The familiar feeling of my small apartment, the smell of ramyun—my midnight snack, the sight of my rainbow curtain, the ticking sound of my Doraemon clock.

All of those don't enter my senses, instead, my vision fills with the darkness of the cave.

Huh? Why am I still here?

My heartbeat quickens up its pace as I start to panic. Calm down Star, perhaps my thought was jumble so the magic didn’t work.

I look up to see the blood red moon and gaze toward the pirates, all of them are staring at the moon as if they’re being hypnotized. I have no idea how the curse will be broken. Well, I’ll find out through the book once I get out of here.

Then I make a wish again.

Calming my nerves, closing my eyes, wishing to go to my real world and then opening my eyes.

Heck! I’m still in the cave.

Panic rises from head to toe. Something must have gone wrong. Because I didn’t perform the blood ritual so it wouldn’t work?

I shift toward Aurora, seeing her hanging her head down and hugging herself.

“You sure I don’t have to drop my blood in the water?” I whisper to her, afraid to interrupt the others.

She nods without lifting her head. I scratch my head and shrug at her eccentric action.

Okay, let's try again.

Then I clamp my hands together, shutting my eyes, and start mumbling my real name and full address. Perhaps this realm doesn't know where I live.

AAAARRRGGGGHHHHHHH!!!!

Suddenly, a blood curdling scream pierced through the silence.

My skin crawled at the sound. I abruptly whip my head toward the commotion. The scream caused ruckus among the pirates as they erupt in fright buzz and form a circle around the person that continues screaming. Each cry became like a screech that sounded less and less human.

“What’s going on?!” Hongjoong shouts to the crowd. He signals Seonghwa to investigate the area. The quartermaster hasn’t taken a step too far when he let out a painful growl. He clutches his ears and stumbles to the ground. His collapse alarmed the crew as they instantly backed away from him, only few brave souls checked upon the quartermaster.

“Surgeon!” Hongjoong took large steps toward Seonghwa while shouting for Yeosang. The surgeon who stands beside me immediately darts toward Seonghwa who lies on the floor with a heavy panting as he tries to swallow his pain, his hands digging into his skull around his ears that began to bleed.

“It’s the curse!” Someone yells in the crowd and creates a wave of terror cries among them.

“Shut up!!” Hongjoong growls, appearing at his extreme outrage. He stands tall and firm, and glares at his cowardice crew. “The curse must be broken here and now! If you have to sprout nonsense, then try and be my guest!”

“It could be the side effect of lifting the curse.” Someone gives an opinion so the crew are able to calm down a little.

The cave quiet down for a split second then it’s terrorized by a series of screams. It’s not just one person, but more than ten crews- no, more than that, no one can count this time. The agonizing howls quickly drown the cave.

Cold seep to my bone. My frozen body is shaking, my breath becomes shallow, my brain is blank. I watch the crew around me thrashing on the ground with my own eyes. Then I see it, a man that stood close to me, a sharp object protruding out of his head.

My feet step behind by its own will, hands fly to my mouth as I feel bile rise to my throat. What the hell is happening? Are they turning into...

A grunt sound interrupts my thoughts, I snap my head toward where Ateez stand. All of them have painful expressions written across their face, they clutch on their body parts that start to change...into a monster.

I let out a sob, shaking my head furiously. This can’t be real. Wonderland is supposed to lift their curse unless...

I turn toward Aurora. She’s already on the ground, messily brawling her eyes out. I crouch down and shake her like a soda bottle.

“Aurora! What is happening to them?! What went wrong!?” I didn’t mean to sound so harsh, however the fright slowly turned into confusion, and it’ll turn to anger soon.

“Answer me!!” I scream when she keeps crying and covering her face with her hands.

“I-I’m sorry. I c-can’t- or she will, she-” She stutters weakly. Her fragile look doesn’t bring out my pity at this moment, my priority is Ateez. They can’t turn into sea monsters. I must stop it.

“Who the is she!?”

After my question, a feminine laugh echoed throughout the cave. Her chilling high pitch voice froze my body. Also the screams from the pirates stop in unison, but are left with groans and panting sounds. The stagnant pool reacts with bubbles floating on the surface. Then something or someone emerges from the water.

I completely forget how to breathe. My courage dies down and fear begins to capture my heart. My eyes glue to the shadow although its green eyes terrified me to the core. The pair of glowing green eyes cause my throat to burn like I was drowned.

