Forty-Two Years had passed since Wer­ryck last expe­ri­enced the rest­ful­ness of sleep, a fact the pro­tag­o­nist learned dur­ing a series of late-night con­ver­sa­tions. Wer­ryck revealed that his choice to for­go sleep was moti­vat­ed by an insa­tiable desire for revenge and con­trol, a deci­sion that had cost him his peace. This unset­tling admis­sion forced the pro­tag­o­nist to reflect on Lark’s beliefs regard­ing redemp­tion, specif­i­cal­ly for those who had wronged her—like Large Beef, a man who once attempt­ed to fire­bomb her shop. The rev­e­la­tion stirred a mix of emo­tions in the pro­tag­o­nist, who, feel­ing over­whelmed by Werryck’s com­plex­i­ty, decid­ed to play a famil­iar bass line to ease the ten­sion. In that moment, the pro­tag­o­nist could only won­der about the deep bur­dens Wer­ryck car­ried, while try­ing to offer com­fort through music, hop­ing to calm the trou­bled soul before him.

As the con­ver­sa­tion con­tin­ued, Wer­ryck shared a poignant mem­o­ry, recall­ing a vivid dream of dri­ving a car off a moun­tain, a des­per­ate yearn­ing for dreams that had been denied to him. This sur­re­al rec­ol­lec­tion sym­bol­ized Werryck’s inner long­ing for a reprieve from his relent­less real­i­ty, a reprieve that sleep once pro­vid­ed. The pro­tag­o­nist, reflect­ing on the cru­cial role sleep plays in one’s life, felt a deep sad­ness for Werryck’s plight, real­iz­ing how much he had lost in pur­suit of vengeance. The con­trast between Werryck’s trag­ic sac­ri­fice and the pro­tag­o­nist’s own untrou­bled rest only deep­ened their sense of empa­thy, high­light­ing the fragili­ty of the human spir­it. The rev­e­la­tion of Werryck’s sac­ri­fice also left the pro­tag­o­nist con­tem­plat­ing the weight of deci­sions made in the name of pow­er, and the price that must be paid when per­son­al peace is will­ing­ly trad­ed for some­thing much dark­er.

The fol­low­ing work­day took the pro­tag­o­nist and their crew to the dark, damp, and fore­bod­ing con­fines of the ship’s Sham­bles, a deten­tion area beneath the water­line. The crew was tasked with the grim job of seal­ing cor­rod­ed steel hulls using hot tar, a job that would require both phys­i­cal endurance and men­tal for­ti­tude. As they entered the Sham­bles, the oppres­sive dark­ness swal­lowed them, bro­ken only by faint glim­mers of light that revealed the decay sur­round­ing them. The air was thick with an eerie still­ness, bro­ken only by the signs of inmates serv­ing their harsh sen­tences. This envi­ron­ment, where time seemed to stand still, mir­rored the sense of hope­less­ness that often over­whelmed the crew. Yet, amid the bleak­ness, there was a sense of duty, as if the work itself was a kind of redemp­tion, albeit a grim one.

Dur­ing their time in the Sham­bles, the pro­tag­o­nist met Mar­cel, a fel­low work­er, who intro­duced him to Mag­gie, a woman con­fined in a near­by cell. Mag­gie, who had been hear­ing music through the plumbing—music that turned out to be the protagonist’s—shared a heart­felt exchange with him. Her appre­ci­a­tion for the music they played offered a glimpse into the unex­pect­ed bonds that can form even in the harsh­est of cir­cum­stances. Maggie’s words con­veyed a long­ing for con­nec­tion, remind­ing the pro­tag­o­nist that even in the most oppres­sive places, the human spir­it can find ways to reach out and touch oth­ers. This small, inti­mate con­nec­tion amidst the despair of the Sham­bles served as a brief moment of solace for both of them, pro­vid­ing a sense of warmth in an oth­er­wise cold, iso­lat­ed envi­ron­ment.

As the work­day came to a close, the pro­tag­o­nist received a slip of paper from Ivar with a sin­gle name writ­ten on it—“Sol.” The name car­ried an air of mys­tery, hint­ing at deep­er nar­ra­tives and emo­tions that were yet to be uncov­ered. The rev­e­la­tion of this name brought a rare moment of lev­i­ty, as the protagonist’s amuse­ment tem­porar­i­ly lift­ed the weight of the monot­o­nous life aboard the ship. It was a fleet­ing but vital moment of hope, remind­ing the pro­tag­o­nist that even amidst the iso­la­tion, new sto­ries and con­nec­tions could still emerge. Lat­er that evening, Wer­ryck, now vis­i­bly more vul­ner­a­ble and human, suc­cumbed to sleep while the pro­tag­o­nist played sooth­ing music for him. This qui­et, inti­mate moment marked a sub­tle shift in their rela­tion­ship, reveal­ing the fragili­ty of the man who had once seemed so for­mi­da­ble. The chap­ter closed with a sense of con­nec­tion and vul­ner­a­bil­i­ty, high­light­ing the evolv­ing emo­tion­al land­scape with­in the harsh envi­ron­ment, and sug­gest­ing that even in the dark­est places, moments of ten­der­ness could still exist.