Rhodes Island does not exist.

"Thank you so much..." The Doctor didn't know how to deal with Skadi's behavior, so he could only try to defuse the awkwardness in his heart with words, appearing somewhat timid.

Even though he knew that he shouldn't be the one feeling awkward.

"Alright, record it, record it." Skadi sat up along with the Doctor. "When will the recording be ready? Let's get it done, hurry up!"

However, there seemed to be a hint of unease in her voice.

-

Thank you segment.

Thank you SCP agent zyz绁星灯 for the monthly pass, thank you.

Chapter 273, Section 271: The Path of Disintegration

In fact, we all live in a dream.

Rhodes Island is the framework of a dream, the daily life on Rhodes Island is a continuation of the dream, and the Doctor is the master of this dream.

Therefore, once the doctor wants to wake up and stop pursuing his dream, this place will probably collapse into sand at some point and never be the same again.

-

"Doctor, is the doctor there? Doctor?"

Awakened from his daze by a familiar voice, the doctor lifted a corner of his hood and rubbed his eyelids.

He sat down in the chair in front of the tea table, where the familiar monitor was hanging in his line of sight.

"Really, you're not connected to your past self, so how did you fall asleep?" The voice came from the locked circuit. Although she had no eyes, the expressiveness of her facial muscles and the corners of her mouth surpassed that of the two round beads.

"Just now... I think I remembered some things from the past." The doctor tried to recall the words that had just entered his mind, but for some reason they had become increasingly blurry, almost as bland as watered-down beer foam.

"Oh, oh." Locked Circuit sat opposite the Doctor, stirring the liquid in his glass with a long-handled teaspoon, looking like he was concerned but not really. "So doesn't that mean you're about to remember? That's good, that's good."

"...Hmm?" Realizing something was amiss, the Doctor asked, "Why are you alone? Where's Skadi?"

Upon hearing the name Skadi, the lavender vines tightened slightly.

Although it doesn't hurt, it's enough as a request.

The doctor was already used to it, so he didn't care.

"Skadi, Skadi?" The locked loop tilted its head to the left, then to the right. "Who is Skadi?"

"Be serious," the professor sighed.

The doctor had anticipated her reaction, so he wasn't angry.

"Ah, I remember now, I remember now, the sister with the greatsword, right? She went to the supermarket," the closed loop replied casually.

"The supermarket? Didn't she just go there once before?" The doctor pointed to the packaging bags and shopping baskets piled up to the side. "I haven't touched any of them. There's no need to replenish them, is there?"

“Oh, no.” The locked circuit waved its hand. “She seems to have something else she wanted to look for, so she went alone.”

"I see." The doctor seemed to be thinking, but couldn't come up with any conclusions, so he finally turned his attention to the screen in front of him. "Let's get down to business."

"Oh ho." The locked circuit nodded, then snapped its fingers with a nonchalant air.

"Snapped."

With a snap of the fingers, the screen in front of me lit up.

The playback record from the last time was retrieved and presented to the doctor.

"Thank you for your help," the doctor said, as was customary.

"Hey, hey, while I'm happy that you're thanking me, you don't need to thank me." A sunny smile spread across the corners of the closed circuit's mouth. "After all, I said from the very beginning that what you did was actually a help to me."

"Alright, alright." The doctor felt like he had heard this countless times, so he shut his mouth and focused his attention on the video in front of him.

The video plays, time passes, and everything goes smoothly.

The doctor, like a skilled dreamer, gradually merged with the figure on the screen through self-relaxation, experiencing his past delusions.

-

In a hazy state, the doctor emerged from the ocean of consciousness like a whale surfacing.

He returned to that place again.

That place filled with biological tanks.

However, things have changed. Although everything around them remains the same, the most important thing, Warfarin, has disappeared.

"Tsk."

As an observer, the doctor clearly felt somewhat uncomfortable with this obvious gap in the story.

Although the changes were not beyond the doctor's expectations, it did not mean that he could accept such changes.

Even so, he was just an observer.

An observer cannot interfere with the direction of the story or determine the course of events. All they can do is watch from the sidelines, absorb the essence of the story, and fill in the gaps in their own memories.

Time continued to pass.

-

The perspective shifts back to the PhD from the past.

"what."

The doctor gently shook his head.

"I was too impatient, too impatient. It was my fault."

He was reflecting on what he had said to Warfarin earlier.

“She didn’t even know me here, but I still tried to talk to her from that self-righteous position… I even treated myself as my past self and her as her past self… I was so stupid, how could she possibly remember me?”

The PhD student is blaming himself.

He was blaming himself for losing a former partner, all because his words had been too harsh.

"What should I do now? Go out and look for her?" he muttered to himself, deep in thought.

