The homeless gathered around them like a ring of wretched shadows. Their condition was miserable beyond description; hunger had carved deep grooves into their faces, and their sickly bodies shivered from the cold and damp. It seemed as if they remembered nothing of their past, as if their previous lives had been wiped away, leaving only dark, repetitive memories on this bleak island.
"Does anyone here know anything about this place?" Silas asked, raising his voice slightly so everyone could hear. "Or perhaps knows the way to the scrapyard?"
Some hung their heads in despair, while others continued to stare into the void.
"We all live in the same state here..." Sven answered in a raspy voice, then stood up and approached Silas to whisper in his ear, like someone asking for a lifeline: "Tell me... will you really help me?"
Meanwhile, Elyra moved silently toward a woman sitting cross-legged, holding a frail baby girl in her arms. The infant looked at Elyra with wide eyes, and Elyra felt a strange prick in her chest; she felt that the baby was lost in the same void she lived in, a void of lost memories. Or perhaps the child's condition was worse, for she didn't even have a past to forget.
Elyra took off her heavy white coat, draped it over the shoulders of the woman and the child, and smiled a faint, rare smile.
"How have you continued to live here? Where do you get food?" Elyra asked in a calm tone. "Is there anyone helping you?"
The woman raised her head, her eyes brimming with tears:
"Well... we don't have any real source of food. We only live on the scraps brought by Moros."
"Moros?" Silas caught the name and looked at Sven, waiting for an explanation.
Sven answered while rubbing his dirty hands: "He is one of the homeless here, but he is different... He is the one who brings food scraps, but it's not enough; we almost fight over it like animals."
"Where is he now? Is he one of these men?" Silas gestured toward the crowd.
Sven shook his head: "No, he is not here. Moros rarely appears; he keeps wandering alone. Even we rarely care about each other; everyone wanders in their own direction, for there are more homeless people scattered deep in the fog."
Silas furrowed his brows in thought.
Moros... I must find this person. Maybe he knows the secrets of this place. I must find someone who knows the geography; I have no chance of finding the scrapyard in this pitch darkness and fog without a guide. But before that... we will see what lies behind that gate.
Suddenly, a man approached the woman Elyra had given the coat to, snatched the baby from her arms, and kissed the infant's forehead with exaggerated tenderness.
"Are you this child's father?" Elyra asked him.
The man nodded quickly, as if expecting praise for his fatherly affection.
Elyra's features changed in an instant. Pity turned into cold anger.
"Aren't you ashamed of yourself?" she said, her voice sharp as a blade. "How can you allow a life to be born in this terrible place? Do you know how much suffering you will cause this child? Damn you."
She glared at him with hatred and contempt, as if he had committed an unforgivable atrocity. The mother might have shared some of the blame, but Elyra's anger was directed entirely at the father, who seemed proud of his "achievement" in hell.
The screams coming from the gate stopped for a moment, as if the ghost was taking a breath, before returning to echo again with greater force.
"Come on..." Silas said. "We're heading to the gate."
This time, Sven accompanied them, driven by his curiosity and fear of being left behind.
As they walked, Elyra asked Sven:
"Has it not occurred to any of you to breach this place?"
Sven answered, trembling: "No... no one will approach this place. Ghosts appear here. A group of homeless people said the ghosts attacked them and burned their eyes with blue light. Well..."
Sven stopped suddenly meters away from the gate.
"We are very close... I will stay here."
In the custom of these poor souls, "ghosts" was a term applied to anything unfamiliar; creatures, specters, or even phenomena they had never seen before.
They finally arrived in front of the massive gate. It was surrounded by high walls topped with barbed wire made of dark, solid metal. Silas realized immediately that it was impossible to breach it by conventional climbing, as he had tried before and failed.
Elyra stood in a warrior's stance, gripped her sword which she called White Fang, and quickened her steps toward the gate. With a powerful shout, she delivered a horizontal slashing blow toward the massive lock.
CLANG!
The sword bounced back violently, and Elyra's body shook from the recoil, but the gate wasn't even scratched.
"So... there is something you can't cut," Silas laughed lightly, watching her annoyance.
He grabbed his cane, pressed a button on the other side, and stood before the gate like someone preparing to throw a spear.
At that moment, the ghost formed again above the gate. It shimmered in dark blue, looking down at them, reflecting its cold light onto their faces.
///
Elsewhere, far away on another beach of the island, a ship was approaching to dock.
It wasn't an ordinary ship, but a massive vessel with a design that suggested danger, resembling old pirate ships, but with sails dark red like clotted blood. Gas lamps leaning towards yellow were spread across its deck, illuminating a small area in the darkness, but failing to penetrate the surrounding wall of fog.
On its deck stood a crew of six men, centered around a man holding the helm casually.
"Damn them!" the captain shouted, laughing with a raspy voice. "How do they expect a person to find the place in this soup? Even though it's our second time here, we almost got lost! Hahaha!"
A crewman retorted sharply while tightening ropes:
"But we had the compass... we could have arrived earlier if not for your stubbornness, Captain."
Captain Jackson turned with boredom:
"Damn that cursed compass! Captain Jackson doesn't need such cheap things. What's the fun in sailing without obstacles? We are pirates, not travelers on a picnic!"
He took a golden compass out of one of the many pockets in his trousers and threw it carelessly toward the man, who caught it skillfully.
The ship docked, and Captain Jackson and two other men disembarked, stepping onto the black sands.
They heard faint human voices coming from a distance, but they ignored them.
"The smell is still disgusting here..." Jackson complained, covering his nose. "Where do we go now?"
He looked ahead, seeing nothing but a wall of darkness.
Jackson's appearance was strange yet neat for a pirate. His curly black hair reached his ears, and his chin was covered with a light, trimmed beard. His facial features were rugged, but his clothes were a chaotic mix of pirate and noble elegance; an open-chested silk shirt, faded green trousers full of military pockets, and a long coat embroidered with faded golden threads, but he wore no hat.
The loud screams coming from the gate continued, but they didn't bother them. They seemed used to this noise, or perhaps they cared about nothing but their goal.
Suddenly, a blue flash appeared in the distant sky.
They saw the blue ghost forming above the distant gate, rippling and screaming terrifyingly, like a beacon of hell.
The pirates stopped in their tracks, watching the scene silently, their cigarette smoke mixing with the fog. They didn't look scared, but interested.
Then the ghost moved away and faded into the fog again.
///
At the gate, the ghost continued to circle above Silas and Elyra, the annoying screams pounding their ears mercilessly.
"Listen..." Silas shouted to be heard over the noise. "Try to distract it! Make it focus on you while I climb!"
"With pleasure!" Elyra replied, starting to wave her sword and shouting at the ghost to provoke it.
Silas raised his cane, and this time aimed it at the top edge of the gate. He pulled the trigger, and a metal grappling hook attached to a thin, strong rope shot out from the head of the cane, flying through the air like a fisherman casting his line into a raging river.
CLICK!
The hook caught onto the metal at the top of the gate and held fast.
Silas smiled with relief.
Good... Sven and I will go down, and we will open the gate from the inside... that is if we don't find something horrible waiting for us behind it.
He thought with anxiety and confusion.
He signaled Sven to get ready to accompany him. Sven was lying on his belly a little distance away, trembling with fear.
But as soon as Silas lifted his head to start climbing, he was surprised by something that made his blood freeze.
There was no longer just one ghost.
The blue light gathered and condensed, and about nine additional blue ghosts formed, all hovering above the gate like guardians of death, screaming in one voice and looking at them with intent to kill.