In the deepest part of the engine room, where the power sector lies, all the crew mbers and zealots who once stood watch are now dead, but the massive steam core continues to operate without control.
The reactor vessel rumbled with a low vibration, the pipes and valves surrounding it occasionally hissed softly under the control of the automatic balancing system, and the warning lights monitoring the Boiling Gold Catalyst blinked steadily, indicating that the pressure inside the steam core was operating at high levels.
At the end of a steel platform, so dozen ters away from the steam core, stood a colossal copper column, situated between the roof and the floor. Portions of the column’s outer shell were hollowed out, revealing complex gears and connecting rods in motion within. The rapid clicking noise of the precision machinery shed continuously like waves, as strips of paper were sucked into one opening on the edge of the column and then expelled from another to be transferred to other storage devices or punch analyzers.
This expensive and precise difference engine was automatically calculating paraters related to the ship’s subsequent navigation plans and providing this data to the engine room. Part of its input and output data ca directly from the navigation station above—none of this could fall into the hands of the Subspace Shadow.
A massive cloud of doom was gathering, a foreboding more terrible than death descended—the Ghost Ship Captain had realized what was happening, and his anger was descending upon this place.
Without hesitation, the imnse Skeleton Spider moved. It waved its long limbs and quickly scurried to the front of the copper column, then without hesitation, it drove a bony spike into the core power shaft of the difference engine.
The surface of the dark bone spike exuded a field of corrosion, and the protective casing of the power shaft, guarded by a thick copper shell and steel armor, was pierced as easily as if it were paper. The steel bearing inside that constantly rotated instantly emitted a series of ear-piercing noises, followed by a catastrophic collapse of the connected gears and connecting rods, which entangled subsequent punching machines and paper strips into the ss—
The difference engine and the subsequent punch analyzers both derived their power from the sa main shaft. A single power collapse was enough to destroy the entire system, a "safety flaw" designed intentionally so that in case of ergency, the ship’s recent navigational records and the control center could be destroyed as quickly as possible.
But that wasn’t enough; simply destroying the difference engine wouldn’t stop the Ghost Ship Captain.
As long as the ship could still sail, it could still potentially take that captain to the "Holy Land."
The task of The Saint was to lift the safety limits of the steam core.
The steam core, currently in a state of reaction, was indestructible, and its thick protective shell isolated its Boiling Gold Catalyst and reaction dium from the outside world. Even nitroglycerin explosives might not be enough to break through that spherical shell—it was necessary to initiate an ergency shutdown of the steam core first.
Now, the conditions for a shutdown were t.
Accompanied by the roaring sound of the collapsing power shaft of the difference engine and a series of ear-piercing noises from the gears, all the machinery connected by gears, belts, and connecting rods began to fail in a chain reaction. The steam output from the steam core instantly breached the safety valve’s limit, and fatal high-temperature, high-pressure steam began to fill the engine room, surpassing safe levels. In a cacophony of squealing and grinding noises, the spherical shell of the reactor vessel started to descend.
The Boiling Gold Catalyst was disengaged from the core as the casing lowered, but the blazing "fireball" was still burning fiercely within the reactor vessel. The terrifying heat, along with the airflow, swept towards the control platform—a wave of heat that could instantly cook a living person.
To The Saint, however, it was only a breeze.
Facing this "breeze," he lifted his skeletal limbs and quickly picked up several barrels of nitroglycerin explosives piled nearby, and without hesitation rushed toward the reaction container emitting deadly heat with flas rising within.
The mont of devotion had co, the mont of martyrdom had arrived... Destroying everything here, The Saint’s cause could not be disturbed by that evil spirit returned from Subspace...
The flas in the reactor vessel soared, and the uncontrolled Spectral Fla was teetering on the brink of criticality. Just one barrel of nitroglycerin would be enough to "nudge" at this critical point and blow the entire ship to pieces.
The Saint held the explosives aloft.
Almost simultaneously, the flas inside the reactor vessel suddenly took on a ghoulish green light.
A terrifying face appeared within the vessel, among the rapidly uncontrollable firestorm; Duncan’s upper body gradually erged from the steam core’s flas, leaning down to lock eyes with the Skeleton Spider who was holding high the barrel of nitroglycerin, and his voice thundered like a storm, "Do you think this will work?"
"Die, ghost!"
The Skeleton Spider roared in anger, then violently hurled the nitroglycerin at the reactor vessel.
A violent explosion ensued—in the flash of an eye, the entire reactor container was engulfed in an uncontrollable, terrifying explosion. Duncan’s fla avatar, not yet fully ford, shimred in the explosion, and then the flas around him that had not been eroded by the Spiritual Fire beca shockwaves in the blast, sweeping everything in the compartnt.
