Surviving as the Captain of a Mad Cthulhu Deep Sea - Chapter 6

chapter 6

The One Person

Chapter 6: One Man

“Found it! This is it!!”

Charles’s excitement surged. The object was simply lying there, with no guards in sight. If he could just get it to the Coral Archipelago, the mission would be complete!

He raised his hand to grab it, but stopped himself just in time. A thought struck him: Isn’t this too easy? If it were this simple, why had everyone else who tried to take it vanished without a trace?

As Charles hesitated, the bandages beside him stirred. Without a moment’s hesitation, he stepped forward and lifted the Shell God Statue.

He returned to Charles’s side and said in a slow, deliberate voice:

“Let’s… go back… The High Priest… is waiting…”

Charles felt something was amiss, but he had secured the item and had no time to dwell on it. Waving his hand, he led the Vampire Sailors out of the cave.

“The gold statue looks heavy. Let’s take turns carrying it in 30-minute shifts.”

Bandages and James nodded in unison. They hurried back along the narrow path toward the beach. The gold statue was surprisingly heavy, and even taking turns made the journey exhausting.

Halfway down the path, Charles stopped to rest. He couldn’t wait until he was completely depleted of energy. If something happened, he wouldn’t stand a chance.

Sitting by the campfire, Charles scanned the surrounding darkness with vigilant eyes. The fact that there had been no danger on the way in meant that danger now lurked solely on the return path. He couldn’t afford to let his guard down yet.

After resting for about ten minutes, Charles turned to Bandages beside him and said, “We can’t stop again from here on. We’ll keep moving without rest until the end.”

Bandages nodded, hesitated for a few seconds, and looked around before saying, “Um… I think I’ve forgotten something…”

“As long as we have the Statue, I don’t care about anything else. Let’s go.”

Slightly impatient, Charles gripped the Statue and continued forward. Bandages followed silently without another word.

The bizarre and absurd forest flickered dimly in the torchlight, appearing and disappearing. In the silence, only the ragged breaths and footsteps of the two men could be heard.

When Charles returned to the beach and gazed at the distant Old Rat, a faint smile of relief spread across his sweat-drenched face.

“This adventure was a success. If we can just return safely and hand this over to the Cannonball Cult, we can buy an Exploration Ship, recruit a crew, and find our way home.”

As he ran across the sand toward the distant Old Rat, his steps suddenly halted. The smile slowly faded from his face, and a single question surfaced in his mind.

“Did I really sail this massive steamship here alone?”

A nameless dread suddenly enveloped Charles’s entire body, and he began to retrace the steps that had led him here.

“I was invited by the Cannonball Cult to retrieve their Relic, and I sailed the Old Rat alone. I prepared the food in the galley alone, fueled the turbine alone, cleaned the deck alone, and… I patrolled the deck alone, and I… I was at the helm alone?”

Charles paced the sandy beach, clutching the golden statue.

“I used to have crew members. We sailed with Old John, the First Mate, and Jim, the Boatswain, but Jim was skinned alive by something in the water, and John disembarked at the Coral Archipelago. After that, I was alone on the Old Rat. That’s right!”

A pained expression twisted Charles’s face. The memories were vivid in his mind, yet they contradicted the reality before him. It made no sense at all.

“This is impossible! I’m not a superhero. How could I have done all this alone? Something must have gone wrong somewhere!”

As Charles casually glanced at the footprints on the ground, a chill ran through his entire body.

Seven pairs of footprints, large and small, were clearly imprinted on the ground. Their clarity proved they were all recent.

Charles hastily set down the statue in his hand and immediately removed his boots to compare them with the footprints on the ground.

“The pattern, the size, the curves—these are my footprints! I wasn’t alone. My memories have been manipulated!”

Sweating and terrified, he looked at the empty boats next to the Old Rat. Now he understood why there had been no one on those boats.

Charles took a deep breath, desperately trying to calm himself.

“Based on the information I have, I wasn’t alone. I had crew members, and they’ve disappeared. Not just from reality, but from my memory as well. I must find them. I can’t go back alone.”

But a new problem now faced Charles. How could he find six people he didn’t know and who didn’t even exist? Who were they? What were their names? Men or women?

Just then, a figure slowly walked into the torchlight.

The moment Charles saw the person’s appearance, his pupils contracted instantly, and he immediately drew his gun and aimed it at the figure’s head.

