"Sidney..."
"Shh!" Sidney raised a finger to his lips, signaling for silence.
Michel nodded and lowered his voice to the faintest whisper. "Are we... just going to wait here?"
"We don't know what's happening. Don't act yet. These monsters..." A trace of fear flashed through Sidney's eyes. "They're far too powerful and strange."
The group hid in a corner of the cabin, holding their breath as they stared fixedly at the cabin door not far away.
Outside the door, a few enormous silhouettes occasionally flashed past, their long hair faintly visible.
They were trapped here, trapped aboard their own ship, not daring to move a muscle.
This place had become a paradise for monsters.
Sidney gritted his teeth.
Watching the monsters roaming outside, he couldn't help recalling when the transformation had first begun, not long ago.
At first, only a few sailors who had escaped from the mine went mad, suddenly turning into monsters covered in long hair.
Sidney had actually breathed a sigh of relief upon seeing the monsters. He recognized them.
They were relatively weak monsters that were not difficult to control. Their corpses could be used for sacrifices, and quite a few had been sacrificed during this year's Theresia Festival.
Their origins were unknown. They had only been discovered in recent years and had never appeared in historical records.
After the bronze statue of Theresia was discovered to be particularly effective at harming them, they had been chosen as sacrificial offerings.
Sidney had heard about some of their characteristics and immediately ordered the guards to eliminate them.
Very soon, he realized how terribly wrong he had been.
"You're saying they're contagious? That the infection spreads from their corpses?!"
Sidney practically jumped out of his chair.
The soldier who had come to report was also filled with fear,