In three hours, the sun will rise from the distant sea level, and the relatively safe and stable daylight will replace the unsettling night - if the sun really rises normally.

Duncan glanced at the mechanical clock hanging not far away, the hands of which were ticking slowly.

"Are you going to wait for sunrise?" The goat-headed voice suddenly came, "There are still three hours left."

"... Waiting for three hours is less interesting than sitting here looking at a basically pale sea chart," Duncan shook his head, stood up and stretched his shoulders, then slowly walked towards the bedroom, "I'll go back and rest for a while. If I'm not out before sunrise, you can call me directly."

"At your service."

Duncan nodded, pushed the door open and returned to the bedroom, threw the piece of paper with the mysterious emblem pattern on the table, and walked towards the bed not far away.

His body basically didn't need much rest, but every once in a while, he would still take a short nap before dawn - not to relieve any fatigue, but simply to "get up and greet the sunrise."

This allows him to maintain a sense of being "alive" on the Homeland Lost, and prevents him from gradually losing his humanity on this ghost ship - although he does not know if there are any hidden dangers in this regard, after realizing that the state of the Homeland Lost is not as stable as he imagined, he has been consciously maintaining the habit of "maintaining a human lifestyle on the ship."

Duncan just lay down and closed his eyes, listening to the whisper of the wind and waves coming from the sea, feeling the constant and slight rocking of the big ship beneath him, and controlling himself to relax little by little.

※※※

On the Brilliant Star, in the captain's bedroom decorated in a feminine atmosphere, Lucrecia, who was wearing a silk nightgown, suddenly sat up from her bed.

Her hair was a little messy, and her expression showed a bit of fatigue and irritability. When she stood up, she was holding a huge rabbit doll that was half a person's height, with a funny shape and a hint of weirdness.

The doll was made of pink and blue fabrics, with a horizontal scar on its face and a blood-like eerie bright red smeared on its jagged mouth. The moment Lucrecia stood up, the rabbit doll moved slightly, then turned its head slightly, and looked at its mistress with its button-stitched eyes. A little girl's voice came from its cotton-filled body: "Mistress, I thought you fell asleep successfully..."

Lucrecia glanced at the clock beside her and said in a slightly annoyed tone, "Let's just say I slept for a few dozen minutes before I was awakened by a strange dream... What time is it now?"

"Two hours before sunrise," the rabbit doll said as it jumped from the hostess's arms to the ground. It hopped to the cabinet next to it, opened the cabinet door with its soft plush hands, took out the captain's collection of fine wine, poured a small glass, and handed it to Lucrecia. "You can also take a nap - this will help you calm down."

Lucrecia took the wine glass and drank it all, but still stood up: "No need, lying down will only make me more irritable... Clean up."

"Yes, mistress."

The rabbit doll with a little girl's voice answered crisply, then took the wine glass handed to it by the hostess and put it away. Then it began to jump around to make the bed, appearing to be very familiar with the process.

At the same time, Lucrecia snapped her fingers, and the lights in the room came on. She exhaled slowly, dragged her feet to the dressing table, reached out and tapped on a drawer under the mirror with her fingernails - the drawer opened in response.

★Illustration 23★

A toy sailor carved out of wood jumped out. The sailor was wearing a naval uniform from the classical era and holding a small command knife in his hand. He first bowed to Lucrezia, then stood on the top of the drawer, waving the command knife and issuing sharp commands.

A large group of toy soldiers ran out from the drawer, first quickly lined up and called the roll, then ran to the side to pick up the comb, hand mirror, water cup, and toothbrush, lined up quickly and flexibly and ran to Lucrecia's body or the back of the seat behind her, and began to help the hostess with her morning wash.

Lucrecia sat listlessly in front of the dressing table, letting the dolls toss and turn beside her, while she herself fought against the fatigue and stress brought about by a sleepless night and wild thoughts. At the same time, she was thinking about things related to the Lost Homeland from time to time. After a long while, she took a deep breath and forced her mind to clear up.

At this moment, a faint golden light suddenly came in from the gap in the curtains not far away and entered the field of vision of the "Sea Witch".

Lucrecia saw the light and didn't react at first. But after only two or three seconds, her eyes suddenly focused and she suddenly looked up at the mechanical clock next to her.

There is still one hour until sunrise.

This is not the time for the sun to rise!

She stood up suddenly.

The toy sailors were in a state of confusion for a moment, and then they gathered their things and reorganized their formation as if they were familiar with the process. The rabbit doll, which had already made its bed, noticed the movements of the hostess and came over in a bounding manner: "Mistress, it seems to be getting light outside!"