It was a human-shaped figure completely wrapped in tattered yellow bandages. The bandages were ripped and torn, exposing pitch-black skin underneath.

“Stop! State your name!”

“I… I’m called Bandages. No, I’m… I’m not called Bandages. Who are you? I think I know you… Do you know me?”

Charles quickly scanned the mummy-like, bandaged feet and searched among the seven pairs of footprints.

The pattern of the bandages was clearly imprinted in the sand. Unbelievable, but this creature was definitely one of his crew.

Lowering the revolver in his hand, Charles quickly explained the situation to Bandages.

“I… is that so? I don’t remember. Who am I? Do you know who I am?”

Hesitation and confusion still lingered in Bandages’ tone.

“We’ll discuss that later. Where did you escape from? Are there others there?” Charles asked quickly.

“I… from inside a tree… the tree hated me… it set me free. There are others there.”

Charles couldn’t understand what the Bandages were saying, but it seemed he knew where the others were.

“Lead me there quickly! We have to save the rest of the crew!”

After memorizing the shapes of the remaining five pairs of footprints, Charles led the Bandages back into the eerie forest.

The forest, shrouded in a thin mist, remained as silent as before. The Bandages led him back to the narrow path, now covered in footprints.

Thanks to the earlier warning, Charles finally noticed something strange: the footprints on the ground were gradually growing fewer and fewer as he went deeper. It was clear that they had all vanished.

Whether it was his imagination or not, Charles began to feel as though something in the forest was watching him.

After walking for about thirty minutes, the swaying bandages suddenly changed direction and headed into the adjacent woods. It was then that Charles seemed to understand why his body was so badly bandaged.

He yanked on the bandages, drew the Black Saber he had stuck in his thigh, and used it as a makeshift machete, hacking through the branches hung with the swaying bandages that blocked his path.

The thorny branches snapped off easily, but their cross-sections were hollow.

The two men ventured deeper into the forest, and soon Charles saw the others the Bandages had mentioned. The sight before him struck him with horror.

A grotesque Dwarf Tree stood before them, its thorny branches coiled around human bodies. The comatose figures hung suspended in the air like smoked hams, swaying gently left and right as if they were the tree’s bizarre fruit.

There wasn’t just one or two ‘fruits.’ The strange tree was laden with them.

Though his memory was gone, Charles was certain these were all the sailors who had followed him.

“I have to save them.”

Charles gripped his Black Saber and charged forward.

One of the boys fell to the ground, groaning in pain, then regained consciousness. He stared in bewilderment at Charles frantically hacking at the tree trunk.

“Who are you? Have you seen our Captain?”

Charles had no time to pay attention. He swung his sword wildly, hacking through the branches until all the trapped figures were freed. But this time, something emerged from the hollow branches. A cluster of short, quivering pink tentacles fell from the severed ends.

Crunch, crunch…

The Dwarf Tree’s trunk suddenly moved, and everyone present turned to stare at it.

The rust-red trunk slowly split apart, and several strands of substance-like gaze shot out from between the cracks, sweeping over Charles’s body.

“Is this tree alive?” The thought flashed through Charles’s mind like lightning.

The Dwarf Tree’s movements grew increasingly violent, and Charles could now see twisted flesh, amber eyes, and the immense rage within those eyes through the cracks.

“Run!”

The survivors on the scene reacted instantly. Even if they didn’t fully understand the situation, their primal instincts drove them to flee.

Before they could take more than a few steps, a deafening explosion shook the air—BOOM! The Dwarf Tree burst apart as if detonating, and a grotesque Flesh Monster crawled out.

At first glance, it resembled a black-furred starfish, but upon closer inspection, the “fur” turned out to be long, slender tentacles of a dark hue. A large mouth, filled with sharp fangs and a single, orange eye, dominated the center of its body.

The monster opened its beastly jaws, flailing its tentacles as it madly pursued its fleeing prey.

Fortunately, Charles had cleared a path earlier, and the distance between them continued to widen.

Crunch… crunch…

The trunks of all the surrounding trees shuddered and split apart. It was as if Charles’s group had triggered some mechanism, awakening bizarre creatures that began spewing fetid lumps of flesh.

These creatures staggered and emitted ear-splitting shrieks that made heads ache, transforming the entire island into a living hell.

