"Huh, huh, huh, huh..."

The rain gradually stopped, and the sun returned to the sky. The warm sunlight shining on the muddy land seemed to comfort something.

"Crackling—"

The sound of the bonfire burning echoed in the cave, Gaia's eyelids twitched slightly, at least it wasn't so cold now.

"Captain Gaia, are you awake?"

When the familiar voice came, Gaiya was startled, his eyes opened wide in an instant, and he turned over from the ground and stood up.

However, due to the lack of a hand, Gaia's balance was not sure for a while and fell down again the next moment.

"Captain Gaia, move slowly, you will aggravate the injury." 049 sat on the stone beside him and looked at Gaia worriedly.

"049!?" Gaia was startled, and then gritted his teeth. Judging from the broken right hand, everything before was not a nightmare: "Why are you here?"

"I thought you would be arrested, but I didn't expect to scare him away—and since that's the case, I have no reason to leave you alone." 049 said truthfully: "I have already disinfected your wound, and at the same time It’s also bandaged, according to your self-healing ability, although you can’t grow your arm back, it won’t take long to restore your body’s ability to move.”

"..." Gaia was silent, and it took a long time before he let out a long sigh and said, "I see...Thank you, and sorry."

"You don't need to apologize. It was my fault that I didn't explain it clearly before. If you really believed me that way, then there was something wrong with your brain."

"By the way!" Gaiya suddenly remembered something and stood up from the ground: "Where are my team members? Where are all my team members!?"

"They got separated, although most of the enemies are chasing you, but those monsters are not what they dealt with by themselves—"

"You...you mean..." Gaia felt her heartbeat stop for a moment.

"Captain Gaia, let's be sad and obedient. Only by ending this plague as soon as possible can we prevent more people from being sacrificed."

"Did none of them survive?" Gaia turned his head stiffly, with a confused expression in his eyes, and the words of the man in black reappeared in his mind: "When they were alive, they were divided and eaten by wild beasts." In the end, he died in pain."

Yegor, Robert, are they all dead? ......is it possible?

 …

"Good morning, captain!...Huh? Why are you hiding here?...Hiding Cilia? Did you accidentally break her gun?... Damn! . . . ”

"Hey, captain, don't push me, I just celebrate my birthday... Isn't it just vodka? I'll drink it! I can drink it?...Fuck, why is this wine so powerful? of?"

"Huh? Captain, why are you here by yourself, where is Cilia? Didn't you come with me?... Uh, bored... how about we go to the training ground instead of shooting targets?. ...Alas! It was a target, not me!..."

"Captain, Merry Christmas—huh? Why are you so unhappy?—You said you still want to celebrate the Chinese New Year? Although I don't know why, but you are the boss, if you think about it, let it go. As long as there is no task, we all together with you."

 …

Memories of the past and those vivid voices drifted through Gaia's mind one after another, and he felt limp all over, as if he had fallen into the bottom of the sea.

"No, it doesn't..."

At this time, Gaia's pupils shrank and his eyes widened at 049's words.

"Someone survived!? Who is it?!"

"I'm sorry, I don't know your team members...but it's not good news for them to survive..." 049 shook his head helplessly.

"What do you mean?" Gaia frowned.

"Because they were infected by the plague, that's why they survived." 049 explained.

"Is it the plagues you usually 'cure'?" Gaia raised his eyebrows, then closed his eyes and thought for a while, "I'm a grasshopper on the same boat as you now, I don't expect you to trust me, but I trust you now, so I want to know what the plague can cause?"

"I lost my will and became a walking dead, a running dog of the plague, and further spread the plague to others, making everyone like him." 049 said slowly.

Gaia opened his mouth slightly, with a look of surprise on his face: "Is this why you performed the 'operation'?"

"Well." 049 nodded: "I don't have enough resources to carry out experiments to improve my surgery, and the extent to which I can achieve it is limited. The only cure for this plague is death—and my cure is to kill people first and then recover." Rescue...but in the end you also saw it, which caused me to be criticized."

"...I want to go back to the Foundation immediately." Gaia stood up with a cold face, her fists clenched tightly.

"No, if you go back now, you're throwing yourself into a trap." 049 stood in front of Gaia and stopped him.

"what do you mean?"

"What awaits you when you go back now is to be contained. Your surviving team members have been infected, and they will be subconsciously controlled by the plague first, and the control of this plague will become more and more intense as time goes by, but even Now it’s only the early stage of the illness, and you can subconsciously change the thoughts of your companions, for example—make them think that you killed your team members, and finally escaped..."

"!?"

"And they will report this matter to the foundation. Do you think the foundation will choose to trust them or trust you? After all, you are still just a dangerous SCP in their eyes, no matter what contributions you make It's all the same."

"......so what should I do now......"

Gaia sat on the ground weakly, grabbing her hair with one hand.

"In any case, I suggest that no matter what you want to do, don't go back to the Foundation, and don't get involved with organizations other than the Foundation—I will find a way to end this plague, please escape before that , don’t be taken away.” 049 said seriously: “Is the necklace I gave you still there?”

Gaia was taken aback, then reached into his trouser pocket and took out the necklace: "Here."

"Keep this thing, you will need it sooner or later."

"Wait, are you leaving now? Aren't you coming with me?"

"...No~lightnovelpub.net~ shook his head: "It's not convenient for the two of us to act together, it's not good for both of us. "

Then 049 took one last look at Gaia's shoulder: "Since your wound is fine, I don't need to worry too much. I believe you can take care of yourself..."

"Wait! What if those people find us again?!"

"You don't have to worry about this, they won't dare to attack you if you stay in an 'open and aboveboard' place—such as those big cities, the more people there are, the better, if they really attack, they will be the ones who will be unlucky in the end." 049 Faint Dao then turned around to leave the cave, but suddenly he froze and looked back at Gaia: "By the way, I remembered, you still have one team member intact...well, it's just that he suffered It’s just a few scratches and scares, and she hasn’t contracted any disease, and she’s still in this forest, you can find her by going east, if she’s not there, you can follow the trail to find her.”

"Her?" Gaia was taken aback, Xilia was not there, and there was only one woman in the team: "Iris?"

049 did not reply, nodded silently, looked at the clear sky, waved to Gaia and left alone, leaving a last sentence:

"I hope you can retrieve your memory as soon as possible, then everything will be much easier... I wish you good luck, Master Ryoka."