Hesta looked away. "...Did you have any contact with Mother City after that, after District 1 lost contact?"
"No. Why?"
"Has anyone ever told you that Mother City could go dormant again at any time and disappear from this world?"
Victoria let out a quick, light laugh. "Where did that come from? Is it a rumor that started because District 1 lost contact?"
Hesta was silent for a while, then pursed her lips. "You don't believe it?"
"Depends on your source," Victoria said. "Who told you?"
"...Then just take it as me talking in my sleep," Hesta said. "There's a second half to this sleep-talk. Want to hear it?"
Victoria smiled and shrugged.
"District 1 lost contact because it triggered Mother City No. 1's Containment Sequence—and every Mother City could return underground at any time. And the containment condition," Hesta said, looking at Victoria, "is a simple value judgment."
Victoria's expression gradually turned serious. "...What?"
Hesta patted her knees and stood up. "When you know what it is someday, we can continue this discussion. That's all for today."
Before coming to the base, many people had thought they were merely changing where they lived, and that life would not change very much.
Yet in just the first week after moving in, everyone felt the impact of their new life—Hesta and the schoolteachers seemed extremely keen on taking them out: libraries, museums, parks, botanical gardens... They went somewhere new almost every day.
Before each trip, Xia Yixue prepared a route map for everyone, with the destination and public transit information written on it, and everyone began learning how to take buses.
It was truly a troublesome thing, because most of Emangria's buses only used District 3 Language, and most vehicles did not announce stops in order, so boarding the wrong