Deep Sea Embers

As the night faded, the pale scars that occupied the entire sky gradually dissipated. Duncan stood on the stern deck and stared up at the sky, not missing any detail of this moment of day and night.

He saw that the scar became transparent and illusory little by little, like a gradually awakening dream. The gray-white light mist escaping around it first merged with the sky, and then the body of the scar - and in this whole process , the position of the "scar" has never changed.

Duncan blinked, and further speculation emerged in his mind: The trace in the sky has not changed its position. Does it mean that it is not some distant astronomical structure? Does it mean that it is just some kind of phantom "imprinted" in the background of the atmosphere and moving synchronously with the boundless sea?

Or is it because the planet where the Endless Sea is located (if this is really a planet) and the scar just keep running in sync? Or maybe the scar is actually moving, but the observation time is too short to detect it with the naked eye?

Various conjectures are swirling in his mind, but Duncan knows very well that until there is sufficient evidence and reliable experimental verification, these conjectures are just conjectures. There are thousands of possible explanations behind a natural phenomenon, but there is a lack of theoretical and evidence support. It's all talk.

The "sun" has risen.

First, there was a golden radiance emerging from the sky and the sea, and then a huge luminous structure suddenly emerged from the sea. With the brilliant glow, a light sphere locked by a double rune structure appeared in Duncan's field of vision. .

Under the slow movement of the rune structure, the sun rose solemnly. This majestic process seemed to have some kind of sound - some kind of low, powerful, slow roar echoed in Duncan's mind, but when he really When I listened intently, the voice suddenly disappeared.

He frowned, wondering if he had just heard a hallucination, but the memory brought by the voice was so vivid that he couldn't deny it at all.

Is that... the sun's announcement to the world as it rises? Or is it just one of the many illusions brought about by the boundless sea?

No one can answer Duncan's doubts. The vast and boundless sea keeps all the secrets as always.

The pigeon Ay squatted comfortably on Duncan's shoulder as usual. Then it stood up suddenly, flapped its wings vigorously, and shouted loudly while looking at the sea: "More fries! More fries!" "

Duncan couldn't help laughing. He glanced at this weird pigeon and suddenly felt that it would be good to have such a bird thing - the strange words this pigeon made from time to time always gave him some "hometown intimacy" .

"It's a pity that there are no French fries on the ship." He flicked the pigeon's beak and turned towards the direction of the captain's cabin. "But you were right about one thing, we need to get some food."

After a while, the captain of the Lost Home prepared a traditional ghost ship breakfast for himself. In the captain's cabin, Duncan directly used the navigation table as a dining table and placed a few plates on the empty table next to the chart. Today's breakfast Just like yesterday's dinner, yesterday's lunch and every meal in the past, it was jerky, cheese and plain water.

Duncan sat at the nautical table and carefully and ritually laid out a napkin. The goat's head stood quietly opposite him. To his left was Alice, the cursed doll who came to say hello early in the morning. The strange pigeon squatted on the table to his right.

Duncan suddenly felt that this scene began to fit his character as the "Ghost Captain" - the wooden goat sculpture representing the devil, the cursed doll that cannot be discarded, the talking bird that knows the knowledge of other worlds, and the person sitting in the main seat Captain Ghost, this photo can be used as the cover of a movie without any editing...

But only the person involved knows the current situation of the food on board the Lost Home.

Duncan sighed and looked down at the things on the dinner plate - the movie poster-like opening scene was over, and what followed was the real life on the Lost Home.

He picked up the knife and cut the cheese hard. There was a squeaking sound when the hard object was rubbed. He poked the dried meat next to him with his fork. The dried meat collided with the plate, making a crisp clanking sound.

Alice looked at this scene curiously, and finally couldn't help but ask: "Captain, is today's meal the same as yesterday's?"

"It will be the same tomorrow," Duncan raised his head and glanced at the cursed doll, "Do you want to try it?"

Alice thought for a while, then picked up a piece of dried meat with her hands, put it into her mouth and chewed it hard twice, then spat it out: "It's not delicious at all!"

