Chapter 103
Nightfall arrived on schedule, but the storm came uninvited.
Rain hammered the hull in a relentless crackle while waves surged like a thousand charging troops, slamming into the ship beneath howling winds that roared deafeningly.
Somewhere a window had been left open, and damp drafts swept through the corridors, chilling everyone to the bone.
The stairwell door between Decks 6 and 5 was usually left unlocked, and tonight was no exception. With each gust, it creaked eerily, like rusted hinges turning. Residents on Deck 6 merely tossed and turned, pulling their blankets tighter, hypnotizing themselves into ignoring the grating noise—along with the screams and shrieks that came from somewhere—perhaps next door, perhaps just outside.
No night had ever been as terrifying as this one.
Another gust howled, and as the stairwell door swung open and shut, a figure darted swiftly into Deck 6.
"Huh? The door's open?" Lin Tu said casually as she made her way downstairs, only to discover that the safety door between Decks 6 and 7 was merely ajar.
She quietly tucked the [Diamond Coating] back into her pocket—Deck 7 was the work deck, and the crew strictly managed the stairwell door locks. She'd planned to coat a blade with the diamond coating and cut through the door, though she'd worried the noise would draw attention and trigger a house-to-house search for spies the next morning. But the door was open.
Could this be a trap? Lin Tu tensed instinctively, then smiled at her own paranoia. If someone had set a trap specifically to catch her—a random person sneaking in to steal oil at this hour—she might as well hire a fortune-teller to check the feng shui of her home.
Still, since the door was open, she needed to be careful. Riding the next gust of wind, Lin Tu finally slipped into Deck 7.
It was a world apart from the floors above. No warm carpets or soft wall sconces here—only bulkheads divided by rib-like frames, iron brackets clinging to those ribs, pipes that hissed steam from their valves, and a floor of riveted steel plates that felt hollow underfoot.
Lin Tu had learned earlier that a 3D map was located here, so she scanned the area, quickly spotting it. She pinpointed her own position and the location of the fuel tanks.
The rain muffled her hearing like a veil of gauze; Lin Tu could barely hear a thing. She kept her eyes and ears wide open, taking two steps for every one, and finally crept close to the fuel tank compartment.
As she reached the entrance, she was stunned to find that the main door to the fuel compartment was also slightly ajar, pitch darkness within. She hesitated, wondering whether to enter, when she heard two men's voices from behind her. Their words came through fairly clearly, which meant they were already very close. Lin Tu quickly pressed herself to the side, tossed a wire mesh onto the ground, and slipped into the fuel compartment.
She swallowed a Night Blueberry, vaulted lightly over the railing, and tucked herself into the shadowed side of the storage tank farthest from the entrance.
"Seriously, the captain really found Aladdin's lamp? He can turn fuel into beauties? You mentioned something about the Four Great Beauties—can you tell me again? I haven't decided who to pick yet."
"You idiot!" another voice scolded. "I was just messing with you, and you actually believed it. Only someone like you would get stuck with every odd job the captain gives you. Can't you do simple math? Think about it—how could our fuel run out so fast? And if there really was an emergency that required transferring fuel from the storage tanks to the day tank, why would they send us out in the middle of the night?"
"Every detail is suspicious, every detail reeks of something off," he said, word by deliberate word.
"There's only one possibility," the first man said with a dull laugh. "Everything you said is true."
"True, my ass! I've got nothing more to say to you. Get to work!"
Lin Tu cautiously poked her head out from behind the storage tank to observe. She saw the two men connect the storage tank's outlet to another tank, then connect that tank's outlet to a complex machine. They fiddled with it for a while, then attached a flexible hose. That hose extended deep into the fuel compartment, connecting to a thick pipe.
From what they'd said, it wasn't hard to guess that this was the pipe leading to the day tank.
As for why they didn't just hook up a hose directly to transfer the fuel, rather than going through this whole rigmarole, Lin Tu figured they were professionals and must have their reasons.
She'd originally planned to siphon fuel directly from the compartment, but now she changed her mind. Popping another blueberry, she moved lightly and silently through the pipe's shadows, sprinting to the end of the hose.
"Can I use the Energy Stone to upgrade an Anju function now?" Lin Tu urgently asked the Butler.
The Butler always replied instantly to her queries: "Energy Stones differ from points—they can be used during the game, whether in [Infinite Calamity] or in [Anju]."
Lin Tu immediately tossed down a wire mesh, enveloping herself and the hose completely. Under her command, the mesh didn't attack anything; it remained silent, sealing off sound and light from both inside and out.
"Upgrade the [Liquid Storage] function!" Lin Tu commanded.
[Ancillary Storage], an intermediate function worth 600 points, provides one cubic meter of space attached to your home. Energy Stones upgrade it to [Liquid Storage], which initially offers twenty cubic meters (note: each cubic meter can store only the same type of liquid...), and each additional cubic meter costs 600 points. This [Liquid Storage] can be used anywhere outside your home; specific usage instructions are as follows...
Lin Tu realized a plastic bucket with a faucet had appeared in her hand. Thanks to the Night Blueberry, she could read the label on the bucket immediately.
The center of the label was blank, but below it was a short instruction manual—
[Liquid Storage: You may summon this storage at any time. Pour liquids in through the mouth, and dispense liquids through the faucet. Upon initial input, the storage will automatically name the liquid you pour in, and information such as its name and volume will be saved in your Anju system. You can manage your stored liquids at any time through Anju.]
Following the instructions, Lin Tu immediately unscrewed the bucket's mouth, opened the valve on the hose, and shoved the hose into the bucket.
Once she confirmed the connection was secure, she slipped back out of the wire mesh's range. In the distance, voices drifted over again—
"The data looks good, right?"
"Okay, start transferring the fuel."