Walking in the Spirit World

The door closed behind him, cutting off the goat head's empty stare.

But Duncan could still clearly sense the Exile, sensing every subtle change on this ghost ship through his empathic connection to it. He "saw" the series of sails on the Exile being finely adjusted in the sea breeze, and the black helm wheel at the stern was turning slightly, further stabilizing the Exile in the waves.

As he had expected, the goat head temporarily took control of the helm and began conscientiously performing its duties as first mate, but Duncan could still take over the ship at any time.

Compared to when he was directly steering, the Exile was slightly weaker in terms of agility and speed, but Duncan's main goal now was to further dispel the fog on the nautical chart. Without a clear destination or route, he didn't care about this slight impact.

After confirming that the goat head was not behaving strangely and the gothic doll below deck was staying in the room as well, Duncan breathed a sigh of relief and took a look at the not-too-large room.

This was his private cabin as captain, the most comfortable and refined room on the Exile. In addition to a soft bed, there was a classical wardrobe against the wall facing the door, and a shelf with many strange items. Opposite the bed was a dark brown desk, but there were no books on it, only a few decorations and tools for writing and drawing.

Next to the desk was a window that overlooked the distant sea. On the wall next to the window were several hooks where Duncan's pirate sword and flintlock pistol hung.

Duncan walked to the desk, placed the sword and pistol within reach, and opened the drawer to check the gunpowder and lead balls in the wooden box.

A small brass compass was placed next to the lead balls and gunpowder bag. Duncan picked up the compass and saw that the pointer under the glass case was still spinning wildly, as if constantly being pulled by an invisible force of chaos. The bottom of the compass was engraved with a small line of text: "We are all exiles."

Duncan casually played with the compass in his hand, watching the pointer spin around like it was drunk.

He had checked everything in this room many times before. He had discovered this room during his initial exploration, and everything here, including the message, was probably left behind by the real Captain Duncan.

After reviewing the information he currently had, Duncan sighed and placed the compass on the table, then rubbed his fingertips lightly with his right hand.

A small green flame ignited on his fingertip, and under the reflection of the flame, Duncan's half palm immediately showed a transparent and ethereal texture like a spirit. But under conscious control, the flame did not spread out like before. Instead, it hovered above his finger like a candle flame.

After the flame stabilized, Duncan approached it with his other hand and felt it. Then he took a feather pen from beside him and touched the flame with the end of the pen.

There was no heat and the feather pen was not ignited. Only a dark green tint spread on the pen shaft, making the feather pen glow with a faint light.

Duncan did not receive any feedback from the feather pen, which was completely different from when he touched the nautical chart and the helm with the flame.

Duncan silently noted this new experience: the "spirit fire" had no temperature, did not ignite things, and was highly likely to be only connected to the "abnormal" things on the Exile, with no feedback on ordinary things.

So what if there were "abnormal" things outside the Exile... would the flame react?

Duncan pondered, and for a moment, the figure of a certain gothic doll, Alice, suddenly appeared in his mind. Wasn't she an "abnormal" from outside the Exile?

Would she be affected by this spirit fire?

But he only thought about it for a moment, and then threw this endless idea aside.

Because even though Alice was not human, even though she was the cursed "Abnormal 099," she was also an independent entity with her own thoughts and abilities to speak and walk, and she was now a "crew member" of the Exile. Duncan had instinctively regarded her as a "person."

He could not accept using a living person to test his own fire. After all, he was not sure what profound effects this flame might have on affected "abnormal" and whether it was harmful.

Next, Duncan tested several more times, examining the nature of the flames and determining whether there were any extraordinary properties behind everything in the dormitory.

Finally, his gaze settled on the small brass compass with the message on it.

The brass compass lay quietly on the table, with the pointer under the glass case spinning randomly. But it seemed that, as Duncan maintained the flame and cast a "suspicious" gaze on the pointer, it suddenly froze for a moment.

Then it continued to spin wildly as if nothing had happened.

Duncan: "..."

This thing definitely had a reaction to his gaze just now!

He had been wary of this compass all along, as it bore the inscription "The Real Captain Duncan." He was worried that the deceased ghost captain had left some sort of power or "trap" on this personal item to prevent theft. So he had not tested the compass with the flame. But after seeing the compass's reaction, he suddenly made up his mind.

Duncan reached out and picked up the compass. The icy touch spread to his fingertips. After glancing at the still-spinning pointer, he placed the compass directly into his right hand, which maintained the spiritual flame, and slowly clenched his hand.

The eerie green flame flowed like burning oil and spread between his fingers. A faint flame quickly ignited on the surface of the compass. Countless illusions rose and fell within the flames. Then, the next moment, the pointer that had been spinning randomly suddenly stopped and pointed straight to a direction on the vast sea.

Duncan's heart skipped a beat. In that instant, he clearly felt the "feedback" from the compass and confirmed that this was indeed an "anomalous object" that could be controlled by the spiritual flame. But before he could carefully perceive the details of this feedback, a sudden "gravitational force" attacked him!

Duncan felt his body shake, and the next second, the furnishings in the captain's quarters had disappeared, as had the walls and ceiling, which had disintegrated like snowflakes. Amidst the scattered light and shadows, endless darkness filled his vision.

Duncan stood in the center of this darkness, stunned. The alarm bells in his mind were ringing loudly. His first reaction was to reach for the musket and sword that were by his side, but he quickly realized that the only thing left beside him was the brass compass, which he still held tightly in his hand.

Duncan blinked, and in his gaze, countless slender rays of light suddenly spread out from around the brass compass.

These rays of light spread and intertwined in the darkness, as if weaving a web that expanded infinitely. Between the interweaving rays of light, countless dots of starlight appeared, some scattered and drifting, others converging like rivers. Against the background of the interlacing network of light, they glittered like a galaxy.

Duncan looked at the strange vision before him with some confusion. He was alert and somewhat uneasy, but for some reason, he did not sense any sense of danger, and even...

Between the dim network of light and starlight, he felt a long-lost sense of peace and comfort.

The next second, a strange feeling suddenly came over him. Duncan's gaze was involuntarily drawn to a cluster of starlight in the interweaving web of light. He looked at the starlight and felt as though it was about to fall into the darkness.

He instinctively reached out to the starlight.

At that moment, a tremendous force pulled him, and Duncan felt as though his soul was flying. He involuntarily rushed toward the starlight about to fall into darkness, while the dense web of light woven by the compass rapidly receded from his sight. The galaxy formed by the convergence of starlight around him began to rotate and morph suddenly!

As he flew rapidly, he instinctively looked at his right hand, which held the compass tightly, but he saw that the compass had disappeared at some point. At the same time, just before he made contact with the dim starlight, he saw a shadow suddenly condense in the darkness out of the corner of his eye.

That shadow seemed to naturally float beside him, as if it had always been there, and flew rapidly with him towards the dim light.

Duncan could barely make out that the shadow seemed to be a bird spreading its wings, but before he could discern any details, everything went black.

A heavy sensation came from his limbs, and he could also smell the stench of decaying flesh and hear the harsh sound of heavy iron chains dragging on the ground, all of which came from the real world.

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