When Chloe's body was set onto the ground, her pendant ceased emitting the light, and she immediately felt her weight in her feet. At least she thought she felt the gravity, but it was not important to her, because she soon found a bizarre, horrible dog lying on the ground just in front of the gate. It had three heads and the tail of a snake, but, fortunately or unfortunately, it seemed to be sleeping.
Should I ask the dog which way I should go? Chloe asked herself. No...it may be a furious watchdog. If I wake it up, it may bark at me and may even bite me. So, I'd better sneak through the gate, I suppose. Keeping her eyes on the dog, Chloe stealthily tried to walk through the gate. But one of the dog's three mouths trembled slowly and then sneezed. She was astounded because it opened its eyes after the sneeze and turned its glassy eyes on her. She stood rooted there and stared at the dog to see what it would do next, but fortunately, the dog slowly returned its head comfortably onto its forelegs and closed its glazed eyes. So, Chloe fearfully stepped toward the dog and watched to make sure if it had really fallen asleep again.
“Let sleeping dogs lie.”
Chloe suddenly heard a faint, maiden's voice from somewhere. She looked around and said, “Who said that?”
“Who said that?” said the voice.
“I did,” said Chloe.
“I did,” said the voice.
“Who? Are you a fairy godmother?” said Chloe, looking around for a tiny gleam.
“Who? Are you a fairy godmother?”
Chloe heard someone repeating her own words. She wondered if she had just heard an echo, but the voice was totally different from hers.
“You are a fairy godmother, aren't you? Don't tease me,” said Chloe.
“You are a fairy godmother, aren't you? Don't tease me.”
She again heard what she had said. “Well, I guess it is not a fairy godmother's voice.”
“Well, I guess it is not a fairy godmother't voice.”
“Is it an echo?” she murmured on purpose.
“Is it an echo?”
She heard the voice. Although she had said it in small voice, she heard the voice coming back to her ears.
Then she asked in another way, “Are you an echo?”
“Yes, I am,”said the voice.
“I got you,” said Chloe triumphantly.
“Whoops,”said the voice.
“Who are you? Who is saying that?”
“I am an echo, and my name is Naida Echolalia. I tell you what -- you should lower your voice now. Don't disturb the dog's sleep,”said the voice.
When Chloe turned back and looked at the dog, one of its heads was looking at Chloe with its glassy eyes while the other heads still seemed to be sleeping.
“Come in through the gate,”said the voice clearly.
But the place beyond the gate was so dark Chloe couldn't see anything there. She opened her backpack and took the flashlight out of it.
“No. You don't need such a thing,”said the voice.
“Why not? I cannot see anything there without a light,”said Chloe and then crossed the gate, casting the light before her. As soon as she stepped through the gate, the dim fire ignited in the torches standing all around the place she had entered. She screamed at the sight and immediately stepped back with shiver. But there was no time for her to still her fears because the dog at the gate started to bark furiously at her. All its heads were now awake and barking at her with their eyes glaring.
“You cannot go back once you pass through the gate,”said the voice. “The dog called Cerberus allows anybody to come in but never allows them to leave. So, don't try to get out of here. Just come in. There is nothing you should be afraid of here.”
However, Chloe hesitated to go on, because she found a huge ant, as large as herself, lying on the ground. The size of the ant itself was not so frightening to Chloe because she had already seen the same size black widow and praying mantis. However, what she was afraid of was that the ant seemed to be dead. Although it should not have been strange at all that the ant was dead in the land of the dead, Chloe thought it was weird that the ant was completely immobile. And what was worse, the ant seemed to have been killed by fungi that were thriving in the ant's body.
“That ant ate tropical fungi when it was alive,” said the voice to Chloe. “And they germinated and developed into mycelia in its body and absorbed organic and inorganic nutrients from it. That's why it was killed and came to this world.”
“But why is it immobile?” asked Chloe. “If it was killed and came to this world in a form of spirit or astral body, it should be mobile...I mean it should be alive in a form of spirit, shouldn't it?”
“Well, everything doesn't necessarily work that way in this world,” said the voice. “You should keep in mind that nothing makes sense here. Otherwise, you will became mentally ill or even be driven mad.”
“Why?” asked Chloe.
“Why? You should not ask 'why' in this world, because that is the way things work here,” said the voice. “I used to ask myself 'why,' too, but I never found the answer.” The voice seemed to become sad and started to talk about its own story.
