Chapter 1 The Fading Night

The night receded, and the pale scar occupying the entire sky gradually dissipated. Duncan stood on the stern deck, gazing up at the sky, not missing a single detail of this transition between night and day.

He watched as the scar slowly became transparent and illusory, like a dream gradually awakening. The grayish-white mist emanating from its surroundings was the first to merge with the sky, followed by the scar itself—and throughout this entire process, the position of the "scar" never changed.

Duncan blinked, a further speculation vaguely rising in his mind: the mark in the sky had not changed position, did this mean that it was not some distant astronomical structure? Did it mean that it was just a kind of illusion "printed" on the background of the atmosphere, moving in sync with the Endless Sea?

Or was it because the planet where the Endless Sea was located (if this was really a planet) happened to be in synchronous orbit with that scar? Or was the scar actually moving, but the observation time was too short to be detected with the naked eye?

All kinds of conjectures rose and fell in his mind, but Duncan was very clear that before there was sufficient evidence and reliable experimental verification, these conjectures were just conjectures. There could be thousands of possible explanations behind a natural phenomenon, but without theoretical and evidentiary support, everything was just empty talk.

The "sun" rose.

First, a golden radiance emerged from the horizon, followed by a huge, luminous structure abruptly surfacing from the sea, accompanied by brilliant and dazzling glows. The light sphere locked by a dual-rune structure appeared in Duncan's field of vision.

Under the slow operation of the rune structure, the sun rose solemnly, this majestic process seeming to have a sound—a kind of low, powerful, and slow rumble echoed vaguely in Duncan's mind, but when he really concentrated on listening, the sound suddenly disappeared.

He frowned, wondering if he had just had an auditory hallucination, but the memory brought by that sound was so vivid that he could not deny it at all.

Was that... the sun's declaration to the world as it rose? Or just one of the many illusions brought by the Endless Sea?

No one could answer Duncan's doubts, the vast and boundless Endless Sea kept all the secrets as always.

The pigeon A Yi squatted comfortably on Duncan's shoulder as usual, and then it suddenly stood up, flapping its wings vigorously, looking at the sea and shouting loudly, "Get some fries! Get some fries!"

Duncan couldn't help but laugh. He glanced at the strange pigeon and suddenly felt that it was not bad to have such a bird around—the strange words that this pigeon blurted out from time to time always gave him some "familiarity with home."

"Unfortunately, there are no fries on board," he flicked the pigeon's beak casually and turned to walk towards the captain's cabin, "but you're right about one thing, we need to get something to eat."

A moment later, the captain of the Ghost Ship prepared a traditional ghost ship breakfast for himself—in the captain's cabin, Duncan directly used the nautical table as a dining table, placing several plates on the empty tabletop next to the sea chart. Today's breakfast, like yesterday's dinner, yesterday's lunch, and every meal in the past, was jerky, cheese, and plain water.

Duncan sat in front of the nautical table, carefully and ceremoniously spreading his napkin. The goat head was quietly waiting opposite him. On his left was the cursed doll Alice, who had come to say hello early in the morning, and the strange pigeon was squatting on the tabletop on his right.

Duncan suddenly felt that this scene began to fit his persona as a "Ghost Captain"—the goat head wood carving representing the devil, the cursed doll that could not be discarded, the talking bird who knew the knowledge of another world, and the ghost captain sitting in the main seat, this could be used as a movie cover without editing...

But only those involved knew the current situation of the food on the Lost Country.

Duncan sighed and looked down at the things on the plate—the movie poster-like opening scene was over, and what followed was the real life of firewood, rice, oil, and salt on the Lost Country.

He picked up the dinner knife and cut hard on the cheese, and there was a squeaking sound in the friction of hard objects. He also poked the jerky next to him with a fork, and the jerky collided with the plate, making a crisp clanging sound.

Alice looked at this scene curiously, and finally couldn't help but ask, "Captain, today's meal is the same as yesterday's?"

"Tomorrow's will be the same," Duncan looked up at the cursed doll, "Do you want to try it?"

Alice thought for a while, then directly picked up a strip of jerky, put it in her mouth and chewed it twice, and then spat it out, "It's not tasty at all!"

