In the dream world.
Alka woke up in his dream bubble at night.
As his eyes opened, he turned to look at the massive crystal floating in his world.
Within the transparent crystal, only a tiny amount of dream energy, previously stored for so long, remained.
Watching this tiny amount of energy drift within, Alka sighed.
"I knew it would cost a lot to use dream energy to create something tangible by flowing it from dreams into reality, but I didn't expect it would be so expensive."
Alka had simply constructed three metal lightning rods with lightning-attracting properties, but these three rods had almost completely consumed the dream energy he had stored for months.
This was only after he used a mirror to reduce the energy required to transition from dream to reality.
If he had simply brute-forced his way through the barrier between the two, the cost would have been even greater, and perhaps the energy injected would only be enough to construct two lightning rods.
It seemed the only way to understand how to maximize results with the least energy was to witness the moment the barrier between the dream world and reality was broken.
Arka knew the dream world well; such instances were not uncommon, though they occurred sporadically across the world.
Forget it, let's not dwell on it. After all, the reason for this limited energy was that there were so few dream creatures within the dream range of the Forward Channel, and it was too desolate.
It would take several days to encounter a suitable target.
Controlling his body, he floated out of a bubble.
When Arka emerged into the outside world, he was slightly surprised by the scene around him.
Because numerous tiny bubbles had appeared around him, they were aqua blue and unusually transparent.
From the outside, he could clearly see the seawater inside, indicating that these were dream bubbles of marine life.
But this was the first time Arka had seen so many bubbles floating around in the Forward Channel.
This place no longer seemed as desolate as before.
Looking at the bubbles, Alka turned around.
He realized that, besides his own dream bubble, all of his teammates' dream bubbles were surrounded by various creatures of light and shadow, attacking them.
Although there were many creatures, they were all familiar to Alka, or similar creatures. He simply cleared them out.
Curious, Alka began to explore the surrounding dream world.
He could indeed see that it was a bit more lively. Quite a few dream bubbles, large and small, were floating around, all transparent. They were the dreams of wild animals, nothing special.
The appearance of these bubbles meant that there were also many creatures in the outside world.
But why did this change occur in this final section?
Is it because the nearby sea area belongs to the Sea God?
Not to mention the certainty that there are intelligent races living in the forward route.
After a complete circle and finding nothing special, Alka arrived at the edge of his dream bubble.
A mirror appeared on his face, and the Dreamcatcher floated out from his chest.
The two powers began to interact, altering their surroundings.
This was Alka testing his strength and verifying his own ideas.
These were the main things Alka had been thinking about in his dreams recently.
He wanted to figure out how to isolate a portion of his dream bubble and how to build defenses around it to prevent it from being disturbed by dream creatures while it slept.
This had been bothering him for a long time.
He couldn't ensure that every member of his ship could sink into a dream while resting.
And the dream creatures weren't always so weak as to not affect their dreams.
And once they truly encountered a fatal influence, it would be too late.
Even if it wasn't fatal, causing excessive damage was unacceptable.
There's nothing wrong with preparing for a rainy day.
Furthermore, the time spent in dreams was sufficient, and the outer body also needed it to rest.
But it was clear that Alka had gained nothing.
It wasn't until near dawn that Alka returned to his dream, where he quickly recovered from his fatigue.
When he woke up in the morning.
Alka washed up briefly and went to the dining room.
Breakfast was already set on the table.
Soon, Sofia walked in.
"Good morning."
"Good morning."
After greeting him, Sofia sat down across from Alka and began to eat breakfast.
"How long until we completely cross the forward route?" Alka asked as he ate.
Alka didn't know much about this; it was usually Sofia who took care of it.
Hearing Alka's question, Sofia chewed his food, nodded at the table, and said, "I don't know. Since arriving here, the current in the channel ahead has been getting faster and faster, and the strong waves have been hitting us more and more frequently. I can't calculate how long it will take.
But at this speed, if we continue sailing, it won't take more than ten days."
He nodded.
He could feel the ship beneath him speeding up.
More people then arrived at the restaurant.
After finishing breakfast, Alka left the restaurant.
As he entered, he saw a rope floating down, and then patted him.
"What's wrong?" Alka asked curiously.
A melodious song drifted softly. Hearing it, Alka understood the meaning and nodded.
"So it's already this late. Come to think of it, you did suffer quite a few injuries yesterday."
Turn-ing toward the dining room, Alka saw Pororo and Jason still eating. "Don't dawdle," he said. "It's time for maintenance today. The Voice of Dawn is already urging us."
"It's already this late?" Jason said, quickly eating his food.