“When I was in the earthly world, I was a naiad living in a brook. And I pined for the affections of Narcissus who used to contemplate his face on the surface of the tranquil, serene water. But I could not tell him my heart because I didn't want to bother him. If I had done it by going up to the surface of the water, I would have broken up his image reflected there. So, when I became an adult, I was so anxious to get out of the brook to tell him my heart. I got out of the water before he came and waited for him to come back, but unfortunately, he never came that day. I needed to hurry, so I eagerly flew all around, but I never found him.”
“Why did you have to hurry?” asked Chloe.
“Because I was a mayfly. I had only one day of life. I was ephemeral like a transitory bubble....”
The mayfly's words immediately reminded Chloe of what Kip had muttered to himself at high school, “Man is a bubble...,” but she didn't think there was a relation between his remark and the mayfly's words.
“I was cursed with my wretched fate,” continued the voice. “I even denounced myself as a biological mistake, as the ant there would detest itself as an ecological mistake. And, unfortunately, I closed my life just when I figured out what happened to Narcissus.”
“What happened?” Chloe was fascinated by its story.
“Well, believe or not, he pined away in love for his own image on the surface of the water and became the flower called narcissus. I was so devastated by the truth that I also pined away until all except for my voice perished. That's why... well, if you want 'why,' that would be why I am absent in spirit but present in voice. However, nothing makes sense, does it? In general, if you die, you will be absent in body but present in spirit. But I am just present in voice, and my beloved is still the flower of narcissus even in this world. I used to ask myself 'why,' but I never understood. So, I have given up searching for the answer. I am now content just to eternally gaze at him over the gate, although I still have no means to tell him my heart.”
Chloe somehow felt sympathy for the voice, but she didn't know what to say. All she could say in response were the questions coming out of her innocent mind. “Where is he now? Which flowers are you looking at?”
“The flower blooming over the gate. It is in front of the river bank, isn't it?” said the voice.
Chloe turned her eyes toward the flower over the gate and then remembered what the bargeman had told her about the flower. “Isn't it a flower of death?” asked Chloe.
It was an innocent question, but the voice said indignantly, “A flower of death? Don't make such a rude remark! He is truly my beloved and has nothing as sinister as death in himself!”
“I am sorry,” said Chloe. “I didn't mean he was a sinister person. I just said the flower over there was a flower of death that I should not touch. That's what the bargeman I saw told me.”
Although Chloe tried to apologize sincerely, the voice broke off and didn't speak again.
“I am sorry. I apologize from the bottom of my heart. Please answer me. I still need to talk to you. I don't know which way I should go next. Please quell your anger and tell me the way I should go now.” But there was no answer from the voice.
“You made a sociable mistake....”
A cavernous voice suddenly sounded. It was a male's low voice. Chloe turned her face in the direction of the voice and saw one of the torches intensify its flame. Then the image of a creature loomed and became clear to her eyes under the light of the fire. There was a creature like a lizard beside the torch. It was sluggishly keeping watch over the fire, and there were juvenile salamanders among the flames, but they were not burned at all.
“Mind what you say,” said the lizard. “There is always a certain way you should converse with others, and there are things you should not ask about.”
Upon hearing this advice, Chloe remained quiet. Although she wondered why there were young salamanders in the fire from the torch, she hesitated to ask and became silent for a while because she was afraid she would offend the lizard if she asked about it.
Then a bird suddenly flew over and said to Chloe, “Don't pay attention to him!” It flew around over her head and said again, “Don't listen to what he says.”
“Why not?” asked Chloe.
“Because he is Moloch!”
“Moloch? What is that?”
“Don't you know? Aren't you a Christian?”
“No, I am not. Would I have known it if I were a Christian?”
“Of course, you would. If you don't know what it is, look it up in the Bible. It is in Leviticus and Kings!” said the bird.
“I am sorry, I don't have it with me now,” said Chloe.
Although her parents were both Christians, she was not a pious Christian. Because she was interested in a psychologically or psychiatrically related abstract concept rather than a religiously abstract one, she had never seriously read the Bible before.
“Don't you have it? Well that may be why you not only listened to Moloch but also didn't understand how much that mayfly had been afflicted. If you had read the Bible, especially 1 Corinthians 5:3, you could feel sympathy for her.”
“I did! I did feel sympathy for her, but I just didn't know what I should say to appease her,” said Chloe.
“Well, if you really had sympathy for her, you must at least have a conscientious moral mind as Christians do. If so, no matter who you are, never listen to Moloch for any reason.”
“That's what I want to say, missy,” said the lizard to Chloe. “Don't listen to the bird, or you will get into trouble.”
“Why?” asked Chloe in wonder.
