Deep Sea Embers

The entire bottom of the Vanished was in a fragmented state with the space beyond the broken cabin being filled with nothingness and endless dark shimmers.

Is this the real “bilge structure” of the Vanished? So what’s outside of this broken cabin?

Would such a sight exist under the Boundless Sea?

Duncan cautiously took two steps forward on the largest plank of floating wood while at the same time making sure the exit behind himself didn’t disappear as he did so.

“Captain…” Alice’s nervous voice came over again as the doll peeked a part of her head out from the door in horror, “This… this is normal, right?”

Duncan’s heart was actually less confident than this doll; after all, the latter could still blindly trust the captain, whereas he had no one to turn to. However, in the face of Alice’s nervous appearance and the “crew rules” mentioned by the goat head before, Duncan muscled his uneasiness and maintained the usual calm appearance.

“Don’t worry,” he said lightly, “the Vanished is a ship you can’t imagine.”

“Indeed, it is unimaginable…” Alice said in amazement. Duncan’s calm performance obviously reassured her a little as she glanced around the broken and fragmented space that was once the ship’s lowest level, “Captain, this outside… doesn’t look like it has water.”

Duncan mused over her question before cocking his brow up, “You think this is the underwater parts of the Boundless Sea?”

Alice appeared stunned: “Huh? Why are you asking me that?”

Duncan looked indifferent: “Because you have experience.”

“Isn’t it because I was thrown overboard by you…?” Alice said subconsciously. But halfway through the sentence, she quickly corrected herself, “I don’t think so… The sea must be full of water. Even if the Boundless Sea is not right, there must be water under the ocean. But this looks like…”

“A nothingness filled with chaotic streams of light,” Duncan shook his head as he finished her sentence. Coming up to the edge of the floating wooden platform he’s stepping on, he glances downward at the flowing stream of lights, “The bottom of the Vanished… is not in the Boundless Sea.”

Alice got taken aback by the information: “Huh? So where is this place?”

Duncan didn’t answer her. Truth was, he didn’t know either. Nevertheless, he still had a vague guess in mind.

Maybe the ship is actually sailing in several different dimensions at the same time?! On the surface, the Vanished sails on the Boundless Sea of the real world, but in actual fact, the different parts of the ship belong to different dimensions at all times!?

This also explains why the deeper you go into the Vanished, the more eerie and gloomy the surrounding cabins become. Perhaps the weirdness and gloominess are not in fact from the cabin itself…

If that’s true, what exactly is this chaotic space if not the Boundless Sea? It doesn’t look like the spirit world, nor does it look like the dark space tunnel when I perform the Spirit Walk… Could it be that it is the “deeper” secluded subspace?

With countless speculations and assumptions in his mind, Duncan slowly reached to his side and drew the pirate sword from the waist. He’s going to test the water with the blade instead of himself because he has no clue if something nasty will snap at him like a predator trying to bait him in.

But in the next second, his eyes widened slightly in surprise at what he saw.

The tip of the sword had disappeared, and at the edge of the fragment opposite to the crack, a sword tip had appeared.

Duncan frowned and tested in a different direction again, and a similar phenomenon happened as well.

Now he finally got it.

These seemingly cracked areas are actually spatially connected, and the seemingly fragmented bilge structure is still intact!

Straightening his back with newfound confidence, he glanced around to confirm there was nothing else before heaving a long sigh.

These “cracks” are no more than an optical illusion in essence. Though the foundation is different, the final result is the same in our senses.

But what caused this though? Is the space overlapping? Or is it the warped projection of the high dimension to the lower dimension?

Duncan mobilized all the reliable and unreliable knowledge in his mind to try to explain the strange phenomenon here.

Meanwhile, Alice watched in confusion as the captain made strange movements at the edge of the floating wooden platform when she asked: “Captain… are you using a special ritual of appeasement… to pacify the cabin?”

Awkwardly freezing on the spot, the man quickly sheathes his sword before replying, “That’s right….”

“Oh that’s awesome!” Alice’s eyes lit up, “Then do you want to perform a pacification ceremony for all the fragments here?”

“…… One is enough,” Duncan continued to say his lies with a straight face, and then quickly diverted her attention before the curious doll got too nosy, “Let’s go.”

As he spoke, he made sure the lantern was operating correctly and kept it close.. After this, there’s no turning back, yet nothing happened….

Just like he had tested with his sword before, Duncan had directly “skipped” the process of crossing the crack.

Alice watched in amazement as the captain walked ahead without issue. Of course, she’s still nervous despite seeing it’s okay. In her moment of courage, she suddenly charged and jumped forward with her eyes closed. Naturally, this had the direct effect of crashing straight into Duncan who was completely unprepared for the cannonball – he literally got the wind shot out of his lung.

Pulling himself up after the tumble, he stared expressionlessly at the headless doll that was scrambling around behind himself – Alice’s head had fallen off again after the mess, which had now rolled off around ten meters from the body.

“So… Sorr… Sorry…”

“You behave and wait here for me. I’ll come pick you up afterward.” Duncan sighed, reflecting in his mind on why he had brought this crappy doll down here. “Do you want to consider putting a screw onto your neck….?”

Alice’s head didn’t seem to hear Duncan’s second little quip when she started to stammer in shock, “The-Ther-There…. There’s a d….”

Duncan frowned and turned his head to look in the direction that Alice’s head was desperately signaling with her eyes.

A dark wooden door stood silently at the end of the debris.

A door… There is actually another!

Duncan had wondered if this classical situation would happen like in the old horror movies. But when he finally came head-to-head with it, his heart still jumped in fright.

At this time, Alice’s headless body had also stumbled over. Unable to bear the nonsense, the pirate captain promptly grabbed the doll’s head and handed it over: “Was there such a door over there before?”

Alice tucked her head back on with a “click” and answered: “I don’t recall there being one. I believe it only appeared after we came over.”

Duncan snorted nonchalantly and walked cautiously toward the door with the lantern in his hand.

Actually, he didn’t need the lantern for illumination anymore in this strange cabin. The chaotic shimmering from the cracks was bright enough that he could see most of the outline, but that’s not why he kept the ghost lantern activated – it’s for his safety and protection.

The newly appeared door looked unremarkable from the surface. The dark panel wasn’t any different from the “last door” behind them, and it had a similar style and material used by most cabins on the Vanished.

“This door leads to the Vanished”. Duncan read the words atop the doorframe, which seemed to have been cast in copper.