How Come You...

On the other hand, there is concern.

After all, she still doesn't know whether Priestess really left on his own or whether Maria disposed of him.

Although it's not nice to say it this way, the truth is that she could ignore Priestess's departure, but she wouldn't dare to stake the Doctor's life on it.

So...

"If you want to travel and see the world, I can go with you."

Kal'tsit volunteered.

But the Doctor did not respond; instead, he turned to look at Maria beside him.

His slightly lowered eyes held a hint of helpless smile.

"I hope... I can follow the same path as her... Is that okay?"

The Doctor's words were soft, even weaker than a plea, like a helpless person begging for a sip of water at the last moment, filled with weariness.

Perhaps for her, whether Maria agrees or not makes no difference.

And Maria did indeed begin to ponder this.

A moment later, she glanced at Lamaline, who was still smiling beside her, then turned back and nodded to the Doctor.

"Can..."

"Thanks."

The Doctor politely raised his head and smiled.

"This?!"

Kal'tsit's ears drooped limply...

Realizing she couldn't stop the Doctor's actions, and that the Doctor was unwilling to let her follow her, Kal'tsit could only place her last hope on Maria.

Before setting off, she mustered her courage several times to talk to Maria, repeatedly telling Maria that the Doctor meant a great deal to her, and that she hoped Maria would reconsider.

To be honest, Maria felt that Kal'tsit's concerns were completely unnecessary.

After all, from the perspective of the future, her relationship with the Doctor is considered to be of a relatively good type... In that case, Kal'tsit has no need to worry about her taking action against the Doctor.

However, Maria also knew that if she brought up future matters in the present, Kal'tsit would definitely have a hard time understanding... so she didn't say much, and each time she just gave a calm answer to express her attitude.

Another two weeks passed, and the new pack animal caravan was ready once again.

After a brief farewell to Lamaline, Maria and the Doctor slowly drove away.

In the same amount of time, they arrived at the camp where Maria and Priestess had camped last time.

The traces left by Maria can still be faintly seen on the side.

How are you feeling?

Perhaps because Kal'tsit had specifically mentioned that the Doctor's health was not even as good as Priestess's back then, Maria specifically inquired about the other's physical condition.

The Doctor, with a pale face, gave a helpless smile.

"Fine..."

"Your appearance is hardly good."

Maria shook her head slightly, then casually lit a campfire and sat down beside the other person...

"I remember asking her the same question back then, why did you leave... She told me a lot, but you shouldn't have asked those questions."

"... Not necessarily."

After a few moments of silence, the Doctor smiled.

"I may not have Kal'tsit's problems, but I think we are the same in terms of personal feelings."

The Doctor is really smart; even though Maria didn't say anything, she could guess what Priestess was struggling with back then.

To put it bluntly, it was simply that Kal'tsit couldn't provide her with a sense of security, and she couldn't fully trust Kal'tsit. Furthermore, the unfamiliar environment deepened her unease about this world, and the unfamiliar race was something she couldn't accept. Therefore, she chose to leave, to escape Kazdel...

Do you want to leave too?

Maria blinked after hearing the Doctor's explanation.

Perhaps because everyone here is intelligent, there's no need to hold back on the topic; we can just speak our minds directly.

After a brief silence, the Doctor suddenly laughed.

"Of course I want to..."

"Yeah..."

Maria lowered her eyes slightly, and her hand quietly gripped the Blades beside her...

359

Chapter 359 What happened to you...?

"To be honest, although Kal'tsit said you could understand our conversation, I was still a little surprised to see that you could actually understand and respond..."

The Doctor paused for a moment, not noticing Maria's left hand movement. She simply looked up with a sigh and gazed at the starry sky beside her.

The stars in the sky were much the same as she remembered, still in their original positions.

"Priestess entered the life support pod before me, so what she didn't know was that by the time I entered, all the other personnel carrying out the missions had already failed."

