Pigeon?

The snow-white pigeon stood blankly on the table, with the Brass Compass Duncan had spent ages looking for hanging around its neck. The familiar Obsidian Dagger lay by its feet.

Duncan stared blankly at the pigeon, and the pigeon stared blankly back at him.

It was no easy thing to read an expression from a bird's face, but for some reason, Duncan felt he could understand this pigeon's expression. Not only could he read its expression, he could even see a certain "wise" gleam in its slightly reddened eyes—the bird's little green-bean eyes stared straight ahead, and when Duncan looked over, one of its eyes clearly shifted its attention toward him, while the other seemed to still be looking at the ceiling of the Captain's Cabin, its gaze wandering all over the place.

"A... pigeon?"

It took Duncan several seconds to react before his mouth twitched and he muttered instinctively.

Why was it a pigeon? Why had a pigeon suddenly appeared? Why was his Brass Compass hanging from this pigeon? And how had that dagger gotten here?

Or, to sum up all his questions in one sentence: could anything normal still happen on this abnormal ship?!

While Duncan's head was full of question marks and doubts, the pigeon, which had been dazed for quite some time, seemed to finally "wake up." It bobbed its head and took two steps across the table, then approached Duncan, stretched its neck out with all its might, and let out a loud coo.

"..." Duncan looked at the bird speechlessly. For some reason, classic images of pirate captains from his memories suddenly surfaced in his mind. Then he looked down at his captain's uniform. "A captain having a bird beside him does seem standard, but shouldn't it normally be a parrot... What's with the pigeon?"

The pigeon immediately nodded solemnly at Duncan's words and spoke in a somewhat strange, stiff female voice: "Transmission complete!"

Every thought and mutter in Duncan's mind and mouth abruptly stopped. He nearly choked on his own saliva, staring wide-eyed at the white pigeon before him with utter disbelief.

He recalled how he had felt when he first boarded this ship and saw the talking Goat Head in the Captain's Cabin.

But this was no longer his first day aboard the Lost Homeland. He had already grown accustomed to the abnormalities of this world, so the pigeon speaking only startled him for a moment. The next second, his expression turned serious. A faint green Spirit Body Fire had already emerged from one hand as he watched the pigeon warily. "Where did you come from?"

The pigeon tilted its head. One eye stared straight at Duncan, while the other drifted toward the ceiling. "Incorrect address. Please check the address again, or contact the system administrator."

Duncan: "...?"

Compared to the brief blankness on his face, a far greater storm had risen in his heart!

What the pigeon had said... did not sound like it belonged in this world. They were not words that Goat Head, Alice, or any of those black-robed cultists would say. Instead, they were terms far more familiar to him as Zhou Ming, an Earthling!

Yet the pigeon seemed completely unaware of the changes in Duncan's gaze and expression. It merely lowered its head to peck at its wings, then shook the Brass Compass hanging from its chest before leisurely pacing about the table.

After taking a few steps, it ran over to the Obsidian Dagger and used its claws to nudge it toward Duncan. In the same strangely toned female voice, it said, "Take up this solar-powered battle axe and embrace the glory of combat!"

Duncan abruptly rose from beside the desk. His chair scraped harshly against the floor as he stared fixedly at the pigeon, which still looked innocent and calm. An emotion both utterly bizarre and absurdly comical filled his mind.

This pigeon could not possibly have originally belonged aboard the Lost Homeland, nor could it have originally belonged in this world!

The words it spoke were things only Zhou Ming could understand!

Perhaps the sound of the table and chair knocking about had been too loud, because Duncan suddenly heard Goat Head's voice in his mind, even from the Chart Room. "Captain? Are you all right?"

Duncan continued staring at the pigeon on the table. He knew Goat Head did not dare to directly peer into the Captain's Cabin, so he answered in a low voice with his usual calmness, "I'm fine."

"Miss Alice has come to see you. Would you like me to..."

"Receive her for now."

"Yes, Captain."

Duncan let out a breath and glanced back at the door leading toward the Chart Room.

Goat Head's barrage of chatter at Alice was still ongoing. Miss Doll had already tried several times to get up and leave, only to be stopped each time. Duncan felt he ought to go out and rescue the unfortunate doll, but now... there was something more important he needed to confirm.

Alice would just have to suffer a little longer.

Duncan sat back down at the desk, intending to see whether he could communicate normally with the pigeon before him. At that moment, however, he suddenly noticed something he had overlooked earlier—

A thin "line of fire" faintly extended from the Spirit Body Fire dancing between the fingers of his right hand. The stream of flame was as thin as a strand of hair, and after floating more than ten centimeters, it dissipated into the air.

The strange pigeon was likewise entwined with a wisp of ghostly green flame. It was hidden in the gaps beneath the feathers of its wings, with its other end extending into the air and vanishing halfway through.

Duncan frowned, raised his right hand, and willed it to move. As the flame flickered, the pigeon on the table instantly vanished.

The next second, the pigeon appeared on his shoulder. It lowered its head, pecked at Duncan's hair, and cried loudly, "Coo coo!"

Duncan flicked a finger again, and the pigeon on his shoulder reappeared on the desk.

The Brass Compass hung from the pigeon's chest, its gleaming shell reflecting the green light of the flames.

Duncan frowned. "...Is it related to this Brass Compass?"

He could already determine that the pigeon had some kind of connection with him, one even closer than the connection between him and the Lost Homeland. This might explain why the pigeon "knew" some Earthly "knowledge" that only he himself knew, though he still could not determine why the pigeon had appeared.

After thinking it over, the only thing he could suspect was the strange Brass Compass.

Ever since he had tested the Spirit Body Fire, every abnormality had begun with this Brass Compass. Whether it was the earlier experience of a soul crossing over, the experience of mentally projecting himself into a corpse, or the compass vanishing without a trace and then reappearing around the pigeon's neck... the source of it all seemed to be this thing.

Duncan stared at the pigeon for a while, then reached for the compass.

He wanted to take it off and study it properly.

The pigeon neither dodged nor stopped him, yet Duncan's fingers failed to touch the surface of the Brass Compass—his hand passed straight through it and touched the soft down on the pigeon's chest.

As if passing through an illusion.

The pigeon hopped twice on the spot, apparently a little ticklish from Duncan's touch. It opened its beak and squawked, "Today is KFC Crazy Thursday, send me fifty..."

Duncan's eye twitched twice. Still unwilling to believe it, he tested it two more times before finally confirming that he could not remove the Brass Compass from the pigeon at all—this thing had clearly undergone some sort of transformation, becoming an illusion bound to the pigeon. It could neither be removed nor touched.

Or rather... was the pigeon now the true form of the Brass Compass?

In an instant, countless guesses arose in Duncan's mind, guesses that even he did not know whether he should believe. The only thing he could be certain of was this: the pigeon's appearance was inseparably linked to his experience of using the Brass Compass for "soul crossing," and that experience might also have changed the form of the Brass Compass.

Perhaps this was the nature of the Brass Compass itself, an inherent property—or perhaps a "cost of use"—as some kind of abnormal object. As for why the pigeon was so strange... that was not because of the compass, but because Zhou Ming was an Earthling.

None of this could be proven or disproven yet, unless Duncan could find manuals for all the abnormal objects aboard the Lost Homeland.

For now, though, he had to consider how to arrange this... abnormal pigeon.

After a brief moment of thought, he decided to give the pigeon a name first.

"I need to give you a name," he said seriously to the pigeon, lightly tapping the table with a finger. "I think you can understand what I'm saying, right?"

The pigeon tilted its head, its two green-bean-sized eyes drifting as it looked at Duncan. "Aye?"

(Oh my god!)