Chapter 574

Chapter 574: Waking from the Dream

The sudden voice from the Black Wooden Idol left Duncan stunned. He had not expected that, on this wrong and uncanny Vanished that felt like a mysterious vision, the strange Goathead in front of him would suddenly “come alive”. His gaze locked on the slowly moving “wood carving”, and a hint of wariness rose in his heart. Then he realized something:

The other side seemed unable to “see” him.

Right now he was only using the flames of his spirit form to build a link and “peek” into the depths of that huge vine. Only his thoughts were being sent here. He had not truly projected his power here, and of course he had not condensed a body in this place.

So the Goathead on the table must have only sensed a presence—and now it was starting to search for the source of that presence.

The unsettling Black Wooden Idol turned slowly. Faint creaks came from its wooden base. In the dead silence of the Vanished, in the dead silence of the captain’s cabin, those creaks sounded even more eerie. Its obsidian-carved black eyes swept several times across the spot where Duncan’s point of view hung. At last it stopped and let out a puzzled sound: “Is… someone there…”

Its voice was slow and low, like someone talking in their sleep.

From its reaction, Duncan at once noticed something odd. This Goathead did seem to have sensed something, but it had not recognized the presence as the “captain’s” aura?!

After a brief, heavy pause to think, Duncan made up his mind.

The link built through the flame strengthened at once. Power flowed here along the fire, and Duncan began to “lean” his will toward this strange space filled with darkness and thick fog, quickly condensing his form here.

He had to figure out what was going on with this Vanished sailing in the mist, and with this strange Goathead in front of him.

On the Vanished that sailed through darkness and fog, strands of ghostly green flame appeared here and there on the deck. In the dimly lit captain’s cabin, a wisp of spirit flame suddenly appeared in midair. It crackled as it spread, then quickly outlined a tall figure.

In almost an instant, Duncan’s link with this eerie dark space grew stronger. But in that same instant, he felt that this fog-filled space, and the Vanished under his feet, seemed to be… triggered. Everything around him suddenly turned vague and unreal. A delayed sense of rejection surged in from all directions. It was as if the dark fog was pushing back against his flame—or as if this strange place itself was quickly falling apart.

The sudden rejection caught Duncan off guard. This was the first time he had felt such an active pushback while using the spirit flame to probe an unknown thing.

He had used the spirit flame to probe many things in the past. He had used it on Alice’s spirit coffin, on that brass clockwork key, and on all kinds of extraordinary items seized from cultists. None of those things had ever reacted like this.

Could this strange space, and that huge “vine” that had appeared in the city, still be alive? Was there a powerful “mind” behind it?

The shocking guess surged through his thoughts, but this was clearly not the time to dig to the bottom. Duncan did not know how long he could keep this “link” to this place. He could only try to keep himself stable while striding toward the Goathead by the chart table.

The black wooden carving seemed to wake from a dream as well. It suddenly raised its head. Its gaze fell on Duncan—both the ghostly green flame and the tall figure had appeared in its eyes out of nowhere, like a bright light suddenly bursting into a peaceful and dark dream. In its startled, broken dream, it stared at the uninvited guest and said in a dazed voice: “Who are you?”

“Looks like you don’t know me.” Duncan was not surprised, since he had already noticed a few clues just now. While he did his best to keep his link to this place, he quickly sensed information about this Vanished and about the Goathead before him. He said: “I am Duncan Abnomar—what is your name?”

“Duncan… ah, that sounds a bit familiar…” The Goathead did not seem fully awake. Its voice drifted in and out, like someone slipping into Dreamwalking, and it did not answer Duncan’s question directly. “But I don’t remember… why are you here… why are we here…”

Duncan frowned.

He could already feel that this dark, fog-filled space was starting to crack and fall apart. The strong rejection was trying to push his flame out. The Goathead in front of him seemed stuck in a half-dreaming state and could not answer his questions at all.

After a brief thought, he stepped closer and pointed at the enchanted sea chart next to Goathead.

“Where is the Vanished sailing?”

