Chapter 32 Breakfast on the Homeloss

Dusk faded, and the ashen scar that filled the sky gradually dissipated as well. Duncan stood on the stern deck, gazing up into the sky, not missing a single detail of the transition from day to night.

He watched the scar fade like a dream awakening, becoming transparent and ethereal bit by bit. The greyish-white mist that emanated from it mingled with the sky first, followed by the body of the scar itself—and throughout this process, the "scar" never changed position.

Duncan blinked, a flicker of speculation forming in his mind: If the mark in the sky didn't shift its position, could that mean it wasn't some distant astronomical phenomenon? Could it merely be some sort of "imprint" embedded in the atmosphere, moving in sync with the Endless Sea?

Or was it because the planet of the Endless Sea, if this truly was a planet, and the scar were somehow locked in a synchronized motion? Or could the scar actually be moving, but it was imperceptible to the naked eye due to the short observation time?

Various conjectures ebbed and flowed in his mind, but Duncan was well aware that without sufficient evidence and reliable experimental verification, all these speculations were just that—speculations. Behind a natural phenomenon, there could be innumerable explanations, but without theories and evidence to back them up, all would be idle talk.

The "sun" rose.

First, a golden glow emerged on the horizon where sky met sea, then a massive glowing structure abruptly surfaced, accompanied by a splendid radiance. The luminescent sphere, locked in by dual rune structures, appeared in Duncan's view.

Under the slow motion of the runes, the sun rose majestically. This solemn process seemed to have a sound— a deep, strong, deliberate rumbling that reverberated through Duncan's mind, but when he truly concentrated to listen, the sound suddenly disappeared.

He frowned, a bit doubtful whether he had just experienced an auditory hallucination, yet the memory that the sound stirred was so vivid, he couldn't deny its existence.

Was that... the sun's proclamation to the world as it ascended? Or was it just one of the many illusions brought about by the Endless Sea?

No one could answer Duncan's doubts. The vast and boundless Endless Sea, as always, held its secrets close.

The pigeon Ai Yi, as usual, sat comfortably on Duncan's shoulder. Then, quite abruptly, it stood up, flapping its wings vigorously while staring at the sea and squawking loudly, "Some fries! Some fries!"

Duncan couldn't help but laugh. He glanced at the peculiar pigeon and suddenly felt having such a "bird thing" around wasn't too bad—the odd words it blurted out from time to time gave him a sense of "homeliness."

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

Moments later, the captain of the Homeloss had prepared himself a Ghost Ship's traditional breakfast—inside the captain's cabin, Duncan used the navigation desk as his dining table, placing a few dishes on the empty space next to the sea charts. Today's breakfast, like yesterday's dinner, lunch, and all previous meals, consisted of dried meat, cheese, and plain boiled water.

Duncan sat at the navigation desk, carefully and ceremoniously laying his napkin for himself; the goat head rested quietly across from him, while the Curse Doll Alice, having come to greet him early in the morning, was to his left. The quirky pigeon perched on the tabletop to his right.

Suddenly, Duncan felt that this scene began to fit his persona as the "Ghost Ship Captain"—the goat carving representing the devil, the Curse Doll he couldn't dispose of, the Eloquent Bird privy to Otherworld knowledge, and the Ghost Ship Captain himself at the head. This scene could make a movie poster without any edits...

But only those aboard the Homeloss knew the true state of the ship's fare.

Duncan sighed and looked down at his plate—the cinematic opening scene was over, now came the plain reality of life's essentials aboard the Homeloss.

He picked up the knife, pressed firmly into the cheese, the friction producing a squeaky sound, then poked the dried meat with his fork, which clinked crisply against the plate.

Alice watched curiously, finally unable to restrain herself from asking, "Captain, is today's meal the same as yesterday's?"

"Tomorrow's will be the same too," Duncan looked up at the Curse Doll, "Do you want to try?"

Alice thought it over, then picked up a piece of jerked meat with her hand and chewed it hard twice before spitting it out, "It doesn't taste good at all!"

