Chapter 33

Chapter 33.

This breakfast tasted like wax—and the texture was even worse than wax.

After finishing this less-than-satisfying breakfast, Duncan’s mood did not improve at all with his stomach filled. Instead, he grew a bit more restless because some of the things Goathead had mentioned by accident had stirred up a pile of messy guesses.

He looked at the pigeon AI, who was strolling leisurely on a nearby shelf, and felt his wild thoughts grow even more absurd.

He had always thought this pigeon, who kept talking in Earth phrases, was born because he carried the soul of an Earth human. He believed that while he walked in the Spirit Realm, the individual “Zhou Ming” had reacted with the brass spirit compass and thus brought this strange bird AI into being.

But what if… things really were not like that?

If things were really as Goathead had said, and this pigeon was only some kind of phantom that had run out from a “deeper” place and happened to take shape beside him?

Then the Earth phrases AI sometimes blurted out would have nothing to do with Zhou Ming’s memories. They would instead be a projection of some piece of history that this world itself had recorded…

The possibilities behind this left Duncan upset and uneasy.

Alice stood up. Her voice cut off Duncan’s wandering thoughts: “Do you need me to wash the dishes?”

Duncan looked at Miss Doll in some surprise. She scratched her hair in embarrassment. “I just feel that since I’m already on the ship, I should find something to do. Otherwise I’m just here for food…”

“But you don’t eat at all,” Duncan reminded her. “Still, it’s nice that you want to help. Take the plates to the washroom and have a talk with the sink. If it doesn’t mind, you can wash them.”

After he said this, he did not wait for Alice to answer. He stood up, walked toward the door of the captain’s cabin, and added casually: “I’m going to inspect the deck. Don’t come to bother me if nothing’s wrong.”

The pigeon, still strolling on the shelf, fluttered at once onto Duncan’s shoulder and left the room with him, leaving Alice and Goathead staring at each other across the chart table.

“Is the captain in a bad mood?” Alice asked Goathead carefully after a moment’s hesitation.

Goathead answered in a deep tone: “The captain’s mood is like the weather on the Boundless Sea. Don’t try to guess it. Just accept it.”

Before Goathead could go on, Alice quickly asked again: “Oh right, the captain just told me to talk with the sink… how do I talk with it?”

“That’s simple. You go wash things. If you get splashed all over, that means the sink doesn’t like you. Speaking of which, do you know how to wash dishes? If you don’t, I have some theoretical experience…”

Before Goathead could finish, Alice quickly gathered up the dishes on the table. She rushed toward the door while shouting: “No need, I’ll learn it, thank you, Mr. Goathead, goodbye!”

The captain’s cabin fell quiet at once. Only the dark Goathead remained on the table, his hollow eyes fixed in a gaze at the direction everyone had gone.

After a long time, a sigh came from the chart table: “If only I had legs…”

Then his gaze returned to the enchanted sea chart.

The mist around the Vanished was still slowly thinning, and the steering task the captain had left him still had to be done well.

Under precise control, this huge and “living” ghost ship sensitively adjusted the angles of its sails and continued to sail on the Boundless Sea. Goathead began to hum a sea shanty of unknown age. His rough, hoarse humming, almost like noise, echoed in the captain’s cabin:

“Hoist the sails, hoist the sails, the sailors who left home keep moving forward;

“In wind and waves, in noise and crowds, only a single plank stands between us and death;

“Take in the jib, spread the main sail, loose the ropes, hold the rail! We have already reached the middle of the sea!

“Stay far from the fish, stay far from the fish, sailors must pass beyond those routes where Spawn gather;

“Stay far from the fish, stay far from the fish! We must reach the harbor safe and sound—strong drink and warm hearths lie ahead…”

Duncan walked one round through the supplies storeroom and then another through the kitchen, and only then returned to the midship deck of the Vanished.

No matter how many times he searched, he could not find anything more edible on this ship than jerky and cheese.

