Duncan and Alice stood at the end of the stairs leading to the bottom of the cabin, and what they saw was a strange and terrifying scene - the entire bottom of the ship was in a fragmented state, and outside the broken cabin, there was clearly some kind of nothingness filled with endless dim light.

Is this the real "bottom structure" of the Lost Homeland? What is outside this shattered cabin?

Could such a scene exist beneath the surface of the Infinite Ocean?

Duncan took two cautious steps forward and came to the shattered cabin. He stepped on the largest piece of wooden fragment and looked back in the direction he came from.

The "last door" still stood quietly in the same place, fixed on a floating wooden board. Behind the door was a dark staircase, sloping upwards - but around the door, there were no walls that should have existed, only an empty space.

This door is floating alone in this space.

Duncan carefully walked around the back of the door and found that there was nothing behind it. Through the open door, he could directly see the broken cabin opposite.

"Captain..." Alice's nervous voice came over. The puppet looked around with fear on its face, and finally its eyes fell on Duncan. "This... This is normal, right?"

Duncan was actually even more unsure than the puppet. After all, the puppet could still blindly trust the captain, but where could the "captain" find confidence at this moment? However, looking at Alice's nervous look and thinking of the "crew rules" that Goat Head had said, Duncan still forcibly controlled his anxiety and maintained his usual serious and calm appearance.

"Don't worry," he said calmly, "The Lost Homeland is a ship you can hardly imagine."

"Indeed, it's really hard to imagine..." Alice said in amazement. Duncan's calm performance obviously made her feel a little relieved. She began to look curiously at the broken hull and the chaotic light and shadow outside the hull. "Captain, it doesn't look like there is water outside?"

Duncan thought about it, and suddenly looked at Alice curiously: "Do you think this is below the surface of the Infinite Ocean?"

Alice was stunned: "Ah? Why are you asking me?"

Duncan said calmly: "Because you have experience."

"You threw it away..." Alice started to speak subconsciously, but she quickly swallowed it back and answered honestly, "I don't think so... The sea must be full of water. Even if there is something wrong with the Infinite Sea, there must be water below the sea level. But it looks like... it looks like..."

"A void filled with chaotic light." Duncan shook his head and walked forward slowly. He came to the edge of the wooden fragments under his feet and looked down at the flowing light and shadows outside the cabin. "The bottom of the Lost Homeland... is not in the Infinite Ocean."

Alice was stunned: "Ah? Then where is this?"

Duncan remained silent, seeming unfathomable—actually because he didn't know either.

But he still had a vague guess: Perhaps, this ship was actually sailing in several different dimensions at the same time?! On the surface, the Lost Homeland was sailing on the vast ocean of the real world, but in fact, different parts of this ship belonged to different dimensions?!

This also explains why the deeper you go into the Lost Homeland, the more eerie and gloomy the surrounding cabins seem. Perhaps it’s not the cabins themselves that are eerie and gloomy…

So if the dark and chaotic space outside the cabin is not the endless sea, then what is it? It doesn't look like the spirit world, nor does it look like the dark space seen when traveling through the spirit world... Could it be somewhere deeper? The abyss? The subspace?

With countless guesses and assumptions in his mind, Duncan slowly reached out and drew the pirate sword from his waist. Then, holding the lantern in one hand and the long sword in the other, he slowly reached for the edge of the fragment under his feet. He was very cautious at this moment. Although the gaps between the fragments looked like he could jump over them in one step, he did not take a rash step, but instead tried with his long sword first.

God knows if something will suddenly emerge from these cracks and swallow up anyone who dares to cross them.

The next second, he opened his eyes slightly in surprise.

He saw that the tip of the sword disappeared, but on the edge of the fragment opposite the crack, a piece of the sword tip suddenly emerged.

Duncan frowned and tested in a different direction, and a similar phenomenon occurred again.

He finally slowly understood.