"Logically speaking, the last humans in this world should be just the two of us."

The Doctor turned his head to look at Maria, who was also looking at him from his left.

Are you human?

She asked with a smile, her calm tone seemingly concealing a great deal of meaning.

"... That depends on how you define 'human being'."

Maria didn't acknowledge her human nature as she had before; she simply looked at the Doctor, her eyes narrowing silently.

The Doctor was indeed stumped by this question.

She remained silent for a long while before finally managing a helpless, bitter smile.

"Yeah... what exactly is a human being...?"

"..."

Maria paused, then stared at the Doctor's profile for a moment before lowering her weapon.

After pondering for a moment with her brows lowered, she took out a scroll.

"Can you understand what's written on this?"

"Um?"

The Doctor was somewhat bewildered by Maria's sudden action, but out of trust and goodwill, she took the scroll, flipped through it, and was slightly taken aback.

"This thing... is their research record on Gordan..."

Just as Maria had guessed, the scroll given to her by the fallen priest was indeed one of the records of Precursor Civilization legacy.

The Doctor clearly knew about this item, and upon seeing it, he wasn't surprised; he simply remarked on how it had been preserved to this day...

Oh, it seems it's not a preservation, but a replica?

After flipping through it a few more times and reading it all, the Doctor shook his head slightly and looked at Maria beside him.

Maria then asked a question that seemed to be in doubt.

"Um?"

You know Gordan, right?

"Um."

"This record states that Gordan enters a period of weakness approximately every two hundred years..."

The Doctor shook his head, his words tinged with emotion.

"Upon discovering this, our compatriots immediately set about seizing the opportunity to pull Gordan's body into the real world and defeat him..."

"Only..."

The Doctor smiled wryly.

Maria, who was standing nearby, blinked.

"It failed?"

"No... we did destroy the parts of Gordan that we dragged into the ground, but..."

The Doctor took a deep breath and pointed to the moon in the sky.

"But we overlooked the most important point... We seized Gordan's weakest moment, the instant its eyes were obscured by the moon over the world, and we dragged its body into reality and destroyed it."

"But... we took away His body, but forgot His eyes, which were the most crucial moment... because of one mistake, everything we had done and sacrificed before became meaningless."

The Doctor gave a wry smile as he finished speaking.

This also served as a reminder to Maria.

The ritual she learned wouldn't be enough to completely pull Gordan's body to the ground. Would she also need to expend some effort dealing with Gordan's eyes in the sky...?

Maria pondered, while the Doctor beside her smiled wryly and continued speaking.

"We can't wait another two hundred years..."

"We have no choice but to activate the backup plan, leaving only a portion of the population to wait for the next two hundred years."

The Doctor paused abruptly at this point, then looked at Maria.

Where did you get this thing?

"In some ruins."

"... I see."

The faint idea in his mind was extinguished, and the Doctor was filled with mixed emotions.

However, she quickly composed herself.

Perhaps due to Kal'tsit's guidance, the Doctor had already assumed that Maria was a human of the same type as himself, and what he knew, Maria also knew quite well.

So she didn't hide anything, and simply continued asking questions by the campfire.

Do you think... I should continue with Originium Project?

"... I have no right to tell you what to do."

Maria's expression remained unchanged, but her movements subtly shifted several times.

Upon hearing this explanation, the Doctor could only helplessly purse his lips.

"You're quite cold-hearted..."

"... Did Priestess ask you this question?"

"... No."

Maria gave a negative answer.

The Doctor nodded knowingly.

"She is much more determined and stronger than I am."

The Doctor shook his head, took a deep breath, letting the night air mix with the smoke from the burning wood fill his lungs, and then exhaled.

"Did she go to carry out Project Originium?"

"... Um."

Maria blinked, not denying it, while the Doctor's face showed a struggle again.

But soon, she suppressed that fervor again... and Maria's question came from the side.

Do you know why Kal'tsit woke you up?

"She told me."