The fleet returned to the foggy border in the direction they came from. Perhaps due to the sinking of the large entity "Holy Island", the nearby sea area did not seem very calm. The mirror-like sea was constantly reflecting layers of fine ripples like fish scales, and the thick fog around it always presented bizarre illusions - this made many people nervous.

But until halfway through the journey, no truly threatening entity had emerged from the fog.

The spirit sail was hoisted high, and a slight creaking sound was heard from time to time as the angle of the sail rope changed. A thin mist was flowing on the deck of the Lost Homeland. In the thin mist, Agatha's figure was faintly emerging and strolling through the mist.

She was checking the "environment" around the Lost Homeland. At this moment, the scenery of the real dimension and the spirit world were reflected in her eyes at the same time - the surrounding fog seemed different from when she came, and the spirit world seemed to be slightly restless. Although it seemed that this would not have any impact on the Lost Homeland, she was still a little concerned and became more vigilant.

The others were gathered in the cabin at the moment: the captain was communicating with his followers about matters concerning the deep sea.

In front of his trusted crew members, Duncan did not hide his experience in the deep sea, including the content of his communication with the Lord of the Deep.

Morris sat at the long table with a pipe in his mouth. Wisps of smoke floated up, as if showing that he was not at peace at the moment. After a long time, the old scholar put down the pipe and muttered with a subtle expression: "I have seen many incredible things in my life, but I have never encountered such a situation. The creator of this world actually invites you to take over His position..."

Nina stretched out her hand and twisted her arm hard, as if she still doubted whether she was dreaming. Then she looked up at Duncan: "Did you really refuse?"

Duncan said calmly, "Yes, there are big problems with the Deep Lord's plan, so I rejected it."

"Does the shelter have no future..." Lucrecia muttered to herself. She seemed to recall a conversation she had with her father. After a long pause, she said softly, "I still remember the question you asked me. You asked me if I felt that this vast sea was too narrow and cramped. But now it seems that even such a narrow and cramped shelter has reached its limit. I never thought that we would get such news after coming here far away from the civilized world."

A slightly depressing atmosphere enveloped the cabin, and the area around the long table suddenly became quiet. After a while, Nina came to Shirley and asked in a slightly worried voice, "How do you feel now? Are you feeling unwell?"

"It feels no different from usual, even my eyesight and hearing seem to be much better than before," Shirley muttered, her eyes still glowing with blood, "but thinking about having to cover my eyes or close them when I go into the city... it feels really troublesome."

"At least I'm back safely," Nina couldn't help but mutter, "I was so worried when I found out you were missing. I wanted to go to the island to look for you, but Goat Head stopped me..."

Listening to the whispered conversation coming from the side, Duncan's eyes slowly swept over the figures beside the long table. His tense expression relaxed a little, and then he exhaled lightly.

"Let's stop here. This trip to the Holy Island is very exhausting. Everyone should take a good rest before returning to the city-state."

As soon as he finished speaking, he stood up, waved his hand to signal others not to stand up, and then turned and left.

The captain left - and until his figure disappeared at the door, the cabin maintained a slightly depressing silence. It was not until a long time later that Nina muttered to break the silence: "Uncle Duncan looks very tired... He has a lot on his mind."

"He has too many things to consider," Morris put out the pipe in his hand, "unfortunately, there is not much we can do to help him."

After a moment's thought, Lucrecia looked at Agou and asked, "Did father say anything else after he rejected the Deep Lord's 'plan'?"

Agou thought for a moment and spoke uncertainly, "He said he had another plan, but it's just an idea right now and he hasn't found the right path yet... That's all. He didn't mention anything else, and he didn't explain it to me and Shirley."

Listening to Agou's story, Lucrecia fell into deep thought...

Duncan did not go anywhere else after leaving the cabin. He went straight through the middle deck and came to the door of the captain's room at the stern.

In the thin mist that slowly drifted across the deck, the dark wooden door stood quietly before him as always, and the words "Door of the Lost" on the door frame were clear and sharp.

〖The door of Banished〗

Duncan put his hand on the door handle, but suddenly stopped and just stood there quietly. In a brief moment of contemplation, he raised his head and looked at the pale mist like layers of curtains outside the ship's side, and the chaotic sky light shining through the mist, and stood there for a long time.

After an unknown amount of time, he finally withdrew his gaze and pushed the door open.

