Though, theoretically, Anomaly 077 wasn't a normal "dead person," everyone thought it could—at least it was worth a try.

So, a dozen minutes later, a sailor who was lazing about in some corner of the lower deck was startled awake by a flurry of hurried, chaotic footsteps. He widened his eyes and saw the captain leading the entire crew rushing towards him in a frenzy. Before he could react, Vanna dashed forward and yanked the dried corpse up by the collar.

The sailor had never seen anything like it. After being lifted by Vanna and noticing the murderous (and expectant) gazes focused on him, the dried corpse started trembling down to its molars. He shrank back, doing his best to hide. "I... I was just taking a nap. That shouldn't violate the crew's code, right? And even if it did, you can't all come at me at once, can you?"

"Stop napping. You can't sleep anyway," Duncan said as he stepped forward from behind the others, sizing up Anomaly 077. "We have something important for you to do."

"Something important?" The sailor was taken aback. Then he realized the gazes weren't murderous. He quickly straightened up and adjusted his clothes, cautiously watching Vanna’s next move (still worried that the beautiful muscle-woman might accidentally break his bones). He asked curiously, "What is it? Did we just reach the Node of the God of the Dead? Are we heading back already?"

Duncan waved his hand dismissively. "Precisely because we've reached the Node of the God of the Dead—we need a dead person right now to see if we can reawaken the guidance here."

The sailor listened in bewilderment, not understanding for a long while. He turned his pleading gaze to Agou, who was in the corner. "...What does that mean?"

"Simply put, due to the 'rot' of the God of the Dead, the mortal world's death mechanism has disappeared. Because of this, no more dead people are arriving in this wasteland. Consequently, the gatekeepers and the Path of No Return that were originally here to guide the dead are also gone," Agou explained patiently, even though he didn't know why he was being asked. "The 'gate' of the God of the Dead is hidden in a place that can only be reached through a specific 'guidance ritual.' We must now find a way to reawaken the gatekeepers—simply put, we need a dead person."

The sailor blinked. He finally roughly understood the situation, but after a few seconds of blankness, he hesitantly pointed to himself and brought up a fact. "I'm not completely dead, though… Even though I've been trying to go that way. Why don't you have Agatha try? She's much deader than I am. At least I have some bones and flesh left. Her soul is practically gone..."

"We discussed it. Agatha, Vanna, and Shirley are not quite suitable," Morris sighed, then couldn't help but size up the dried corpse before him, his expression complex. "But then again, you don't seem suitable either. While you are technically a corpse, there are quite a few active corpses like you in the mortal world right now, and these sorts of 'undead' don't seem to attract the 'gatekeepers' attention."

"Ultimately, it's unknown whether the 'gatekeepers' on the Death Wasteland even still exist," the sailor shrugged. "Maybe they all disappeared along with Bartok's 'rot'. After all, strictly speaking, those 'gatekeepers' were themselves part of the death mechanism..."

Morris frowned, lost in thought. Duncan suddenly noticed that the blurry shadow on the wall next to them seemed to be swaying slightly. He asked curiously, "Agatha? Is something the matter?"

"I was thinking..." Agatha broke the silence. "Perhaps we can use a ritual to fabricate a dead person on the 'foundation' of the 'sailor.' As for whether the 'gatekeepers' here still exist, we'll find out then."

Duncan was stunned. "...You can fabricate that?"

"I was also once a 'gatekeeper'—albeit a gatekeeper on the side of the living world. But in a sense, the gatekeepers of the living world and the gatekeepers of the dead world 'correspond' to each other. This is also a manifestation of the God of Death's 'symmetry'," Agatha said. "In the training I... in the training I underwent in my memory, there was an operation to 'dialogue' with the gatekeepers of the dead world after the soul leaves the body. Through those 'dialogues,' I learned that the 'gatekeepers on the other side' do not judge the dead all that accurately. Sometimes they even linger near the living, and this kind of 'misjudgment'... can be artificially guided."

Shirley blinked, suddenly realizing, "Wait, are you allowed to do that? This sounds very heretical!"

"Of course not. This is apostasy," Agatha shrugged casually. "Deceiving the Lord's messengers, blaspheming the order of life and death, and it could even be used to induce death—under normal circumstances, this would be punishable by death."

Hearing this, Shirley quickly said, "Oh, I was just about to ask, are death clerics promoted or fired when they're sentenced to death..."

Duncan raised a hand and pulled Shirley behind him, interrupting her bold words (though he had asked this question too). Then he looked up at Agatha. "Is it okay?"

