Deep Sea Embers

The night continued, and on the twenty-second day after the sun set, news from afar began to reveal many disturbing situations.

In the distant Cold Harbor, a huge shadow briefly appeared above the sea - it was as tall as a sea cliff, like a weightless cloud. The shadow floated silently from the offshore waters to the sky, like a curtain. Closed on the side of the city-state, in the night, almost no one saw the shadow appear. It was not until the priest who was keeping watch suddenly felt the gaze from the sky in hallucination, and all the churches rang their bells at the same time, that the shadow retreated into the night in panic.

In the warm Moko, the entire downtown area was once immersed in a weird, scarlet and rancid mist. The lighting in several blocks broke down almost at the same time. The scarlet, rancid mist even briefly penetrated the church and the night. In the shelter, when the city-state's Keeper of Truth finally dispelled the fog that grew out of the night, several disappearances were reported in the city shrouded in fog - among the missing people were two people who were inspecting the technology of the steam hub. priest.

News came from the Parman Islands that a fleet suddenly appeared in the nearby waters and approached the city-state in the night. The city-state issued an order prohibiting docking and instructed the fleet to temporarily dock at the assembly point in the nearby waters. But the fleet seemed unaware of the "long night". They asked blankly about the night, insisting that it was "normal daytime" and "warm and bright sunlight was shining on the deck", and even People who question the city-state go crazy...

When the strange fleet ignored orders and insisted on approaching the city-state, the local city-state navy had to open fire and destroy all the unknown ships coming from the night - the radio was filled with frightened screams and desperate curses and cries, until the raging Burning debris was strewn across the sea.

No one knows what the city-state navy destroyed in the night, and no one knows what kind of "sunshine" the fleet that sailed from the night was bathed in...

It is now the twenty-second day of night, and the order of the world is still being maintained with difficulty, and the shaky "peace" is gradually falling into this long night.

In the lower town of Plane, the gas street lamps in front of Duncan Antiques Store emit a dim light. Street lamp poles line the empty streets like sentinels, and the flames of many of the lamps dance with subtle, A faint green flame that is imperceptible to the naked eye.

Duncan sat on a chair next to the display window, wiping a brass ornament while casually flipping through an old book.

It was one of Morris's collections of books, a masterpiece left by the famous "mad poet" Pullman.

On the open pages of the book, there are beautiful floral letters printed——

"We will finally have a long voyage..."

Duncan actually doesn't have much interest in the poetry of this world, but when the entire city-state falls into silence, this thing can help him kill time to some extent.

There have been no customers here for a long time - everything in the antique shop is at least twice as old, and it is foreseeable that this will continue to be the case for a long time.

But at this moment, the sound of the store door opening interrupted Duncan's random thoughts - the bell rang crisply. He raised his head and looked at the door of the store to follow the sound, and saw a man and a woman walking through the night. A little reserved and nervous.

"...It's really strange," Duncan glanced at the two of them casually and confirmed that they were just two ordinary humans. He couldn't help but be a little surprised, "There are still people hanging out at this time?"

The young man suddenly tugged on his coat nervously and said quickly while looking around: "We saw that the door is still open here... most of the shops outside are locked..."

"We work in the steam pump room and power plant," the young girl next to her also said, explaining the "legitimacy" of her activities at the moment as if she was afraid of being misunderstood, "We have the pass certificate."

"Oh," Duncan said casually, put down the brass ornaments in his hands, and glanced at the two nervous young people with a funny look, "Don't be so tense, I won't check your passes...you are Are you here to buy something?"

"We want to buy a pair of porcelain plates, the kind that can be placed on the fireplace as decoration," the young man said immediately, and then added, "...not too expensive."

He actually came here to buy something.

Duncan raised his eyebrows, stood up and walked to the nearby shelves. As he walked, he said: "This is an antique store, and everything is not cheap. Of course, there is less business during special periods. I can give you a discount. The original price is more than four thousand. Twenty-six of them all..."

He suddenly turned his head and looked at the man and woman with some curiosity: "But let me say one more thing, why did you buy this? I mean, do you have to choose this time?"

The two guests looked at each other, and the young girl smiled shyly: "We are getting married."

Duncan opened his eyes slightly in surprise.

"We are decorating our new home," the young man said. "We want to buy some decorative items... Most of the shops are closed, but we heard that your place is always open, so we wanted to come over and try our luck..."

