Ever since the Heavens, Hell, and Earth rolled into one, the Dragon Princess of the South Seas had to take her degree at Singapore Management University and graduate with a bachelor of accounting. She had to store her long, flowing robes into her cupboard and had to buy sheath dresses and power suits with what she had saved on her student budget. In the mirror, she concentated to make her horns shrink, until they were no more than scars on her head—that is, if one looked at her hair closely.
This was what it took to be normal. She went to an interview at accounting firm after accounting firm, where recruiters told her that she looked very young for someone who was at least five hundred years old. She wanted to summon a tsunami to swallow them whole, but she had to find a job and support her father, who no longer had any seas to rule—they were forced to abdicate their rule and surrender it to mortals—it was the mortals who had stolen their heavenly decrees and now ruled using a Golden Treaty. There was nothing she could do about it, unless she planned a heist to collect these documents from the government’s headquarters. But then again, this was stealing state artefacts and she would be charged under the penal code.
Anyway, back to these interviews. She tried asking for a higher salary at them, since she was competent enough, but managers laughed at her and told her that she was a typical millennial, expecting too much out of her employers. It was only after she had shown them her speed and accuracy at balancing accounts that they decided to pay her more.
And so, the dragon princess, who was now made to use the name of Jingxuan, instead of her title, got a job. Instead of feeling happy, she trudged home, depressed. It irked her that the sun was shining, so, with what little power she had left, she made it rain, making sure that whoever had done the weather forecast would have a bit of a problem.
The newly minted executive walked home, where her parents tried to look as normal as possible. They, too, had shoved their robes into the cupboards and wore t-shirts and shorts now. Her father had to shave his beard and hair so that he would not look like a Chinese kungfu master but rather, more like an old man who spent his days bitching about the government at the coffeeshop.
Every day, Jingxuan, the dragon princess posing as a mortal, would wake up from her bed, realising that she had lost control of her body. Her tail, along with her horns would appear, and she would have to spend some time making herself shrink so that she could pass off as a human. She would shower, grab breakfast, and then go to the office, where she would be the first among her co-workers to arrive. The rest timed it in such a way that they were a few minutes in before their bosses, lest they be scolded for being “late”.
Jingxuan made friends at work, and they would all go to lunch in a group. All of these ladies would talk about the latest Korean drama, their children, or their boyfriends, and she would listen. Jingxuan would nod and smile at intervals so her coworkers would think that she was listening, but she couldn’t actually care less. Often, she would get that dreamy look in her eyes, and that was when she was imagining herself in dragon form, soaring across the skies and bringing rain to this tiny, tiny island.
After lunch, the former princess would continue to work with her colleagues, and sometimes, there would be a meeting. She and her associates, as the company liked to call it, would lock them up in a room while someone droned on and on about figures and suchlike. She would have to take notes, sometimes, because some higher-up exec said that she was a woman and it was therefore her job, or one of her other female colleagues, and she would think of striking that manager with lightning. She would then smile, because she had practised smiling without her fangs, and then continue.
The meeting would end, as it always did, and the young lady would join her colleagues in the pantry, where they would talk and snack. A while later, a manager would come by to scold them, and they would get back to their desks. Jingxuan would finish her work at top speed, if she was motivated enough, and take the bus home.
Dinner would be waiting for her at home. Her mother would make a mess of it as usual because the servants were no longer there. Jingxuan argued that they could get domestic helpers, but her mother insisted that she wanted to try and cook on her own. Jingxuan would eat it anyway–she was grateful for the food, and for her mother. They would also watch the news instead of planning where to make rain or not. The immortal missed it, but now, she had new duties. Duties that made her soul feel like it was being sucked into some black hole.
The family would talk among themselves, and sometimes, her younger sister, Jingyi, and older sister, Jingfei, would come home later and join them. They would finish the meal, wash up, and retreat to their rooms for their hobbies, or spend time together.
If Jingxuan wasn’t making more of those long, flowing robes that she could no longer wear out, she would be bitching about work with her younger sister, who was in a similar boat. They would compare salaries, the inane conversations of their co-workers. Other times, she would play video games with her sister, Jingfei, because it was one of the ways in which they could fantasise using their powers again. This would go on late into the night, as the sisters were angry and resentful at having to be normal. They would sleep at two o’clock in the morning, and wake up in the morning to redo everything once more.
Sometimes, she would go on Tinder and put up a profile, swiping through the many faces she’d see, just searching for something that was like her. Fur, horns, or even a magical staff in the background, but no luck. She wondered if this was because she was lonely and went on dates, but everyone she met was a shallow mortal with carnal desires. It seemed like all the immortals, beasts and creatures that humans had created, had been, once again, destroyed by humanity’s stupidity and recklessness. Was she the only one left?
Sometimes, if she were feeling a little rebellious, she would make her horns grow, only to make them vanish once someone noticed. At times, she would smile at her boss with teeth, only to replace it with the sweet (but fake) smile that everyone saw. And sometimes, if she worked late, she would take the long route home. She’d take the one where there were no street lamps, walking along with the darkness, as though it was a companion and then she’d transform into her true self, her dragon self, soaring across the sky, making it drizzle. Imaginative children would swear that they saw her, but parents would say that what they had seen was part of a myth and legend. Besides, all immortal and mythical entities had supposedly relinquished their powers with the Golden Treaty, and they were no more.
And most of all, Jingxuan would return to the ocean, just her and no one, to see the wreck that had been her home, once upon a time. The pale corals that were once her castle had been bleached white, and plastic bags, as well as bottles and sometimes even mortal money, floated down to the seabed.
She would sit, wait, and dream. She dreams that one day, she will not have to be bound by a boss and salary. That one day, the humans that rule over her will be washed away by their greed and that the oceans will boil in anger and swallow them all. Then, will rise among the ruins and the world will be born once more.
But in the meantime, she will wait. She will sleep, rise, work, eat and sleep again. Such is existence, after all.
Featured image by Ryan Moulton from Unsplash