The captain's cabin of the White Oak was temporarily transformed into a sanctuary.
The scent of incense floated in the room. Amulets depicting storm runes were hung on all the doors and windows. The priests set up bronze boundary markers at the four corners of the room and tied strips of cloth soaked in holy oil on the top of the boundary markers. Finally, a copy of "Storm Codex" from the cathedral was brought into the room to serve as the "pillar" of the entire sanctuary.
After completing all these arrangements, Captain Lawrence and Judge Vanna entered the captain's room together.
"I hope you don't mind our 'renovation' here," Vanna said calmly, maintaining the reserve and proper courtesy that a high-level clergyman should have. "Everything is for safety."
"Of course, everything is for safety. What I lack most right now is a sense of security." Captain Lawrence nodded in understanding. He looked around at the sacred things in the room and breathed a sigh of relief. "With these things here, ordinary twisted and contaminated things would probably die after just one look..."
"You can talk to me about the Lost Homeland without worry," Vanna nodded. "Let's start from the beginning. Where were you and how did you see the ship?"
Captain Lawrence calmed down and began to recount the most terrifying day in his memory: "It was like this..."
Captain Lawrence spoke in great detail. In front of the professional judge, he even accurately told what he had eaten for breakfast that day and what time the sailors on the ship started eating. For those things he couldn't remember clearly, he looked through the captain's log and the sailors' diaries of that day.
Experienced captains all know this: before many abnormal phenomena occur, there are often seemingly ordinary signs. People at the time may find it difficult to realize the connection between these things, but professionals who review the situation afterwards can summarize experience from those daily clues and use them to warn future generations.
Every captain on the vast sea has the habit of recording a logbook - at the same time, reading one's own logbook is the only safe "way of reading" on the vast sea besides reading church classics.
After hearing the thrilling story, Fanna's heroic brows gradually wrinkled.
The situation is more serious and bizarre than imagined.
She originally thought that Captain Lawrence's so-called "encounter" was just a face-to-face encounter, or at most a close pass by the ghost ship, so the terrible captain only took away the cargo on the ship without hurting anyone - but she didn't expect that it was actually a head-on collision.
The entire White Oak crashed into the cabin of the Lost Homeland, and the entire ship was swept from top to bottom by the green ghost flames.
According to Captain Lawrence, the White Oak had even begun to transform from top to bottom into the Lost Homeland! He could clearly see his body transforming into a spirit!
The holy emblem beacon on the ship was in a shut-down state at the time, the holy objects in the ballast were unresponsive, the protective materials added to the hull were ineffective, the priests could only protect themselves, and the entire ship was at the depth of the spiritual world, unable to seek help from the outside world - it can be said that the White Oak was already the captain's prey at the time, and there was no possibility of a "lucky escape" at all.
The only reason Captain Lawrence is still standing here today is because the Lost Homeland gave up this prize without hesitation.
"Your Excellency, Judge," Captain Lawrence finally finished telling his story. Seeing that Vanna didn't respond for a long time, he couldn't help but ask, "What did the Lost Homeland want to do at that time? Did they really just want to take away Anomaly 099?"
Vanna glanced at him and said, "Isn't this what you have always believed?"
"I... I have always believed this, but now I am not sure," Lawrence sighed, "especially since you just said that the ghost captain recently extended his power to the Plande city-state... I always feel that things are not that simple."
"No one can guess what the ghost captain is thinking," Vanna shook her head. "All we can do now is to conduct a thorough inspection of the White Oak to prevent the ship from carrying any 'invasion objects'. You and your crew will have to endure some injustice these days. Before the investigation is completed, you are not allowed to contact anyone except the church priests... including visits from family members."
Captain Lawrence lowered his head: "I understand."
He then paused, and then asked, "Then... about the theft of Anomaly 099..."
Vanna knew what the captain was worried about.
The strange and terrifying anomalies at sea are a threat hanging over the head of civilization, but before considering these long-term and widespread threats, the captain is first and foremost an ordinary person who needs to support his family in Lake Mouth - he has lost Anomaly 099, and this responsibility is too heavy for an ordinary person.
"Don't worry, the church will explain this matter to the city-state authorities and the Explorers' Association," she said calmly. "The appearance of the Lost Homeland was force majeure, and the loss of Anomaly 099 is not your responsibility - even if the church ship was responsible for escorting it at the time, the result would probably be the same."
The expression on Captain Lawrence's face visibly relaxed a little.
However, there was something else in Fanna's mind that she hadn't said out loud: After all, "anomalies" are always on the edge of being sealed and out of control. Every year, new anomalies get out of control, and there are always city-state residents who lose their lives under the influence of strange things. The church has been fighting these out-of-control anomalies for thousands of years. In the face of this long and huge dynamic balance, the loss of an anomaly is not unimaginable - even if the number of that anomaly is within the hundredth digit.
