Deep Sea Embers.

Chapter 793 Alice's "Liberation"

When Duncan and Vanna arrived at the stern control platform, Miss Puppet was squatting next to the rudder, whispering to a pile of ropes and barrels - Duncan got closer and listened for a while, and found that it was the puppet who was giving psychological counseling to the barrel.

The main content of the counseling was "Although I don't know how to drive a boat, don't panic. After all, I don't know much about driving a boat, because I said I don't know how to drive a boat."

Duncan felt that it was a mistake to leave the puppet alone on the bridge, and now he felt that the whole ship was tense.

At this moment, Alice finally noticed Duncan standing nearby. The puppet quickly stood up from the pile of barrels and ropes and waved happily: "Captain! You are finally here!"

"Yeah," Duncan nodded sternly, looking at the puppet while seriously ignoring the miscellaneous objects around him that were moving away from the platform in various strange ways. "Why, are you still feeling nervous?"

"A little bit," Alice nodded a little stiffly, but then a smile appeared in her eyes, "But it's much better now! I just talked to my friends and found that they were also very nervous, so I'm not so nervous anymore..."

Vanna looked at the puppet with strange eyes: "...Do you know why they are nervous?"

"I don't know," Alice looked up with a righteous look on her face, "They didn't tell me, but they said they would remain optimistic."

Vanna was stunned, while Duncan sighed with an expression that he had long been accustomed to, and then waved his hand at the puppet: "Don't think too much, don't worry, Goat Head and I will monitor the situation on the ship throughout the whole process. I said that you are at the helm, but it is just to complete a 'symbolic' process. Do you remember what I told you before?"

Hearing the captain talking about business, Alice's expression finally became serious. She quickly recalled her experience with the captain in the "Alice Mansion" and the feeling in her heart when she held the "drawing board" in that strange black fog hall. Then she nodded to the captain with a serious face: "I remember it all. You asked me to remember that feeling... When I hold the steering wheel, I will imagine it as my own 'drawing board' and 'tell' the Lost Homeland all the information in my memory, right?"

"This is a plan based on the feedback from the Lost Homeland when the Sailor was at the helm," Duncan nodded gently, "but now we are not sure whether the Lost Homeland can 'understand' the instructions you gave. After all, the routes recorded by you and the Sailor are not the same."

"Yeah, I understand." Alice nodded repeatedly, "So we need to do a test first, right? Once we are sure that I can really establish a connection with this ship, we can really leave this place."

Duncan nodded silently, and as he brought Vanna to the edge of the control platform, he once again checked the status of the Lost Homeland, communicating with the slightly agitated "consciousness" of the ship in his mind. After confirming that the Lost Homeland was ready, he nodded slightly to the puppet beside the rudder: "You can start, Alice."

Alice's expression was tense. She took half a step forward and took a deep breath - however, the doll did not need to breathe, so she just imitated the deep breathing movements of others to hint herself to calm down.

The dark rudder stood quietly in front of her, confronting her in silence.

The doll thought about it and still felt that this was a very incredible thing - although she was not very smart, she usually thought about a lot of things, and even in her most imaginative imagination, she had never imagined such a scene: she stood in this place and had to touch the steering wheel of the Lost Homeland like the captain.

But this is what the captain asked her to do, and what the captain said must be right.

Alice was nervous and afraid, but she never had any doubts. She reached out her hand without any doubt and grasped the steering wheel, which was as dark as the night and looked particularly heavy.

At this moment, the world in the puppet's eyes... turned upside down.

Alice opened her "eyes" wide, and she clearly felt that she had lost the perception of her body.

She lost her body... no, she now has another "body".

She felt herself floating on the sea, surrounded by chaotic mist. The cold and calm sea water soaked every inch of her hull. The dim light of the sky illuminated her deck. The invisible sails were curled in the spiritual world, waiting for the order to set sail.

She became the Lost Homeland, she was the ship itself, she was its rudder, its sails, its deck and ropes - endless threads entwined around the ship, like strings controlling a puppet, like human nerves, like the countless thoughts flowing in a mind.

She was amazed at the changes in her "body" and the close connection between herself and those "lines". Suddenly, she seemed to understand something she had always ignored:

The Lost Homeland has a soul.

Then of course it's wired.

It’s just that it has been hiding its “line” - until now, with the captain’s permission, it has finally seen the “line” on the ship.