Pororo simply shoved all the food around him into his mouth, stood up, clapped his hands, and walked towards Alka.
Jason followed closely behind, still holding his unfinished food.
Watching the two's actions and hearing what Alka had just said, Simon followed curiously.
"If you don't mind, let me help, okay? I'm curious about the structure of this ship, and those holes repaired yesterday need a closer look. Honestly, I've never seen a ghost ship like this before," Simon said as he stepped forward.
"Other ghost ships? Have you seen any before?" Pororo asked casually.
At this question, Jason scoffed and said, "You're stupid! Didn't the captain of the ship he once sailed on possess a treasure? That steel ship is certainly a ghost ship, too."
Simon smiled and nodded at Jason's words.
Just as Jason said.
Alka nodded at Simon's request.
After all, it was just routine maintenance, and it wouldn't involve core areas. It would only involve oiling and inspecting the ship's deck, sails, masts, and other exterior areas.
And Simon and him had also repaired the damage from yesterday's lightning strike.
After a day, he did check to see if there were any problems with yesterday's repairs.
Thankfully, these patches didn't make the ship look ugly. After all, this was a beautiful girl.
Moreover, this was a ghost ship, a living vessel. These patches would become one with the vessel, like flesh and blood, perfectly repaired.
Simon had told him this knowledge yesterday while he was repairing it.
After picking up their tools, everyone began to work on the repairs separately.
Simon followed Alka.
Originally, the ship's maintenance should have been done on shore, but that was too difficult in the waters of the Forward Passage.
After sailing such a long distance, Alka and his companions had only encountered two islands, and that was because Alka had discovered dreams of land-based creatures in his dreams.
If it weren't for this, they might have drifted all the way to the sea without seeing a single island.
So they had to make do with it.
The sails were lowered, and the ship sailed along with the current. Aside from a slight slowdown, nothing changed.
They carefully inspected the sails, focusing on the corrosion of the material and whether there were any broken inscriptions that needed repair. "These spells are so neatly arranged and perfectly distributed," Simon exclaimed in amazement as he observed the spells on the sails.
"Do you know anything about shipbuilding?" Alka asked, not even looking up from his inspection.
"I learned it while in the church and participated a few times, but always as an assistant."
Hearing this, Alka nodded.
The maintenance work wasn't difficult.
It didn't take them long to complete.
At that moment, a dinging sound emanated from the observation room.
This signaled something was happening nearby.
Xadaiti's voice came from above.
"What's behind us?"
Hearing this, everyone gathered at the stern.
After a while, an object was seen speeding across the sea.
However, it wasn't directly behind them, but rather diagonally behind them, at a considerable distance. Even as it drew closer, it passed right by them, showing no sign of approaching.
As the object accelerated, everyone finally caught a glimpse of its full form.
"Fish?" Jason, looking at the object through binoculars, couldn't help but utter a strange sound.
It was something resembling a sea fish, but this one was enormous, perhaps 90 to 100 meters long.
It was a pale blue in color, and if it weren't swimming so fast, it would be difficult to spot from a distance.
"No, it's a ship!" Alka, now transformed into a crocodile frog, said, gazing at the fish-like creature with a pair of enormous eyes.
"Ship?" Julia's voice was a little surprised, and she looked at Alka.
"But it's a giant sea monster, a fish?"
Julia could clearly sense that the giant sea monster was alive, not a fish-like ship.
She could still clearly sense whether it was a living creature.
As they talked, the giant sea fish approached their side, then sped forward from a distance of about five or six hundred meters.
It didn't stop at all, maintaining a safe distance from Alka and the others.
At this point, everyone could clearly see patterns carved into the fish's body that looked like text, and a flag on its back.
The fish was clearly built with some strange, man-made structures, with people moving about on it.
It felt as if they were treating the fish like a horse, saddled it, and then built rooms onto the saddle.
In this way, they were using the fish as a boat.
At the same time, they could see that the people on board were also wary of them.
"They're using a giant sea monster as a vehicle?" Pororo thought as he observed the scene.
Alka nodded, his mind returning to normal.
"Perhaps it's what you're talking about."
"How interesting! How did they do it?" Lucilia said, her eyes sparkling.
Riding a fish, racing across the ocean, the more he thought about it, the more fascinating it became.
And looking at the man-made structures hanging from it—rooms, connected by simple suspension bridges.
They even saw weapons on it.
Xadaiti also slid down from the fish and immediately asked, "Did you see that? Those people even built something like a house on the fish."
Everyone nodded, indicating they had clearly seen it.
"So, is this a characteristic of the Southern Storm Sea?" Alka couldn't help but ask.