Then it hit me. It’s the same shadow that I saw in the water!

Blood red moonlight shines on her, revealing her true figure. Her height is almost 2 meters, her slicked back white long hair reaches her waist, her entire face and upper body covered in dark green scales like a snake, stretches from ear to ear showing row of pointy teeth, and her long black split tongue her nails that are sharp yellow claws. Her lower body is in the form of squid tentacles.

“Sea witch!” The crew are crying in horror when they regain consciousness.

“Love my present, pirate king.” The sea witch's voice is alluring like a siren. She stays in the water, her eyes fixate on Hongjoong who fearlessly strides toward her. Seonghwa and Wooyoung stay closely behind him although they limp a little.

“I expect more from you, sea witch. It’s not the 3rd full moon cycle yet you turned us into sea monsters. How deceitful.” Hongjoong sneers through his sly grin with glowing eyes.

A smirk loss from the sea witch’s face then she lets out a hysterical laugh, “You arrogant human. You thought you’re so smart to break my curse. Wonderland wouldn’t appear for you, filthy human. I couldn't wait to teach you the lesson so I accelerated the process. With a help from my little friend, you fell right into my trap. Your blood that mixes into this pool binds your soul with me. You’ll be forever my slave monster.”

As if on cue, the pirates glares our way where Aurora and I sit on the ground. The accusation from the witch appears like we lure them into the witch trap. I want to protest to clear my name but my voice refuses to come out.

“Come my dear. You accomplished a wonderful job. I’ll grant you your wish.” The sea witch raises her hand toward us, beckoning to come at her side. Aurora and I stay still like our body are casted by a spell.

“Come!” She growled when none of us went to her.

Then the girl next to me moved, leaving me dumbfounded on the cold ground. She wobbles toward the witch who also float toward her by tentacles in the water.

“Did you get the things that I ordered you?”

Aurora meekly nods and then pulls out a bag inside her coat. The witch’s tentacle snatched it from her hands. The witch laughs as she retrieves the things inside the bag. A folded paper came into the view.

She unfolds it and scrunches her face. “Wonderland map? It’s a blank paper.”

“O-only the contractor can see the map.” Aurora stammers.

The sea witch shrugs and drops the map into the water. Then she pulls out a necklace. “The mermaid’s tear necklace, an heirloom of your family.” She sneers and also tosses it in the water. Aurora whimpers when her beloved necklace disappears in the dark pool.

“So this is the crescent dagger.” Holding the crescent dagger in her grasp, she observes it, smirking evilly.

“Hardtacks my ! You betrayed us!” Mingi shouts furiously while clutching on his arm.

I watch Aurora petite’s body in disbelief. She stole Wonderland map and Crescent dagger to the witch, the villainess. She lied about losing her pendant. More importantly, she deceived the pirates into turning into sea monsters.

Why?

The mess up plot unable me to think straight. The heroine is supposed to rescue male protagonists, not the other way around. The happy ending became a tragedy in the blink of an eye. I’m scared of what will happen next.

“Shush, I hate loud monsters the most.” She hisses and glares at the master gunner. Then she waves her hand. Afterward the pirates start screaming and some plummet to the ground.

“There’s one thing that you failed me.” She turns to speak to Aurora. “I ordered you to kill her, but you loiter around with your pathetic kindness.”

The tentacle wraps around the crescent dagger and forces it in Aurora’s shaky grasp. “Think of your wish and kill her!” The witch points her claw at me.

Me?

Like an ice bucket thrown over me, my body turns numb. Aurora tried to kill me?

“Star!” A shout woke me up from my trace. I quickly scramble to my feet, stepping away from Aurora.

However Aurora doesn’t move, she continues crying and shaking her head. “I can’t! I can't kill my friend.” Then she threw the dagger into the water.

That causes the witch to furiously smack her with a tentacle. Aurora’s frail body hit the ground, lying unconscious. “Fool! If you learn that this friend of yours stole your place, your men. Will you still protect her?” She peers at Ateez and snarls at me who are thunderstruck by what just happened. “I can’t believe that old hag sent such a weak girl to save these damn pirates.”

Her remark baffled me. Old hag? Stealing Aurora’s place and men?

The sea witch lets out a high pitched laugh, “Oh, you’re so clueless. But it doesn’t matter. You’re destined to die today anyway.”

