"The view from the sea is nice?"

"It's true that it's not the same feeling as watching it from the shore." Patting away the big wet hands on his shoulders, the neatly dressed blond young man took a step to the side and gave up the bow position to the visitor, "It would be better if there were fewer bumps." ”

The sound of retching came from behind him, and the man in the costume lay on the edge of the boat, spitting out a little acid feebly. A little dry bread that I ate in the morning was fed to the sea fish before I had time to digest it, and there was no more content in the stomach.

He tried to wipe his mouth with his sleeve a few times, but his scruples about brand new clothes stopped him. A thick hemp rope was tied around his waist and tied to the mast in case any wave caused him to disappear directly from the deck.

The sailors passed by him as if they were not looking, adjusted the sails, scrubbed the deck, and the ship ran in an orderly manner.

"Hah, that's not a bump." The bearded captain rolled up his sleeves, revealing the thick arms that had been exercised by the struggle against the wind and waves, and inadvertently showed off a large tattoo of the waves from his wrist to his elbow, which looked like a man with a story.

Most of the passengers are attracted by the tattoos, which leads to a small day of gossip and bragging, distracting from the boring time at sea day after day, and listening to more anecdotes and anecdotes from people of different identities from the passengers.

But instead of giving his attention to the communicative captain, the passenger looked out at the endless sea, which was covered in clouds and took on a dark blue and leaden gray color, a gloomy and ominous hue that united at the end of the view.

The remnants of the cold winds from the North Sea ice fields were pushing them south, but they couldn't escape the rain anyway.

The captain has seen many passengers, no matter what their status, when they reach the boundless sea, in the face of the approaching scene of wind and rain, they will have doubts about the small sampan under their feet, and there is an inevitable sense of fear.

"No need to worry. It's scary to watch, but it's just a rain. He pointed to the hidden sea level on the left side of the ship, as if he could see distant land, "Besides, we are not far from the shore, and even if there is any accident, I can take you ashore with one hand." ”

"It's so reassuring." The passenger combed his hair, which had been tossed by the sea breeze, pressed them back into place, and continued to look at the undulating sea. I can't tell if he's perfunctory.

The captain couldn't think of what he was looking at, it had been three days since the departure, and the monotonous scenery of the sea should have smoothed out the excitement of any young man. What's more, the current scenery is not commendable, it is nothing more than the cold and hard sea breeze blowing on the face, and the water and sky are gray and misty, and after looking at it for a long time, it will produce the illusion that the ship is stuck in place and has no movement.

A slender finger pointed to a small spot in the distance, guiding the captain to follow its master's vision, "What's that?" ”

"Huh?" The captain looked at his fingertips, and there was indeed a small spot on the surface of the sea that was not easy to spot, with a faint reflection, "probably a piece of ice floe." ”

"And ice floes here?"

"Luckily, I haven't seen it in a few days. It came from the sea of ice, and there were not many big pieces over there, and there were very few that could not melt here. We call it the Lucky Star. ”

This statement aroused the passenger's interest, and he took one last look at the ice floes hidden in the waves, and turned around as the captain wished, "What do you say?" ”

"The sailors who took this route called out, and heard that there was a ship that had been caught in a storm and had lost all its fresh water and beer." The captain licked his lips under his bushy beard, a story that made you feel thirsty to listen to.

"And then the sharp-eyed one of them, like you, found something on the surface of the sea that shone like a white crystal, or a morning star. In desperation, they took this as some kind of revelation and decided to take a gamble. ”

"Of course, it's not a white crystal, it's not a star falling in the sea, but it's far more precious than these things." The captain paused at the right time, and found that the audience was listening attentively and telling the answer to the riddle with satisfaction.

"A piece of freshwater ice, a whole two barrel-sized pieces of freshwater ice. Drifting from the Sea of Ice, the North Sea, to here, and possibly even further south, is incredible. Therefore, people who walk this path feel that seeing ice floe is a symbol of luck. ”

"I can imagine it." The passenger nodded and said that he had never heard this story, and he could join the story collection one day in the future. Then, suddenly remembering something, he asked, "So you've been to the Ice Sea."

"Of course, I've been dealing with those ice plains over there before, and this little ice floe is everywhere, and I haven't seen how lucky I am." The captain has always been willing to share his experiences, which bears a striking resemblance to the chatty driver on the otherworldly soul's side.

Whether it's on a boat or in a tavern, the feeling of being in the limelight is addictive, and it doesn't have to be an unspecified story fee included in the ticket price, at least not like in the tavern when you want to ask him to drink.

"There are no big icebergs or anything like that?"

"No, it's just a lot of small ice floes, and the highest Xiaoice mountain can't be touched from the side of the ship, so it's too reluctant to call it a 'mountain'."

