Chapter 94
The old man floated in the air, still in his cross-legged position, until he reached in front of Ella.
Then, after observing Ella closely, he abruptly spoke.
"I am one of the practitioners who seek to reach the roots of the collective unconscious through mental cultivation to attain truth. One of those who travel across the surface of this collective unconscious. The reason that nameless child treated me familiarly is from her experience of seeing many like me. I have no intention of harming you, nor can I harm you, so listen to my words without worry."
The old man first introduced himself and reassured Ella.
"This place is the surface of the collective unconscious. It's a collection of the unconscious, a place where the unconscious of those who share the same culture and common sense gather."
As Ella seemed to lower her guard a little, he slowly continued his explanation.
"When you look at the night sky in reality, you see stars. However, while that twinkling is simply visible to the eye, its reality is so far away that it's unreachable. This place is like that. The collective unconscious is like looking at the night sky in a dream, so far away that it's unreachable, and full of dark clouds and dazzling lights that make it difficult to even confirm that starlight. But if you're lucky enough to see that starlight, that's precisely this surface of the collective unconscious."
"Yes..."
"However, while the surface is amazing, it's not amazing. Although it's a place where fragments from many people's unconscious have gathered and accumulated, that's all it is. Even if coral gathers over time to form an island, would that be alive? Could the island control the coral? This is a separate space created by the accumulation of traces, and it's a one-way plaza where you can cross over from dreams to here, but not from here to dreams. It's a place that can give inspiration but cannot affect individuals. However, you can see their traces remaining and see their lives, and based on that, you can cultivate and train yourself."
Words full of metaphors.
But Ella felt like she somehow understood.
And as if seeing through such thoughts, the old man stopped his explanation.
"It seems you've understood to some extent. Cute child, is this enough?"
"Yes~~"
But despite the woman's cheerful response, the old man seemed somewhat uncomfortable and kept stroking his beard.
"It's not delving inside, and just understanding the surface doesn't seem to match the price of obtaining a piece of the witches' collective unconscious..."
"It's okay~~ I have no use for it anyway. And it helped you, so that's good enough!"
At those words, the old man seemed to make up his mind and opened his mouth.
"No. The balance of the scales must be right, and what is given and received must necessarily be of similar weight. So I will tell you something that will be helpful to you."
The old man plucked several beads from his rosary and placed them in his hand, then crushed them to ignite flames.
The burning flames moved here and there as if dancing, then rolled down to the floor, and burst into sparkling embers that began to circle around the old man and the sisters.
And as they moved around, they drew lines and formed planes, creating a pattern that was difficult to recognize.
"A great flame will spread across the world. Flames ignited not from one place, but from countless places, will set the whole world on fire but barely leave the breath of life."
The old man looked at the woman.
"You will live in those flames. You will cover that terrible pain with curiosity, cover fear with inquisitiveness, and that's how you will live. Even if your extremities are cut off and you scream, you won't stop grasping at unfamiliar things, and even if your vision is halved, you won't stop craving that wisdom, truly like the one-eyed god. You must have received that blessing in their land and tasted that fragment."
The old man paused in his speech.
Then he closed his mouth tightly and looked at Ella.
"Like a wheel rolling, fate has rolled. Just as something rolling down a slope, the wheel never stops until it reaches the bottom, and even if there are stones, its massive inertia crushes and ignores everything and continues to roll. There is direction, destination, and inertia. It only stops when it reaches the goal of death, so there is only one future. However, the slope is short and the wheel rolls fast, so that life has finally been cut off."
The old man said that much and frowned slightly, muttering.
"However, fate is variable. A single grain of sand can stop an intricate mechanism, and even a great watercourse can be changed by human hands. Fate has been twisted and what was determined has disappeared, and the intertwined causality has unraveled, now new possibilities have bloomed. This is truly good karma, the two who gained new life from the burning flames will now shine and burn until they reach the future they will finally arrive at."
He stopped there and closed his mouth.
The sparks in front of the old man were still moving incessantly as if they had much more to say, but the old man just frowned seriously and kept his mouth shut.
After a long while, he finally opened his mouth.
"A great obsession is about to finish preparing to leave its nest."
He asked the woman with eyes that seemed to be looking far away.
"Nameless child. I ask you, is it good to save a person in mortal danger?"
"Yes! Of course!"
"Then is it good to save someone who wants to die?"
"Huh? Yes. It's good!"
"What is the reason?"
"Because the act of saving a person itself is good?"
"If what you say is true, then the action of the person saving is good, and regardless of the intention of the person being saved, being saved from death is a good thing."
"Huh? Is that... so?"
"Saving a life is literally good, so this is good karma. Then I ask. If there is a beast that will continue to get hurt and eventually meet death if given freedom, is it a greater good to put a leash on it to save its life rather than giving it freedom?"
The old man asked.
"The result is saving a life, so it will be good, and regardless of the process and will, that action is good. However, there are degrees of goodness, and there is right and wrong. Is it wrong to release someone who craves freedom and let them lose their life, and right to save them by putting on a leash? If saving a life is good, is giving freedom not good, or is it less important?"
The old man looked at the woman with deep eyes.
"If only the result is important, how can one live in the world? If one only wants the result of goodness, is everything else unnecessary? Even though heaven and earth are vast, when walking, one only uses the place where their footsteps touch, so if one digs everything else deep enough to reach the afterlife, how can one walk around!"
The old man approached the woman.
Somehow a lot of time had passed, and her body was becoming blurry and translucent.
It meant that the time to wake up from the dream was approaching.
"The use of the useless. It's true that the result is important, but other things are important too, so if the result is good and the process is good, there's nothing better than that. There's neither less nor more, and nothing is angular."
"Grandpa?"
"You gave something precious to me whom you're seeing for the first time, and paid an excessive price for something insignificant. This can clearly be called a favor. As one who seeks truth, I can only return favor for favor. So I will repay the remaining price by telling you a clever move."
The old man whispered in the woman's ear just before she disappeared.
"When you wake up, there will be your benefactor. Before he opens his mouth, you say this."
With those final words, Ella and the woman's vision turned dark.
* * *
Floating.
Ella realized her consciousness was floating upwards.
Unlike before when she fell into a black space and her breath formed bubbles creating a path, the opposite was happening now. As if water had hands, it was pushing and pulling her consciousness up, and the light that had looked small was gradually increasing in size, brightening her vision.
The white light changed from a point to a plane, and the plane eventually became a space that brightly colored her eyes.
Finally, when someone painted colors on her brightly colored vision as if doing watercolor, and when those colors formed shapes.
She realized she was looking at the hotel ceiling.
"Huh, huh?"
Normally, she should be shouting with joy just for regaining her consciousness after the terrible kidnapping.
But Ella could only roll her eyes, not knowing what to do with herself due to bewilderment.
"Huh?!"
This was because she was completely naked without a single thread on her body.
Also, a child was pressing down on her body, equally naked.
Moreover, not only was being naked bewildering, but there was a strange thread-like thing connecting her nose and the child's nose, and following it, there was a needle stuck in their noses.
Ella thought it looked similar to making a potato battery in science class.
But, who is this child?
But here was where the question arose.
Who was this child, who looked about elementary school age, lying on top of her body, pinning her down with their body weight so she can't move an inch?
Ella was about to open her mouth to wake her up.
But as if her intention was transmitted telepathically, the child suddenly opened her eyes and looked at Ella.
Then, smiling brightly just like the woman in the dream, she said:
"Hello? It's big sister~"
At that dazzling smile, Ella couldn't help but shout with deep sincerity:
"I’m obviously the older sister! You fraudster!"