One Hundred and Fifty-Six: Look, this world!

When my space-wading friends are gone, the world falls silent. Although it was still early, the figures around were already very thin. There are fewer and fewer free-roaming people, and the few people who occasionally meet on the road are also mentally exhausted and weak, and the rest are the primordials who seem to never tire and get tired of anything, retaining a faint vitality for this sleeping world.

Whenever this happens, I can't help but fall into a panic that I can't help but understand. I used to spend the whole day frantically completing all kinds of tasks, filling this alone time with running around and fighting; He also used esoteric alchemy to dispel this loneliness and spend this time in a simple laboratory; But more often than not, I prefer to find a quiet place – or a lush lawn, or a huge rock, or a soft haystack – and feel the breeze pass over my body, watching the sun, moon, and stars rise and set again and again, and let the awake soul sleep with the world until my friends reawaken me.

I never knew what my friends meant by exhaustion and sleepiness, I could run all night or fight all day, I thought I didn't need rest – I didn't even understand the word "rest" at one point – but I soon realized that maybe my body didn't need rest, but my soul did.

When I owned the hut upstairs in the guild, I used it as my soul's resting home - in fact, it did help me through many lonely days and nights. But now, I don't have the ability to find peace of mind here, and an irrepulsible sāo movement grows in the depths of my heart, leaving me in a trance and distraught. I always felt like there was something important to do, but I couldn't remember what it was......

…… Or maybe I don't want to remember? Don't dare to remember?

Pushing open the window, just after dusk, the holy city of Freishite was bathed in a warm twilight, as if draped in a light veil of gold. As far as the eye can see, the woods outside the city loom and stretch into the distance to the edge of the horizon.

Suddenly I was not satisfied, and I stood on my tiptoes, wanting to look farther away, to see the other side of the horizon, where there seemed to be something that I silently longed for, even though I didn't know what it was, but I couldn't help but miss it.

What's further afield? There are a few mountains, a river, a vast plain, and a few small but laid-back villages.

No, it's more than that. It occurred to me that in that far away place, which I could not see, there was a small town called Campunavia, with its mossy walls, its gray roofs, its not-so-large but always lively central square, and the sculptural fountain that never sprayed water but the water in the pool was always clear......

On the side of the city, there is also a bright path with flowerbeds filled with roses. The sunset must be rippling on that line at this moment, I imagined, like a stream full of light, flowing quietly along the bluestone slab. Standing in the middle of the road, it seems that you can pick up a handful of bright sunlight as soon as you stretch out your hand, and if you can drink it, it is a warm feeling.

Oh no, none of that mattered, the important thing was that on the edge of the road there was a small but delicate bakery, whose oven was always hot, and the red fire was always beating merrily, and the faces were red. The shelves in the bakery are stocked with bread of all kinds: blueberry jam, chocolate, baguettes, large torn buns...... Even the bread on the shelves is always hot to the touch, because there is a kind and industrious girl who always replaces the cold ones with freshly baked hot bread.

Of all the breads, I like the vanilla the most, the soft and sweet taste that always reminds people of the girl's soft and white hands. Oh, by the way, I have this vanilla bread in my backpack. I took it out and held it in my hand, and the bread was already cold, but the faint, soft taste was still there. Put it under the tip of your nose and sniff it, and the face of the freckled, always smiling lively girl came to mind.

Suddenly, a strong longing struck me, and I suddenly remembered what was the cause of the myriad things that had been bothering me. Marianne, the beautiful girl as beautiful as roses, I haven't seen her for a long time since the last time I fled in a hurry. For a time, I was so scared of the emotion that I was so doomed that I forced myself to forget about it.

But now? Now that I have decided to face my life calmly and cherish all this as one of the best memories of my life, can't I regain the courage to see her again?

I couldn't sit still any longer, so I immediately opened the door and ran out, hurrying to find the nearest stagecoach station. I arrived just in time for the carriage to Campunavia to stop. No sooner had I plunged into the carriage than the carriage swayed and set off.

I've long guessed that these stagecoaches traveling between faraway cities possess some kind of mysterious magical power, and that they can reach their destinations at speeds far beyond common sense, even the fastest mounts I know of. Now, however fast the dwarf coachman sat in front of me, however fast he was, it was so slow to me. My body was sitting in the carriage, but my heart was already flying in front of me.

Did you know that "missing" is the most amazing magic? Whether it is the end of the world, whether it is the vast sea of people, or even life and death, it can pull your heart to the person you miss in an instant, so that you can clearly appear the voice of that person in your mind. Compared to it, the speed of light and electricity may not be so fast; Compared to it, your vision and hearing are so blurry.