After all, the Southern Storm was still the Sea God's domain, and when they passed through the storm yesterday, they had confirmed that the gate was open.
A ship like this appearing at this time could very well be someone emerging from the Stormy Sea.
Hearing Alka's words, Simon said, "But they haven't come near. If they'd just emerged and seen a strange ship, there's no way they wouldn't come up to say hello or inquire about the situation."
Hearing this, Alka reflected. If it were him, he certainly wouldn't have just glided past without stopping.
"That's true."
"Never mind. Let's not think about it. We're leaving soon. We'll know when the time comes."
Everyone nodded. This was true.
At least no one else expressed any hostility.
And this approach certainly piqued their curiosity.
They were still chatting about the fish that had just passed by them.
...
At this moment, within a room surrounding the head of the giant sea fish that had just departed,
A woman with cooler clothes and tattoos spoke up, "Did you see who owned the ship we just passed?"
One of the men standing next to him shook his head. "I don't know. I've never seen a sign like that. I don't know who it belonged to."
They were obviously referring to Alka and the others.
"They didn't come out with us. While waiting at the gate, I'm sure I didn't see that ship, nor did I see that flag.
And I never got any information about the ship back then," said an unnamed murloc.
The human man sitting behind the desk then spoke up.
"Are you sure? Are you sure there wasn't that ship?"
"Of course. I'm absolutely sure I'm not mistaken, and I didn't see it wrong." The murloc nodded, confident in his words.
He was in charge of intelligence matters here, and he couldn't be wrong about that.
"Really..." the man behind the desk repeated, and then the room fell silent as he pondered.
He was clearly the leader here.
At this moment, the door opened and another person walked in.
"What are you doing? Why is it so quiet?"
The leader then asked, "Did you see the boat we just passed?"
The man who had just entered shook his head. "No, I was just checking on the big bluefish, but I heard the crew discussing it outside."
"So a boat just passed by us?"
"Yes," said a nearby adult.
The staff member nodded and said.
"Interesting," the newcomer said, leaning against the wall with an amused expression.
"We're sailing the ocean on the back of a large blue fish. How could a ship be faster than us? Judging from your expressions, you've never seen that ship, right?"
The fishman who had spoken earlier nodded: "Yes, I've never seen that ship before."
Hearing this answer, the man nodded.
"It's a completely new ship, yet it happened to be running ahead of us. That means it didn't come out of our waters with us, right?"
Everyone nodded, sharing roughly the same idea.
"Then what's left to speculate? Either they live outside of this world, or they're from another sea area," the man said, spreading his hands.
Of course, he clearly believed they were from another sea area.
Everyone here knows that the only intelligent race living outside of the sea is the gatekeeper Naga.
"Are there really other seas?" the person next to him asked solemnly.
Although rumors about the outside world have long circulated within their seas,
The existence of the Infinite Sea is no secret, but specific information related to it is a secret.
Because this is a road of no return.
This has led to many rumors, but when they truly investigate, they discover that most are false, with very little actual information.
The existence of other seas and other gods also falls under the purview of these rumors.
The Church is clearly the one that knows the most about the outside world.
But they are not members of the Church.
"Why don't you believe me?" the man asked, turning around. Then, with a chuckle, he spoke, "Didn't I tell you? You don't know as much about the outside world as I do."
Everyone in this room was a trusted member of the team.
They all knew the story of the man before them. As a child, he had found a diary of a journey to the outside world on an abandoned ship.
Through the entries in the diary, he had learned a great deal about the outside world.
And as they began preparing to journey to the outside world, many of his records were confirmed.
"I once saw in the diary that the map of the world is semicircular, like a crescent moon.
The entrance to the Infinite Sea is just ahead. We'll reach it in a few days, so we must be the people living at the bottom.
The diary says that his journey to the Infinite Sea took him over three months."
At this moment, a knock on the table was heard, and everyone turned to look.
The leader, sitting behind the table, spoke up, "Alright, there's nothing to worry about. We'll reach the gate to the Boundless Sea in a few days. Once we leave, we'll know everything."
As he finished speaking, everyone fell silent.
"Now, let's discuss other matters."
This was just a minor incident. He had only asked these questions out of curiosity about the ship's identity.
Since it was already confirmed to be from other seas, there was nothing to worry about.
A giant blue sea fish swam through the water, its upper half emerging above the surface.
This half wore a massive, horse-like saddle.
Around and on this saddle-like structure were suspended rooms, along with a simple path built across it.
The members of the team walked back and forth on this simple suspension bridge, living on the fish's back.
That's all there is to this ship.