"It is not daylight now," said Lucrecia quickly, walking quickly to the window. "Where are we now?"

"We are still following the route we planned last night," the rabbit doll said quickly, "We are approaching the direction where the 'big guy' fell down!"

The moment the rabbit doll finished speaking, Lucrecia had already pulled open the thick curtains and then pushed open the window reinforced with a fine metal grid.

There was a thin, hazy fog floating on the sea outside the window. This was the most common scenery in the border area. Deep in the thin, hazy fog, a huge, vaguely diffused, light golden glow was quietly floating on the sea. It was impossible to judge how far away it was from the Brilliant Star.

A huge, glowing object floating on the sea.

Lucrecia stared at that direction, then took a deep breath, and her body suddenly turned into a pile of flying colored paper pieces - these colored paper pieces were blown out of the window, flew across the deck, passed through the stairs, and flew into the cockpit on the upper middle floor.

In the cockpit, Luni, a clockwork puppet dressed in a maid's outfit, was steering the ship. She was the first to notice her mistress approaching and let go of the steering wheel when pieces of colored paper flew in and circled. The next second, Lucrecia's figure emerged from the colored paper and reached out to take over the rudder.

"Madam, I was just about to send someone to call you," Luni stepped aside and said, "The golden light suddenly appeared from the fog. Judging from the direction, it should be the 'fallen object' we are tracking."

"Increase to full speed, everyone on standby, and prepare the stern to dive into the spirit world at any time," Lucrecia said quickly, "Are there sufficient reserves of spiritual dust and witch oil?"

Luni responded quickly: "Sufficient supplies, your order has been conveyed."

Lucrecia nodded, and soon after, the Brilliant Star fully woke up under the captain's command.

A large number of clockwork sailors, puppets and ceramic soldiers rushed to their respective jobs, and the special paddle wheel structures on both sides of the hull began to rotate faster. The engine device that seemed to be behind the times gradually released power that exceeded that of modern propeller engines, which rapidly increased the speed of the entire ship. In the back half of the hull, the ghostly "original hull" became more illusory and blurred, and black hair-like stripes gradually spread from the stern to the surrounding sea. From a distance, it seemed as if a dark tail wave extended from the back of the Brilliant Star.

Under Lucrecia's personal control, the entire ship presented a coexistence of magic and machinery, a mixture of beautiful elegance and terrifying ugliness!

As the speed of the Brilliant Star continued to increase, the huge golden glowing body floating between the mist and the sea surface finally appeared more and more clearly in Lucrecia's eyes.

Also revealed is its increasingly huge true scale.

Even the clockwork puppet Luni gradually opened her eyes wide and couldn't help but exclaimed in a low voice: "Oh my God... Mistress, what is that?"

Lucrecia did not speak, but just stared straight ahead, staring at the huge golden shadow that was gradually emerging from the mist and looked like a small mountain.

It is so large that its full outline is almost impossible to judge from a single perspective, and it is so majestic and perfect that it does not seem to be something that could be built by humans.

A huge and complex golden geometric body floated quietly on the sea, emitting a soft and breathtaking light golden glow all over. Its height was almost three times higher than the highest flagpole of the Brilliant Star, and its two sides extended out like city walls. Its upper part tilted slightly outward like a terrifying cliff, and there were no unnecessary and trivial protrusions on its surface. Every part looked natural.

As they got closer, Lucrecia and Luni began to observe more details of the giant creature.

"It seems to be translucent?" The doll Luni curiously crouched in front of the open viewing window. "It looks like... a piece of glowing colored glass?"

"...No, it seems that it's not just as simple as being transparent..." Lucrecia shook her head. She stared straight ahead without blinking, as if she noticed something incongruous at the edge of the huge glowing geometric body. At this moment, a small black dot suddenly flew out from the nearby mist and entered her field of vision.

It was a seabird - even in the vast ocean, even in this border full of strange phenomena, such a thing still existed.

Rather, it is precisely because they do not possess complex intelligence like humans that these "wild animals" live better in the strange border waters than those brave and powerful explorers.

Lucrecia's eyes were drawn to the seabird. She noticed that the poor creature seemed to be confused by the golden light on the sea, and in panic it rushed straight towards the glowing "mountain".

However, the next second, the expected tragic crash did not happen - the bird flew directly in, into the slightly inclined "cliff".

A moment later, out of the corner of her eye, Lucrecia saw the bird fly out from another direction, seemingly intact.

Luni also saw this scene. The clockwork puppet muttered in surprise: "...Is that an illusion?"