These areas that look like cracks are actually still continuous in space! The seemingly fragmented cabin structure is actually still intact!

He stood up, looked around at the cracks and the light and shadows flowing outside the cracks, and realized something in his mind: these "fractures" were only an optical result, but did not affect the continuity of space. The hull of the Lost Hometown was not broken here, but for some reason, the "picture" outside the hull appeared inside the hull.

But what causes this? Is it spatial overlap? Or is it an incorrect projection of higher dimensions into lower dimensions?

Duncan subconsciously mobilized all the reliable or unreliable knowledge in his mind, trying to explain the strange phenomenon here. Alice, who was standing by, looked at the captain with a confused look on her face as he made some strange moves on the edge of the crack, shining a lantern everywhere, poking everywhere with a sword, and finally couldn't help but ask after watching for a long time: "Captain... are you using a special soothing ritual to... soothe the cabin?"

Duncan turned his back to Alice and silently put away his sword. He gritted his teeth and said, "...Yes."

"Oh! That's amazing!" Alice's eyes suddenly lit up, "Then do you want to perform a soothing ceremony for all the fragments here?"

"...That's enough," Duncan continued to say with a straight face, and then quickly diverted her attention before the curious puppet could continue to speak, "Let's move forward."

As he spoke, he took a cautious step forward with the lantern in hand - when he took this step, he almost tensed all the muscles and nerves in his body, ready to guard against any unexpected situation when crossing the crack, but in the end nothing happened.

Just like the previous test with the long sword, he simply "skipped" the process of crossing the crack and walked directly to the debris on the opposite side as if he was walking in a normal cabin.

Alice watched in amazement as the captain walked ahead, passing through the cracks as if ignoring them. She followed him in the same way, but she still became nervous when crossing the cracks. Finally, she couldn't help but speed up and jump forward...

Then, of course, he bumped into Duncan in front of him.

Duncan felt a sudden gust of wind behind him, and then something hit his back hard. He subconsciously turned around and waved his hand -

The next second, he looked expressionlessly at the headless puppet that was fumbling around behind him. Alice's head was rolling more than ten meters away while she stammered, "Right...right...right..."

"Just wait here and I'll pick it up for you," Duncan sighed. While thinking about why he brought this useless doll down with him, he quickly caught up with Alice's head that was gradually rolling away and picked it up with ease. "Would you consider putting a screw in your neck..."

Alice's head seemed not to have heard the second half of Duncan's complaint. She just suddenly opened her eyes wide and looked in a certain direction: "There...there...there is...there is a fan..."

Duncan frowned and turned his head to look in the direction Alice's head was desperately signaling with her eyes.

A black wooden door stood quietly on the debris at the end.

A door... There is actually another door, there is actually another door!

When Duncan saw the hint on the door at the end of the stairs, he wondered if this classic situation would happen. But when he saw that there was an extra door in the "bottom space", his heart couldn't help but jump!

At this time, Alice's body also stumbled over. Duncan returned the doll's head to her and looked at the door: "Was there such a door over there just now?"

Alice put her head back on her neck with a pop, and while moving her cervical spine, she glanced over there: "It seems not, it only appeared after we walked over here."

Duncan hummed noncommittally and walked cautiously towards the door with lantern in hand.

In fact, in this strange cabin, he no longer needed the lighting of the lantern. Although the chaotic light that seeped in from the cracks was dim, it was enough to maintain the basic brightness of the entire space. However, he still kept the lantern in his hand - this was necessary caution.

Although Goat Head had not reminded him of this, Duncan had decided that as long as he was in the cabin below the waterline, he would never turn off the light.

The newly appeared door looked ordinary. The black door panel was not much different from the "last door" at the end of the stairs. It also had a similar style and material to the doors used in most cabins on the Lost Homeland.

Duncan looked up and saw a line of letters cast in copper above the door frame:

〖This door leads to the Banished〗①

Notes:

①This gate leads to the Lost Hometown.