Story Inspo…
In the depths of the Maritime Antiquities Vault beneath Whitestone Keep, behind rusted gates and forgotten crates, there stood a tall, tube-shaped tank encased in aged bronze. No one quite remembered how it got there. Its brass nameplate had long corroded to near illegibility, save for a single word etched in an elegant, curling script: Nereidia.
The tank rose taller than a man, wrapped in bronze ribbing shaped like tentacles and coiled sea serpents, their glass eyes glinting in the dim light. The casing bore porthole-like rivets and barnacle-like textures, as if it had been dredged from the bottom of the ocean—and perhaps, it had.
Inside, sea water bubbled steadily, never overflowing, never growing stagnant. Strange particles shimmered in the fluid, like slivers of bioluminescent scales or drifting marine snow. No power source was connected to it, yet the water remained warm, alive with motion, and faintly humming—like a heartbeat heard through the hull of a ship.
Some called it a remnant of the Nautilus, one of Captain Nemo’s many rumored experiments.
Others whispered it was older, a relic from a time when the sea had secrets too deep for men to reach.
Only one person ever dared open the inspection hatch.
Her name was Dr. Elira Vane, an oceanographer and historian who had spent her life chasing maritime legends. When she uncovered the tank during a restoration of the vault, she couldn’t look away. It called to her—not with words, but with the tug of tides in her veins, like she was a seashell hearing the sea.
The night she opened the hatch, the bubbling stopped.
Silence fell like a shipwreck settling into sand.
Then, a pale tendril of something—not quite plant, not quite animal—unfurled inside the tank.
It pressed gently against the glass, pulsing with a soft blue glow.
Elira didn't scream. She simply leaned closer.
A voice filled her mind—not spoken, but felt. Return me.
Images flooded her senses: a sunken temple, a trench deeper than any charted map, and a throne made of coral, empty for a thousand years. The thing in the tank was not a creature, but a fragment—like a pearl born from a wound in the ocean’s soul.
When the vision ended, the bubbles resumed. The tendril withdrew, and the hatch sealed itself shut with a hiss.
No one believed her story. The tank was locked away once more.
But Elira knows better. She knows the sea left something behind.
And deep beneath the waves, something ancient waits, listening for the sound of its name—Nereidia—and the call of the one who will set it free.
*IMPORTANT - Please note that all my products feature small parts that can pose a choking hazard if used incorrectly, please do not place any of the items in your mouth or anywhere they aren’t intended to be placed, All my items are intended for collectors, people aged 14 and over. Items that have batteries should be treated with care and not misused to avoid choking, I can not be held responsible in anyway for the misuse of any item or items battery pack.