Evil gazes poured in from all directions, chilling everyone to the bone and stiffening their limbs.

“Faster! Faster!”

Charles helped the boy and fled swiftly.

They ran for an unknown distance, but the situation grew increasingly desperate. Not only were flesh-like masses surging after them, but the bizarre trees ahead began to sway violently.

Just then, the writhing tentacles in front formed a massive net, trapping them!

In that critical moment, Charles suddenly remembered something. He reached for his waist and felt the hard object—the explosives he had brought!

Boom!

Flesh flew, and the blocked passage burst open.

The explosives had helped them clear a path, but as the amount of explosives left in their bodies dwindled, the faces of the group grew increasingly grim.

When only a final bundle of explosives remained in Charles’s hand, they heard the distant sound of waves crashing against the sandy shore. The exit was right before them!

Knowing what this meant, they redoubled their speed, desperately squeezing every last ounce of potential from their bodies.

The last explosive was ignited and thrown. The solid ground finally gave way to soft sand, and they escaped.

The seven of them raced toward the wooden boat on the beach like madmen, the Flesh Monsters hot on their heels.

Glancing sideways, Charles noticed a golden flash beside him. It was the Shell God Statue he had thrown to the ground earlier.

Charles sprinted ahead, scooped up the statue, and leaped onto the wooden boat. The others rowed desperately, finally escaping back to the sea just as the Flesh Monsters were closing in.

The monsters seemed to fear the seawater; they recoiled slightly at its touch and retreated.

Only when the group had fully returned to the Old Rat did a collective sigh of relief escape them. They collapsed on the deck, gasping for breath like exhausted dogs.

Every muscle in Charles’s body screamed in protest, but he ignored the pain and stood up. The danger wasn’t over; they had to leave this island.

“First Assistant Engineer, fire up the boilers! Deckhands, raise the anchor! First Mate, take the helm! Let’s get out of this hellhole!”

“Aye, Captain!”

Seeing his crew swiftly carry out his orders, Charles felt a sudden sense of unease. Something felt wrong.

He quickly retraced his memories and was surprised to find that all his crew members had returned, and he could now recall their names.

Perhaps the island or its monsters had manipulated their memories, but their memories seemed to have returned the moment they left the island.

Leaning against the ship’s railing, Charles gazed into the distance at the island. In the darkness, the Flesh Monsters were faintly visible.

They extended their tentacles long and swayed them rhythmically from side to side, as if performing some ritual. The sight was utterly chilling in the darkness.

As Charles watched, black smoke rose again from the Old Rat’s chimney, and the crew slowly sailed away from the bizarre island.

Only at mealtime, under Charles’s explanation, did all the sailors learn what had happened, and they were greatly astonished.

“Good heavens, are all unexplored islands this dangerous? No wonder the exploration ship’s disappearance rate is so high.”

“My memories disappeared and then came back? Captain, you’re not tricking me, are you?”

Charles coughed after taking a sip of broth, and the murmur of discussion died down.

After scanning their faces one by one, Charles spoke.

“Everyone, report your name and position. Then, let’s check each other’s memories to ensure there are no inconsistencies.”

The peculiar island had the power to silently make sailors disappear and erase their memories, so Charles couldn’t afford to let his guard down.

“Bandages, position… First Mate, assisting the Captain and organizing work plans… responsible for cargo loading plans, from 12:00 to 24:00… Helmsman.”

“James, position First Assistant Engineer, responsible for maintaining the normal operation of the turbines, as well as managing the propulsion systems, auxiliary equipment, boilers, lubrication, cooling, and fuel.”

“Fred, position Cook, responsible for the crew’s meals.”

“Dip, Boatswain: responsible for supervising deckhands in the maintenance of anchors, ropes, and loading equipment; leading deckhands in painting, sail repairs, and high-altitude work.”

“Water, First Deckhand: responsible for steering, navigation watch duties, and routine maintenance of the deck department.”

“Jack, Second Deckhand: responsible for knot tying, stowing side ladders, and performing various technical tasks in the deck department.”

“Anna, Ship Doctor: responsible for treating crew members’ illnesses and conducting regular health checkups.”

After comparing his memories with the actual scene and confirming the presence of eight pairs of footprints, Charles finally let out a sigh of relief. He had truly overreacted, and at last, the matter was settled.