After her sentence, a tentacle hurled toward me. Everything went into slow motion. I hear Ateez’s raging yell, but my body is too rigid to move. Then I feel a cold metal prick my hand, I grab it and I spontaneously swing it at the tentacle that aims for my life, and close my eyes out of fear.

A sizzle sound and the witch’s screech reach my ears. I open my eyes and see that the tentacle has green liquid oozing out from a split wound that burnt like grilled meat.

“How did you get that thing?!” She growls, her face contorted in pain.

I look in my hand and see San dagger. Seems like it causes an immense pain to the witch. The way she stares warily at the dagger gives me a little bravery thus I point it toward her.

“If you don’t want to be grilled like your tentacle then break the curse and let us go!”

Upon hearing my unintimidated threats, she burst out laughing. “You’re just a weak human. How dare you threaten me!” More tentacles are flying toward me.

Oh ! I won’t be lucky this time.

Before the tentacles strike into me, a claw slash at them. A figure steps in front of me, guarding me from the witch. I stare at his back with conflicted emotions.

He saved me again.

“Aim at the witch!” The authoritative voice of the pirate king orders his crew.

Then everything went into chaos. Rain of bullets poured down on her, including bombs and daggers. The sea witch screamed furiously from pain and anger.

“Get back to the ship!” Hongjoong shouts again. He and Ateez members remain fighting with tentacles that thrash around the place. The crew immediately pile out of the cave’s hall, some have to carry up their crewmates who haven’t recovered from pain.

“No one will get out of my lair!” Her raging shouts dominate the cave.

Suddenly, monsters are crawling out from the pool and cave wall. Their beastly growls creep into our hearts. They begin seizing the crew. Once it captures a man, it’ll melt into the ground or the wall, or into the water.

“San, take Star back to the ship!” Hongjoong shouts, a pistol in his hand fired at a crab monster that is trying to grip him with its pincers.

San instantly stops slashing the monsters and whirl around to grab my wrist, and pulls me along with him. On our way out, many monsters keep pouring out. Even though San swiftly cut them in half with his new claw, I try my best to defend myself. I wave San dagger in front of me, surprisingly, the monsters are scared of it.

When we exit the cave, the glowing trees outside have turned into monsters, their vine tie onto the crews’ body.

Mingi fires at the monster trees to free his crewmates while cursing loudly. Ateez members are fighting behind while letting their crew reach the ship safely. So San and I quickly reach the beach. He lifts me up to sit on a thwart on a rowboat.

“Go!” He yells for his crew to start oaring while pushing the boat to the sea.

“San!” I call him and throw San dagger to him, he catches it with left hand, the normal human one. He smirks and turns around to join the fight with his crewmates.

As the rowboats are limited, some of the crew have to swim to the ship. I watch the scene with despair. Ateez and other men fight on the island. Some unfortunate crew get dragged into the dark forest behind.

Then I notice it. The monsters are trying to get into the sea to catch a prey but they hiss when their skin contacts with the water.

“Get into the water! They can’t get into the sea!” I shout on top of my lungs, hopefully, they can hear me through the fight.

And they did as they all leap into the water. I let out a relief exhale once I see that Ateez are swimming vigorously toward the Revenge.

Not long after that we safely boarded the ship without monsters trailing after us. Sea witch and her monster are gawking at us from the island.

“Blow that wench island!” Seonghwa glowers with rage, looking disheveled. I notice black fins emerging from his ears.

The crew then shout in agreement. 
 

“No, our crew are held captive on the island. We must leave for now and rescue them later. We won’t win in this condition.” Hongjoong stops the idea. And he’s right, their low morale will only escalate their doom faster.

“Weigh the anchor!” Hongjoong ordered the boatswain.

“Aye cap’n.” Jongho responded from somewhere among the crowd. After a short moment the ship started sailing. 
 

I stay at the rail, staring at the island that is getting smaller and smaller. The encounter with the witch was unforeseen. I thought the pirates would eventually break the curse, turning out the outcome was a total opposite. I avert my gaze to observe the crew, some parts of their body turn into the monster.

“Now, miss Star, I hope you can answer all of my questions.” Hongjoong diverts his glowing yellow slit eyes at me.

Oh how I want to drop the F word.

----

The witch stands on the beach of her lair and her little monsters, watching the Revenge sail away.

wide apart. “Old hag, your power can’t protect them forever.” She stares at the wooden figurehead of the ship, overwhelmed with hate that her monsters recoil in fear.