"It wouldn't be tasty even if you could eat it—do you have a stomach?" Duncan reached out and took the remaining half of the jerky in Alice's hand, "I asked you to try it, and you really tried it."

Saying that, he looked at the food on the plate with some distress again.

The only food that could be found on the ship was this. The jerky tasted like salted cardboard, and the cheese was like loose, sandy firewood. And no matter how it was processed, it had a strange smell. He had also tried boiling the jerky in water or baking and pan-frying it, but he had spent a lot of effort but failed to improve the taste and flavor of these things.

The good news was that these foods had not rotted at least and would not poison people to death. The bad news was that the power of the passing years had still turned these substances that had not rotted into some kind of extremely not recommended to swallow state—Duncan had every reason to believe that this cheese was several rounds older than himself, and those jerkies, if they were still alive, had at least witnessed a century of ups and downs.

The captain of the Lost Country might not have to worry about scurvy, but Duncan was still longing for a healthy diet—at least, he hoped that the food on the plate could be younger than himself.

The same age would also be fine.

The "Lost Country Material Supply Plan" and the "Land Exploration Plan" that he had thought about in his mind yesterday floated into his mind again.

But none of this could be achieved in a short period of time.

Duncan sighed and continued to cut the "firewood" on the plate with a revengeful attitude. A Yi, who had been tilting his head and watching for a long time on the table next to him, came over curiously. The bird first looked at its master, and then looked at the things on the plate: "Crystal ore reserves insufficient?"

Duncan glanced at the pigeon and casually pinched some of the fallen cheese crumbs and threw them to it. A Yi pecked at it twice, and immediately stiffened like it had suddenly crashed...

The bird froze for a full three or four seconds before suddenly moving again. It flapped its wings and flew to the shelf next to it, making an angry voice: "I'd rather starve to death today, die outside, jump down from here, I won't eat..."

Duncan felt a little hurt, and the goat head, which had been quiet for a long time on the opposite side of the table, finally couldn't help but start making squeaking sounds of wood friction.

Before this guy drilled himself to make fire, Duncan finally nodded: "Speak if you have something to say."

"Yes, Captain," the goat head finally had a chance to speak and immediately became noisy, "I've been wanting to ask since yesterday, this one you brought... is she called 'A Yi'? Why can't I always understand what it's saying? I thought about it all night, what does charging Q coins mean?"

Duncan immediately raised his eyebrows—he really didn't expect that this goat head could hold it in until this time to ask, he had actually underestimated this guy's self-control!

"You don't have to care, this bird's thinking is very strange," Duncan did not stop the woodworking in his hand, but casually said the excuse he had thought of while making the sound of chisels, axes, and saws with the knife and fork in his hand, "It seems to use a set of language that only it can understand to communicate with people. If you listen to it more, you can probably guess what it means."

"Is that so?" The goat head pondered to itself, "But I always feel that there seems to be some kind of logic hidden in its words... just like there is a complete, self-consistent knowledge hidden behind that language... Did you discover A Yi during your travels in the spirit world? Then could it be some kind of projection from the depths of the dark? You know, the deeper you go, the more information from misplaced time and space will appear in the form of projections, including some lost eras that we have never understood, and even some fragments of the future. Perhaps A Yi is talking about something in another time and space?"

The cutting work in Duncan's hand paused for a moment that was difficult to detect with the naked eye, and then everything was as usual. At the same time, he said in a flat tone, "Then I wish you would summarize the logic behind the A Yi language as soon as possible."

The goat head's words might have been just random guesses, but the information revealed in them inevitably stirred up waves in Duncan's heart!

In the process of traveling in the spirit world, his soul got closer to the "deeper layer" of this world? In the "deeper" place, the more projections from misplaced time and space would be seen? Those projections might even present scenes from different timelines?

Duncan didn't see any "scenery from different timelines" when he was traveling in the spirit world, but the goat head didn't say a word wrong—A Yi was indeed from another time and space.

So... was this pigeon brought to this world by an earthling named "Zhou Ming," or was it really from the deeper layers of this world, as the goat head said?