A few minutes later – for me, it was as long as centuries – I rode to the junction of "Rose Street". Everything was as peaceful and tranquil as I had imagined: the sunset filled the stone paths, the scent of flowers in the wind, the lovely cottages on either side, and the occasional sound of wind chimes in the air. The whole road was empty, and not a single pedestrian could be seen as far as the eye could see; But it is so full, filled with something called "gentleness".

Along the way, I have fantasized countless times about this reunion with Marianne. I had imagined myself in tears, with a bitter cry to say goodbye to the best love of my life; I also imagined that I would force a smile, and let my heart hurt like a knife and a needle, but I still smiled and talked to her; I imagined myself like a fool and my mind was empty at the sight of her, and I stood there staring blankly...... I even imagined myself to be a coward, a coward, an evasor who was crushed in the face of my own feelings, and I didn't even have the courage to set foot on the street, not even the shadow of the bakery, let alone see the beautiful girl who haunted me in my dreams.

But I never thought it would be like this:

I rode my horse and walked slowly on the right side of the path, watching the cute sign of "Santa's Bakery" grow bigger and clearer, and then there were beautiful doors and bright windows. The night had gradually darkened, but it was not yet enough to light the candles. The fire flickered in the room, shaking a bright light and shadow.

Just outside the window, I saw Marianne? Santa, the girl I was destined to fall in love with, but I was never destined to fall in love with me.

She was lying on the counter, as I remember, with her hands on her cheeks, looking at the sky outside the window, and did not see me standing outside the window, with a shallow smile of happiness and longing on her face.

There was no sadness, no excitement, no tears, no cowardice, neither like a hundred twists and turns, nor as meticulously carved as poetry, to the point that it was like a simple prose, she was in the window, I was outside the window, and everything happened naturally, as if everything was supposed to be like this.

I suddenly remembered an old question that no one answered, unanswerable: what exactly is "love"?

It is a kind of strong feelings, which can only be described with extremely strong words such as pain and sweetness, survival and death, loyalty and betrayal, with the irresistible surging emotions that hit the deepest part of your nerves again and again, leaving you with the most thrilling spiritual feelings.

Or is it a private, obscure, never declared, but always hidden in the heart of the emotion, delicate and fragile, can not withstand the slightest touch, time will wear it, words will hurt it, ** will scorch it, only the most beautiful and purest thoughts can blend with it, this pure spiritual care and nurturing, this is "love"?

No, no, no, that's not love, at least not the whole of love. It should be like breathing, like hearing, like sitting, like walking, like thinking, a part of our life, a part of our life. It should probably be a calm and ordinary thing, when you have it, it is so natural, and when you savor it, you will feel so incredible that it is incomprehensible. You don't know why you can drive the index finger of your right hand to press a tiny button exactly less than three square millimeters, but you have no difficulty doing so; In the same way, you don't know why your heart beats faster and your breath shortens every time you see that familiar figure walking past you, but you just love and love it.

Not so mysterious, not so intense, not so fragile, I had truly loved, that was the imprint of my life. I used to be confused and broken, but I now know that what I am afraid of facing is not love itself, but only the failure of love.

Will you be burned by the warmth that you exude from yourself? Can you get punctured by the skin of your own palm? If not, then there is no doubt that you will not be hurt by the love in your heart. That's the warmest and softest emotion in your heart, what can it hurt?

Marianne? Santa got up lightly, bent down to take the freshly baked bread from the oven, and replaced the bread on the shelves and in the window one by one. The fire shook red, reflecting her slender figure on the window, as if it was within reach, so real and clear.

I couldn't help but slowly reach out, wanting to touch the beautiful light and shadow. No, it's not just touching, I'm trying to integrate myself into the other, not my body, but my emotional part is mapped into this graceful figure, so that she can carry all my tenderness and all my thoughts.

At this moment, my heart was suddenly touched, and in a blink of an eye, everything around me was lost. Heaven and earth are shrouded in a black sè, filled with the "0" and "1" of the endless green sè that changes all the time. I stretched out my hands in amazement to see what I had become, but I didn't intend to change the countless "0s" and "1s" hundreds of times, and then rolled up a huge green wave, surging quickly into the distance.

I did it?! I was amazed and excited—even my amazement and excitement were channeled by the infinite green sè characters—and I succeeded in seeing through the origin of the world, restoring all this splendor to the infinite wilderness with only the black sè background and the green sè characters.

