The captain's quarters of the White Oak were temporarily converted into a sanctuary.

The smell of incense wafted through the room, amulets depicting storm runes were hung from all the doors and windows, the priests set up bronze boundary tablets in the four corners of the room, and tied strips of cloth soaked in holy oil to the top of the boundary stones, and finally, a copy of the Storm Texts from the cathedral was sent into the room to serve as the "pillars" of the entire sanctuary.

After all this was done, Captain Lawrence entered the captain's room with Inquisitor Vanna.

"I hope you don't mind our 'makeover' here," Vana said lightly, maintaining the reserved and proper courtesy expected of a high-ranking priest, "all for safety." ”

"Of course, it's all about safety—what I lack most now is security," Captain Lawrence nodded with immediate understanding, and he looked around at the sacred things in the room, breathing a sigh of relief, "With these things, ordinary twisted and polluted things are afraid that they will die if they come in and look at them......"

"You can rest assured that you can talk to me about the Lost Ship here," Vanna nodded, "Let's start with the beginning, where are you and how did you meet that ship?" ”

Captain Lawrence froze, and began to tell the most terrible day he remembers: "It's like this......"

Captain Lawrence spoke in great detail, and in the presence of a professional judge, he even told exactly what he had eaten for breakfast that day, and what time the sailors on board had eaten—and he looked through the captain's journal and the sailors' diaries for that day.

Experienced captains know this: many anomalies are often preceded by seemingly ordinary signs, and it may be difficult for people at the time to realize the connection between these things, but the professional who reviews it afterwards can learn from the daily clues and use them to warn future generations.

Every captain of a ship on the Infinite Sea has a habit of keeping a logbook—and at the same time, reading his own journal is the only safe way to read on the Infinite Sea, other than reading the Church scriptures.

After hearing the thrilling encounter, Vanna's heroic brow furrowed little by little.

The situation is more serious than imagined, and even more bizarre than imagined.

She had thought that Captain Lawrence's alleged "encounter" was just a face-to-face, or at most a brush with the ghost ship, so that the terrible captain had only taken the cargo from the ship and not hurt anyone - but she didn't expect it to be a head-on collision.

The entire White Oak crashed into the Lost Territory's cabin, and the whole ship was swept through by the green ghostly flames from top to bottom.

According to Captain Lawrence, the White Oak had even begun to transform into a Lost Country from top to bottom! He could clearly see that his body had become a spirit state!

The ship's emblem was shut down at that time, the ballast relics did not react, the protective materials added to the hull materials were useless, the priest could only protect himself, and the whole ship was in the spiritual depths, unable to ask for help from the outside world - it can be said that the White Oak had already been hunted by the captain at that time, and there was no possibility of "getting away with it" at all.

Captain Lawrence is still here because the Lost Country did not hesitate to give up the trophy.

"Your Excellency," Captain Lawrence, seeing that Vanna had not reacted for a long time, finally couldn't help but say, "You say, what exactly did the Lost Country want to do at that time?" Is it really just trying to take Anomaly 099 with you? ”

Vanna glanced at him, "Isn't that what you've always seen?" ”

"I ...... I've always thought so, but I'm not sure now," Lawrence sighed, "especially since you said that the ghost captain had recently extended his power into the city-state of Purland...... I always felt that things would not be that simple. ”

"No one can guess what Captain Ghost thinks," Vanna shook her head, "all we can do now is do the most thorough inspection of the White Oak to prevent any 'intrusions' on this ship." You and your crew will also have to suffer some grievances these days, and you are not allowed to come into contact with anyone but the clergy of the Church until the investigation is over...... Including family visits. ”

Captain Lawrence bowed his head, "I understand. ”

Then he paused, then asked, "What about ...... ...... about the theft of Anomaly 099"

Vanna knew what the captain was worried about.

The eerie and terrifying sea visions are a threat hanging over civilization, but before considering these long-term and vast threats, the captain is first and foremost an ordinary person who needs to support his family - he has lost Anomaly 099, and this responsibility is too heavy for an ordinary person.

"Don't worry, the church will explain this to the city-state authorities and the Explorers' Guild," she said in a quiet voice, "The appearance of the Lost Country is a force majeure, and the loss of Anomaly 099 is not your responsibility - even if it was a church ship that was in charge of escorting it at the time, the result would probably be the same." ”

The expression on Captain Lawrence's face visibly relaxed.

Vana still had a word left unspoken in her heart: after all, the "anomaly" itself is on the verge of being sealed and out of control, and every year new anomalies go out of control, and there are always city-state residents who lose their lives under the influence of strange things, and the church has struggled with these out-of-control anomalies for thousands of years, and in the face of this long and huge dynamic equilibrium, the loss of an anomaly is actually not inconceivable - even if the anomaly is numbered within a hundred.

