People in Terra, governing a bizarre little country

This is the last inch of territory left by the once glorious human civilization on this land. Because one-tenth of its energy has been extracted, it looks much more desolate and cold than when Ernst last visited.

From the moment he stepped into this area, the doctor gradually fell silent.

He gripped Kelsey and Ernst's hands tightly, his gaze darting between the sarcophagi that no longer emitted any sound or showed any signs of life. His breathing grew heavier and heavier, making him appear like a drowning man suffocating in the quiet space.

He himself was not quite sure why he had such feelings.

"Kal'tsit, in here."

"These are all stone coffins."

Kal'tsit nodded slightly.

“They are not fundamentally different from the stone coffin in which you awoke.”

"So, you mean there's a version of me inside every single sarcophagus here?"

Kal'tsit paused, then gave the Doctor a complicated look.

She wanted to say something comforting, but when she met the doctor's eyes, she found it difficult to say the words.

No amount of comfort is more valuable than the truth; the doctor is past the age of describing "death" as "going to work in a faraway place."

So Kal'tsit finally nodded:

"The Institute of Stasis once preserved 100,000 orphans of human civilization."

"ever?"

"There are no longer any living beings in these stone coffins."

Kelsey said,

"At least, they passed away peacefully."

""

The doctor did not answer; his breathing suddenly became much heavier.

People don't feel sadness for those they have no memory of. Wars break out every day in the world, and countless people die in places beyond our sight. If we had to mourn and waile for every one of them, the whole society would become an ocean of weeping.

The doctor had absolutely no recollection of those who had fallen into eternal sleep in the stasis institute.

They may have been the prophet's friends, relatives, enemies, research partners, or theoretical adversaries in the past. But at this moment, they are nothing more than a bunch of slowly decaying flesh.

The doctor felt no sadness about it.

It should be so.

But he still felt a pang of unease, as if a sharp thorn had pierced his heart, a truly horrifying sensation.

EnsizhongQun: I understand his feelings.

Although this analogy is not entirely appropriate, when he first stepped into that memorial hall in Nanjing, his emotions were probably not much different from those of the doctoral student at this moment.

The horrific scene was too much for me to bear, and the rumors were even more unbearable to hear.

A wise person, when dealing with birds and beasts, cannot bear to see them die when they are alive; nor can he bear to eat their flesh when he hears their cries. Therefore, a wise person keeps away from the kitchen. If this is how humans treat birds and beasts, how much more so their own fellow human beings!

More than 100,000 corpses silently decay in this quiet underground tomb. Few people know how much hope humanity carried on their backs, and no one cares anymore.

Only a time traveler like the Doctor would feel a pang of sorrow and be qualified to offer condolences.

However, he also lost his memory.

He no longer remembers how many sacrifices they made, so how can he presume to claim that he understood their resolve? How can he guarantee that he has inherited their will and has not failed their expectations?

Some people might wonder why he should take on this responsibility.

But the doctor would say that this is not an option to give up, but rather an obligation he has as a human being.

"How come I don't remember anything?"

He let out a sigh filled with countless thoughts.

“It’s not your fault,” Kal’tsit comforted her, but dared not say it any more explicitly.

She was unwilling to accuse Theresa of any wrongdoing. From the perspective of a Terran, Theresa had done her best. She had genuinely saved the Terran civilization once in the face of a cruel creator and brought them back a benevolent one.

That's all she could understand.

The doctor offered no explanation, nor did he blame his not-so-bright cat. He took a deep breath, looked at Ernst's profile, and slowly stopped, muttering to himself:

"Perhaps this is my fault."

If he had disappointed his comrades in the stone coffin, he could at least console himself, since they were unlikely to come out and offer him any opinions. But the gentleness shown to him by the person beside him at this moment was the most severe test.

Ernst said nothing, which the doctor found regrettable.

They had also lost their memories, and he believed that he, like Ernst, could understand that feeling.

How did Ernst cope with all of this?

Ernst naturally noticed the doctor's gaze. It was hard not to notice a big man walking in a cemetery, holding your hand tightly, looking scared, and his eyes constantly darting back and forth between you and the tombstones!

If these "tombstones" hadn't been unmarked, Ernst would have suspected that the doctor was matching them one by one with himself!

Hey, you silly Chun, what are you doing! Don't hold me so tightly!

I don't want to perform Sichuan opera with you!

Fortunately, they had reached the end of the stasis chamber, passing countless tombstones, countless sorrows, and countless histories, and arrived at the side of the tomb keeper.

Trevor Friston's enormous, eyeball-like body may have been inspired by a race that had vanished from the universe and fed on the stars. Or perhaps it was simply a desire to amplify the concept of "overseer, preserver," thus emphasizing his omnipresent, all-seeing eyes.

Most people who come here for the first time will be frightened by its appearance, but the doctor was not. On the contrary, when his eyes met those huge eyeballs, he even felt a rare sense of "kindness".

"Long time no see, prophet."

Trevor Friston's voice carried a hint of melancholy, and the heaviness and nostalgia in his words weighed heavily.

"Nice to meet you, Trevor Friston."

The doctor answered softly, but the simple phrase "nice to meet you" was enough to convey his attitude and feelings.

My clattering footsteps were a beautiful mistake. I am not a returning traveler, but a passerby.

Even though he had anticipated all of this, Trevor Friston fell into a brief silence.

When he spoke again, it seemed he had temporarily activated a stronger emotional suppression module, making his voice sound more mechanical.

“I understand, Doctor.”

