Deep Sea Embers

Duncan and Alice stood at the end of the stairs leading to the cabin. What they saw was a strange and horrifying scene - the entire bottom of the Lost Home was in a state of fragmentation, and outside the broken cabin, it was clearly A certain void filled with endless dim light.

Is this the real "bilge structure" of the Lost Home? So what is outside this shattered cabin?

Could such a scene exist under the sea level of the Infinite Sea?

Duncan cautiously took two steps forward and arrived at the shattered cabin. He stepped on the largest fragment of wood and looked back in the direction he came from.

The "last door" still stood quietly in place, fixed on a floating wooden board. Behind the door was a dark staircase, sloping upward - however, there was nothing visible around the door that should be there. The walls were just empty.

This door is floating alone in this space.

Duncan carefully walked around behind the door and found that there was nothing behind it. Through the open door, he could directly see the broken cabin on the opposite side.

"Captain..." Alice's nervous voice came over. The puppet looked around with fear, and finally its eyes fell on Duncan, "This... this is normal, right?"

Duncan was actually more confident than this puppet. After all, the latter could still blindly trust the captain. Where could he, the "captain", find confidence at this time? However, looking at Alice's nervous look and thinking of the "crew rules" that Goat Head once said, Duncan still managed to control his uneasiness and maintain his usual serious and calm appearance.

"Don't worry," he said calmly, "The Lost Home is a ship you can't even imagine."

"Indeed, it is indeed unimaginable..." Alice said in amazement. Duncan's calm performance obviously made her feel a little more at ease. She began to curiously look at the broken hulls and the chaotic light and shadow outside the hull, "Captain, outside ...It doesn’t look like there is water?”

Duncan thought for a while and suddenly looked at Alice curiously: "Do you think the outside is below the surface of the Infinite Sea?"

Alice was stunned: "Ah? Why do you ask me?"

Duncan said calmly: "Because you have experience."

"That's not because I was thrown away by you..." Alice said subconsciously, but she quickly swallowed it back mid-sentence and began to answer honestly, "I don't think so... the sea must be full of water, even if the boundless sea is Something's wrong, there must be water under the sea level, but it looks like...just like..."

"A void filled with chaotic light streams," Duncan shook his head and walked forward slowly. He came to the edge of the fragmented planks under his feet and looked down at the flowing light and shadow outside the cabin, "The bottom of the Homeless Ship... Not in the boundless sea.”

Alice was stunned: "Huh? Then where is this?"

Duncan didn't speak, appearing inscrutable - actually because he didn't know either.

But he still had a vague guess: Perhaps the ship was actually sailing in several different dimensions at the same time? ! On the surface, the Lost Home is sailing on the boundless sea of ​​the real world, but in fact, different parts of the ship belong to different dimensions! ?

This also explains why the deeper you go into the Lost Home, the more weird and eerie the surrounding cabins become. Perhaps what is weird and eerie is not the cabin itself at all...

So what is the dark and chaotic space outside the cabin if it is not the boundless sea? It doesn't look like the spirit world, nor does it look like the dark space seen when traveling through the spirit world... Could it be a "deeper" place? Deep? Subspace?

With countless guesses and assumptions in his mind, Duncan slowly reached out and pulled out the pirate sword from his waist. Then, holding a lantern in one hand and a long sword in the other, he slowly explored the edge of the fragment at his feet - he was at this moment He was very cautious, even though the gap between the fragments seemed to be jumpable in one step, he did not step forward rashly, but tried to test it with his long sword first.

Who knows if something will pop up from these cracks and swallow up anyone who steps across them.

The next second, he opened his eyes slightly in surprise.

He saw that the tip of the long sword disappeared, but at the edge of the fragments opposite the crack, a sword tip suddenly emerged.

Duncan frowned and tested in different directions. A similar phenomenon happened again.

He finally came to his senses.

These seemingly cracked areas are actually spatially continuous! The seemingly fragmented bilge structure is actually still intact!

