Shrouded Seascape

Chapter 591: Inexistence

"Captain, what are you talking about? I don't see anything outside," Dipp said, sounding puzzled.

However, Charles couldn't care less about Dipp's thoughts. He could see a white object streaking across the sky, making a beeline for the Narwhale.

The next moment, familiar giggling noises pierced his ears, shattering his altered memories. True and false memories intermingled, creating a hodgepodge of indescribable memories.

Charles now had two completely different sets of memories in his head. An agonized look took over Charles' face. He grabbed his head, and the veins on his forehead bulged.

"Chief Engineer! Bring the doctor here! The captain is in pain!" Dipp decisively roared into the communication pipe connected to the turbine room. He wasted no time, as Charles looked to be in extreme pain.

Charles gritted his teeth and used his trembling right hand to take his diary out of his chest pocket as the two worlds before him overlapped.

"Anna, come here quick! Delete my memories!! Now!" Charles roared agitatedly. He finally remembered the identity of the bizarre entity making a beeline for the Narwhale. It was none other than the so-called "Inexistence" Tobba had spoken of, and it was the same entity he had seen in his dreams.

Anna appeared almost immediately and read Charles' memories. She instantly understood what was going on, so she grabbed Charles' head in an attempt to erase and alter his memories.

"Wait! We still have some time! We have to leave clues for our future selves," Charles said. He took out his phone and was about to start recording when he came to a screeching halt. His heart skipped a beat upon realizing that there was something wrong with the thumbnail.

When he opened the video with a quick click, Charles' assumption was confirmed to be true. The new thumbnail was from a brand-new video, and the brand-new video depicted an extremely flustered Charles.

"There's something wrong. Future me, this is the tenth recording. Something has gone very wrong. No matter how many times you delete and alter your memories, that monster will always appear. It can even latch onto others, so you must not let anyone else perceive its existence!

"That monster is the so-called 'Inexistence.' It exists the moment you think it exists. Second Mate Charlie, O.S Sam, and Third Engineer Clark have perceived its existence, and they ended up disappearing!"

"Second Mate Charlie, O.S Sam, and Third Engineer Clark? Who are they?" Charles muttered, and his hair abruptly stood on end. He couldn't remember ever having crew members with those names. Since he couldn't remember them, it meant that their existence itself had disappeared.

"That entity has already noticed you by the time you see this video, and you have two minutes at most to figure out a countermeasure. That entity's speed is very—"

The ghastly skeleton head abruptly appeared on the screen, and the video ended there.

"Charles! Hurry up! It's coming!" Anna exclaimed. Her expression was grim as she stared intently at the elongated monster in the distance.

I've altered and deleted my memories so many times now, but it still hasn't been working! Am I going to be trapped in this loop of deleting and altering my memories forever? Charles' heart sank into the abyss of despair upon recalling his own words in the video. He then turned to the distance and saw the entity approaching the Narwhale at a seemingly leisurely pace; it was now just at least a hundred meters away from the ship.

Charles' brows were knitted tightly as he tried to come up with a solution, and that was when his expression abruptly became calm.

"Anna, I'm the root of this issue. Three crew members have already vanished into thin air. Who knows how many people will disappear if we wait much longer? We must solve this issue at its roots."

Anna's face changed, and she seemed to have an idea as to what Charles wanted to say, "Shut up! I am not going to let you do something like that!"

"I want to give it a try. You know I can't run away, right? If deleting and altering my memories a thousand or ten thousand times is not enough to solve the issue, then I'm just going to face the problem," Charles said, and he cast a determined look at the oncoming entity.

The next moment, a black spike protruded from the palm of his prosthetic hand.

"You can't possibly defeat that thing! We don't even know what kind of entity we're facing, and it's from the mist as well, so why are you trying to face it? Have you lost your mind?!" Anna yelled, looking extremely agitated.

The light in Charles' eyes solidified into a firm determination. "You might be right, but there's no other way! We also don't have the luxury of time. If I end up dying here, then please live on well with Sparkle.

"I can't lure that thing here and implicate the Narwhale! Anyway, my last will is beneath my pillow. Give it to my crew later," Charles said.

Anna raised her hands, and more than a dozen tentacles wrapped around Charles.

Unfortunately, Charles had seen through Anna's move. There was a flash of white light, and Charles' figure disappeared into thin air before reappearing at the bow. He was bent over and was vomiting the contents of his stomach.

Anna's heart stirred slightly, and she attempted to force Charles to turn back using mind control, but Charles seemed unaffected for some reason. A silver bracelet on Charles' right hand was emitting a soft glow amidst Anna's attempt to control Charles' mind.

Meanwhile, the enraged Charles kicked off the bow and rushed toward the oncoming monster with a black spike in hand. However, the monster seemed like it couldn't see Charles as it continued its leisurely stroll toward the Narwhale.

"Die!!" Charles used all his strength to thrust the black spike in his hand toward the ghastly skeleton head.

The moment Charles made contact with the skeleton head, it disappeared instantly—no, it wasn't just the entity. Charles' surroundings faded slowly, including Anna and the Narwhale behind him.

Everyone and everything disappeared until Charles found himself standing in a hazy and monochrome world.

Charles stood blankly for a while before he started looking around. The world was desolate and silent. Charles opened his mouth to shout, but no matter how hard he tried to shout, no sound came out of his mouth.

Just then, a vast amount of knowledge appeared in Charles' mind. He suddenly understood the identity of that skeleton head. It wasn't a Divinity on the surface, nor was it a monster. It was nothing—it was "inexistence" in itself.

Funnily enough, the concept of "inexistence" did not exist in its own world. It was nothing—it was nothingness. However, humans couldn't comprehend nothingness.

Nothingness was beyond humanity's comprehension, so they subconsciously concretize this "nothingness." And it was exactly the reason Charles saw such a bizarre monster as the representative form of "inexistence."

Those unlucky enough to perceive its existence would become a part of it. The current Charles was an "inexistence," so those outside would not be able to perceive Charles' existence.

Charles turned around and saw something in the distance. He walked over and saw a corpse. It was the corpse of someone familiar to him—Second Mate Charlie.

Second Mate Charlie was completely unresponsive as he sat blankly on the void-like ground. It seemed that Charles wasn't the only one unlucky enough to perceive the Inexistence. Second Mate Charlie had perceived it as well, so he ended up becoming a part of it.

Just then, Charles realized that he had never noticed that his second mate had disappeared, and he couldn't remember seeing Charlie since they left 068. Clearly, Charlie was assimilated way earlier than him, and Charles was convinced that he only lasted this long, as Anna had been deleting and altering his memories.

"What am I supposed to do now? Should I find a way to escape?" Charles chuckled bitterly. He couldn't escape. He had already become an Inexistence, and he had been forgotten by everyone outside.