The good news was that he did not have to eat maggot-filled biscuits like the sailors of the age of sail on Earth. The bad news was that this ship did not even have maggot-filled biscuits.

He pushed aside his earlier wild thoughts for now and, taking the now quiet AI with him, walked to the edge of the deck.

He gazed at the Boundless Sea and kept thinking:

[No matter what, I have to find a way to resupply the daily necessities on the Vanished… Even if I should not care too much about quality of life on a ghost ship, I still cannot really live like a ghost…]

[Alice might need clothes to change into. There are no dresses on this ship that suit her.]

[I must build contact with the city-states on land as soon as possible… the Vanished has been drifting at sea for too many years. In that time, the city-states on land may have developed to a level even that Goathead could not have predicted. From the things I saw before in that sewer, at least the city-state of Pland is a strong and advanced great city. The revolvers those cultists carried also show how far human society’s technology has come…]

[An ancient ghost ship may not be so unbeatable when facing a civilized society that has developed for a century. The Vanished still has some lingering power, but if only that power remains, things will be bad…]

Duncan glanced at AI on his shoulder.

Maybe… after resting and saving his strength today, he should try another walk in the Spirit Realm.

“Coo?”

AI tilted its head. It finally made a sound a normal pigeon should make.

Duncan could not help but smile. Just then, the corner of his eye caught a flash of ripples on the nearby sea.

His attention was drawn by the movement. He instinctively looked out past the ship’s rail a few more times and then noticed that something really seemed to be swimming under the water nearby.

After a brief pause, Duncan suddenly slapped his own forehead.

“Hey! What is wrong with me… This is the sea! Aren’t there fish in the sea?”

This sudden “possibility” lifted Duncan’s mood at once. He knew that setting up contact with the land and arranging a stable supply line for the Vanished could not be done in a day. But could this vast ocean itself not help him a little?

There were fish in the sea—and he was already sick of the jerky and cheese on the ghost ship!

Duncan’s enthusiasm flared up. He remembered that in one of the storerooms under the deck there were heavy fishing rods for sea fishing, and mounts on the rail along the deck edge where the rods could be fixed. As for bait… he wondered if the jerky and cheese would work.

And so, while the cursed Doll washed dishes in the washroom and the talking Goathead focused on steering the ship, the captain of the Vanished busied himself back and forth between the deck and the cabins.

Duncan soon found what he wanted. He carried three heavy fishing rods and the “bait” back to the deck. A bit clumsily, he fixed the rods to the mounts along the rail, baited the hooks, and cast the lines. Then he dragged over an empty barrel to use as a seat while he waited.

In truth, Duncan had no experience with sea fishing. All his fishing experience came from ponds and a small river back in his old hometown. He did not know if this sudden idea would really let him catch any fish, but he was idle anyway, so why not try? What if it worked?

He treated it as a way to rest and recover before his next walk into the Spirit Realm, while also keeping a bit of hope for better meals in the future.

Duncan sat down between the rods. During the long wait, his mood slowly returned to calm.

The sea was fairly calm today. There were quite a few clouds in the sky, but no prophetic vision of a storm.

Duncan sat on the barrel, leaning against a winch used to fasten the ropes. As the ship swayed gently, he narrowed his eyes.

Before he knew it, he slipped into a half-dreaming, half-waking state.

He dreamed that he was walking barefoot on a calm sea. The water was deep blue, and the sunlight was warm.

The familiar and “normal” Sun from his memories hung high in the sky, bright but not scorching.

He heard the sound of splashing water. Following the sound, he saw fish suddenly jump out from the calm surface nearby.

It was a school of small golden fish, each only about the size of a palm. They blew bubbles in the air and waved their tails as if they were swimming in water, slowly circling around Duncan.

These fish that swam through the air drew closer bit by bit. Zhou Ming looked at them with curiosity, at their round bulging eyes, their fine scales, their mouths opening and closing, and the faint ripples, like water waves, that floated behind them.

Zhou Ming suddenly felt that these fish were very beautiful, and also…

Very fragrant.

They must be very, very fragrant.