The Sun

A doll—an exquisite doll so lifelike that Duncan had nearly failed to tell it apart at first glance. She lay quietly inside the ornate wooden box, like a lady sleeping in a coffin, waiting for someone to awaken her.

Duncan truly felt that she would wake up the very next second.

But it was only an illusion. The doll merely lay quietly in the box, completely unresponsive to her surroundings.

Duncan watched this bizarre... "thing" with vigilance and caution. There was nothing strange about a doll itself, but its excessively human appearance and its coffin-like wooden box instinctively made him feel danger. Considering how the box had inexplicably appeared aboard the Lost Homeland, it was no wonder he was wary.

After observing it for quite some time, Duncan finally determined that the gorgeous Gothic doll in the box would not suddenly leap up and give him a surprise. Only then did he relax slightly before frowning at Goat Head. "What do you think is going on?"

"This should be important cargo escorted by that previous ship," Goat Head immediately replied. Although it had previously claimed not to recognize the strange wooden box that had suddenly appeared on the deck, its experience with matters at sea was clearly richer than Duncan's, a fake captain's. "There are symbols on the box pointing to the gods, and pegs around it for securing chains. This may mean that it was once in some kind of sealed state—transporting Sealed Objects across the Boundless Sea is an extremely risky matter. That ship seems to have some background."

"Sealed?" Duncan's eyelid twitched involuntarily, and he immediately looked at the lid he had completely opened. The lid had already been damaged when it arrived aboard the Lost Homeland, which was why he had been able to push it open so easily. Though he knew nothing about seals, he believed that this thing's seal had definitely failed. "So this thing is dangerous?"

"Very dangerous to those fragile ordinary people, but I do not believe it poses any threat to you—an 'Anomaly' that can be sealed through special techniques cannot withstand Captain Duncan's might."

Duncan said nothing. His expression was grave, but his thoughts churned within him.

Goat Head's flattery sounded rather pleasant—if he truly were Captain Duncan, perhaps he would have believed it. But he was not, so he was panicking like hell.

Because Goat Head's words had made it clear that the doll lying in that coffin was dangerous goods! It simply could not threaten the real captain!

Although he now bore Captain Duncan's name, seemed to have occupied his body, and had gained some power, Zhou Ming knew his own limits—he did not think that made him equal to the "real Captain Duncan."

He still knew far too little about this world, this ship, and even the body he now inhabited.

Besides, he had keenly noticed a new strange term in Goat Head's words just now—"Anomaly."

Anything outside convention was anomalous. It sounded like a perfectly ordinary word, yet Goat Head's particular emphasis made him vaguely realize that it seemed to carry a special meaning here.

Perhaps in this world, "Anomaly" referred to more than simply something beyond the ordinary. Perhaps it specifically referred to a certain type of thing? For instance... a doll lying in a coffin.

Unfortunately, he had no suitable reason to ask about something that should have been common knowledge.

After reflecting that he still needed to gather intelligence and accumulate knowledge carefully, Duncan frowned and gave the doll one final look, as if making up his mind. "I should throw it back into the sea."

There was a trace of hesitation in his heart when he said that, especially as he looked at the doll. The feeling was particularly strong.

Of course, it was not for some simple reason like the doll is beautiful. It was because... "she" looked far too much like a living person sleeping in a coffin. At the thought of throwing her into the sea, Duncan even felt as if he were tossing a living person overboard.

Yet that hesitation only strengthened his resolve in the end.

Because he had long known that this world contained many bizarre and uncanny things. Though all he had encountered in this world so far was the Lost Homeland, even on this ship alone, he had already seen a talking Goat Head, masts that raised their sails by themselves, ship lamps that never went out, and that strange, dangerous sea, the unnerving Spirit World, and endless sea fog...

And just moments ago, he had rammed into a Mechanical Ship transporting Sealed Objects across this bizarre sea, and the thing it had been "escorting" had somehow ended up on the Lost Homeland's deck.

