Voyage Of The Villainess

"The best thing to survive a disaster is to avoid it at all cost." Malaya rushed towards her cabin.

The wind was getting stronger and stronger. Elred, Iris, and Rein struggled to set down the sails. Rhyme while gritting his teeth turned the steering wheel of the ship at all cost.

The ship started to turn left as soon as all the sails got down.

"What now?!" Iris yelled as the whirlpool was getting nearer to them.

She glanced around, Malaya was nowhere to be seen.

'Where is she?!'

"Lady Iris! Look out!" Dorris yelled with fright, cutting the chant she was making for the huge teleportation.

It was too late for Iris to evade the incoming man running straight to her.

"We are all going to die!"

Maru, before he jumped out of the ship, got entangled with the rope on the way and Iris who was holding the same rope got dragged with it.

"This mother f****r!" Iris yelled amidst the storm.

---⚓⚓⚓---

Malaya, despite the strong rocking of the ship, went straight to her cabin without any pause. She immediately got the chest.

['Are you sure you don't want to join us?'

'No need. For the second time, that guy would be enough.' Nicholas replied.

'Also...' he paused for a bit looking at Malaya with a dead-serious expression on his face. 'You have a Temperance Reversed and Chariot.'

'What?' Malaya asked when Nicholas suddenly spoke something she didn't understand. 

"It's a rare combination of your fate. There is a possibility of a catastrophe hitting you in your voyage and at the same time, it could also lead to some triumph. Be careful on your voyage."]

'Is this the catastrophe he was talking about? His tarot divinations were really something.'

Malaya opened the small wooden chest. And there was a single tarot card there. 

'The Fool.'

'The card to activate the real image of Bituins.'

['You just need to drop blood on this card and chant this. 'Reveal those you can't see to thy fool'. And if you want to hide your ship's real appearance again, just reversed the card and chant, 'hide thy truth to the fool.']

'Nicholas surely loves to make things magical as always. Well, I guess it's not bad since I paid a lot for this quality to have.'

With the card in her hand, Malaya started running out of her cabin just before she stepped out. The ship trembled much heavier.

'It seemed despite the efforts, it was still not enough to avoid the whirlwind.'

Malaya bit her thumb and smudged her blood to the card.

"Reveal those you can't see to thy fool!"

As Malaya said that, nothing happened for a few minutes and she started to get nervous. 

'Nothing is happening? Maybe there is something wrong in the process.'

As she was about to repeat the chant...the card started to glow. Multiple cards of the fool emerged from it and flew everywhere from the ship.

Malaya's eyes grew wide in amazement as the cards started to plaster on the ship. And the once wooden walls of the ship started to change into silver metal. 

'But the main problem is still not over.' Malaya immediately went outside. The wind was still strong however there was something she didn't expect to see.

"Iris?!"

While the others were still clinging on the mast. Iris with her spear stuck between the railings of the ship was holding in. And in her arms, she was holding someone too so that they would not completely fall to the ravaging waves of the sea.

However, all of the sudden, the red skies started to change into a lavender hue. And the wind gradually declined. The waves became calmer and the incoming whirlpool disappeared.

But there was no time to waste right now. Malaya immediately tore a talisman and appeared in front of Iris.

"I got you!" She called out to Iris.

Malaya started to pull out Iris but she was too heavy for her. 

"You're too heavy!" Malaya shouted.

"Who are you calling heavy?!" Iris screamed back, completely displeased. "Just so you know, you are pulling two people!"

"I-I don't want to die!" Maru who was below Iris trembled as he held on tightly to Iris' wrists.

"Then you shouldn't have jumped and

dragged me into this bastard!" Iris yelled back.

"I'll help!" Another arm grabbed Iris.

"On my count let us pull her at the same time."

Malaya nodded her head to Elred. 

"One two pull!" 

With all their strength they pulled both Iris and Maru.

"One two pull!" They exerted more force until Iris was able to hold onto the railings. Then she pulled Maru with her. 

"That was a close call," Malaya wiped off the sweat that formed her forehead.

But it seemed it was not over. The next thing happened...

"Ah!" Maru slumped on the ground touching his left cheek. Iris just gave him a hard punch.

"If you want to die, don't drag someone with you!" 

Maru looked down as if cold water had just dampened into him, waking him up from his delusions.

Seeing his state, Iris just clicked her tongue. "Pathetic," she said as she walked away.

Maru looked down at his words. Malaya glanced and noticed that the huge red stone ring on Maru's finger had become a dull white stone.

"Milady," Dorris called out. "The Bituins, it changed."

Everyone noticed that the Bituins were no longer the dull old wooden ship. But instead, it was now made out of metal and completely looked modernized like the ships Malaya had been boarding back on Earth.

"This is the real appearance of the Bituins."

Dorris and the others were in complete awe. "I don't know that you could build a ship using metal." Elred also said bewildered.

"Milady." They all turned to Rein who have lavender lifa oozing out of him.

"It seemed we were trapped from an illusion before. When I found out about this, I had no choice but to set out another illusion so that we will not be harmed."

Malaya narrowed her gaze. "That was an illusion." She then turned to Maru.

"It must be the ring that caused that then." But as Malaya turned everything around them was in the color of lavender mist.

"I apologized, Milady, but my illusion magic could only last for two hours more." Rein said. "Once it disappears, we will be back in front of that whirlwind again." 

"That's plenty of time for us to get ready already, Rein," Malaya said. "Let's know first the real situation we got into from the person who seems to already experience this."

Everyone looked at Maru and the latter couldn't help but gulp in their intense stare.