The passenger was a little disappointed, not knowing what to expect, and what kind of plot was rehearsed in his head, "Really? Haven't even seen one? ”

"Normally, there are no big icebergs." The captain didn't say anything to death, how could a well-informed navigator not be able to take on the content? Since there is "usual", there is "but".

Cooperatively, the audience answered him: "It's as rare as the ice floes in the south?"

"Yes, so few that almost no one has ever seen it, and the implication is the exact opposite." The captain looked around at the deep sea with no end in sight, and departed from the edge of the ship, as if he did not want to go on, and invited his passengers, "It's a long story, you don't want to listen to the second half in the rain." Going for a drink in the cabin? ”

"Sounds like a beer." Passengers gladly accepted.

"Water is fine, you have to drink something, right?"

……

……

It was almost five years ago in the summer when a fairly mature ice field trade route suddenly became vacant, connecting with a long-connected ice tribe.

Normally this is impossible, and an Icefield tribe willing to communicate with outsiders means an extremely stable and secure exchange relationship.

When the captain, who is rarely recognized by them, decides to leave the sea, he will only introduce his closest heirs to the tribe, and continue to be a constant source of wealth like a family fortune.

The middle-aged captain named Becker was willing to sell the opportunity at a fairly favorable price, along with the undamaged empty ship for a fixed property in the port of Wendeng, and a large sum of cash to distribute to the crew members.

The price comes at a cost, and Becker refuses to introduce the buyer in person, only willing to give something that is considered a "token", and he can't even send a crew member who is familiar with the Icefield people to go again.

This has to make people suspect that he has a conflict with the Ice Plains, so he uses this method to make a fortune in the end.

But after privately knocking on the drunken crew of the tavern, the movers came to a negative conclusion, unless the sailors were all able to remember to cover up the truth for the captain while snot was soaked in wine.

During their brief waking hours during the day, they refused to talk about it, and everyone from ordinary sailors to first mates made it clear that they were not willing to take this route even once, and no matter how much it was.

As a result, there were rumors that the ship was cursed, which could not stop a few young second-generation boaters with an adventurous spirit and their own ships from competing for this opportunity.

After some struggle, one of them took all the tokens of Captain Becker, as well as the secret communication tips and details of the customs.

Instead of setting sail at once, he waited patiently to observe, until the vice-tainted men of Becker's crew squandered the last penny in their pockets, and even went into debt, and had to accept a meeting in a sober state in exchange for a little payment.

And so, from the mouth of a sailor whose lender threatened to take his finger away, in exchange for paying part of his debt, an insanity description of the voyage was pulled.

Rao had reached this point, and the sailor would rather have one finger less than let go of his mouth and go to the ice field with him.

It wasn't until he was about to set off that he recorded the successive intermittent narrations of the sailors, roughly restoring the mutilated half of the face.

From the perspective of Seaman, a sailor.

The return journey, like each of the previous ones, began with Captain Becker returning with the men who were carrying furs and metal ore.

His companions stopped making fun of Seaman's similar-sounding names to St. Simon, and climbed the mast to look at the approaching black dot in the distance, which was the procession back to the ship.

Several ice plains dragged a large sleigh to help them deliver some of the goods, and the leader had a good conversation with the first mate, and before leaving, he also stuffed the captain and the first mate each with a piece of local gem ore, saying that they had picked it up while hunting.

Captain Becker laughed from the moment he got on the ship until he lifted anchor, playing with the beautiful crystalline stones in his hands with the first mate, and talking about whether there would be any material in it that could be used to make large pieces of jewelry.

Seaman didn't know anything about it, but only looked at it enviously, and then went to work with the cargo.

The sailors had to allocate positions for the cargo in the cabin, and the heaviest ore was evenly pressed into the bottom compartment and placed with the ballast.

Store your fur in as dry a place as possible, leaving plenty of room to spread out, as the slightest imperfection can make a perfect fur worthless. If it happens, the captain will be eager to skin them.

The work was tiring, but thankfully there was meat from the Icefields tribe, which the captain generously served as part of his meal. After soothing his stomach after more than two months of eating and drinking on the voyage, Seaman returned to the cabin and fell asleep in the shaking.

Sleep at sea was not very good, and in the middle of the night he faintly heard footsteps and conversation coming from the deck. The companion who was woken up next to him cursed, rolled over and covered his ears. A majestic voice put an end to the commotion, presumably the boatswain on duty.

Then the voice subsided, and he slept peacefully through the second half of the night, and went to pick up the above man in the morning.

There was something strange about the atmosphere on the deck, and Seaman was about to open his mouth to complain about the noise of the previous night, but he was interrupted by a gesture in his eyes. He took the cable and looked over there, and the boatswain's face was very unpleasant.

"Don't ask." The man whispered, "It's just an iceberg, not a big deal." ”