"Under our beliefs, every time we set sail is an act of proving our valor to Odin, a wager for a seat in Valhalla."
Eve felt something was off. The captain stared into the storm ahead, where the swelling and collapsing sea was carved into a monstrous silhouette by pallid lightning.
He truly seemed to be doing nothing more than steering the ship—then, quite casually, chatting with her.
"What is it you actually want?"
Eve asked warily. Had the captain suddenly transformed into a demon and lunged at her, she would not have been surprised. But this—this idle conversation—unsettled her far more. With Ed's death, a major obstacle to tonight's operation had vanished, yet at the heart of that immense source of corruption, something far more terrifying awaited her.
An uncanny blackness seeped into every corner of her vision. There was not the slightest trace of light inside this grotesque lighthouse. The great door behind them shuddered—countless demons were battering against it, hungry for blood and flesh, desperate to break through the final line of defense.
Beyond that, there was only the frantic sound of her own heartbeat and Red Falcon's. In the darkness, the two exchanged a brief glance. They both knew the truth: this place could not be held. Once the door fell, they would have no means of resistance at all.
There seemed to be only one path left—to step into that strange darkness and press forward in utter desperation. Rather than dying beneath the claws of demons, it was better to gamble on destroying the mysterious source of corruption, to see the truth behind it all.
The thermite rifle sparked a faint glow in the night. No words were needed. With tacit understanding, they moved along the wall and soon reached a staircase that spiraled upward, clinging to the stone.
The pounding of demons against the door urged them onward. Without hesitation, Eve and Red Falcon sprinted forward—and beyond the darkness, light finally emerged.
For a fleeting instant, Eve felt dizzy and unreal. When she came back to herself, a dense sea wind lashed her face. Countless raindrops streamed across her cheeks as the cold howled around her.
The ground beneath her feet was swaying. A massive bolt of lightning tore across the night sky, and brilliant white sails seized the raging wind.
This was a ship.
A great ship sailing through a storm.
A profound sense of dislocation struck Eve. Moments ago, she had been racing through the lighthouse—so why was she here now?
None of it made sense. She looked ahead. A tall man gripped the helm with both hands, utterly fearless in the face of wind and rain, driving straight into the surging waves.
There seemed to be no one else aboard but her and that peculiar captain. Though she had no idea what was happening, Eve tightened her grip on her gun and moved forward cautiously.
"Greetings, beautiful guest."
As if he had sensed her all along, the captain turned just as she approached. Beneath his soaked hair shone a pair of brilliant, unsettling eyes.
"Where is this?"
Eve asked.
She had not been dealing with these aberrant demons for long, yet she had already adapted to their rhythm. There was a high chance this was a damned hallucination—much like what she had seen in the underground complex. As she drew closer to the source of corruption, she, too, had been devoured by a dream at the very end.
She recognized the phenomenon. She simply had no way to escape it.
"This is the Silverfish," the captain replied. "And I am her captain."
He smiled—but inside Eve's chest, waves crashed violently.
Woll's death had been the first case she ever took on. Though it had gone disastrously wrong due to Lloyd's interference, she had uncovered many clues afterward—among them, that Woll came from a fishing vessel called the Silverfish.
Yet something was terribly wrong. The Silverfish was supposed to be a steamship, a mechanical creation clad in rivets and iron plating. And yet the vessel she now stood upon was an old-style fishing ship—no invincible steel, only a hull built from countless wooden planks. There was no roar of a steam engine, only vast sails snapping violently as the storm dragged them onward.
This was an eerie dreamscape. Eve remained silent—until another man entered the scene.
"What's going on, Captain?"
The man approached from the rear of the ship. Seeing Eve appear out of nowhere, he tightened his grip on a harpoon, his expression tense.
"Nothing, Woll," the captain said lightly. "Go back to your post. Just a friend paying a visit."
The words struck Eve like thunder. She stepped sideways, keeping the captain within her firing range, while her peripheral vision slid toward the man behind her.
It was Woll.
Though the corpse in the morgue had been mangled beyond recognition, Eve could still trace a haunting familiarity in the man before her.
The sense of wrongness deepened. Unease unlike anything she had known before crept into her bones.
"Don't be afraid. I mean no harm,"
the captain said, attempting to soothe her.
Eve did not believe him. She raised her gun and aimed it squarely at him. The captain waved Woll away, and the man—long dead—departed stiffly, like a machine. Once again, only Eve and the captain remained.
"Where… exactly is this?"
Eve asked.
She knew the weapon in her hands might be utterly useless against him, yet she clutched it all the same. It was the only thing that gave her even a shred of security.
"The Silverfish," the captain said. "We are sailing toward a new era."
With that, he turned his back to her and resumed working the wheel. Facing the storm head-on, he did not retreat in the slightest. Cold rain lashed against his resolute face as he stood there like a statue.
"You know," he continued, "I actually hate the new era. When I was a child, steam engines were nothing more than distant rumors. I didn't even know what such a thing truly was."
Nostalgia filled his expression. Veins bulged along his arms as he locked his grip around the wheel, unmoved no matter how fierce the storm became.
"In those days, the Vikings believed in Odin. We sailed pirate ships across the northern seas, seizing wealth with fire and axe. In your eyes, we were unforgivable marauders—but to the Vikings of that time—"
He paused, then laughed softly.
"I suppose I just wanted to say something. Some stories—if you don't tell them to the young—will vanish along with this aging body of mine, won't they?"
He went on.
"Later, when I grew up, I thought I would follow my forefathers' path—become a pirate, perhaps. But by the time I did, the stories of my childhood had already faded. Steam engines and firearms conquered everything. Battle-axes and so-called glory became nothing more than rotten relics before the march of technology."
"I believed I would still have the chance to raise the sails and roam the seas. But when I reached the harbor, steamships were docked everywhere. The very last sailing ship had been dismantled and thrown into the furnace—to bring warmth to a cold winter."
The captain looked quietly sorrowful.
"And just like that," he said softly,
"my childhood came to an end."