Deep Sea Embers

Agatha is able to travel through shadows and mirrors in an instant. In the first moment after The Dream of the Unknown, she can return to the Homeless Ship in the real world and observe the changes in the boundary of the reflection - Duncan has no doubt about her ability.

"As long as there is an awakening between Silendis and the Goat Head, the Dream of the Nameless One will end..." Duncan frowned slightly, thinking carefully about the conjecture that Agatha just raised, "That is to say, the Dream of the Nameless One will end..." Is it actually 'maintained' by Silantis and Goat Head?"

"In other words, it's their shared dream," Agatha said with a serious face. "This can also explain why the 'Reflection Lost Home' sailed on the edge of Silantis' dream."

Duncan didn't speak for a while, just quietly gathering his thoughts.

After a while, he suddenly broke the silence: "So just like you said, the reason why the dream of the Nameless Man ended early this time was that my first mate was 'awakened' - that caused it to be 'awakened' What’s the reason?”

Agatha thought for a while and then spoke uncertainly: "Maybe... it has something to do with your final helm?"

Duncan frowned slightly: "At the helm?"

"You controlled your flames very carefully this time, and also reserved a safe fire on the 'dream ship' by implanting the flames in the reflection of the Lost Home in advance, which really avoided the 'scare' To Sirandis, but you yourself are still an 'outsider' to that dream ship," Agatha said of her conjecture, "Do you remember? You passed in the real world. Qingfeng Port touched the vine and forcibly intervened in that dark and misty space from the 'outside'..."

Agatha spoke, Duncan listened, and the goat head kept turning its head around, looking at the captain and then at Agatha. As the most direct party to the whole thing, it was the most confused one on the scene, but Now it finally understood what Agatha meant, and immediately reacted and looked at Duncan: "Captain, my loyalty is unquestionable, Captain! You are the real owner of the Lost Home, even if I really dream... "

"I know, but the problem is not with you," Duncan waved his hand before the goat head finished talking. "It is the inherent property of dreams - it will repel 'invasion'."

Having said this, he paused, and then continued thinking while thinking: "It seems that unless they are directly dragged into the dream like Vanna and others and become a part of the dream of the Nameless One, any attempt to connect to the Nameless One from the outside will The act of dreaming will lead to this kind of 'repulsion', either waking up Silantis or waking you up..."

The goat head raised its head, and the hard wooden face showed a humanized look of confusion: "Then what should I do? Captain, you know, I don't even know that I am dreaming, and I can't control this. …”

"You can't control it, but the matter itself may not be difficult," Duncan said thoughtfully, "I already have an idea... Maybe I can verify it tonight."

…

Lucretia frowned and looked at Taran El who was busy in a lot of "clutter" in the laboratory. After a long time, she finally couldn't help but said: "You sent the apprentice to my house early in the morning. You called me here just to show me how messy your lab is? You've been 'digging' in this mess of machines and papers for half an hour... Did I tell you that I'm very busy? ?”

"It's almost ready, it's almost ready. There is a lot of automatically recorded data here that needs to be sorted out..." Taran Ayre raised his head from behind a machine with a black casing, his messy hair Brushing away the oil stains from who knows where, "I have improved the equipment here myself. Now it seems that they still have a lot of room for improvement in terms of convenience... Oh, I finally removed this paper box. , this is the last one..."

The elf scholar muttered, and finally got out of the dazzling pile of machinery and equipment, and returned to Lucretia with a pile of printouts, paper tapes, and films. He piled things on the table and continued without raising his head: "Yes, I know you are very busy, because Qingfeng Harbor is shrouded in a huge vision, and you and your father are both working on this." Things are running around - thank you for your running around, but we 'locals' should also do something, even if we haven't found a way to fight against that 'dream' yet..."

Lucretia's expression finally became more serious. She temporarily forgot the unpleasantness of being interrupted from her work early in the morning and being urged to go out. She came to the academician's desk and looked at the various records on it: " So, is this your effort to fight against that 'dream'?"

"It's not just me who is working hard, many departments, many colleagues, as well as other agencies in the city, knowledge guards and peace officers, we are all thinking of ways - we may not be as powerful as your father, but stupid ways are also ways... Yes, this is partly my work.”

Taran El said, pulling out a long piece of paper tape from the pile of records and placing it in front of Lucretia.

"Here are my vital signs and sleep logs from last night."

