Chapter 229

Chapter 229: The Blood-Seeking spirit compass

The Ironclad Warship lay quietly at anchor in Pland’s Harbor. Above the warship, the flag of the Sea Mist fleet unfurled in the sunlight, fluttering in the wind. Its emblem was a cluster of ice crystals as sharp as blades, with a crack running through the center. The ice crystals were the symbol of Frostholm; the crack was the mark of a self-exiled rebel.

After the famed pirate captain and his attendants left, no one else disembarked from the warship. The Sea Mist was like a silent iceberg, lying quietly at anchor. Its towering, imposing hull and prow blocked all curious gazes from the docks. At the same time, a city-state Guard Corps detachment arrived from a nearby station and sealed off the road leading to the pier to keep unrelated people from approaching.

Only after a Constable personally came to disperse them did the gawkers gathered near the docks finally begin to drift away.

First Mate Aiden stood on the Sea Mist’s bridge, quietly watching the activity on the pier.

He had not gone ashore with Tyrian. Whenever the captain left the warship, the First Mate had to stay on board to temporarily hold the captain’s authority, in case anything went wrong.

“Those city Guard Corps look awfully nervous,” a Sailor muttered beside him. “Are they afraid we will go ashore and start pillaging? I thought the Guard Corps of the Sea Jewel, Pland, would be a bit stronger than the useless lot up in Frost Sea.”

Aiden did not even turn his head. He said: “If they did not come out to keep order, you would complain that Pland’s Guard Corps did not even have the courage to go out and block the streets. If they really sent you to fight their Steam Tanks, would you go?”

“…I would not go. I do not want to be carried back onto the deck in a bucket again,” the Sailor hurriedly shook his head, then looked toward the direction where the Steam Walkers had just left. “The captain went off with them… He will be all right, yes? That tall young woman looks hard to mess with. I do not think the captain could beat her…”

“We did not come here to fight. We came here by invitation. Invitation, understand?” Aiden finally could not help giving the Sailor a sidelong look. “You – and the rest of you – can you adjust your mindset a little? Have you forgotten the captain’s usual lectures? We are now the Sea Mist Venture Company. Raiding does not last. Doing business makes money faster than robbery, does it not?”

“Then when do we go raiding?”

Aiden thought for a moment, a ray of sunlight glinting off his polished bald head. “Naturally, when the other side refuses to do business…”

Several Undying Sailors nodded one after another, acknowledging the First Mate’s wisdom. They fell quiet for only a few seconds before one Sailor, whose whole left skull had caved in, could not help glancing toward the city-state and mumbling: “Can we go ashore and have a look? Pland… I have heard that in this city…”

“Do not even think about it,” Aiden cut him off at once. “The captain ordered that no one is to leave the Sea Mist without permission. You lot of misfits would scare people to death if you went ashore. Pland is not the north. Hardly anyone here has seen a talking corpse.”

“So the captain only picked the ones who look the most alive to go ashore, right?” the Sailor with the caved-in skull said resentfully, lifting a hand to support his head. “I think I look all right, actually. If I just covered this part with half a shell and put on a hat…”

“Shut it. Without the captain’s orders, no one sets foot on land!” Aiden shot the chatterbox Sailor a fierce glare. “If you truly have nothing to do, go below and see whether those poor bastards who were plastered to the deck earlier have come back to life. If they have, tell them to report in…”

A faint clicking sound suddenly came from not far away, cutting off Aiden’s orders.

Everyone on the bridge heard the faint clicking. Several gazes turned at once toward the source of the sound, and the Sailor who had spoken first spotted where it came from.

Beside the captain’s seat stood a strange machine made of a mass of gears, connecting rods, and spirit compass needles. The machine now sat quietly, but several of its needles still trembled slightly, as if showing that a moment ago it had suddenly moved.

“Did this thing just move?” A Sailor standing closest walked carefully over to the delicate, complex machine, staring at the spirit compass needles that had already gone still.

Aiden walked over as well. His gaze fell on the hemispherical little bowl at the center of the machine. A bit of dried blood remained there, a trace left from the last time Captain Tyrian had used this device.

The bald First Mate’s brow furrowed bit by bit.

As the captain’s most trusted subordinate, Aiden knew this device very well.

Anomaly 203, the Blood-Seeking spirit compass, was a brass machine of complex structure and unknown principles. It had once been part of the Queen of Frostholm’s collection. Now it belonged to Captain Tyrian.

Among the ranked Anomalies, this machine counted as one of the more “positive” types. Blood could be poured into the small central bowl, and after absorbing the fresh blood it used a series of spirit compasses to indicate the location of the user’s blood relatives. The priority of its indications was linked to the closeness of the blood relation, the physical distance, and the user’s own intent.