“Because that bird will deceive you. As you heard, that bird said I was Moloch. But it is totally a lie. I am not Moloch! I am actually a moloch.”
Chloe didn't see any difference between what the bird said and what the lizard said. “So...you are Moloch, aren't you, as the bird said?” she asked in confusion.
“No! I am a moloch! Moloch horridus! I am just one of the reptiles in
Australia. So, I have nothing to do with the Bible! If you don't believe me, ask a herpetologist in your school!”
“No! Don't listen to him!” the bird shouted to Chloe. “Here is not the place you should stay. If you do, he will force you to sacrifice your child.”
“I don't have a child,” said Chloe.
“You will,” muttered the bird.
“I will?” Chloe frowned with wonder.
“Well, even though you don't have a child now, you'd better not stay with him.” The bird then flew in the direction from which it had come, avoiding the moloch, and said, looking back to Chloe, “You are tired from the long journey here and hungry now, aren't you? I will take you to the place where you can eat. Just come with me.”
Chloe looked at both the bird and the moloch, but she couldn't decide which one she should believe.
“You can do whatever you like,”said the moloch to Chloe, still watching the fire in the torch, without looking at her, “but I advise you not to follow the bird. That bird is called Indicator indicator, and it will tell you where you can eat food, but I know many who repented of having followed that bird.”
“Why did they repent?”asked Chloe, but the bird immediately interrupted them.
“No more talk with him!”exclaimed the bird, showing its frustration. Then, it flew back to Chloe, pinched her shirt with its bill, and tried to pull her after it.
Chloe was forced to step forward while she hesitated, but after looking back at the young salamanders in the fire of the torch, she decided to go with the bird rather than stay with the strange lizard.
When Chloe started to follow the bird, she suddenly found herself in a forest before she knew it. And because the way in the forest was dark, she just walked on, keeping her eyes on the bird so that she didn't stray off, since she didn't know where she was going.
“Here you are,”the bird suddenly said after a few moments of silent flight, leading Chloe close to a honeycomb. There were so many bees busily carrying and storing nectar and pollen in the nest, the bird flew back to and perched on a branch of a tree a short distance from the tree where the honeycomb hung. But Chloe didn't know what the bird wanted to show her and looked around with wonder.
“Don't you see the honeycomb right there?”asked the bird.
“Yes, I do. But why did you bring me to such a place? Just to show me a beehive?”
“Not just to show you...I thought you were hungry. That's why I guided you to this beehive. There is plenty of honey inside it. So, why don't you go ahead and take the honey?”
“I cannot do that,”said Chloe.
“Why not? Aren't you hungry?”
“Yes, I am. But I cannot do that.”
“Why not? I know many humans take honey out of beehives. Even many gods do it to make nectar which imparts immortality to them. So, it is good for you.”
“But it is not good to rob the bees of honey. They are diligently collecting nectar and pollen for their own food, aren't they? How can I snatch it from them for my own sake?”
“I can tell you how. Just pluck the nest off the branch and drop it onto the ground. Then break it with your foot. That's easy,”said the bird simply.
“That's not what I am talking about. What I said is that I cannot do it just in order to satisfy my hunger at the cost of another's life.”
“But you will eventually have to eat something. That means you have to deprive something of its life, unless you are a plant. Only plants, except for some kinds of them such as insectivorous plants, can peacefully grow without harming other organisms as long as resources are not limited, which means if there is no competition. Therefore, almost everybody other than plants has to exploit others or even kill them to survive. That's the law of nature.”
“I know. But I cannot do it with my hands. I really cannot,” said Chloe in a depressed voice, realizing the contradiction between what she had to do in her life and her convictions about it.
“Well, that's what most people say,” said the bird. “They insist on not killing animals, but they actually eat some types of meat. They simply don't stain their own hands with blood. Some of them might eat only vegetables, but that also means they still directly or indirectly kill plants or deprive them of part of their life for their own sake. However, that's all right. Nothing is wrong with it in nature if it is the way of surviving. Actually nobody would mind even if they or their offspring are killed by others. They know everybody has to exploit or kill others to survive. That's why some of them who know their offspring will be killed and eaten reproduce so many of themselves. In a sense, they allow others to eat some of their offspring because that's the way of maintaining an ecological balance. If nobody exploits or kills others, nobody will survive. So, if you are hungry, you'd better take the honey out of the nest,” the bird simply explained and looked at Chloe, who lost her words and hesitated to do anything that would directly or indirectly result in killing others. “Well, if you don't want to do it, that is fine. That's your choice. That's what he chose, too. But that's not what I would do. I am hungry now....” With those words, the bird flew away.