Lucretia's expression changed slightly. She took the paper tape handed over by the other party and looked at the jumping curves and a series of punch records on it with a serious expression - she noticed that this was the output of some kind of punch recorder. Automatic data, and there are extremely obvious "breaks" in the data.

"I slept in this laboratory yesterday," Taran El pointed to a bed in the corner of the room. Next to the bed, you could see several strange-looking equipment. The equipment seemed to have been moved in a hurry. Here, cables and pipes are tangled in a mess. "These are things I have made before. I have tried to use them to improve my sleep efficiency. The goal is to exchange the shortest sleep time for a better rest effect." ...Those electrodes can record my brain activity. The curve on the paper tape is the curve. The punch holes next to it are my breathing records. Each time I exhale, there is a round hole, and every time I breathe in, there is a square hole..."

"There are two obvious interruptions here," Lucretia interrupted. "Judging from the timestamps on the edge of the tape, they occurred at nine o'clock last night and early this morning, that is..."

"That's when the Dream of the Nameless One begins and ends." Taran El took the paper tape from Lucretia's hand, found the two interruption points, and then held the paper tape in front of him, "At At these two points in time, there was an obvious 'gap' in my brain, but this is not the biggest problem. The biggest problem is actually... between these two interruption points."

He held up the paper tape. The long record was filled with continuous jumping curves and punched holes.

"There are still records," he pointed to the part between nine o'clock last night and this morning. "Have you discovered the problem? Ms. Lucretia..."

"I guess you recorded more than this," Lucretia had already reacted and said quickly, "Where are the other things?"

"The most intuitive thing is this." Taran Ayre didn't show off. He turned around and took another pile of things from the table - it was a pile of black and white pictures.

Lucretia took a look at the pile of things and found that they were all photos - the subject of the photo was the bed in the corner of the laboratory.

The first few photos showed Taran El lying on the bed, including the great scholar greeting the camera, but the subsequent photos only showed an empty bed-the ones that were originally fixed on the great scholar's head. The electrode fell onto the pillow.

"I set up three cameras, hooked them up to timers and continuous film, and every fifteen minutes they would take a picture of my sleeping place from three angles," Taran Ayre said. "Did you see? There has been no one in the bed since nine o'clock - because then the dream of the Nameless One appeared and I had disappeared to the 'other side'..."

The great scholar said, picking up the long piece of paper again, finding the middle part of it, and placing it in front of the "Sea Witch".

"Then the question is, madam - between nine o'clock last night and five o'clock in the morning, when I had disappeared from the real world, who was the brain activity recorded by this machine... of?"

Lucretia took a breath and looked at the last photo in her hand.

On the empty bed in the corner of the laboratory, the electrodes used to read brain activity lay empty on the pillow. The metal pieces of the electrodes glowed coldly in the lens, as if silently in the quiet night of the city. Communicating with invisible ghosts.

"The problem doesn't stop there. The Dream of the Nameless One has brought us a lot of confusion, and the weird data recorded by the instrument is only part of it." Taran El's voice woke up Lucretia from her thoughts. The university student The reporter walked behind his desk, sat down and said slowly, "Another question is - where do we go after falling asleep?"

"……you mean?"

"I just listened to your description. When the Dream of the Nameless One occurred, you and your father's followers were involved in a strange dream. There was a huge forest in the dream, similar to what I saw when I was trapped in the dream. They are very similar, but... I have no memory of this last night.

"Since the last time I was trapped in a dream and rescued by you, I have never seen that forest in my dream again.

"Not just me, but everyone in this city. When the dream of the Nameless One comes, the whole city disappears into the night, but we don't wake up in the dream world like you. , and there was no activity in that mysterious forest - we closed our eyes, and when we opened them again, it was another normal day. Without the reminder from you and your father, we wouldn't even be aware of what happened last night. .

"So, when night falls, where do all the people in the city go?"

Of course Lucretia didn't know the answer, and Taran El didn't expect to get any answers from this witch. He was just talking to himself and setting a goal for himself.

The sun passes through the clouds, passes through a big tree outside the laboratory, passes through its lush crown and intertwined branches and leaves, and casts mottled brilliance, falling on the desks of the university students, and falling on the automatic equipment to record on the information.

Lucretia slowly raised her head, her eyes moved along the sunlight, looking at the mottled tree shadows outside the window, and then slowly opened her eyes.

"Master Taran El..."

"What's the matter, ma'am?"

"...Was there originally such a tree outside your laboratory?"