Chapter 28 “The Pale Night”
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Life, as it existed back then, was far removed from the whimsical tales of fairy stories. The clear distinction between reality and fiction was evident in the realistic need to manage many mundane yet very real details that fairy tales typically ignored.
Consider the following: Did a living cursed puppet need regular maintenance for her joints? What if Alice’s routine disassembly of her joints caused her to unexpectedly fall apart during a stroll? And what about the longevity of the salted meat and dry cheese stored on the phantom ship?
Even superheroes, who thrilled audiences by day and fought evil forces by night, when did they find time to rest? Did the defeated evil entity, after a battle with these superheroes, need to undertake the mundane task of grocery shopping?
Folk tales and legends rarely addressed these trivial details. In such stories, characters remained as pristine as freshly fallen snow and as fleeting as a passing breeze. The cursed puppet in the tale only needed to emerge from a shadowy corner to startle people, and the spectral ship’s captain never worried about managing century-old salted meat and stale cheese.
In sharp contrast, reality presented a completely different scenario. After being submerged in salt water, the cursed puppet started feeling an incessant itch all over, even contemplating how to wash off the tiny grains of salt stuck between her joints.
On the deck of the ship, Duncan sighed deeply, realizing with a growing sense of clarity that mere determination was insufficient for long-term survival on this ship.
He was confronted with numerous practical issues, especially with the increase in the ship’s crew.
He realized that the ghost ship was not equipped with sufficient resources for living.
Indeed, the ship had an endless supply of fresh water. However, apart from that, the food stores would not magically replenish once depleted. The only available food items were salted meat and hard cheese. And while the ship’s unique properties prevented them from spoiling, Duncan couldn’t help but wonder if they had been stored for at least a hundred years.
Moreover, the ship lacked clothes that would fit Alice (although the cursed puppet never expressed a need for them), nor did it have any forms of recreation—not even a chess set or a deck of playing cards were available.
Lost amidst the boundless expanse of the unending sea, the ship aptly named “Vanished” struggled to acquire any real supplies. It lacked a reliable “home port” for rest and repairs and had no communication channels with the sophisticated city-states on land.
The goat-headed figure seemed entirely unperturbed by this predicament, but it was now something Duncan was beginning to seriously consider. He needed to devise a plan to address the current shortage of supplies aboard the Vanished.
Furthermore, Duncan began to contemplate the possibility of establishing connections with the “city-states” on land.
Duncan found that perpetually drifting on the open sea was an extraordinarily inefficient method of exploration. After venturing into the spirit realm, he realized that to thoroughly understand this world, he needed to gather information from the land.
For his own mental and physical well-being, he recognized the necessity of interacting more with the city-states on land and engaging with their structured societies. Otherwise, he feared he might eventually become a twisted, melancholic, and antisocial captain of a ghost ship after a long period of aimless drifting.
With these thoughts in mind, Duncan slightly turned his head to glance at the dove named Ai, who was busily grooming its feathers while perched comfortably on his shoulder.
His attention was mainly on the brass compass hanging around Ai’s chest. The dove cocked its head, scrutinizing Duncan before suddenly saying, “Establish a base! Spread out the mushroom carpet! Do you have any clue how to operate anything?”
Duncan was momentarily caught off guard, his eyebrows knitting together in contemplation. Although the dove generally seemed scatterbrained, it occasionally made surprisingly apt comments. These remarks made Duncan suspect there was a deeper wisdom behind the bird’s apparent foolishness.
This Translation is hosted on bcatranslation.com
Navigating through the spirit realm now appeared to be the only feasible way to reach the terrestrial city-states. Despite the unpredictable nature of this realm and the enigmatic presence of the dove during his previous journey, Duncan knew he would soon need to embark on another spiritual walk. He needed to gather information about the land and quickly verify and refine a potential new skill.
Equally intriguing was Ai’s odd ability to retrieve a ritual dagger from a distant land. If the dove could bring back a dagger, what else could it return with? What were the rules and limits governing this bird’s carrying capacity? Could this process be controlled?
After a moment of deep thought, Duncan decided to ask the dove directly, “Do you understand how you managed to bring that dagger back?”
The dove pondered this before replying solemnly, “Insufficient crystal ore.”
Duncan decided to temporarily end his conversation with the dove, resolving to try to understand the bird personally during his upcoming spiritual journey.
Meanwhile, inside the cabin, Alice had finally figured out how to operate the water pipes after considerable trial and error, and she learned the basics of bathing.
Given the constraints on the ghost ship, she could only manage a cold bath—hardly an issue for a doll like her.
