This is a rather simple quest in essence, but can take some time to achieve because you need to collect a huge number of cursed pearls. In any case, prior to starting this quest, ensure that you have sold/freed all the prisoners aboard your ship, left all your gold with the moneylender/one of your officers and placed all your best ships and officers in Port Control, giving yourself a Tartane. You will lose them all if you have not done so. Items are not lost.
- Go to the tavern of any colony, then speak to drunkards about "stories" you hear in the local taverns. Keep talking to them until they mention the Flying Dutchman, whereupon your logbook will update.
- The first logbook update will be "There's this story going 'round the taverns of a ghost ship..."
- The second logbook update will be "It's a tale everyone seems to know..."
- The third logbook update will be "I hear tell it's been seen near the island..."
- At this point, after the third logbook update, set sail and enter the world map, and you will see a pirate ship spawning and heading towards you. Engage it - it's the Flying Dutchman.
- In the battle with the Flying Dutchman, you cannot board it - the only way to progress this quest is to lose and get sunk. If you sink it, your logbook will simply state "Still...I do wonder if that is the last I shall meet this specter...", and the quest will remain active. In this case, you'll have to talk to the drunkards again until they tell you that it's near the island.
- After you get sunk, you will lose everything except your items, but "miraculously survive" on a random island after a random number of days. Since it's random, you can technically keep reloading before you get sunk to land on an island you want; for example, on an island where you stored your gold with the moneylender.
- Now go to the town of the colony you're in and make some money or retrieve your gold from the moneylender. Once you have enough gold, buy a ship or, if the shipyard has no ships, save then talk to the smuggler to take you to a location. This location that they will take you to is random, so save before speaking to him in case the location is not where you want to go. Remember to pay the smuggler in the tavern after the specified time has passed before heading to wherever he tells you to go!
- Easter Egg: You can also buy another Tartane at this point and make sure all your gold is with the moneylender, then go talk to the drunkards again until you get another logbook update that the Dutchman is near the port. Once again, sail out into the world map, engage the Dutchman, and get sunk a second time. This time however, you will receive a strange item called "Metal Hand". Head into town and sleep at the tavern, and one of these nights you will be visited by the "Terminator" who claims he is an Mk K-102 cyborg manufactured by Seaweb Industries in the year 2022. He will also go on to tell you that the Crew of the Flying Dutchman are actually cyborgs with a biological framework, then leave. Nothing else happens after that, and as to the truth of his story, who can tell?
- Now get back your ships and unless you're Spanish, buy a Spanish Trade License and fly a Spanish Flag before mooring on the shores of Amatrice, south of Belize (flying the Spanish Flag alone will NOT work, even if your stealth skill is 100). Now head past the caves, and go straight all the way until you come to a jungle whereupon you will be greeted by a pearl diver. Now, if you don't have a Spanish Trade License or aren't Spanish, you will immediately see him running away to warn the pearl divers and you'll have to wait a few months before they become non-hostile again - so take caution here.
- Head into the Pearl Diver settlement and look for a guy with a mustache and wearing a brown cap - he should be quite easy to spot. His name is White Boy, and he will tell you to bring him 666 black pearls to make the crew of the Flying Dutchman mortal once more - sounds familiar?
- Now you'll have to collect 666 black pearls. To achieve this, during the 10th-20th of each month, you'll have to talk to governors of any nation colony (not pirates) about "fighting for the glory of their nation" and they'll tell you that the town is under attack by the undead (this will happen most of the time but is not guaranteed, so if he doesn't give you the quest just wait another day and try again), so go out and kill them all with the city guards then talk to the Governor for your reward. Each skeleton killed will drop a random amount of cursed pearls without any need to loot the bodies or land the last hit. Unfortunately, you can only do this once per town per 10th-20th cycle, so to ensure optimum efficiency, do this quest in friendly towns close to each other, so you can immediately set sail and do the quest again in another friendly town. Note that this quest is separate from the governor's quests and that they can be taken immediately after this one has been accepted.
- Once you have all 666 black pearls, go back to the Shores of Amatrice, south of Belize, and speak to White Boy (make sure you have the Spanish License, etc.). He'll tell you that the Flying Dutchman is no longer immortal, and your logbook should update.
- Now go to any tavern and talk with the drunkards and they'll tell you the Flying Dutchman is near the port again. This time however, they won't be immortal so you can enter the world map, engage them, then sink/board them. Of course, it is highly recommended to board them since you will receive no reward otherwise. Note that if you board the ship, there are 500 Aztec coins inside the Captain's cabin chest. After boarding or sinking the ship, the quest ends.
- On the GoF mod v2.0 (vanilla stats may differ), the Flying Dutchman is a powerful Class 3 ship with 59,500 hull armor and 49.00 maneuverability, absurd stats even for Class 1 Man-o-wars or the fastest of ships. However, it is balanced out with a smaller crew and only 54 cannons. That said, it is still a good and powerful ship to have in any fleet, and its hold is big enough to accommodate a huge number of loot anyway.