Walking through the familiar door, stepping on the familiar floor, and entering the familiar room, Zhou Ming let out a light breath and strolled through the living room.

Everything in the single apartment is just as I remembered, as if it would never change, as if it had been like this not just for the past few years or decades, but even for the past thousands or even tens of thousands of years.

Everything here was imprinted deeply in Zhou Ming's mind. He walked past the home furnishings that were so familiar that they couldn't be more familiar, walked to the window, and looked at the scenery outside through this window that had never been opened.

The pale mist was like layers of curtains. It was impossible to distinguish any scenery that should have been the "street" in the mist. Only the chaotic sky light was pouring down from above and permeating the mist.

Zhou Ming hesitated for a moment, then slowly reached out his hand to the window and pressed on the glass.

I felt a cold and hard touch, but the window remained motionless as usual, as if it was solidified with the space.

He took a deep breath and then blinked slowly.

The moment his eyelids closed, in the first 0.002 seconds of darkness, he... saw nothing.

There are no windows, no fog outside the window, and no so-called "real side" presented in one's field of vision.

There was only endless darkness before his eyes, an ultimate nothingness like the extinction of all things.

Zhou Ming slowly took two steps back and calmed his breathing.

He remembered the changes that had taken place in himself. He remembered that when he was moving on the "other side" of the door, every time he blinked he could see some "real scenery" hidden beneath the real dimension in the brief moment of 0.002 seconds. But why was there only a darkness of extreme nothingness before his eyes here?

Is it because he is "Zhou Ming" instead of "Duncan"? Is it because this room is some kind of higher-level existence? Or is it because there is really... nothing here?

Zhou Ming stood in the living room, lost in thought, and then, out of the corner of his eye, he noticed a bright light in the room.

…That was his computer. The computer that had been unplugged was humming, and the monitor was automatically playing the wallpaper image in a continuous loop, just as usual.

Zhou Ming frowned, as if he had thought of something, and quickly walked to the computer and sat down.

He moved the mouse to close the wallpaper, then opened the browser and began typing in the search bar. It seemed that because he had not used it for a long time, his operation became a little unfamiliar. He made several typing mistakes before he slowly regained his touch.

He still remembered that the browser of this computer had responded to one of his operations - it showed "the moon" at the time, and this response did explain to him the "truth" of the world to some extent.

Will it respond to any other questions of its own?

Amid the sound of the keyboard, he first typed "0.002 seconds" in the search box and then pressed Enter.

He looked anxiously at the rotating cursor and the slowly moving progress bar, while his thoughts were fluctuating -

Navigator No. 1 told him that he had come to this world at the beginning of the Great Annihilation. The ancient kings surrounded him, and he saw a chaotic cocoon of light floating in the center of the ashes... Was that cocoon of light his "bachelor apartment"?

If so, then what do all the furnishings in this bachelor apartment represent?

What does this computer represent? What does the shelf at the end of the room represent? What about those "models" that were transformed here after being burned by the flames? What do they symbolize?

The cursor flickered, the progress bar at the bottom of the screen suddenly cleared, and the browser's error message appeared in Zhou Ming's field of vision.

But he was not surprised.

After a brief thought, he typed new information into the search box:

The Great Annihilation

The browser reports an error and the search fails.

Zhou Ming was not discouraged. After thinking for a moment, he typed another keyword:

The End of Time

Then came the new error message, and then more keywords——

[Cosmic Collision]

Redshift

Shelter

[Ancient Kings]

Deep Sea Era

[Stars]

…

I kept trying the keywords one after another, but the error message on the screen remained the same.

After trying countless times in a row, Zhou Ming finally frowned. As the last keyword "Zhou Ming" brought a new error message, he sighed softly, feeling a sense of loss in his heart.

"It" did not respond to itself and did not give any answer.

Unable to tell whether he was feeling frustrated or empty, Zhou Ming shook his head, leaned back in his chair, and stared at the screen in front of him with tired eyes.

The tiny cursor was still flashing in the search bar, as if it was still waiting for him to type new keywords, or just making a silent mockery.

Zhou Ming sat quietly like this for more than ten minutes, but suddenly, he stared at the small flashing cursor, and something seemed to suddenly occur to him.

He sat up straight, put his hands on the keyboard again, and typed another keyword -

〖Inverse singularity〗

The moment he pressed the enter key, an illusory roar suddenly broke into Zhou Ming's mind, and then the screen in front of him fell into darkness.