“The more you use your power, the weaker you’ll become. You used power to return back time and brought that girl to win against me. It's pointless. No matter what, I will be the victor this time.”

---

I feel like a prisoner once again as I was ordered to sit at the end of the table and being interrogated by Ateez.

“Where to start?” Hongjoong yellow slit gaze fix on me. Even with his previous hazel eyes can scare me deeply, these monstrous eyes are giving me nightmares.

The air of the bridge became too thick for me to breathe. The chilly temperature doesn’t prevent me from breaking into sweat. The dim light from the chandelier complements the new look of monster Ateez.

Then a hand rests on my shoulder. I look up and see Yeosang, although he looks the most human compared to his crew, his nose turned blue and there're gills on his neck.

Oh hell! My angel is turning into a fish.

“Can’t you see that she’s still terrified? Why do you need to pressure her? She’s as clueless as us. She’s also the victim of the sea witch.” Yeosang scowls at his crew, especially at Hongjoong.

“We are not thinking that she sided with the witch. But she seems to know more than she told us. And we’d like to know everything, right now. ” Seonghwa calmly speaks with a stoic expression. However, the black fins on his ears prevent me from taking him seriously. As if he could read my mind, he narrows his eyes at me.

“Calm down, Yeosang. We could see that Star tried to help us. We only want to know something that the witch said which perhaps she can clarify it to us.” Wooyoung surprised us with his wise speech. Then he ruins the image by winking at me.

Wooyoung’s upper body may remain as human, however, his legs turn into grey scales and feet into claws which he can’t wear shoes.

Sighing, Yeosang nods and sits next to me.

Before I make up my answer, the door abruptly opens. The navigator with a stingray tail attaching from his swings side to side as he bolts inside the room.

“Not good, captain. I can’t spot a single star.” He sits on Hongjoong’s left side.

Hongjoong pinch his nose, furrowing his brows. “Seems like we’re still in the witch territory.”

A series of curses then leave their mouths.

“Because that pretty face betrayed us.” Mingi clenches his fists. His left arm turned into dark glossy gray-brown color.

At the mention of Aurora, my heart deflated. I don’t quite understand what happened to her and why she was on the sea witch side. The whole situation is messing up with my brain.

“Ah ! My arm looks like an eel.” Spark lit up from Mingi’s arm when he banged it against the table.

“Woah! What the hell!” The room erupts when we witness Mingi’s strange arm.

“Electric eel?” I mutter under my breath as I recognize the spark as an electricity. “Wow you can zap people with that arm.” Mingi heard me and reached his hand to the person next to him, the poor Jongho.

“Yahhhh!!” The younger boy screams when Mingi’s finger touches his shoulder, his ear-splitting sound almost destroying our eardrum. He bares his teeth that became pointy like a fish.

“Were you trying to kill us with your voice?” Seonghwa growls, glaring at Jongho.

“Sorry.” Jongho lower his voice. “But he poked me with that deadly eel arm.”

“Eel arm? You have a gut to call this eel arm?” Mingi repeats with a scoff. However, his reaction caused Wooyoung and Yunho to burst out laughing.

“Stop laughing would ya? ” Mingi grumbles and glares dagger at Yunho. “Someone literally became the real puppy with that tail.”

“Ha! This is a stingray tail. You should know that it can kill people. You wanna try?” Yunho sneers, defending his tail.

“Pff,” Wooyoung has the time of his life, laughing until his face turns red. “You lot are so childish. None of you can compare to my awesome legs. They can run 10 times faster than your human legs” Wooyoung lifts up one of his legs on the table.

I can’t help but smile as I thought I’d never be able to hear them bickering again. We were escaping death a moment ago, and now we’re laughing like the old days.

“Annoying.” From the window sill, San stares outside the window with absolute zero interest in the commotion inside the room. He clenches and unclenches his right hand that have sharp yellow claws attach to them, black gleaming scales cover the entire right arm.

Hongjoong hit the table with his fist to silence his crew. “Is this a time to joke around? You lot wanna stay in monster form that much? Do you want me to sail back to the witch’s lair?”

Of course, his crew immediately quiet down and shake their heads in guilt.

Hongjoong ignores his crew then stares at me, signaling me to start explaining to them.

A smile loss from my face, I take a deep breath. I guess it’s time to confess everything.

“First of all, I’m not the seeress...”

☆*:･☆*:･☆*:･☆*:･☆*:･☆*:･☆*:･

OMG will Star survive after she confessed?