"It wouldn't taste good even if you could eat it—do you even have a stomach?" Duncan took away the remaining half of the jerked meat from Alice's hand. "You really tried it when I asked you to."

As he spoke, he looked at the food on the plate with a somewhat troubled look.

The only food they could find on the ship was like this: the jerked meat felt like thick cardboard with salt added, the cheese was like loose, sandy wood, and no matter how it was processed, it still had a strange smell. He had tried boiling the jerked meat or baking and pan-frying it, but all his efforts did nothing to improve the taste or texture a bit.

The good news was that the food wasn't rotten at least, and it wouldn't poison anyone. The bad news was that the relentless passage of time had turned these non-decaying substances into a state that was highly not recommended for swallowing—Duncan had every reason to believe the cheese was several decades older than himself, and if those pieces of jerked meat were still alive, they would have witnessed the rise and fall of a century.

The captain of Homeloss might not have to worry about scurvy, but Duncan still longed for a healthy dietary balance—at least, he wished the food on his plate were a bit younger than himself.

The same age would do.

The "Homeloss Supply Plan" and "Land Exploration Plan" he had considered yesterday once again surfaced in his mind.

But these were not things that could be achieved in a short while.

Duncan sighed and continued to saw at the "wood" on the plate with a vengeful fervor, while Ai Yi, who had been tilting his head watching from the next table, walked over curiously. He first looked at his master, then at the food on the plate: "Is there a shortage of mineral stock?"

Duncan glanced at the pigeon and casually tossed it some cheese scraps that had fallen off. Ai Yi pecked at them twice and then suddenly stood as if frozen…

The bird stayed stiff like that for a good three or four seconds before it suddenly sprang into action, flapping its wings and flying to the shelf beside them, making a distressed sound: "I'd rather starve to death today, die outside, jump down from here, but I'm not going to eat..."

Duncan felt like he had been slightly wounded while the goat head that had finally quieted down for a while on the opposite side of the table couldn't help but start making creaking, grinding wooden sounds.

Before the goat head could pester him for fire again, Duncan finally nodded, "Speak if you have something to say."

"Yes, Captain," the goat head finally got the chance to speak and immediately began babbling, "I've been wanting to ask since yesterday, the one you brought with you… is called 'Ai Yi,' right? Why can't I ever understand what it says? I thought about it all night, what exactly does 'topping up Q coins' mean?"

Duncan's eyebrows shot up—he really hadn't expected the goat head to hold out this long before asking the question, underestimating its self-control!

"No need to fret over it, this bird's thoughts are very strange," Duncan didn't stop his woodwork, but continued making the noise of chisels and saws with his cutlery while casually offering the excuse he had prepared, "It seems to communicate with people using a set of language that only it understands, listen enough and you'll roughly guess what it means."

"Is that so?" pondered the goat head on its own, "But I always feel like there's some kind of logic hidden in its words...as though the language conceals a complete, consistent body of knowledge...Did you discover Ai Yi while wandering through the Spirit Realm? Could it be some kind of projection from profound depths? You know, the deeper you go, the more likely you are to encounter projections from misplaced spacetime, which often contain fragments of lost eras or even the future. Maybe Ai Yi is talking about matters from another spacetime?"

Duncan's cutting paused for a moment imperceptible to the naked eye, then everything resumed as normal, and he said in an even tone, "Then I wish you luck in figuring out the logic behind Ai Yi's language."

The goat head's words might have been a random guess, but the information revealed inevitably stirred waves within Duncan!

During his journeys in the Spirit Realm, had his spirit drawn nearer to the "deeper layers" of this world? The deeper the place, the more likely he was to see projections from misplaced spacetime, which might even show scenes from different timelines?

Duncan hadn't seen any "scenery from different timelines" while wandering the Spirit Realm, but the goat head got one thing right—Ai Yi indeed came from another timeline.

So… was the pigeon brought to this world by an Earthling called Zhou Ming, or was it, as the goat head suggested, from deeper layers of this world?