Upon hearing Agatha’s report, Duncan’s first reaction was to glance at the bedroom door not far away with the corner of his eye.
Then he returned his gaze and looked at the forr "gatekeeper" in the mirror, his expression exceedingly solemn, "You’re saying it was reflected on the surface of the sea?"
"Not just the reflection on the sea, but also its projection in the Spirit Realm—in normal circumstances, these two types of ’shadows’ are deeply connected and influence each other," Agatha said earnestly, "Last night, when it was quite late, I was traveling through the mirrors on the ship as usual to check on the ship’s condition. Then suddenly, I discovered this situation, but at the ti I thought it was one of the ’peculiarities’ of the Holoss, given that I knew so little about it..."
"The Holoss doesn’t have that Trait—at least within what I know, its ’shadow’ wouldn’t disappear out of the blue," Duncan shook his head, "When did this phenonon occur? About how long did it last?"
Agatha imdiately nodded: "Judging from the ti, it should have happened during the influence period of ’The Dream of the Naless’ you ntioned, lasting until the first light of dawn appeared on the sea surface."
Duncan didn’t speak but furrowed his brows tightly, a tinge of deep contemplation on his face.
After a mont’s silence, Agatha continued, "When the shadow of the Holoss disappeared, I happened to be traversing through the mirrors of the real world. Normally, I could jump directly through those mirrors into the Spirit Realm, or enter the reflection of the Holoss on the sea surface. However, last night, this ’jumping passage’ disappeared along with the shadow of the Holoss...
"However, my feeling is that the domain ’on the other side’ of the mirror didn’t really cease to exist, but there seed to be so kind of barrier that I don’t understand, obstructing my view, so I couldn’t see the path in the mirror, nor could I sense what was on the other side..."
Listening to Agatha’s account, Duncan seed to think of sothing, "You an... you believe that the ’shadow’ of the Holoss didn’t really disappear, but at that ti, it entered a state that you couldn’t understand or observe; or in other words, there was a ’perception’ barrier that ’locked’ you on this side of the real world?"
"Exactly," Agatha looked as though she had let out a sigh of relief, "I was worried my description was too abstract and that I would have to struggle a lot to explain it to you..."
"In Pland and Frost, I’ve dealt with all kinds of ’curtains’," Duncan said offhandedly; then after a pause, he looked thoughtfully at the door not far away, "So, after hearing my conversation with the goat-headed one just now, you grew suspicious—because my ’first mate’ never ntioned last night’s abnormal situation."
"I don’t know why that is, but theoretically... it should be able to notice changes in the Spirit Realm. While its perception may not be as sharp as mine, it wouldn’t be completely unaware," Agatha’s tone was slightly hesitant, "Especially regarding the matters you just ntioned, the existence of the other ’goat head,’ and its suspicious and peculiar behavior..."
Duncan exhaled softly and said, "You believe that ’goat head’ is no longer trustworthy because it might be hiding sothing from ."
"...I know, as a ’new crew mber’, I shouldn’t doubt the first mate of the ship. It’s a great taboo, but as a forr ’gatekeeper’, I have an instinctive... ’alertness’ to these matters," Agatha chose her words carefully, speaking sincerely, "Many irreversible situations start with a little sense of ’wrongness’ that first arises."
Duncan listened in silence, neither expressing agreent nor blindly refuting.
After a long ti, he finally spoke amidst his pondering, "There could be two explanations: either the goat head knows what happened but didn’t tell , which would be a deliberate concealnt; or, even it is unaware of the changes that occurred on the Holoss last night."
Agatha was montarily taken aback, then quickly understood, "The second explanation ans..."
"That so force is affecting this ship—and the goat head is within the ’affected’ range," Duncan said gravely, "While you were not influenced, which is why you could observe the changes that happened to the Holoss at night."
...
Humming a cheerful tune that she couldn’t even rember the na of, Alice was bustling around the kitchen.
For her, the busier days aboard the Holoss were always the happiest monts.
Here, she had everything she was familiar with: the familiar deck, the familiar kitchen, the familiar pots and pans, and also the familiar barrels, kitchen knives, and spatulas.
They were all her friends; everything on this ship was her friend—and in most cases, she found dealing with the ship’s friends much easier than interacting with people in the City-State.
