Neon Tides
Cyberpunk · Hydro-Punk
In the drowned city of New Venice, where neon advertisements flicker between salt-crusted towers and the sea devours the old world block by block, Maren Corvane navigates shadow markets that surface only after dark, trading secrets for bioluminescent pearls that keep her family's pressure-capsule alive. But when she intercepts a cargo of illegal deep-sea tech—a coral-bronze device that can rewire the ocean's currents—she uncovers a conspiracy that threatens to sink not just her home, but every floating city clinging to the drowned world's surface. Hunted by the syndicate that lost the device and haunted by visions of a creature that shouldn't exist, Maren must dive into the lightless trenches where the old world's climate machines still hum—and decide who gets to control the tides of the future.
68,818 words