“Wait! What do you mean by 'That's what he chose'? Who did you mean?” asked Chloe in a shout, running after the bird, but it had quickly disappeared without answering her questions. “What did the bird imply?” murmured Chloe in a small voice, stopping her pursuit of the bird. “Who does 'he' refer to?”
As she considered one question after another, she fancied she heard a deern bellowing mournfully from somewhere. She curiously looked around straining to listen carefully to its bell, when she found it near a tree set off from the surrounding trees. She slowly approached it for fear of surprising it and realized it was the stag that had been killed by the hunters in the forest where Kip and Chloe had gone together.
“Oh, dear hart. What are you doing here?” Chloe asked the stag in a tender voice, but it just rested its cheek against the tree Chloe thought was a laurel, without showing any reaction to her question, as if it were mourning for something. “What are you crying for?” asked Chloe again, but it didn't answer her at all.
Chloe then tried to ask the stag in her mind without actually speaking, using the psychometrical ability she supposed she had. However, there was still no answer from the stag. The only sound she could hear now was the buzzing sound audible from behind her. She turned back curiously and saw the bird coming back, followed by a wild honey badger. Many bees were nervously flying around as the badger started to climb the tree toward the low branch on which the bees's nest was located. The bird, on the other hand, just perched on a branch of another tree and looked at the badger silently and patiently.
“Don't!” Chloe shouted and promptly went back to the bees's nest. “Don't break up the nest, please!”
The badger continued to climb up the tree without listening to Chloe.
“Why do you allow that animal to take the nest off the branch? Don't you have any mercy or morality?”shouted Chloe to the bird.
“I am not making the badger do that at all. I just guided it to that nest because it was starving to death,”said the bird.
“So, do you think you are doing something good because you are saving the life of that animal in spite of the cost of those bees?”
“Well, I actually brought the badger here just for my own sake. I don't care if it is dying or not. I just want to eat the beeswax.”
“The beeswax?”said Chloe.
“Yes. I prefer wax to honey. I will let the badger eat the honey, but instead, I am going to eat the beeswax. That't my innate means of survival, since I was born as a 'Honey guide.'”
“But I think it is not morally right to sacrifice another's life for your own sake! If you are hungry now, why don't you eat something else besides that in order not to disturb others's lives?”asked Chloe indignantly.
“Because I am not omnivorous as you are. I definitely have to eat the wax to survive. And many in nature don't survive by the proverb, 'Live and let live.'”
While the bird was explaining to Chloe, the badger finally managed to drop the beehive onto the ground, but he was immediately swarmed by many bees that were driven mad. Some of the bees even flew violently toward Chloe to attack her as if out of revenge. Startled, she began to run. Although she was concerned about the stag she had found by the laurel, she just ran and ran, covering her head with her hands, without even thinking which way she should go until the bees ceased flying after her.
“Agony Column.”Those words met her eyes when she stopped running in front of a very wide column standing on the ground in a glade. It was slightly taller than she was and standing alone with many sheets of paper messily stuck to it.
“Agony Column?”Chloe soon wondered if somebody might also have looked for Kip. She curiously looked through those messy pieces of paper, searching for Kip's name. But when she turned over some of the sheets overlaid on the others, she realized that her hands were swollen and painful, although she hadn't noticed it when she was desperately running away from the bees. It was much more painful than the prickly pain caused by the stinging nettles she had touched when she had gone to the forest with Kip. What was worse, as soon as she became aware of the pain of her hand, it started to intensify into a violent agony.
“It is not a column for missing persons.”
Chloe heard somebody behind the column speak to her. She promptly stepped aside and looked for the speaker behind the column, clenching her fists to bear the pain.
“A violent pain is not preferable in this world,” said somebody again.
Chloe carefully looked for the speaker by casting her gaze around the glade that was darkened by the canopy of vegetation. When she focused her attention on where the voice came from, something started to loom ahead, and it seemed to be walking through the vegetation toward Chloe.
“Celestial Tapir!” shouted Chloe. “Why are you here? You said you couldn't set foot in this place because it was a very exclusive place.”
“Yes, I said so before,” said Celestial Tapir, whose figure was apparent now. “But I dared to come here because I still wanted you to stay in this world a little longer.”
“Why?”
“You don't have to know why. There is no reasonable explanation in this world, and nothing makes sense here. The voice of the mayfly you talked with told you so, didn't it? It even told you that if you sought for 'why,' you would become mentally ill or even driven mad.”
