The Captain's yurt was abandoned. The lantern oil had run dry, plunging the circular dwelling into an uncharacteristic, brooding silence. There was no sign of struggle, no hastily scrawled note, and most worryingly, not a single Polish cavalryman in sight to explain the sudden absence.

Panic, mixed with a healthy dose of superstitious dread, gripped the remaining crew. Where had the Black Captain gone?

Believing he might have wandered into the treacherous bogs that bordered their encampment, the crew mounted a desperate search. Torches hissed and sputtered in the damp night air as they trudged through the muck. The search yielded nothing of the Captain, though it did result in a tragedy of its own: a few unnamed, newer crew members wandered too far from the safety of the path and were swallowed by the mire. They did not return, destined, perhaps, to become modern Moorleichen, preserved forever in the cold, acidic embrace of the earth.

The mood the following morning was darker than a starless squall. That is, until salvation arrived in a creaking wagon. A local beer peddler rolled into the encampment, touting a special, highly potent brew he called 'Bergziege'.

Desperate for a reprieve from their swamp-induced sorrows, the crew bought the man's entire stock. They drank the wagon dry. When the peddler had nothing left to sell, the drunken sailors continued to pester him for answers, for stories, for anything that might distract them.

Cornered by the raucous, slurring mob, the salesman threw his hands up and revealed a secret: the Black Captain was not lost in the bogs at all. He was in Prague!

The crew could scarcely believe it. Prague? A landlocked city? They badgered the man for details, but as the Bergziege worked its formidable magic, their memories grew hazy. When they awoke the next afternoon with heads pounding like ship's drums, nobody could remember the specifics—only the destination.

Bound by duty and the lingering effects of the brew, the crew commenced a grueling overland journey to the Czech capital. Upon their arrival, parched and weary, they encountered a group of locals engaged in a lively, aggressive game of Palant.

When questioned about a man fitting the Captain's fearsome description, the players simply pointed their bats toward the Vltava river.

There, bobbing gently on the current, was a houseboat. And there, sitting on its humble deck, was the Black Captain himself. He was calmly smoking his pipe and sipping from a tankard of a strange, bright yellow brew.

A cheer went up among the sailors, and they rushed the gangplank, eager to reunite with their commander. But their path was abruptly blocked by a burly, unyielding figure—the houseboat boatswain.

"I am just a receptionist," the man growled, crossing his massive arms, "but you cannot enter."

The crew protested, gesturing wildly toward their Captain, who seemed entirely unbothered by the commotion.

"The Captain needs his time off," the boatswain declared with finality. "Please, go and play some Palant, or take a walk on the Karola-Bridge. But leave the man be."

And so, the crew was left standing on the riverbank, staring across the water at their elusive Captain, wondering what strange winds had blown him to a houseboat in Prague, and just what exactly was in that yellow brew.