Deep Sea Ember

Chapter 28 Pale Night

Real life is different from strange stories, the biggest difference is that in reality, you have to consider a lot of real and trivial details

Do moving cursed dolls need joint maintenance? Could Alice's frequent disassembly of her joints cause her to suddenly fall apart as she walks? Do the bacon and dry cheese on the ghost ship expire?

Do superheroes who socialize during the day and fight with evil forces at night sleep - do evil forces who fight with superheroes usually go to the supermarket to buy things?

The people in the story are always dressed in white like snow and come and go like the wind, and the cursed dolls in the story only need to suddenly come out of the corner to scare people, just like the ghost captain in the story has never worried about the problem of only bacon jerky and hard cheese that have expired for a century on board.

In reality, the cursed doll scratches its whole body after soaking in seawater, and when it takes a bath, it has to temporarily think about how to deal with the salt particles in the joints......

Duncan, standing outside the cabin, sighed, realizing more clearly that it seemed that it was more than determination that was needed to survive on this ship for a long time.

He also had to consider a lot of practical problems, especially after the crew increased.

There are actually not too many abundant living materials on the ghost ship, which Duncan is very clear about.

The ship had an unlimited supply of fresh water, but only unlimited fresh water, and the ingredients stored in the food warehouse would not be automatically replenished after consumption, and the only edible things there were only bacon jerky and hard cheese, although due to the special nature of the Lost Home, none of them showed signs of decay, but Duncan still reasonably suspected that they had been stored for at least a century.

On top of that, there were no change clothes on board for Alice's size (although the cursed doll didn't mention the need for this), and there was nothing to entertain—not even a chess deck or a deck of poker.

The boundless sea is boundless, but it is difficult for the Lost Hometown to get real supplies from this vast sea, and the ship does not seem to have a reliable "home port" to stay and repair, let alone a channel for communication with the civilized city-states on land.

Goathead didn't seem to care about this at all, but Duncan had seriously thought about it at the moment - he wanted to find a way to improve the current lack of supplies on the Lost Home.

Further, he was also considering how to establish contact with the "city-state" on land.

Drifting blindly like this on the sea forever is an extremely inefficient means of exploration, and information about this world must be obtained from land, which is Duncan's deepest experience after "walking in the spirit world".

Putting this aside, even for his own physical and mental health, he had to try to get more in touch with those "city-states" on land and the civilized society of this world - otherwise he was really worried that he would really become a twisted, gloomy, and withdrawn ghost captain after a long drift.

Thinking of this, Duncan turned his head slightly and looked at the pigeon Ai who was honestly squatting on his shoulder to comb his feathers.

His gaze mainly fell on the brass compass on Ai's chest.

The pigeon tilted his head to look at his "master", and suddenly said: "Open the base for points!" Spread the fungus blanket! Hey, can you operate it?

Duncan was a little silent for a while, this pigeon was nervous most of the time, but the occasional words it popped out were so just right, and even just just right, that people couldn't help but suspect that it was wise and foolish.

At present, it seems that walking in the spirit world is the only viable means of "traveling" to the land city-state.

Although there seemed to be too much uncertainty in this method, and there were mysterious accidents like "Ai" after the last use, Duncan knew that he would soon be on the next spiritual walk—not only to gather intelligence on land, but also to verify and master a very useful ability as soon as possible.

Just as important as walking in the spirit world is the "special ability" of Pigeon Ai to bring back a ritual knife from distant land.

If it can bring back a pocket knife, will it bring back something more? What are the rules and restrictions of the bird's carry? Can this process be controlled by humans?

After thinking for a while, Duncan decided to ask the pigeon directly: "Do you know how you brought that knife back?"

The pigeon thought for a moment and said in a deep tone: "You need more crystal ore.

Duncan: "......"

He decided to give up communicating with this pigeon for the time being, and it would be more reliable to try this matter himself when he performed the spiritual walk next time.

……

In the cabin, Alice finally figured out how to use the water pipe, and roughly figured out how to wash the bath.

On the ghost ship with limited conditions, she could only take a cold shower, but for a doll, this was not a problem at all.

But before jumping into the bathtub, Alice decided to greet everything in the cabin first.

She patted the huge oak barrel, knocked on the pillars supporting the cabin, kicked the floor under her toes, and stood on tiptoe to pull the ropes and hooks hanging from the roof.

"Hello, my name is Alice," she greeted the cold things cheerfully, as she greeted the goathead before, "and I will live on this ship from now on." There

was nothing in the cabin that responded to her greeting, butAlice didn't care at all.

Goathead said that the Lost Homeland is alive, and many things on this ship are alive.

Although they don't seem to have the real "spiritual intelligence" of Goathead, or even the ability to communicate, this does not prevent Alice from treating the entire Lost Country as a "neighbor" that needs to be greeted.

The

Lost Homeland is a living object, and so is she.

Convinced that her greeting was polite and appropriate, Alice's mood became even more cheerful, and then she took off her gorgeous dress and crawled a little awkwardly into the oak barrel that had been filled with water.

The first step was to remove the head and rinse it - the joints on the neck were not very strong anyway. The

doll lady thought her plan was very reasonable.

……

The late night in the city-state of Pradesh finally ended the hustle and bustle of the whole day, and under the pale light of the night sky, this prosperous "pearl of the sea" gradually fell into a peaceful sleep.

But in the quiet darkness, there are night watchmen watching the city after falling asleep.

On the tallest building in

the city-state of Prade, the "Great Clock Tower", a tall and unusually tall young lady with long gray-white hair is standing in front of the window overlooking the city.

The lady had beautiful features, but a daunting scar across her left eye, she was taller than the average man, wearing silver-gray light armor and a battle skirt, she was clearly well-trained, her limbs were full of muscles and well-proportioned lines, and within reach beside her was a giant sword that exuded a faint silver glow—the hilt of the giant sword was engraved with runes symbolizing waves, and the blade also floated like water waves.

Behind the lady, the sound of mechanical operation continued to be heard - the movement of the large bell tower was running smoothly under the drive of the steam engine, and the complex and precise gear and connecting rod structure ran through the roof and floor, driving the four-sided dial upstairs and the mimic planetarium hidden deep in the building to run continuously.

Judging from the sound, this huge and precise machine was in very good working condition, and no evil forces had invaded the sacred steam core.

But there was still a faint unease in Inquisitor Vanna, a terrible premonition that something was about to happen or had already happened, and that she was destined to be powerless against it.

Footsteps came from the direction of the stairs, and the gray-haired woman in front of the window turned around, and she saw a priest in an ocean priest's robe coming up from the staircase, the priest holding a copper incense burner in his hand, and clean smoke slowly wrapping around him.

The priest came to the movement column in the center of the room, removed the old incense burner that had been hanging on the column guardrail and replaced it with a new one, observed the smoke escaping from the incense burner, and confirmed that the smoke was floating unhindered around the moving gears and connecting rods, then whispered the name of the storm goddess, and turned to look at the gray-haired lady standing at the window.

"Good night, Your Excellency Inquisitor—you are keeping vigil again?"

"I always have a bad feeling, as has always been the case in the last few days - especially tonight."

"A bad feeling? What is it?" The priest raised his head, with worry in his deep eyes, "The goddess has sent you a sign?"

"Not such a clear message," the young female inquisitor shook her head, "I just vaguely feel...... Something is approaching the city.