"It's so delicious that you can't eat it - do you have a stomach?" Duncan reached out and took away the remaining half of the dried meat in Alice's hand, "I asked you to try it, but you really tried it."

As he spoke, he glanced at the food on the plate with some worry.

These are the only foods that can be found on the ship. The jerky tastes like thick cardboard with salt, and the cheese is like loose firewood mixed with sand. No matter how it is processed, it has a strange smell. He has also tried boiling the jerky in water or I tried baking and frying, but I couldn't make the texture and taste of these things any better despite all my efforts.

The good news is that these foods are at least not rotten and will not poison people to death. The bad news is that the power of the passage of time has still turned these non-corrupt substances into some extremely undesirable state - Duncan has every reason to believe that This cheese is several rounds older than me, and those dried meats, if they are still alive, have witnessed the ups and downs of at least a century.

The captain of the Homeless Ship may not have to worry about scurvy, but Duncan still yearns for a healthy diet - at least, he hopes that the food on his plate will be a little younger than himself.

Even if they are the same age.

The "Lost Home Material Supply Plan" and "Land Exploration Plan" that I had planned in my mind yesterday came to mind again.

But this is not something that can be achieved in a short period of time.

Duncan sighed and continued to cut the "firewood" on the plate with a vengeful attitude. Ay, who had been looking at the table with his head tilted for a long time, came over curiously. The bird glanced at its owner first. , looked at the things on the plate again: "Insufficient crystal ore reserves?"

Duncan glanced at the pigeon, pinched some fallen cheese crumbs and threw them to it. Ay lowered his head and pecked it twice, and immediately froze and stood still...

The bird froze like this for three or four seconds before suddenly becoming active. It flapped its wings and flew to the shelf next to it, making an exasperated voice: "I will starve to death today. I will die outside. From now on Even if I jump here, I won’t be able to eat..."

Duncan felt a little hurt, and the goat head who had been quiet for a long time on the other side of the table finally couldn't help but start to make a creaking sound on the wood.

Before the guy could start his own fire, Duncan finally nodded: "If you have anything to say, just say it."

"Yes, Captain," the goat head finally got a chance to speak, and he immediately started to chatter, "I have been wanting to ask you since yesterday. Is this person you brought... called 'Ai'? Why do I always keep talking to him?" Don’t you understand? I thought about it all night yesterday, what does charging Q coins mean?”

Duncan immediately raised his eyebrows - he really didn't expect that this goat-headed man could hold it in until now and asked. He actually underestimated this guy's self-control!

"Don't worry, this bird's thinking is very weird." Duncan did not stop the carpentry work in his hands, but casually said the excuse he had thought of while making the sound of chiseling, axe, and sawing with the knife and fork in his hand, " It seems to communicate with people in a language that only it can understand, and you can roughly guess what it means after listening to it a lot.”

"Is that so?" The goat head pondered to himself, "But I always feel that there is some kind of logic hidden in its words... As if there is a complete and self-consistent set of knowledge hidden behind the language... You Did you discover Ai while walking in the spiritual world? Could it be some kind of projection from the deepest depths? You know, the deeper you go, the more information from dislocated time and space will emerge in the form of projections? There are some lost eras and even some fragments of the future that we have never understood. Maybe Ai is talking about another time and space? "

The cutting work in Duncan's hands paused for a moment at a level that was imperceptible to the naked eye, and then everything went as usual. At the same time, he said in a calm tone: "Then I hope you can summarize the logic behind Ai's language as soon as possible."

The goat head's words may have been random guesses, but the information revealed in them inevitably caused waves in Duncan's heart!

In the process of walking in the spiritual world, his soul approached the "deeper" world? The deeper you go, the more you will see projections from misplaced time and space? Might those projections even show scenes from different timelines?

Duncan didn't see any "landscapes in different timelines" when he was walking in the spirit world, but the goat head was right in saying one thing - Ai is indeed from another time and space.

So... was this pigeon brought to this world by an earthling named "Zhou Ming", or did it really come from a deeper level in this world as the goat head said?