However, before Alice could immerse herself in the bathtub, she decided to familiarize herself with everything in the cabin first.
She tenderly patted the large oak barrel, lightly tapped on the cabin’s supporting pillars, playfully kicked the floor with her toes, and stretched out her hand to toy with the ropes and hooks hanging from the ceiling.
“Hello, my name is Alice,” she greeted enthusiastically, addressing the cold, inanimate objects with the same vigor she had used earlier when greeting the goat head. “I’ll be residing on this ship from now on.”
No response came from within the cabin to her warm greeting, but Alice remained unfazed.
The goat head had told her that the ship, named “Vanished,” was very much alive, just like many other things onboard.
Although they did not seem to show any conscious intelligence like the goat head, nor did they have the ability to communicate, Alice was not deterred. She treated the entirety of the Vanished as a fellow inhabitant, worthy of a courteous greeting.
The Vanished was a sentient entity, just as she was.
Feeling assured that her greeting was both polite and appropriate, Alice’s spirits lifted. She then slipped out of her splendid dress and awkwardly climbed into the oak tub filled with water.
The first item on her bathing agenda was to carefully remove her head for a thorough cleaning, considering the joints at her neck were not particularly sturdy.
Miss Puppet deemed her bathing strategy to be quite logical.
…
Meanwhile, as the bustling day in the city-state of Pland drew to a close, the prosperous “Pearl of the Sea” began to yield to the quiet slumber of the night under the faint glow of a starlit sky.
In the serene darkness, sentinels always stood guard over the resting city.
Perched atop the highest structure in Pland, a woman of remarkable stature stood gazing out from the majestic Clock Tower, her long silver-grey hair fluttering in the night breeze. She was tall and robust, towering over the average man. Her striking features were marked by a noticeable scar across her left eye—a sight that could evoke both admiration and fear.
She wore silver-grey light armor and a battle skirt, her well-sculpted muscles a testament to her rigorous training. Near her, a gigantic sword with a subtle silver glow was within reach. The hilt was adorned with wave-like symbols, and the blade seemed to shimmer with ripples of light, reminiscent of those on a tranquil lake.
Behind her, the rhythmic hum of machinery filled the otherwise silent space—the mechanized heart of the tower, a marvel of steam-powered technology. Gears and mechanical connections, intricately detailed and meticulously assembled, extended from the floor to the ceiling, continuously driving the four clock faces and a hidden celestial orrery embedded deep within the structure.
Despite the consistent hum indicating the machine was in pristine condition, a sense of restlessness began to brew within the vigilant observer. Her name was Vanna, the Inquisitor of Pland. A nagging premonition of an approaching calamity, a terror she might be unable to prevent, added to her growing frustration.
The sound of footsteps echoing from the staircase captured the attention of the silver-haired inquisitor. A man dressed in the robes of a storm priest approached, carrying a brass incense burner from which smoke gently curled around him. Upon reaching the central pillar of the clockwork, he replaced the spent burner with a fresh one. He watched the smoke tendrils closely, ensuring they flowed freely among the whirling gears and mechanical linkages before he uttered a prayer to the Storm Goddess.
Turning to Vanna, he offered a quiet greeting. “Good evening, Inquisitor Vanna. You stand vigil again, I see?”
“I have been troubled by a sense of doom over the past few days, and tonight it feels even stronger.”
“A sense of foreboding? In what way?” The priest looked up at her, his eyes wide with concern. “Has the Goddess sent you any signs?”
“It’s not a clear message,” the young inquisitor shook her head, “It’s just a vague feeling… as if something is approaching our city.”
Thanks for the chapter!
First contact?
I get the author is trying to have some clever introspection with the doll joints as elements that are not normally viewed in horror stories. However this stuff is covered in certain series like SCP foundation or Lobotomy Corp but generally it doesn’t get this silly. The doll is generally possessed by a spirit and can move around to other objects and possess them. It’s simply an avatar they choose, if not the mystical element as a living being would fight against such elements that try to destroy the vessel.
It’s only an issue in the story because it was an aspect the author gave to the doll that was sailing on an ocean. Bit of a rant but It feels like author is patting themselves on the back prematurely critiquing other peoples not going into further aspects, while in the same breath talking about the self regeneration powers of the ship he has been gifted.
You might be reading a bit much into the author’s intent. I think they were just attempting to be funny with the whole joints thing, rather than making some big statement on other works of fiction.
What novels are those like SCP foundation or Lobotomy Corp
Dommy
It would be good if the MC uses the compass to see if he can control both bodies, and even if he can’t use a good body, so try until he finds a good one to create his own port with it.