Chapter 27 She's Never Heard Those Words Before

Lucrezia slid several meters across the deck—it all happened so suddenly that Duncan didn't even realize what had occurred.

It wasn't until the "Sea Witch" scrambled to her feet in a fluster that he hastily released the paper in his hand.

The colorful paper "whooshed" away, quickly disappearing into Lucrezia's hair, while she remained standing there, somewhat dazed, with no discernible expression on her face.

She was probably stunned from the fall.

"Lucy..." With an embarrassment that could bore holes in the deck and a subtle apology, Duncan cautiously approached the still-dazed witch. "Are you alright?"

Lucrezia snapped to attention, seemingly awakening from her stupor. She slowly turned her head, her expression finally shifting from confusion to shock. She looked at Duncan with disbelief, and after a long moment of silence, she finally spoke, "How did you do that?"

"Huh?" Duncan was taken aback. "Do what?"

"You caught... 'shadows'..." Lucrezia said hesitantly, seemingly struggling to find the words to describe such an abstract thing. Then she raised her arm, and starting from her fingertips, part of her arm rapidly disintegrated into fluttering colorful paper, swirling around her. "Could you try it again so I can see?"

Duncan reached out with confusion and grabbed a piece of colorful paper at random.

In the next second, the scattered paper abruptly "collapsed," reforming into Lucrezia's arm. Her expression turned to shock once more.

"This is incredible!" The witch stared at Duncan, wide-eyed. "Nothing like this has ever happened before. Can you tell me how you did it?"

Seeing that his adopted "daughter" seemed to have been ignited by her passion as a researcher, Duncan had no idea what was going on. He frowned, looking at the colorful paper he held, and said with a puzzled expression, "Is it difficult? They're just pieces of paper flying in the air..."

"They're impossible to catch, Papa," Lucrezia said, opening her hands. "If the Phantom Wind could be interrupted by someone catching a piece of paper, I would never have used it as my most common means of transportation—these are all phantoms, theoretically able to penetrate any obstacle..."

"I didn't know that," Duncan shrugged. "I was just curious about these pieces of paper and wanted to catch them to take a look. Sorry... did you hurt yourself? Bump into anything?"

Lucrezia suddenly paused slightly.

It seemed like she hadn't heard anyone care about her in that tone for many, many years.

Ever since she became the powerful "Sea Witch," a cursed individual feared by many, the captain of a ghost ship, she had stopped hearing such words.

It made her feel a little awkward.

"I... I'm fine," she shook her head with a strange expression, trying to suppress the embarrassment in her heart while attempting to shift her attention through thinking. "You were able to catch phantoms... is that one of your powers now? What is its essence? Is it an understanding of the deeper layers of the world? Or is it due to the influence of the subspace?"

Lucrezia truly delved into thought. The instinct to explore the unknown made her seem to instantly forget her earlier embarrassment. She continued to mutter to herself while thinking, "...Could it be that in the 'layer' of subspace, there is actually no difference between matter and phantoms in the real world? Are all things in the mortal world equally 'concepts' in the face of subspace...? Is Crow-Divence's theory correct? Are all things 'concepts' and form a uniform projection in subspace..."

Duncan listened to the witch's muttering and finally couldn't help but interrupt her, "Lucy... you can study this matter at another time."

The "witch" was instantly startled, but she still stared at Duncan, wide-eyed and unblinking.

Duncan, however, lowered his head, looking at the colorful paper in his hand, his mind also unable to stop thinking.

He hadn't expected these dazzling pieces of paper to be such special "things." And seeing Lucrezia's reaction, his actions just now were obviously worthy of being called "shocking."

He had caught a phantom—but Duncan knew that he didn't have the ability to catch phantoms.

He simply didn't know these pieces of paper were phantoms.

Thoughts surged in his mind. Some past events and conjectures floated up in his memories, and some "things" appeared in Duncan's mind—fish.

After an unknown amount of silence, he suddenly spoke softly, as if to himself, "Its essence... perhaps it's 'I don't know'..."

Lucrezia heard her father's mutterings, but she was completely baffled. "What are you saying? Are you saying you don't know the essence of this ability?"

Duncan came back to his senses. He opened his mouth, seemingly wanting to explain something to his "daughter," but after hesitating several times, he shook his head.

"It's another meaning, but I don't know how to explain it to you—Lucy, we'll talk about it another time. We have other things to do now."