But as a judge, she couldn't say such words.
"In addition..." At this moment, Captain Lawrence suddenly broke the silence again, hesitantly, "I want to know, what is so special about Anomaly 099?"
He paused for a moment, then quickly added, "Of course, I did get a copy of the information when I took on the escort mission, but it mainly involved the sealing method of Anomaly 099 and the emergency disposal method after the initial loss of control. It did not involve the origin and background of this anomaly and the situation after it completely lost control... You know, it is an anomaly within the hundred after all. The more ordinary people around it know about it, the more likely it is to lose control. I still understand this rule.
"But now that Anomaly 099 has been abducted by the Lost Hometown, according to regulations, it should be considered completely out of control, so..."
"I can tell you," Vanna nodded before Captain Lawrence finished speaking. "Anomaly 099 has escaped the control of civilized society. According to regulations, its relevant information will be announced to the Adventurer's Association and the extraordinary teams of various city-states, in order to capture and re-seal it in the future. You are a member of the Adventurer's Association and the last person to contact Anomaly 099. You should know this information."
At this point, she paused to think for a moment, then she sorted out the information she knew and slowly said, "Anomaly 099, puppet coffin, it looks like a gorgeous wooden box like a coffin, inside it there is a puppet in a sleeping state, the puppet has silver hair and purple skirt, and its body shape is similar to that of an ordinary human;
"The anomaly was first discovered in the Frigid Sea in the north. The doll inside it looks very similar to the Frost Queen Lenoir, who was beheaded by rebels half a century ago. However, there is no evidence to prove that there is a real connection between the two.
"This anomaly has no thinking tendency and no consciousness, but it is very likely to actively perceive the outside world driven by instinct and exert influence on the outside world;
"You should be very familiar with the method of sealing Anomaly 099, so I won't repeat it. As for its dangers...
"First, the puppet coffin has a tendency to 'settle down'. Once it stays in a certain area for a long time, it will regard the area as its own territory, and it will be difficult to move it. It will gradually expand its influence in its settlement, and at the same time, the strength of its seal will be drastically weakened, becoming more and more likely to get out of control. This is also a common feature of quite a few anomalies, so Anomaly 099 needs to be frequently moved to prevent it from growing excessively.
"Secondly, if the puppet coffin goes out of control, all humanoid units within a certain range around it, including humans, elves, Sen'jin, and Gypro, will be used as verification targets. This range ranges from a few hundred meters to nearly a thousand meters, and will grow with the "settlement" time of Anomaly 099. The specific verification standard is not yet clear, but it is known that the selected target will immediately lose freedom of movement as if controlled by puppet strings, and will unconsciously kneel and bow in the direction of the puppet coffin, just like the people of the city-state worshiping the queen, and once this action is completed... the victim will be beheaded immediately.
"This beheading cannot be avoided, defended, or exempted. It is meaningless to cast any blessing or wear armor on the victim. The only condition for it to take effect is to be 'selected by the puppet'. The victim will be directly beheaded after the action is completed. After the beheading is completed, the puppet will temporarily remain silent for four to six hours, and then begin to look for the next target until no one is alive in the range, or the coffin is re-sealed.
“When out of control, the puppet coffin has the ability to move, with extremely fast speed and great strength, and will break free in all kinds of unimaginable ways. In addition, the coffin itself is extremely strong, so the harm it causes after losing control will be further increased.
"In the several incidents where the puppet coffin went out of control, only one saint survived. However, that saint happened to have the bloodline of the northern frost city-state. Therefore, it is unclear whether it was the saint's power that resisted the curse, or because his bloodline happened to meet the 'absolution' conditions of the puppet coffin."
Listening to the young judge's calm and indifferent narration, Captain Lawrence felt his hair stand up little by little.
His first thought was: It is really hard to make money from the city-state authorities!
No wonder the reward for escorting Anomaly 099 is almost five times that of escorting ordinary anomalies - this kind of thing completely ignores defense and evasion, and the only condition for effectiveness is that "the puppet is targeting you" to launch a lethal damage. Put it on an ocean-going ship with no escape, it is simply a horrible thing that is doomed to kill everyone on board if it gets out of control!
Only the captains of the Explorers' Association who specialize in "extreme survival" would take on this kind of job.
At the same time, he heard the voice of Judge Vanna: "… For the strange and terrifying ability of the puppet coffin, the church gave it a name when it created the file for Anomaly 099. The name was named after the torture instrument used by the rebels to execute the Frost Queen half a century ago:
"Alice Guillotine."