The steam core exploded; the Boiling Gold Catalyst triggered a chain reaction under critical pressure. Amidst the terrifying boom and wildly boiling heatwave, the entire ship began to rip apart from the engine room at its core.
The Skeleton Spider stretched its limbs within the storm of impact, its bone spikes desperately grasping at anything nearby. Its bone fragnts ignited in the heatwave, its brain’s surface bulged and emitted a dim light, its nervous system was slowly burning away, its blood boiling within the brain tissue—he was dying, but a strange exhilaration spurred his mind.
He had successfully detonated the steam core before the Ghost Ship Captain could take full control.
No one on this ship would survive, including himself—but at least, the "Holy Land" was safe.
The hull beneath the engine room began to tear open, the surging seawater boiled amidst the flas and quickly backflowed into the cabin, emitting a deafening roar.
"The Saint" pulled in his severely burned eye stalks, quietly awaiting the arrival of death.
But death did not arrive.
The surroundings had, unbeknownst to all, fallen silent.
After a mont of hesitation and bewildernt, the dying Skeleton Spider lifted its eyestalks around its brain again. Through its blurred and dim vision from burns, it witnessed a bizarre scene.
Every fla in the chanical bay had been instantaneously tinged with an eerie green. The Spectral Flas, like ti itself had frozen, were suspended midair. The shattered cabin, along with the surging seawater, was all frozen in place.
Amidst these frozen elents was the recently destroyed steam core—its fragnts still floated in the air, with molten drops of steel blooming like a strangely beautiful and sinister flower.
A tall figure descended from the explosive light of the steam core. Dunkan stepped out of the fire and approached the Skeleton Spider in the still chanical bay.
He brushed aside the suspended molten tal near him, commanded the obstructive frozen flas to move aside, and calmly gazed at "The Saint."
This "Annihilating Priest," hardly recognizable as human, was still alive. After facing the massive explosion of the steam core at extrely close range, within the terrifying high-temperature impact capable of vaporizing steel, this monster was rely severely burned.
Moreover, during the brief encounter earlier, it had quickly assessed the situation and, without hesitation, chose the strategy with a higher chance of success—destroying the ship. Such sensitive and rapid judgnt was almost akin to a kind of "precognition."
Very powerful, very clever, possessing eerily potent abilities.
But for Dunkan, sothing else was more important—
As Rabi had said, the Annihilating Priest had already "devoured" his Symbiotic Demon, eliminating one of his most significant weaknesses as a follower of annihilation: he would not die from either the death or loss of control of his Symbiotic Demon.
This made him a bit more "durable."
However, it was evident that to make this follower of annihilation useful, he would first need to heal—his present weakened state could not endure the pressure that ca with establishing communications with the mysterious Saint.
As for the present, Dunkan had another concern.
"I’ve heard this ship has a supply port, which you call the ’Holy Land,’" he lowered his head, looking into the many eyes of the Skeleton Spider, "Where is it?"
The weakened Skeleton Spider shook slightly, part of its limbs struggled to lift but soon fell again, and a hoarse and muffled voice arose from within the mass of grotesque and nauseating biological tissue: "Give up... You’ll never find it... I’ve destroyed all the navigation records and control devices, and beyond that, the location of the Holy Land is only in my brain—just now, I have obliterated that part of my mory. Even if the four deities themselves ca, you couldn’t find that route..."
However, to "The Saint’s" surprise, the captain of the Ghost Ship did not show the slightest displeasure at this response.
Dunkan simply shook his head with a hint of regret.
"No matter, it won’t take too much effort."
In a faint perception, The Saint suddenly sensed sothing, his skeletal limbs struggling violently, his damaged eyestalks turning repeatedly toward the figure standing in the flas: "What... what are you going to do?!"
Dunkan paid no attention, simply turning his head to look at the still flas in the air, the fragnted cabin in the distance, and the surging seawater beyond the shattered hull.
The ship was so severely torn apart that through the broken upper deck, one could even vaguely see the sky amidst the frozen flas.
"What a fine ship, such a pity."
He murmured softly and then turned to face what was left of the now thoroughly shattered steam core. He reached out and gently touched the group of flas hanging still in the air.
These flas used to be the heart of the ship.
Now, they needed to beat again.
The eerie green flas began to ripple, a low and strange rumble started to emit from every inch of the ship. With increasing tremors, the ship—whose power was entirely lost, and which was broken and scattered—seed to be slowly "coming to life," struggling to begin to accelerate.
Dunkan leaned close to the group of flas and commanded the reanimating ship—
"Go ho."
Thus, the great ship turned around and embarked on the journey ho.
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