"Nice to meet you. I am Trevor Friston, the head of Project Preservation. I am different from the servant robot Ama-10 beside you. She has a human body, but she is a genuine creation. I am the round robot I am now, but I am a real human."

“I am your compatriot.”

The surrounding space gradually began to reconstruct itself as he spoke, and the Doctor couldn't help but tighten his grip on Ernst's hand.

"Don't worry, this is a debate."

Ernst explained patiently.

Friston's voice began to fade into the distance, and his massive spherical body slowly diffused and dissipated like an ink droplet merging into water. In its place, a blond old man emerged from the spreading ripples.

Ernst recognized the appearance; compared to the Faceless Man who had given him the orange when they last met, this was perhaps his true form.

Trevor Friston himself is the head of Project Preservation, one of the four major survival plans of prehistoric civilization. He is the guardian of civilization, the lonely gravedigger, and the one who leads the project.

"I will do my best to answer any questions you may have. There is nothing false between us here."

Trevor Friston smiled gently and spoke softly in as calm a tone as possible.

"Is there anything you want to know, Doctor?"

The doctor pursed his lips.

What did prehistoric civilizations look like?

What kind of person was I in your eyes?

Why are prophets called prophets? Does this title have some special, deeper meaning?

Did the prophet make any arrangements for what is happening now? Did he truly foresee that he might lose his memory and become out of control, so he prepared a "beacon" in advance to guide things in the direction he wanted?

What exactly is the nature of my relationship with Kal'tsit? Why do you all call her Ama-10, while I call her Kal'tsit? And why does she even seem surprised, panicked, and sad when I deliberately use the name Ama-10?

What is the relationship between Ernst and me regarding the "treasure"? What does he mean to me? What does he mean to this civilization? Why did Kal'tsit say that the last task given to her by the past prophet was to find and protect the "treasure"?

There are so many things I want to know.

There were so many questions that he couldn't quite tell which one would be the most appropriate to start with.

The greatest regret in life is being powerless to help those who need you. And the greatest obstacle in life is the endless barrier created by information asymmetry.

The complex and diverse information from the prehistoric civilizations, coupled with his fragmented memories, has built an unbreakable wall of information between him and the prehistoric civilizations, and between him and Terra.

Without understanding the civilizations of the past, one cannot figure out one's own origins. A person without origins is like a rootless duckweed in the vast sea of ​​stars. He will never be able to obtain the answer called "self," and thus will never be able to sever ties with this experience.

If he can't understand it, and can't let go of it, how can he believe in a "Terra civilization" that he's only been in contact with for a few months and that has left him with almost no good impression?

Some might say that Kal'tsit and Rhodes Island didn't leave him with a good impression either?

No, Kal'tsit and Rhodes Island did indeed offer him solace in this strange world and unfamiliar era.

But as Trevor Friston, the Preserver, said, isn't Kal'tsit herself a creation of the prehistoric civilization?

Rhodes Island, which she has been responsible for establishing the concept of and managing to operate to this day, has not become alienated. Doesn't it embody the high moral standards of the ancient civilization?

Isn't this the source of the immense sense of division between Rhodes Island and Terra?

Therefore, every day the Doctor lives on Rhodes Island only deepens his bond with Rhodes Island, but not his bond with Terra.

Because as long as he is a normal person, he really finds it hard to consider Rhodes Island, which is united, friendly, helpful, and free from discrimination and oppression, as the same as Terra, which makes things difficult for Ernst and keeps him running around and busy.

After a long silence, the doctor finally confirmed his question in his mind.

This wasn't the question he most wanted to know, but it was the most urgent at that moment. In a way, it also stemmed from his curiosity about the person who was supposedly "inseparable" from him and who was still "absent" so far.

He looked at Trevor Friston and asked the question:

"Where's Precious?"

After a long silence, the golden ocean within the Originium's internalized universe finally rippled after this question.

Ripples converged into waves, surging like tides, and the waves roared deafeningly. The stagnant ocean seemed to come alive at this moment, and the diamond-shaped emblem, like the eye of God, hung high in the sky, rippling in circles beneath the tsunami, as if responding.

Precys's figure slowly appeared in the center of the rhombus.

She opened her eyes, seemingly a little confused, but quickly recovered and answered softly:

"I'm here."

I've always been here.

everywhere.

In the midst of the debate.

A small cluster of Originium crystals was slowly growing towards the sky along the boundaries of thought. Within each facet of the Originium crystal, the Doctor could vaguely see that white figure.

He was familiar with that figure.

Trevor Friston frowned. The unusual turn of events in the debate reminded him once again of Ernst's account of Precys's intrusion into his debating system. This time, however, she didn't even try to hide it, but instead used the most straightforward method of proof.

All the visible colors began to recombine. The garden full of sugar oranges, the boundless desert filled with joyful songs, the deep space that seemed to hide all truths—everything was distorted, absorbed, and corrected by the Originium into a curtain of rainbow-colored light.

The curtain was drawn back, and the figure was already standing there, as if she had never left.

"Pureseth."

The doctor's slightly furrowed brows relaxed, and his eyes held a hint of realization and recollection.

The beautiful figure whose name he called smiled slightly, nodded to Trevor Friston with his gloomy gaze, Ernst with his normal expression, and Kal'tsit who was already hiding behind Ernst, and finally looked at the Doctor.

"haven't seen you for a long time."

Chapter 1058 How many people did we kill as a price?

Trevor Friston walked up to Ernst, nudged him lightly in the waist with his elbow, and wore a mocking smile.

"You've experienced it, haven't you?"

Ernst turned his head slightly, looking speechless.

"I've experienced that."

Damn it, how could I not understand?