“Why do you know such things when you were not present there?” Chloe asked in surprise, but she quickly altered her question when she noticed she had used the word “why.” “How do you know what the mayfly told me?”
“Well, that's not important here now,” said Celestial Tapir. “The problem now is that you have a violent pain in your hands.”
As soon as Chloe was reminded of the pain, it started to hurt again, although she had forgotten it while talking to Celestial Tapir.
“Look behind you,” said Celestial Tapir. “There is a hospital there. Why don't you go and have your hands treated?”
When Chloe turned around, there was a huge hospital with some animals waiting outside to see a doctor.
“Why is there a hospital there? When I ran up here, it was not there.”
“Well,” said Celestial Tapir, “I wonder why you want to know 'why.' It is just there irrespective of 'why.' That is the fact you should accept.”
“But it is natural to wonder why it suddenly appeared when it was not there before, isn't it?”
“I don't think so,” said Celestial Tapir simply. “If it is natural, why didn't you wonder why I suddenly loomed in front of you?”
“I did. I asked you why you were here even though you had said this was an exclusive place,” said Chloe.
“That's what you asked about the reason I came here. That's not the question of why I appeared in a place where I had not been before, without physically coming here.”
“I wondered about that, too! But I thought you somehow appeared here with your supernatural power or something.”
“If you think that way, that building behind you might also somehow have appeared here as I did.”
“That's impossible!” shouted Chloe. “How can that building, which doesn't have any will, come here as you did?”
“How do you know it doesn't have any will?”
“It is obvious,” said Chloe.
“It is not to me,” said Celestial Tapir flatly.
“Why not?” shouted Chloe, who was almost driven mad. “It is just a building, that is, just an object. It is not a living thing which can have a will.”
“So, do you think that building is not alive?”
“Of course not.”
“Well, if so, it may be dead,” said Celestial Tapir.
“It can't be dead!” said Chloe, stamping with vexation. “How can something which was not alive before be dead?”
“If so, what condition do you think that building is in now?”
“Well, it is not....” Chloe tried to find an appropriate word for a moment. “It is not an organism. So, it can be neither alive nor dead.”
“If so, what sort of condition is it in now?” Celestial Tapir asked the same question again.
“I don't know. It is hard to tell because it is simply there. Well, all I can say is that it is in an inanimate condition.”
“That's what I said. It is just there! So, you don't have to wonder why it is there now.”
“But it was not there when I came here!” Chloe persisted.
“Haven't you even thought about why you are here?” Celestial Tapir abruptly asked her.
“That's because I physically came here, isn't it? Well, I might not come here physically...since here is not a physical world...I suppose. But at least I can say my will was involved. That's why I am here now.”
“That's not what I am asking. What I am asking is why you are present. In other words, why do you exist now although you had not existed before you were born?”
“Because...,”said Chloe. “Because I was created and developed in my mother's uterus and was born in the world I came from...I mean, the earthly world where I had previously been before I came to this world.”
“But,”said Celestial Tapir, “Then you were created -- I mean, when the zygote which was considered as you was created -- your will must not have been involved. However, you are present here now. In the same way, that building is present there although its will may not be involved.”
“That's not correct!”insisted Chloe. “Then I was created, my parents' will was at least involved. That's why I was given life. That's why I exist now, even though my will was not originally involved.”
“Well, that building might also have been created by somebody's will before you noticed it.”
“Somebody created it? Did somebody create it so fast before I noticed it?”
“How fast he or she created it is not the matter. The important thing is that it was created by somebody's will. You just don't know when it was created there.”
“If so, who created it?”asked Chloe.
“Probably the author of this world,”Celestial Tapir answered. “The author of this world? Do you mean the creator of this world? Who is it?”
“I don't know,”said Celestial Tapir. “You must figure it out.”
“How?”
“I can't tell. That's also what you should figure out by continuing to stay in this world. But to do it, you should go to the hospital to have your hands treated.”
Celestial Tapir then pointed its finger at the nurse coming out of the hospital and said, “Ask that nurse over there how you can see a doctor.”
Chloe turned back and looked at the hospital beyond the column, but there was only one bird coming out of the hospital. “Where is a nurse?”asked Chloe, turning back again to Celestial Tapir, but it was no longer there. Unlike when it had disappeared into the tunnel in the window before, it disappeared quickly and silently this time. “Well, he implied something important, but he disappeared without telling what he actually meant,”said Chloe to herself. “All right. I'll figure it out just as I found out how to come to this world.”