But in the end, he rejected his own thinking.

"Still not."

The doctor stopped sighing and turned his eyes to the organs pulsating in the biological tanks in the room.

Those organs, they are alive.

Just as the diary records, these originally muddy tissues were transformed into living things after being thrown into these biological tanks.

"Wait, what if it's a living thing...?"

The doctor recalled his promise.

He had promised the huge, strange creature in the stairwell that he would find food and feed it.

And those scraps, those rotting and smelly organs and parts piled up in the corner of this room are probably the best food for it.

They'll be fine if you just treat them in one of these unused bio-tanks.

So, are there any unused bio-tanks here?

The answer is of course yes.

After all, warfarin's research has obviously not yet reached a mature stage; everything is still under development, so there are naturally more bio-tanks available for use.

"So, all that's next is to throw these things in?"

The doctor's gaze fell on the corpse parts that were even beginning to ooze a putrid, blackish fluid, and then he slowly walked over.

He showed no disgust on his face.

After all, for him, this level of filth was not worth it.

Throughout his incredibly long career as a traveling doctor, he treated countless patients on the verge of death, touched their bodies in the late stages of infection, and caressed their festering, oozing wounds. He also bore the responsibility of preparing bodies for burial, using his own hands to harmlessly dispose of corpses that even their loved ones were unwilling to look at.

He did all this not because he was seeking anything.

Simply because he is capable of doing it.

Chapter 274, Part 272: The Insight of Black

Wearing his own gloves, the doctor threw the piled-up body parts, resembling fertilizer, into the biological tank.

Snapped.

Snapped.

The slimy texture slipped from my palm and then piled up in the jar, filling the air with an astonishing stench of decay.

This is probably what composting is.

"Being able to work for so long in this kind of smell shows that, at least in terms of work attitude, Warfarin is still the same as before."

The doctor couldn't help but laugh, recalling how Warfarin had yelled at him for the sake of the experiment.

He was smiling because of Warfarin.

Because he felt it was good—even though he had lost his memory, he had not lost his true self.

"If she still doesn't come back soon, then I'll really have to go look for her." The professor muttered to himself as he picked up the scraps of meat and put them into the bio-tank. "Logically speaking, the environment here is really not suitable for human habitation, so she probably doesn't live here."

The layout of the tenth floor is somewhat similar to that of the fourth floor, so there must also be some rooms here that are exactly the same as those on the fourth floor for people to stay in.

As for the strange phenomenon—presumably, any strange creatures that could roam this tenth floor have already been dealt with by Warfarin long ago.

Otherwise, where would the experimental materials come from?

"It seems that although she has lost her memory, she is even more capable than before." Imagining Warfarin speeding across the battlefield, the Doctor couldn't help but smile. "Warfarin, the battlefield medic, is she starting to gradually transform into Gavial?"

"...No, Gavial is still not up to par." After careful consideration, the Doctor shook his head. "Her strength is beyond what ordinary people can match."

"Goooooooooo."

Some bubbles began to rise from the surface of the mushy, minced meat in the vat, and then burst.

It seems that the biomass reaction in these bio-tanks is very fast, even faster than the doctor expected.

After all, it had only been a few minutes since it was put in, and the substances inside had already begun to change.

However... this seems to be different from what is recorded in the diary, doesn't it?

The doctor frowned slightly as he looked at the bubbling bits of flesh.

So, to confirm that his memory was indeed correct, he reopened the notebook that Warfarin had given him and found the section about the experimental biological tank.

Day Fourteen.

This aquarium seems to have a mysterious ability to preserve food; the food I put in yesterday hasn't spoiled at all.

[P.S.: So I cut the monsters I killed today into pieces and threw them in.]

Day 18

[Due to complicated reasons, I haven't written anything down for the past three days, so I'm skipping the first three pages and starting from this page.]

[First, regarding the strange body part I put in the terrarium, it changed.]

The originally chaotic, reddish-black mass of flesh inexplicably began to grow things resembling hands, feet, and branches, and even seemed to be sprouting skin.

That's right.

The time doesn't match.

According to Warfarin's records, she threw the body parts into the biological tank on the fourteenth day, but the changes in the contents of the biological tank did not become obvious until three to four days later.

The bio-tank in front of us is clearly moving much faster.

But the doctor knew he couldn't just draw a conclusion like that.

After all, less than ten minutes have passed. If we want to produce evidence, we have to wait until a certain amount of time has elapsed.

So the doctor decided to wait.

However, as he sat down on the ground and began to stare at the biological tank, he suddenly realized that something was wrong and opened his diary again.

Day 19

My thinking is correct.

Although the remains I examined yesterday didn't show much change, I unexpectedly discovered food that I had put into another aquarium a few days ago.