ugly - mashton

prologue

- PROLOGUE -

Most mermen were depicted as unattractive creatures. Seen with green seaweed hair, big red noses, and an overall unattractive face, there's an obvious reason why mermaids are seen as beautiful while mermen were the opposite.

For years mermen were called evil, that they sunk ships and caused storms. Sometimes they were said to sing in beautiful and melodic tones to lure humans in, just like their women counterparts did. But they weren't bad, humans just couldn't see what happened underwater.

The ocean was different from land, of course. If you asked a human what was there, they would say fish and plants. A mermaid would tell you different.

A mermaid would tell you that there were rows of houses, like a suburban neighborhood. The neighborhoods surrounded the twin center which included the main local store and library, which was almost always vacant.

At the edge of the little town that sat at the deepest part of the sea was the castle. The mermaids lived in a monarchy and the queen and king lived in the biggest building there. It was made out of gold and contained almost all of the treasure out there.

Almost every mermaid was rich. They lived with gold and diamonds and liked the nicer things in life. Even the non-rich ones weren't poor, they just didn't have as much money.

The king of the ocean liked to be richer than everyone. He liked to have power, because he never had a say in anything when he was a child. He wanted to make everyone suffer what he did, just like his ancestors made their people do.

He wanted to make everyone ugly.

Growing up he wasn't the most attractive merman in school. He had the stereotypical green hair and big red nose. He didn't have a strong build like his brothers did. And now that he was king and had earned his magical powers, he wanted everyone to feel the way he did.

So every August 24th, every sixteen year old had to line up in front of the palace for the king to cast a spell on them.

The spell was more of a curse than anything. He made every sixteen year old ugly. The only way they could become beautiful again would be to have a human fall in love with them.

Usually, this wouldn't be hard for a mermaid. They were naturally beautiful (even the men) and had voices of angels. They were meant and born to lure humans in, and make them fall in love. But the king takes that away from them and gives them an unattractive face and voice.

And this made everybody afraid of turning eighteen. The beautiful town became an evil one once the purple and green tailed king was made a monarch. It was full of jealously and envy of the young teenagers and the people who could somehow find someone to love them.

The world became scary for mermaids. And Michael might have been the most nervous for August 24th.

•~•~•

This will be sort of based off the book uglies (which i've never read but I know they turn pretty when they're sixteen lol). Also got a lot of inspiration from dreamparadise i love their stories haha.

If you're confused, the mermaids live like normal humans, just underwater. When they are sixteen they have to turn ugly, and can only become pretty again if they have a human fall in love with them, which is close to impossible.

PM for more questions and thank you for reading!