"...It's been a long night, and I didn't expect to meet a new couple," Duncan said softly. He found a few pairs of beautiful decorative porcelain plates on the shelf, and said as if talking to himself, "Why not wait until dawn?"

"What if it's dark?" the young man said suddenly.

Duncan turned around and looked into the other person's eyes steadily.

"We don't know what the future will be like now... We were supposed to have a wedding last week, but it was postponed until now, but we all feel... there is no need to continue to postpone it."

"The wedding is small and will not violate the current night ban. The church pastor agreed to give us a small 'witness' at our home if the sun does not rise again..."

The young girl was talking, but she seemed to get stuck after saying "the sun will never rise again." She didn't know what to say next, so she could only smile awkwardly.

It was obvious that they were both people who were not good at words - but in their slightly reserved smiles, what they wanted to express no longer needed to be described in words.

Life must go on - panic and complaining will not wake up the sun.

"Pick the one you like," Duncan laughed suddenly, turning around and pointing to the beautiful plates on the shelf that shone under the light of the electric light. "They all come with solid wood stands."

The two young men made a selection and finally selected a pair of light green gold-decorated porcelain plates with southern elf characteristics. They waited for Duncan to wrap the things in thick paper, and then the young girl smiled shyly. Then asked: "How much?"

"Give it to you." Duncan said casually.

The two young men opened their eyes wide in surprise.

"This is a wedding gift to you - the night is still long, I hope this gift can bring you good luck."

The young man hesitated: "But..."

"Don't waste time, your pass is not valid all day," Duncan said with a smile, walking towards the door of the store, "Don't worry, I have received your 'repayment'."

The young man wondered: "Have you received it...?"

Duncan pushed open the door of the antique shop. In the night, bright street lights illuminated the way back into the darkness. He smiled and pointed to the brightly lit avenue: "A good mood."

The customers left, and the antique store returned to silence again. Duncan stood at the door for a while, finally exhaled softly, and looked away from the street.

The dock area of ​​Qingfeng Port is bathed in pale golden "sunshine".

The tall mast of the Lost Home made a slight creaking sound, and the translucent spiritual sail gradually emerged as a clear outline around the mast. As the sail gradually filled up, the huge sailing expedition ship tilted slightly. angle, and began to leave the docked dock.

On the nearby sea, the sound of the Brilliant Star's impeller starting was also heard. Along with the crashing waves, the ship of the "Sea Witch" also slowly sailed away from the dock.

Alice, who was standing next to Duncan on the bridge on the stern deck, suddenly noticed the smile on the captain's face.

"Why are you smiling?" the puppet asked curiously, "Is there anything happy?"

Duncan turned back and glanced at Qingfeng Port, which was gradually being left behind by the Homeless Ship. He saw that the city-state had thousands of lights, and there was thin and dim sunlight spreading from the coastline, covering the island - - As the distance goes away, all the light gradually dims, and is replaced by endless darkness that permeates the entire boundless sea, growing in the night as if it is about to swallow up the entire city-state.

But until a long time later, that weak firelight was still shining tenaciously in the darkness. The remains of the sun left by the Cretan Dynasty and the lights of thousands of families in the city-state era gradually merged together, as if they were fighting together. This is an endless night.

After a while, Duncan answered the puppet's question: "There are some happy things."

"Oh..." Alice said in confusion, and then looked in the direction of the city with some reluctance, "Are we coming back?"

Duncan hesitated for a moment. He seemed to have many answers to explain the next voyage and plan, as well as many possibilities for the future, but in the end, he just nodded with certainty: "...come back."

The puppet becomes happy.

A smile appeared on Duncan's face, and then he breathed a sigh of relief and released his hands from the dark steering wheel.

They have left the Breeze Port. Next, the Lost Home and the Brilliant Star will go to the "assembly point" on the eastern border, where they will join the Deep Sea Church's border fleet. Then, they will march towards the Eternal Veil, all the way Heading towards the "six nautical mile critical line".

They will follow the route that the Sea Song once sailed to find the truth beyond the border.

For Duncan, this will be his most important step in “seeing the sanctuary from the outside.”

But before that, Duncan still needs to verify a few things.

He turned his head and looked at the skinny and rickety figure on the edge of the bridge who was trying to reduce his presence.

"sailor."

Anomaly 077 was immediately excited when he heard this: "Hey...hey?!"

"Come here," Duncan smiled. He took a half step back, looked at Anomaly 077, raised his hand and pointed at the steering wheel of the Lost Home, "hold it."