Koro Veln | New San Diego

Koro stands backlit by the late-morning suns, his arms crossed over his chest as he surveys the tourists enjoying the warm waters on the shores of New San Diego. His form shifts gently in the warmth of the Orthean sun, the waxen filaments that make up his yellow and green ‘skin’ reacting to the temperature and to his mood. For now, all is calm but he knows that when it comes to careless tourists and the Orthean ocean, calm is an aberation. There’s always one, at least, who ignores the signs and the warnings and gets themselves in trouble.

As if to prove his point, he hears a collection of surprised, horrified screams and catches sight of a tourist being sucked under as a sneaker wave breaks over the picturesque rocks further down the beach where the waters are rougher and not so welcoming to swimming. Without thinking, he immediately runs to the surf and dives into the water. His waxen form smoothes to make his passage through the water frictionless and fast.

He can’t see them at first and fear fills him. But—there they are, tangled in sapphire-blue seaweed. His strong arms are around them in an instant and they surface in record time. He pulls them out of the surf and onto the warm, vivid pink shore as quickly as possible. Koro’s fellow lifeguards keep the crowd back.

Please be alive, Koro thinks as his black eyes, usually hidden behind the long, curling meldar filaments that hide his face, move over the tourist frantically trying to find any wounds. That’s when the tourist awakens, coughing up water all over them both. Gently, he rolls them over, encouraging them to spit it all up. “What were you thinking?” he asks gruffly. “Those rocks are out of bounds to tourists for a reason. You could have died.”