.”
Yanfei already knew where this was going. She understood what family meant to someone like Hu Tao, but she wished that she would try to understand Yanfei’s perspective as well. “I can always visit them every month. It’s not like I won’t visit home..”
“I just feel like I wouldn't travel if I had a home in the first place, it’s not like traveling is my dream job or anything of the sort. I don’t understand why you’d choose it over being in the comfort of your own home.”
“Don’t you know the quote, ‘Home is where your heart is’? It’s even a man-made quote! I get to decide where my home is. My family won’t forget me even if I leave for a year; did you forget that mermaids live for up to hundreds of years? It’s not like I’ll never come home—we’ll be traveling, won’t we? Anyway, what’s with you and never letting yourself accept the good things in your life? Stop living so pitifully, this isn’t the Hu Tao I know!”
At that, Hu Tao halted her movements and finally returned Yanfei’s gaze. Unsure of what to say, she sighed and discontinued the argument. However, Yanfei wasn’t done yet.
“Hu Tao, from the bottom of your heart, do you want me to join you in your travels or not?”
“Of course I do, you know I do,” she relented. Perhaps she should have known that she would lose an argument to someone like Yanfei. In her heart, Hu Tao thought that if Yanfei were a human having a human job, a lawyer would probably fit her too well. She felt bad for Yanfei’s opponents in that alternative universe.
“Then, the only thing stopping you is your survivor’s guilt, is it not? It’s stopping you from having happiness, but we both know your family wouldn’t want you to live like this, don’t we?”
Indeed, their argument was about Yanfei joining Hu Tao in her travels. It would solve so many problems, such as their lack of contact and the long-distance part of their blooming relationship. Yet, Hu Tao couldn’t bear the thought of someone else leaving their home for her because she’d been forcefully left by her family thanks to fate. They had passed away while she was young, and having no money, she was also kicked out of their apartment. Having no education and any family left, she finally ended up becoming a traveler. It was an occupation decided by a cruel fate, circumstances that forced her hand.
To her, it was more bad than good, but she had made peace with it. Having Yanfei with her would undoubtedly make her much happier; there were so many things she wanted to show her and she loved seeing the reactions of someone so thoughtful. Yet, her mind was clouded with guilt and hesitance.
Of course, Yanfei knew her better than she knew herself. In the end, the argument was settled before dinner and their night was spent in the same bed. It was awkward in the beginning, but they relished in the fact that they could finally touch each other and feel the skin instead of the cold water that surrounded them. They shared a few soft kisses, shy and inexperienced but loving all the more.
“You’re really much too convincing for your own good, Fei,” she said as she gathered the mermaid in her embrace. Somehow, despite being a cold-blooded creature, Yanfei was warm. Incredibly so, and her face was almost as dark as her hair. Hu Tao couldn’t help but smile fondly at the sight.
“Of course I am! I need to be, to convince someone as hard-headed as you who thinks she knows everything already,” Yanfei said, as if Hu Tao was much too handful, but they both knew their feelings were returned by the other. “Tomorrow, help me send a letter to my family. I don’t know how you send letters from here, is it delivered by birds?”
This connection was made because the letters underwater were delivered by fishes, yet Hu Tao couldn’t help but laugh at the absurdity. “Of course not! It’s sent by humans. I’ll show you tomorrow. We need to sleep now.”
So, with the promise of tomorrow and the future in front of them, they let their minds be overtaken by sleep.
Part of Papilio de Iustitia: Yantao Zine
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