I suddenly looked curiously in the direction of the bakery girl, Marianne - even the mere act of "looking" would make the characters around her churn - she also became a part of the world of symbols, and even then, the characters that represented her looked brighter and more beautiful. The characters were dancing with joy, and though I had no idea how I had done it, I knew very well that she was putting the bread out the window.

It's funny, even the aroma of those breads has been reduced to the shape of numbers, and it is constantly diffusing to the world around me - this is the first time in my life that I have "seen" what it tastes like.

Even though it was the first time I had come to this strange world of digital origin on my own, I didn't panic too much. The old troll witch doctor, Carlson, didn't teach me how to do it at the time, but he poured it into my head a lot. He told me that if you want to return to that figurative world in this situation, you can start with a simple thing, stare at it, and sketch out what it looks like in your mind – the more delicate you imagine it, the better – until it transforms from a number into a form. And even if something the size of a needle or a stone has an image, then the whole world will immediately have an image.

Of course, when you're familiar with all this, you don't have to go through that much trouble. Traveling between these two worlds is just a thought.

Instead of choosing something that seemed simpler, I set my sights on Marianne? Santa. I knew it wasn't a good choice, a face with two eyes, two ears, a nose, a mouth, and countless brown hairs would be as easy to imagine as a brick or an iron bar. But, at this moment, I couldn't imagine anything else in my mind in front of her.

The whole process was not as difficult as I feared, perhaps Marianne's face was too clear in my mind to even forget every detail, and in just an instant, the handsome little face of the bakery girl reappeared in front of me, and the world immediately became vivid again, and the sunset filled the sky, reflecting the city with a shy red sè.

I just thought it was all interesting, and I immediately froze and thought back to the methods that Kars had taught me, trying to see through the walls of this false world, and try to return to the original world that was constructed by two basic digital frames.

But I failed. No matter how much I tried, no matter how much I imagined my consciousness as a sharp blade, a spear, or a heavy hammer, I could not make the world open in the slightest.

Something must be wrong, and I thought, since I succeeded just now and I don't, then the problem must be in a different place between the two attempts. I immediately stopped this futile attempt and recalled the consciousness in my mind.

At that time, I didn't want to break anything—I thought—I didn't try to expose the falsehood of the world, but I realized the truth of my own heart. My consciousness is not a sword, not an axe, and in fact I do not want to condense my consciousness into a powerful, sharp and strong image, but rather to make it more gentle and gentle, trying to merge it into Marianne's figure......

I understand!

Here's the key: blend in, not break.

All along, I have fully accepted Carlson's understanding: he said that this splendid surface world is a kind of falsehood, and only the source world of digital accumulation is the only reality, so I always imagine that I have a huge wall in front of me to hide the truth, and only by breaking it can I see the truth behind it.

However, I have always overlooked one point: Is Carlson's understanding necessarily correct?

You know, this lonely old troll man had never stepped half a step out of the Gravel Fortress, and the magic vortex created by the dungeon magic at the fortress gate sealed his steps, blocked his gaze, and locked his mind at the same time. It is true that he awoke with a magical power that I had been unable to grasp, but as he had taught me, he could not explain to me the natural and instinctive power of speaking with his mouth and listening to sound with his ears, and he himself knew it but did not know why—he could only use it.

All his explanations and teachings to me came from his own one-sided understanding of all this, for which it did not matter whether this understanding was right or wrong, and he was still free to use this power; And for me, this fundamental deviation in understanding means a completely ineffective approach.

There is no "surface world", and similarly, there is no "source world", there is only one world, and the very existence of this world is real. What he calls the "surface world" and the "source world" are just two different representations of the same real world. This is like the "energy" mentioned in alchemy, it can be calmly solidified in a certain object, it can be smoothly output and consumed, and it can also burst out in an instant with extremely destructive impact, you can only say that it is released in different ways, but you cannot say which energy is "real" and which energy is "fake".

If I had to distinguish between the two worlds, I would think that perhaps the "source world" is a direct manifestation of the basic laws of the gods at the time of creation, while the "surface world" is a concrete representation of these laws. While both are real, the "Source World" is more basic. Therefore, only by "integrating" one's consciousness into the "surface world" can one touch the power of the origin of this world. As for imagining consciousness as a sword, a sword, a halberd, an axe, a fork or something, then in fact, it is fundamentally excluded from entering this world, and of course it cannot be entered.

Realizing this, I slowly closed my eyes and let my consciousness drift into the endless void, not touching anything, but trying to mix and stir it like brewing coffee, and scatter it aimlessly.

Open your eyes again, the night is endless, the green waves are like the sea, look, this endless world of symbols, so clear and clear!