It took a second or two before Goathead reacted. It slowly turned its neck, and its gaze landed on the “sea chart” that was currently showing a forest. After a long time, it murmured: “…Oh, good… so they’re still there…”

“They?” Duncan asked at once. “Who are they…”

But a sudden violent lurch and a low roar that seemed to sweep through the whole space cut off his words.

The rejection he faced here reached its peak. Every inch of space and time seemed to resist the spread of the spirit form’s fire. Soft crackling pops sounded in the air, like the flames were burning against an invisible barrier. Senses carried through the fire became suddenly blurred and slow.

Duncan lowered his head and saw that the projection he had condensed, his avatar form, was growing more and more indistinct. His link to this place seemed about to be severed.

He knew he could force more power together and use the fire of his spirit form to keep the link by brute force—but after realizing that the giant vine was very likely “alive”, and that there might even be a consciousness behind it, he no longer knew if he should.

Just then, the Goathead on the chart table finally seemed to notice something strange about him as well.

Its gaze fell on the flickering flames around him. After a brief delay, it muttered in a muffled voice: “Ah… you scared her…”

Duncan froze for a moment, then snapped his head up: “Scared who?”

“Atlantis…” Goathead seemed ready to sink back into its dreamy state. Its voice grew slower and slower. “Atlantis doesn’t know you. Your existence… scared her.”

Atlantis… the “World Tree” from the ancient legends of the elves?!

The information and a flood of guesses flashed through Duncan’s mind. But before he could ask more, a dizzy feeling struck him, like his senses were being peeled away and the whole world was rushing off into the distance. The scene before his eyes dimmed fast. The captain’s cabin, the chart table, the enchanted sea chart all faded into the dark. Only Goathead’s hazy, self-muttering voice echoed faintly in the darkness:

“Ah, time’s up—she’s waking up.”

In the next second, the feeling of solid ground under his feet snapped Duncan awake. He drew a reflexive breath and opened his eyes.

Alice’s face was only ten centimeters from his.

The silly doll startled him so badly that he jumped back. Alice at once broke into a beaming smile. She bounced after him and shouted: “Captain! Captain! It’s almost dawn! Everything outside looks normal again!”

Duncan had been about to scold Alice a few times, but her words stopped him short. Then he noticed how the world around them had changed.

The dense forest that had filled the whole block was gone. The huge growth that had merged into the tall buildings around them had vanished without a trace. The street fixtures that had twisted and mutated into part of the forest had really returned to their original forms.

On both sides of the road, the soft light from the gas lamps lit up the surroundings. Over the block, sunlight from the far-off sea coast spread across the city like a curtain. In the gaps in that light, the outline of the World’s Wound in the sky had already turned dim. At the far end of the sky, a hint of dawn, just before Vision 001 rose, seemed to spread through the clouds.

Duncan blinked and looked, by habit, toward the sloping street deeper inside the district.

He still remembered the huge vine that had spread down from that slope, and how his flame had sunk into the depths of that vine.

There was nothing there now.

Just like the rest of the block—everything had gone back to normal.

With the rising morning sun, with the end of the veil of night and the coming of day, that massive, eerie phenomenon… dissolved into the light of morning like a dream being shaken away.

Duncan felt as if he stood at the edge of a bizarre dream. The displaced Mortal Realm and the memories still left in his head made everything before his eyes feel unreal.

But the dazed feeling only lasted a moment. He soon came fully back to himself and at once turned to look toward Crown Street.

His senses spread in that direction. The familiar Marks appeared in his “sight”.

Nina, Shirley, Morris…

Their presences had returned to the Mortal Realm.

The puppet head in Alice’s arms suddenly twitched. The mouth of the maid puppet opened and closed, and Lucretia’s voice came out: “Dad, we seem to…”

“I know. You’ve all come back, and the district is already back to normal.”

Duncan cut in quickly. Out of the corner of his eye, he could already see a few scattered figures on the street—that was the local residents coming out now that it was day.

They swept the streets. They chatted at their doors. They hurried off to work. They talked about yesterday’s news and today’s weather.

No one seemed to know what had happened last night—even though only a few hours ago, every one of these people in the district had truly vanished into the veil of night.

Now, they had come back too.

As the street scene slowly woke up and grew busy again, a faint, hard-to-name sense of strangeness and eeriness seemed to rise over it.