But she, the judge, can't say that.

"Besides......" At that moment, Captain Lawrence suddenly hesitated again to break the silence, "I want to ask, what is so special about Anomaly 099?" ”

Speaking of this, he paused, and hurriedly added: "Of course, I got a piece of information when I took over the escort mission, but it mainly involved the sealing method of Anomaly 099 and the emergency disposal method after the initial loss of control, and did not involve the background of the origin of this anomaly and the situation after it was completely out of control...... You know, after all, it's an anomaly within a hundred, and the more ordinary people around it know about it, the more likely it is to get out of control, and I still understand this rule.

"But now that Anomaly 099 has been taken away by the Lost Country, according to the regulations, it should be considered completely out of control, so ......"

"It's okay to tell you," Vanna nodded without waiting for Captain Lawrence to finish, "Anomaly 099 has been out of the control of civilized society, and according to the regulations, its relevant information will be released to the Adventurers' Guild and the transcendent teams of various city-states, in order to capture and reseal it in the future, and you are a member of the Adventurers' Guild and the last contact of Anomaly 099, so you should know this information." ”

Speaking of this, she paused and thought for a moment, and then said slowly while sorting out the information she knew: "Anomaly 099, the puppet coffin, the appearance is a gorgeous wooden box like a coffin, and there is a puppet in a sleeping state inside, the puppet is silver-haired and purple-dressed, and the body size is similar to that of ordinary humans;

"The anomaly was first discovered in the cold northern seas, and its internal puppets resemble those of the Frost Queen Rei Nora, who was beheaded by the rebels half a century ago, but there is no evidence of a real connection between the two;

"The anomaly is not inclined to think and is not conscious, but is highly likely to be instinctively driven to perceive and influence the outside world;

"You should know the sealing method of Anomaly 099 very well, I won't repeat it, as for its dangers......

"First of all, the puppet corpse will have a tendency to 'settle', once it stays in an area for a long time, it will consider the area as its own territory, and it will be difficult to transfer it later, and it will gradually expand its influence in its settlement, and at the same time, its seal strength will also weaken dramatically, becoming more and more easy to get out of control - this is also a common characteristic of a considerable number of anomalies, so Anomaly 099 needs to move the seal location frequently to prevent it from overgrowing.

"Secondly, if the puppet corpse is out of control, all humanoid units within a certain radius of it, including humans, elves, senjins, and jeeplos, will be targeted. This range ranges from 100 meters to nearly 1,000 meters, and will grow over the time of Anomaly 099's 'settlement'. The exact criteria for verification are not clear, but it is known that the chosen target will immediately lose their freedom of movement as if they were being manipulated by the puppet line, and unconsciously bow their heads in the direction of the puppet's coffin, just as the people of the city-state worship the queen, and once this action is completed...... Victims are immediately decapitated.

"The decapitation cannot be avoided, cannot be protected, cannot be exempted, it is meaningless to apply any blessing or armor to the victim, the only condition for it to take effect is 'chosen by the puppet', the victim will directly become decapitated after the action is completed, and after the decapitation is completed, the puppet will be silent for four to six hours, and then start looking for the next target, until no one within range is alive, or the coffin is resealed.

"The puppet coffin has the characteristics of moving when it is out of control, extremely fast, extremely powerful, and will break free from capture in various unbelievable ways, and the coffin itself is extremely strong, so the harm of its loss of control will be further increased.

"Only one Saint survived several out-of-control events of the puppet coffin, but that Saint happened to have the bloodline of the northern frost city-state, so it is impossible to determine whether it was the Saint's power that resisted the curse, or if his bloodline happened to meet the 'pardon' conditions of the puppet coffin."

Listening to the young inquisitor's calm and indifferent narration, Captain Lawrence felt his hairs stand on end.

His first thought was: the money of the city-state authorities is really not easy to earn!

It's no wonder that the reward for escorting Anomaly 099 is almost five times that of escorting ordinary anomalous objects - this kind of lethal damage that completely ignores protection, ignores dodging, and only needs to be effective when "the puppet is eyeing you", and when placed on an inescapable ocean-going vessel, it is simply a terrifying thing that is destined to kill everyone as long as it gets out of control!

That's why the Explorers' Guild of Explorers, a group of captains who specialize in dealing with "extreme survival", will take on this kind of work.

At the same time, he heard the voice of Inquisitor Vana continue: "...... For the horrific and terrifying abilities of the puppet coffin, the Church gave Anomaly 099 a name for its ability when it was documenting it, named after the torture instrument used by the rebels to execute the Frost Queen a century ago:

"Alice's guillotine."