Alice became happy, and her consciousness began to flow in this huge new body, "running around" with great curiosity. She found that there were still many areas on the ship that she could not feel or see through, including the captain's bedroom and part of the structure of the bottom of the ship. But even if these parts were removed, she also discovered many secrets on the ship that she had never seen before - some rooms that she had not "explored" yet, some locked cabins, some corridors and mezzanines that only the captain knew about...

But suddenly, Alice's joyfully flowing consciousness felt an oncoming resistance. Amid an illusory roar, she stopped in this "boat-shaped network" woven by countless thin lines. Something hit her head-on and stopped her - or maybe it was two things.

The puppet stopped blankly, and in the depths of the dim space woven by countless thin threads, she saw a... goat head.

The goat's head was floating somewhere, looking at her in confusion.

She also looked at the goat head in confusion.

"What the hell is that!?" After a few seconds of confrontation, the translucent goat head that was floating in the air like a phantom finally let out a strange cry.

“Mr. Goathead!” Alice was delighted and wanted to raise her hand to greet him as usual, but she suddenly remembered that she was just a simple consciousness wandering in a brand new body, so she shouted at the top of her voice, “Captain, let me take the helm!”

"I know you're at the helm," Goat-head looked at the puppet in confusion. He was monitoring the situation of the entire ship as usual, but he never expected that a "thing" running around would suddenly appear in the "spirit" of the Lost Homeland. He sank down curiously to take a look, and bumped into this ignorant and reckless puppet, "But why are you here?"

"I don't know," Alice said confidently, "Isn't this what it's like to steer the ship? And why are you here?"

"...I have been with this ship for a century. Why am I here?" The goat-headed man suddenly widened his eyes and looked at the puppet in front of him who seemed like a ball of phantom light in his perception. "And who told you that this is how you steer the ship? The person at the helm usually doesn't let his soul get into the soul of the ship! And you are rushing around recklessly. Aren't you afraid of hitting someone..."

Alice was stunned for a moment, and then an idea suddenly occurred to her: "Under normal circumstances, would we bump into people in the 'soul' of a ship?"

Goat Head: “…”

"But I did bump into someone," Alice said with an awkward smile before the goat-head could respond. "And why do I feel like it wasn't just you I bumped into... I always felt like there was a passing black shadow..."

She was just mumbling to herself when she suddenly heard a weak and resentful voice coming from the void: "It's me..."

Alice was startled to see that in the dark chaos beside her there were indeed pieces of strange and incongruous shadows scattered around. Those shadows seemed to be scattered fragments floating in the countless silk threads and the depths of the hazy shadow of the Lost Hometown. After a moment, the largest piece of the fragment suddenly squirmed, and then many shadows of all sizes began to gather and reshape rapidly.

A figure stood up from the shadows—Agatha adjusted her adventurer's coat, rubbed her face, and kneaded herself into a human shape, then stared at the doll.

"You just ran over me! You smashed me to pieces!" The usually good-tempered gatekeeper was rarely so resentful, "How can you be so reckless?"

Alice looked at Agatha in a daze, then turned her head to look at the Goat Head next to her. Finally, after the captain, she became the second crew member on the ship who knew the strange and colorful life of the "first mate" and "lookout".

At this point, she decided to have fun first: "...Hehe."

Goat Head and Agatha lost their temper in an instant.

Then their attention was focused on Alice.

"Your current state... is incredible." Agatha looked up and down at this puppet who had become a "part" of the Lost Homeland without knowing it. With the professional qualities of a former gatekeeper, she carefully observed Alice's "mental phantom". "So, this is your 'essence'? Or... a look that is closer to your essence?"

Alice thought for a moment: "What does it mean?"

"...It means that your normal body has been suppressing and restraining you, but now the more powerful 'carrier' of the Lost Homeland has given you a certain degree of 'freedom'." Agatha was already used to Alice's appearance, and she explained it patiently. "Don't you feel it?"

Alice finally understood. The hazy light with her image floating in the void made a happy sound: "Yes, it feels light and comfortable, but I always feel..."

"I always feel that?" Goat Head and Agatha said in unison.

"I always feel like... something is wrong." Alice hesitated and stopped, muttering as she slowly raised her "head". "This is not my body, that... is it."

Goat Head and Agatha were stunned for a moment, and then turned their eyes to the sky at the same time.

An illusion that was far larger and more fragmented than the hazy phantom of the Lost Hometown had been hanging upside down in the sky above this chaos.

"...fuck!"

(End of this chapter)