Chapter 24 Inward VisionThe color becomes darker after half a cup of spring water is poured down. The first petal stretches out while others still shyly encircle themselves and won’t let its true features be seen.

Lin Luoran takes a deep breath, thinking that this flower is really sweet ah! It has only opened the first petal.

She observes there is nothing happening including the foggy of delusional poisoning not appearing. Then she has been busy for a while to water more cups of spring water.

After doing what she can, Lin Luoran crouches down patiently next to the black flower. As is said a flash in the pan, she won’t miss the moment otherwise the spring water will be wasted.

A minute later, the second petal quivers gently; five minutes later, it stretches out like a naughty fairy who creeps past the first petal, unfolding in the direction of the bevel.

In the eighth minute, the third petal moves a little bit…

Lin Luoran doesn’t know how long she has been in that gesture, it seems as if she has only been crouched for ten minutes or so or as long as a century with her feet becoming numb.

What presenting in front of Lin Luoran is a flower with dark green vein and the stalks are as tender as jade, while both above cannot be equal to its petals—the five are interdependent and overlaps in full bloom as large as the size of a bowl. Besides, the dark petals seems to s.h.i.+ne in plain light

So fragrant, so beautiful… Lin Luoran doesn’t know when she stands up. What she can smell is the tempting aroma and what she can see is the serene and intoxicating black flower.

She feels the petals appear to be magnifying. At first, she thinks it is an illusion; after a while she notices that she is unwittingly leaning over to sniff at this black flower.

One inch, two inches… Lin Luoran becomes vacant in the eyes seeming to be fascinated by the strange fragrance of the black flower. Her nose is getting nearer and nearer to the black jade petals—suddenly there is a twinkle of clear light in her eyes and she struggles to stand up. At this moment, the previous dead thing pops out a ball of light that penetrates into Lin’s nose.

Lin Luoran just feels her head “buzzing”, and she losses consciousness.

Her mind wanders through a dark tunnel, and at this moment she seems to forget who she is. Lin doesn’t know how has long it pa.s.sed, and her spirit seems tired, feeling here is very dark and cold, let it become a bit unhappy.

Why isn’t there light? On thinking about that, the mind wonders, “What is light?”

What is light?… Why do I know the term light? It is so strange! The mind racks its wits about light and then becomes irritable. Thus it collides the tunnel with its intangible body—but the tunnel is nothingness too which limits the mind to shuttling back and forth among the walls.

“Walls”? What a strange word, thinks the mind in melancholy mood. Must be the walls that block the light!

Be blocked? That is impossible. What is completely different from the dark is the light! All of a sudden, the mind becomes happy because the dark tunnel is dotted with colorful circles of light after the meaning of “light” is defined.

It’s so beautiful! Looking at the sparkling and s.h.i.+ning aperture, the mind feels a little dizzy and doesn’t go after what is “beauty”.

The colorful tunnel is dazzling and beautiful. The mind is so happy rolling over and playing with joy, feeling much better than the dark and cold tunnel before.

It has been a long time again, maybe a moment maybe an aeon, after which the mind becomes bored.

Although it’s beautiful here, there’s no one to accompany. It’s so lonely.

An idea flashes—“human being?” what is “human being”? Am I a human being? Because it is so lonely, the mind begins to use his head again patiently.

It will be boring if there is no “human being” accompanying. That is to say I was accompanied before… Well, then I’m a human being! The mind defines itself and there is a dull thunder in the depth of the colorful pa.s.sageway.

As for why the sound of thunder is m.u.f.fled, the mind is not interested in. Maybe the thunder is acc.u.mulating power. As it thinks, the main focus is on the idea of what “human being” is.

To become a man, there is a body first, thinks the mind. Then it feels very dissatisfied with the existence of itself as a fog! It tries to jump up and down, b.u.mping back and forth in the tunnel, and gradually changes its foggy body.

First the trunk, then the head, the hands, finally the feet… but as for the face, the mind can’t remember what it is like. Face has nose, eyes and mouth, otherwise how can it be called face?

It seems that the fog has been lifted a little, and the thunder was louder in the depth of the tunnel. There are a lot of faces that have noses and eyes occurring to the mind—that of adults, children, old men, beautiful ones, ugly ones… Although it does not remember what itself looks like, these faces are not its own!

What about my own face? The mind thinks about it, and is eager to figure it out.

The thunder of the pa.s.sage grows louder, and the mind is awakened. Looking at the depth of the tunnel, it trembles with fear, feeling monster may drill out,

Oh great, there is no need to be afraid of a monster. I have a magic treasure. Feeling scared and dismissive at the same time, the mind turns to figure out what is its treasure. The treasure seems to be a bracelet, a memory flashes the mind, no, no, it is a bead!

The bead—on the occurrence of the idea, thunder begins to roll in the tunnel like the tide next to the coast higher one after another, eagering to go up to the beach.

The bead seemed to be of great importance to it, though the mind. The thunder was ringing in the tunnel, and the colorful brilliance flashes. Suddenly, the sight changes to a warm cradle where a baby was lying inside. A woman beside was coaxing it with a silver bracelet.

The silver bracelet tied by a red string was hanging in front of the baby. A warm pearl wobbled along with the bracelet. The baby opened her eyes widely and was reluctant to blink.

A few years pa.s.sed in a flash. The baby grew into a little girl and was able to run. The honest father, smoking, stumbled over whether to sell the bracelet to pay for the girl’s tuition.

Mother rubbed the bracelet pa.s.sed down by the ancestors, with tears dripping on the silver bracelet, and finally shook her head.

The baby grew older going to a larger school and getting to know more people. Until one day, she went back with a boy, and her mother put the silver bracelet on the boy’s hand.

The mother was glad, the father was secretly happy, and the girl smiled shyly.

A few years later, she grew much older. Except for the big eyes, the appearance of the baby could no longer be seen. She stood beside the red sports car, watching the boy with another girl sitting in the car.

The silver bracelet was thrown mercilessly on the ground and broke… after which the bracelet sucked her blood and watched her whole life coldly. Having watched her quietly from birth, to childhood, to maiden, to adulthood, the bead was finally released.

The flashes one after another pop up like movie clips that screened the life of the mind until that the picture was fixed in a beautiful girl who is bending to sniff a dark and showy flower.

The thunder in the tunnel suddenly speeds up to the velocity of a lightning-fast thunder at the time of shock. The thunder chops at the mind at once—between the thunderclap and light the mind has become aware of who it is.

Tunnel, colorful aperture, dull thunder and flashes all disappears.

Lin Luoran maintains the gesture of smelling the flower. After coming to her consciousness, her eyes are glittering full of brilliant light that cannot be stared blankly forward.

The fragrance of the black flower has already disappeared, and even petals withered at a rate visible to the naked eyes.

Only being touched gently the petals become ashes in the whole s.p.a.ce like broken gla.s.s into countless pieces or flying away as light as a feather.

The only left evidence is the plant stem that reminds Lin Luoran what she has experienced is not imagination.

Lin Luoran closes her eyes again fixing her attention and calming her breath. Now five elements of different colors appear in her mind rather than iris aperture and tunnel.

Liver belongs to wood, so that cyan is the liver, right? The heart belongs to fire, that is embodied by the red ma.s.s… Is the thing stagnant in the red meridians the Reiki inside her body?

No one tells her all this but she clearly knows the strange condition is called “inward vision”.