He straightened up, looked around at the cracks around him and the light and shadow flowing outside the cracks, and realized in his heart: these "broken" scenes were just an optical effect, but did not affect the continuity of space. The hull of the Lost Home There was no breakage here, but for some reason the "picture" from the outside of the hull appeared inside the hull.

But what causes this? Is it a spatial overlap? Or is it a wrong projection of high dimensions to low dimensions?

Duncan subconsciously mobilized all the reliable or unreliable knowledge in his mind to try to explain the strange phenomena here. Alice on the side watched with confusion as the captain did some strange actions on the edge of the crack, and for a while he used a lantern everywhere. After a while, he stabbed everywhere with his long sword. After watching for a long time, he finally couldn't help but say: "Captain...are you using a special comfort ritual to...pacify the cabin?"

Duncan turned his back to Alice and silently put away his sword and said bravely: "...Yes."

"Oh! That's amazing!" Alice's eyes suddenly lit up, "Then do you want to perform a soothing ceremony for all the fragments here?"

"...That's enough," Duncan continued to say with a straight face, and then quickly diverted the curious doll's attention before she continued to speak, "Let's move forward."

As he spoke, he took a cautious step forward with a lantern in hand - when he took this step, he almost tensed up the muscles and nerves in his body, always prepared for any unexpected situation that would happen when crossing the crack, but what happened? None of it happened.

Just like the previous test with the long sword, he "skipped" the process of crossing the crack, just like walking around in a normal cabin, and walked directly to the fragments on the opposite side.

Alice watched in amazement as the captain walked ahead, walking freely as if he ignored the cracks under his feet, and followed suit, but she still became nervous when crossing the cracks, and finally couldn't help but speed up and jump forward. …

Then of course he bumped into Duncan in front.

Duncan felt a sudden sound of wind behind him, and then something hit his back firmly. Suddenly, he subconsciously turned around and raised his hand -

The next second, he looked expressionlessly at the headless doll that was fussing around behind him, while Alice's head was rolling around more than ten meters away while stuttering: "Yes...yes...right..."

"Just wait here and I'll pick it up for you," Duncan sighed, reflecting in his mind on why he brought this useless doll down, while quickly catching up with Alice's head that was already drifting away. , picked it up with ease, "Do you want to consider putting a screw in your neck..."

Alice's head didn't seem to hear the second half of Duncan's complaint. She just suddenly opened her eyes wide and looked in a certain direction: "Then... there... there is... a fan over there..."

Duncan frowned and turned to look in the direction where Alice's head was desperately trying to indicate with her eyes.

A dark wooden door stood quietly on the debris at the end.

A door... there is actually another door, and indeed there is another door!

When Duncan saw the prompt on the door at the end of the stairs, he was wondering if this classic situation would happen. However, when he saw that there was indeed an extra door in the "bilge space", he still couldn't bear it. Live a hop!

At this time, Alice's body also stumbled over. Duncan returned the doll's head to her while looking at the door: "Is there such a door over there just now?"

Alice put her head back on her neck with a pop, and while moving her cervical vertebrae, she glanced over there: "It doesn't seem like it's there. It only appeared after we walked over."

Duncan hummed noncommittally and walked cautiously toward the door with a lantern in hand.

In fact, in this strange cabin, he no longer needs the lighting of the lantern. Although the chaotic light seeping in from the cracks is dim, it is enough to maintain the basic brightness of the entire space, but he still keeps it in his hand. lantern - this is necessary caution.

Although Goathead had not reminded him of this, Duncan had decided not to extinguish the light as long as he was in the cabin below the waterline.

The new door that appeared looked ordinary. The black door panel was not much different from the "last door" at the end of the stairs. It was also similar in style and material to the doors used in most cabins on the Lost Home.

Duncan raised his head, and above the door frame, he saw a line of letters that seemed to be cast with copper liquid:

"This door leads to the Lost Home."