Compared with most Anomalies that carried direct malice and could become lethal merely through improper storage, the Blood-Seeking spirit compass was relatively safe to keep. It did not require any special sealing conditions. But once activated, the device revealed a far more sinister side.

First, once blood had been poured into it, the user would be constantly tempted by the spirit compass, developing an urge to keep feeding it blood. Those of weak mind might even bleed themselves to death in the process. Second, though the Blood-Seeking spirit compass could indeed help the user find their blood kin, it often “smuggled in misfortune” during that process, guiding events toward worse and worse outcomes as the user and their relatives drew closer.

In the cases Aiden knew alone, Anomaly 203 had once guided a father to the son he had lost for many years, only for the two of them to somehow kill each other by mistake the moment they met.

Yet these negative effects had never mattered much to Captain Tyrian. His will was strong enough to resist the Blood-Seeking spirit compass’s “call to offer blood”. As for the misfortune that came when blood kin drew near…

To begin with, the captain and Miss Lucretia would never meet while Anomaly 203 was active. Second, the Abnomar father and son had always been “a loving father and a filial son”.

Even the Blood-Seeking spirit compass could not produce a “reunion” more Plague dusk than two curse warships meeting and immediately blanketing each other with fire.

For the past half century, Captain Tyrian had often used the Blood-Seeking spirit compass as a kind of “warning device”, using it to determine whether the Vanished had returned to the Mortal Realm.

Aiden and the Sailors gathered around Anomaly 203. Several pairs of eyes were fixed on the ancient spirit compasses around the brass device, each one decorated with complicated patterns.

Its gears and needles had fallen completely still.

“…Maybe it just wanted to stretch a little,” a Sailor with a hole in his forehead said cautiously, as if trying to ease the tension. “After all, this thing is usually completely motionless…”

Aiden glared at the Sailor. “If you cannot make a decent joke, then do not make one.”

“Or… should we wipe away the blood in the middle?” another Sailor, shriveled like a mummified corpse, spoke up. “Otherwise I keep feeling as if this thing is about to wake up at any moment.”

“No,” Aiden shook his head. “The captain gave strict orders. The blood in the center of the spirit compass cannot be wiped off by hand. We have to wait seventy-two hours and let the spirit compass absorb it on its own.”

“…What happens if we wipe it early?”

“No one knows. It is hard enough to work out the correct way to use an Anomaly. Who would be full and bored enough to test all the wrong operations?” Aiden said casually. “Unless you want to try. We will count it as a contribution to Human civilization.”

“No, no, no, I was just saying.”

Aiden snorted coldly.

Click, click.

At that moment, the Blood-Seeking spirit compass suddenly made that faint mechanical sound again. The conversation between the First Mate and the Sailors broke off at once. Aiden immediately looked toward the machine and saw its gears begin to quiver. Several spirit compass needles around its edge jerked violently, and then all of the needles suddenly pointed toward the waters around Pland.

The Blood-Seeking spirit compass fell silent once more, and this time it seemed truly unlikely to move again.

All of its needles were now avoiding Pland itself.

Aiden and the Sailors looked at one another.

“…I told you it just wanted to stretch a little…”

“Be quiet.” Aiden cut the Sailor off, but his eyes stayed fixed on Anomaly 203 as he replayed what he had just seen in his mind.

All the needles had turned to random directions outside Pland, yet he was certain that in one brief instant the Blood-Seeking spirit compass’s needles had all pointed in the same direction, toward the city-state of Pland itself.

That moment had been extremely short, so short that anyone might suspect it was just a coincidence during the needles’ aimless spinning. But to Aiden, it was as if the spirit compasses’ many “eyes” had just caught sight of their target and then, in terror, jerked their gaze away.

And now, with all of Anomaly 203’s needles pointing only to the waters near Pland, the situation looked to Aiden more like a clumsy attempt at covering something up.

He suddenly remembered something the captain had once told him.

Anomaly 203 sometimes behaved like a living thing. It did not always run in a purely mechanical way.

This thing could feel fear.

“Something is wrong… There is a problem with this city-state!” Aiden realized all at once. “We have to tell the captain what is happening here.”

“But did the captain not order that we are forbidden to go ashore?”

“We will send a message first,” Aiden said quickly, looking toward one of the Sailors. “Go, bring Polly here!”

The Sailor ran off at once. Not long after, he ran back to the bridge. A huge parrot with mottled tail feathers perched on his shoulder, rubbing its beak against the back of the Sailor’s exposed skull.

“Polly, we need you to carry a message,” Aiden called loudly.

The parrot immediately stopped tormenting the Sailor, lifted its head, and stared at the First Mate: “Polly can carry a message.”

“Go to the great Cathedral of the city-state. Look for the captain’s aura and tell him this: the Blood-Seeking spirit compass pointed to Pland. The city-state is not safe.”