As a rational and cautious person, he could not keep something that most likely contained bizarre and dangerous power simply because the doll looked pretty.

Regret was regret, but Duncan still firmly closed the lid of the "coffin." Unsatisfied, he found nails and a hammer in the cabin and carefully drove another ring of iron nails into the coffin.

Finally, he pushed the "coffin" containing the doll to the edge of the deck.

Goat Head's voice reached his ears. "You may dispose of your spoils as you please, but I must still humbly and respectfully offer a suggestion: there is no need for such caution. It has been a long time since the Lost Homeland acquired any new spoils..."

"Shut up." Duncan simply cut off Goat Head's babbling.

Goat Head fell silent, while Duncan gave the "coffin" a hard kick and sent it straight into the sea.

The heavy wooden box dropped vertically from the edge of the deck and plunged straight into the sea, which had returned to its normal color. It made a dull splash, bobbed back to the surface, and gradually drifted toward the stern of the Lost Homeland.

Duncan watched the box drift away with the waves. Only after it was completely obscured by the stern did he relax slightly. Then he looked into the distance and saw that the mist over the sea had fully dispersed, while the azure ocean rose and fell gently around the Lost Homeland.

The ship had completely left the Spirit World and returned to the realm of reality.

There was no trace anywhere on the nearby sea of the Mechanical Ship that had briefly crossed paths with the Lost Homeland.

Duncan frowned slightly and made a rough estimate of the time that had passed since the two ships met, as well as their respective speeds.

Based on the current conditions at sea, that ship should not have vanished from sight so quickly.

"...Is this also because of this bizarre sea? Or does it have something to do with so-called 'Spirit World navigation'?"

Duncan mulled it over, but his attention was soon drawn away by something else—

He saw a glimmer of golden light suddenly emerge from the depths of the cloud cover that had never dispersed above the sea.

Brilliant golden sunlight gradually filled the sky. The cloud layers, like heavy curtains, slowly scattered as though brushed aside by an invisible hand, and the sea, gloomy for who knew how long, was gradually illuminated by sunlight. Duncan stood at the bow of the Lost Homeland, his eyes wide as he watched the clouds disperse. In that instant, he was suddenly moved for no apparent reason.

Ever since he had learned of the existence of "this side" several days ago, ever since he first explored this strange ship, the unbroken cloud cover had shrouded the entire sea. He had nearly begun to believe that this world had no sunlight at all, that it had always been eternally overcast.

He had been separated from sunlight for far too long. Even on the other side of the Gate, in Zhou Ming's bachelor apartment, the thick fog outside the window had long obscured the sun.

But now, the Boundless Sea had cleared.

After being separated from sunlight for so long, he finally felt as though he had seen daylight again in the world on this side.

Duncan instinctively drew a deep breath and spread his arms toward the sunlight. The heavy cloud layers seemed to answer him, rapidly scattering and fading away. At the brightest instant of daylight, a massive sphere shrouded in countless distorted streams of golden light entered Duncan's vision.

Every expression on Duncan's face froze in the instant he spread his arms to welcome the sunlight.

His eyes widened as he stared straight into the sky. The light was dazzling, but nowhere near as dazzling as the sunlight he knew. He could clearly see the thing hanging in the sky—its spherical shell seemingly covered in countless dense patterns, the brilliant streams of light spilling from around it, and, against the backdrop of interwoven light, two circular structures slowly rotating in concentric rings around the central sphere.

Duncan narrowed his eyes. He could vaguely make out that the two rings seemed to be formed from countless fine, intricate runes, as though some supreme power had engraved an eternal restraint across the heavens, imprisoning the "sun" in the sky.

Duncan had failed to embrace the sunlight he had yearned for so long.

There was no sunlight in this world at all.

"What is that?" he said softly, his voice low and somewhat cold.

"That is, of course, the sun, Captain." Goat Head's voice was as calm as ever.

*(Good grief!

I'll do my best to maintain two updates a day for the next few days... until my backlog runs out or I can no longer keep up, hahaha.)*