Because dealing with people in the city required learning too much, rembering too much knowledge, and paying attention to a bunch of soporific "rules" — those creatures called "humans" were always too frail, their unguarded presence strung with countless "lines," and if she carelessly grasped one, they would inexplicably break beyond repair, much finer and more fragile than the ceramic and glassware on the ship.
But the captain placed great importance on those "humans." He didn’t want her to randomly tamper with the "lines" on others, let alone damage those who shouldn’t be broken.
For Alice, that was a bit difficult.
It was like putting a cat in a room full of balls of yarn but not allowing it to touch any of the strands with its paws.
So after the novelty of going to the city wore off a few tis, Alice found she still preferred living on the ship—because here, she hardly beat anyone.
As long as she was careful not to "touch" the friends who were also on the ship.
She liked it that way; she liked the world around her solid and stable.
Lifting the lid of the barrel storing salted fish, Alice carefully leaned over the barrel, sniffed the aroma inside, and a satisfied expression crossed her face.
The captain never understood this, and neither did the other people on the ship—why would an automaton have a sense of sll?
Alice herself didn’t know, but she never thought too much about it.
She simply felt satisfied with her craftsmanship and took a wooden basin from the side to remove so of the pickled fish from the barrel—she reached into the barrel, but before she could take anything out, a long-handled spoon on the countertop next to her suddenly jumped up and slapped her arm with a "snap".
Alice gasped, quickly withdrawing her hand as she spoke, "I washed my hands already, just now!"
The long-handled spoon wobbled on the edge of the barrel, showing no intention of moving aside.
Alice pursed her lips, a bit displeased, "Not useful!"
The long-handled spoon slowly floated up, gesticulating with the scoop end in front of the automaton.
"...Alright," Alice finally accepted reluctantly, grasping the spoon handle while muttering under her breath, "It’s just that last ti I bent over to pick sothing up and my head fell in, is it really necessary to be this troubleso..."
She took the fish out of the barrel, chatting idly with the friends in the kitchen, sotis ntioning what she saw and heard in the City-State, and sotis talking about things related to the captain.
Then she started checking the other food storage containers—because Ai Yi could supply Holoss with fresh ingredients at any ti, most of the food that needed to be stored here were things that could be preserved over the years, with pickled fish being the most popular.
There were a total of twelve large wooden barrels for storing pickled fish.
Alice started counting along the wall from the door— one, two, three, four... twelve, thirteen.
She suddenly stopped.
The automaton lady blinked in confusion and counted again from the beginning.
Still thirteen.
One extra.
Alice stood sowhat dazed in front of the row of wooden barrels, her brain working hard. At first, she questioned whether she made another counting error, as her math skills had never been that great, sotis not even better than Sherry’s, but soon she felt she couldn’t be that unintelligent—after all, it was just a matter of counting twelve barrels.
She had already learned to do addition and subtraction beyond two digits.
So Alice rubbed her eyes and patiently counted again.
Twelve.
The extra number from before had disappeared, and everything was back to normal.
After counting between the barrels over and over, Alice finally confird that she hadn’t miscounted again, but she still didn’t feel any less puzzled. She turned her head and glanced at the other things in the kitchen, unable to help her curiosity she asked, "Did you notice? There seed to be an extra barrel just now!"
However, the friends in the kitchen were unable to truly answer her—even if they could speak, these at most "animated objects" that exhibited traits of living beings due to the special environnt of Holoss did not possess full intelligence to help resolve the automaton’s confusion.
Alice didn’t get an answer, so she turned back and patted the large wooden barrels that were arranged along the wall, "Did one of you just multiply?"
The wooden barrels didn’t answer her either.
...
Sala l was dumbfounded as he listened to the "Sea Witch" telling him about her incidents, not even noticing the food in his hands falling onto the table.
He could no longer be bothered about the witch lady, who freely ca and went, for barging into his residence early in the morning and interrupting his breakfast ti.
"These inconceivable events... did they all happen last night?"
The elven Governor said in disbelief. In reality, his initial thought was "Are you teasing ?" but considering the witch lady’s temper, he refrained from making such a futile provocation.
"Seeing your reaction, it seems to be as I had expected," Lucricia sighed. She sat across from Sala l, as for the shivering servants in the dining room, they had already been sent away before she started to discuss serious matters. Now there were only the two of them, "The range of influence from that ’Dreamscape’... is larger than imagined."
Reviews
All reviews (0)