He turned his head, looking at the magnificent "wall of light" that had reached the bow of the *Glorious Star*, exuding a heavy sense of oppression with its immense posture.

"First, take me to see that stone sphere."

Lucrezia nodded, but she didn't leave. Instead, she remained standing in place, looking at her father with a conflicted and complex expression.

Duncan frowned in confusion. "Is there anything else?"

Lucrezia hesitated, then carefully pointed her finger. "Could you... could you give that back to me first?"

Duncan looked down and realized that he was still holding the colorful paper that the other party had split off during the "experiment."

His expression stiffened instantly, and he released his hand while apologizing. "Uh, cough, sorry."

The paper floated up and quickly burrowed into Lucrezia's arm, filling a place that had originally been dim and colorless with color again.

The "Sea Witch" looked at this scene with a somewhat subtle expression, then nodded to Duncan and turned to transform into a large cloud of fluttering colorful paper, preparing to fly to the bridge—but she stopped less than half a meter away. Her figure re-condensed, and she turned her head to look at Duncan with worry. "Don't catch me this time..."

Duncan's face was awkward. "...Of course."

Lucrezia nodded again, then turned around, but then turned back again with worry. "If you're curious, let's discuss it before doing experiments next time. Really, don't catch me."

Duncan spread his hands, not knowing whether to laugh or cry. "I definitely won't catch you. I'm not a child."

Lucrezia said "oh," but hesitated for a long time when she turned around. Finally, she sighed. "I think I'll just walk..."

And so the witch walked all the way to the distant bridge.

Duncan watched her walk away with a strange expression, and finally couldn't help but sigh in his heart:

It was fortunate that Grandmaster Talan Aer was too nervous to come to the deck with him and was still resting quietly in his room, otherwise the scene at this time would be more than just fatherly love, filial piety, and awkwardness.

It was likely that the "Sea Witch" would have chosen to silence him—then Talan Aer would have truly died on this ship.

After a jumble of thoughts ran through his mind, Duncan took a light breath, and his mind gradually calmed down. At the same time, the *Glorious Star* also slightly adjusted its angle under the captain's personal control, then sailed straight into the magnificent "light curtain."

Like some kind of substantial crystal, yet with no sense of obstruction, the faint golden "sunlight" filled the field of vision, gradually engulfing the *Glorious Star*.

Duncan stood at the edge of the foredeck, his eyes calmly watching the "sunlight" that rushed towards him and completely immersed him.

He guessed at the essence of the sunlight, and slightly raised his hands as if to feel the "touch" of the sunlight.

On the way here, he had listened to Lucrezia recount many pieces of information related to this "glowing fallen object" and had learned that during the solar extinction, these glowing geometric shapes had continuously sent regular "light signals" outwards. There was a lot of information—but none of it could explain to him the "moon" in the center of the glowing geometry.

Duncan narrowed his eyes slightly.

Some small shadows appeared in his vision.

Those were the research stations that Lucrezia had mentioned, set up by the elves at the center of the glowing geometry, and next to the stations... the mysterious stone sphere.

The research station was a two-story building built on a floating platform, and the stone sphere was less than a few meters away from the floating platform. Temporary bridges and many steel cables connected the two, ensuring the stability of the platform.

As the distance gradually shortened, more and more details of the "stone sphere" came into Duncan's eyes.

Now, he had finally confirmed it in the real world.

Those familiar patterns, those plains, depressions, and crater structures distributed in light and shadow, that frequently appeared in his recent memories, that he had seen more than once in books and on the internet—the moon.

"It really is it..."

An indescribable complex emotion permeated his heart—it wasn't surprise, because Duncan had already been surprised. Nor was it bewilderment, because he had thought about it in confusion for a long time before today.

At this moment, he was simply confirming and witnessing something that had entangled him for a long time, a bizarre fact that he could not understand or admit, coming to him in an unmistakable way.

The *Glorious Star* slowed down slowly. Under Lucrezia's control, this ghost ship, like the *Lost Country*, which was "alive," finally stopped with incredible accuracy only a few meters away from the stone sphere.

Duncan came to the edge of the deck. Here, he could even see every subtle pattern on the surface of the stone sphere.

He was also increasingly certain that this sphere, only about ten meters in diameter, had an astonishing "degree of restoration." It was so exquisite and consistent with the detailed features of the "moon's" surface that it didn't seem like the "miniature model" he had initially imagined.

It seemed that it was completely the real "moon," "compressed" to this size.

(End of this chapter)