"It's okay, because even the order of life and death has disappeared, and who even remembers the old doctrines and the Lord's authority... besides me?" Agatha's shadow whispered. In the swaying shadows, she seemed to shake her head with a wry smile. "And now, no one can sentence me to death."

Duncan quietly watched the hazy shadow for a moment, then nodded gently. "Alright, let's begin then. What exactly do we need to do?"

"First, we need to leave the range of the Ghost Ship. On this ship, even the 'gatekeepers' gazes cannot easily penetrate," Agatha said immediately. "Second, we need the 'sailor's' help. I need to fabricate him into a complete 'dead person,' but he doesn't need to do anything himself. He just needs to cooperate with my instructions. Finally... this is for the sailor."

Her gaze fell on Anomaly 077, who was not far away. "You need to remember, no matter what you see before you, do not follow along—the gatekeepers' guidance is irresistible to the dead. Although you are not a true dead person and have the ability to resist this guidance, it will still be very difficult."

"Don't worry, I won't follow along," Anomaly 077 immediately patted his chest confidently. "I'm doing so well on the Ghost Ship, why would I leave..."

"What if the crew of the Seagull appear at the end of the Path of No Return?" Agatha said slowly. "What if you see the captain of the Seagull?"

The scene suddenly fell silent.

Even the sailor himself fell silent. The dried corpse stood still, but just as Duncan thought he would waver in hesitation, the dried corpse shook his head even more firmly.

"I won't go with her."

"Are you sure? This is very serious."

"I'm sure," the sailor grinned. "The captain told me to deliver a letter to the city-state and gave me the navigation route—she wouldn't let me go with her. That's not her."

"...Alright, then there's no problem."

A cold, chaotic wind blew across the wasteland under the night sky. The black and white tall grass swayed and surged in the wind. A paper boat drifted down from the side of the Ghost Ship and landed on the ground. Duncan was the first to jump off the ship, stepping onto the solid ground of this Death Wasteland.

Beside him, Agatha's hazy figure also "floated" down from the ship as if weightless, landing lightly beside him.

The last to jump off the ship was the sailor—he awkwardly flipped over and jumped to the ground, his hip joint snapping at a strange angle.

"Tsk... I should have had someone install metal joints before I left," the sailor muttered as he reattached his dislocated joint, then limped over. "Is it enough to come here? What do we do next?"

Agatha looked back and saw that the small boat was still in the tall grass. Only Lucrezia's figure stood silently on the ship, while everyone else remained on the Ghost Ship—this was to prevent a situation like that on Ash Island from happening again.

Then she retracted her gaze, looked around to confirm, and pointed to a certain spot. "It's simple. Just come over and lie down."

"Oh." The sailor agreed without arguing. He immediately laid down obediently in the spot Agatha pointed out—not caring about the cold ground and letting the black and white tall grass, almost half a person high, submerge him.

"...It really feels like a funeral," the sailor muttered as he lay there. "These grasses around me are like coffins surrounding me."

Agatha ignored the sailor's muttering.

After confirming that he had lain down properly, she took a light breath and then began to calm her mind and focus her energy—a moment later, her originally blurry, dreamlike figure gradually became clearer.

Faint, undetectable green flames flickered in her figure, as if briefly illuminating her entity. She transformed from a blurred shadow into a translucent, ghostly individual. Although still illusory, it was enough for her to complete the next "operation."

A cane that had reappeared from her memory appeared in her hand at some point.

"...Some nostalgia."

Agatha looked at the cane in her hand and muttered softly. Then she stepped beside the sailor and slowly swept the ground with the cane.

Pale flames burned and rose in the traces she swept, and a triangular outline gradually took shape on the black, white, and gray landscape.

The sailor lay in the center of the triangle, and the tension finally made him shut his mouth, waiting for the next moment.

Agatha then began to add many symbolic runes around the triangle. She outlined them carefully—she hadn't done this for a long time.

"From now on, do not speak or look around. The dead do not speak or look around—you will hear someone calling your name or see strange light and shadows before your eyes, but those are all illusions. Do not pay attention to them," Agatha finally stopped near the sailor's head and looked down at the dried corpse lying in the center of the triangle. "Finally, you will see a twilight-like glow. That is the only 'color' in this land of the dead. At that time, the 'gatekeeper' on this side will come.

"Remember what I told you, do not go with him—let me and the captain negotiate the rest."

(End of chapter)