Reality

Great! The new school term has begun again. It is such a wonderful thing to get to learn all kinds of modern knowledge from my teachers so that I can be more erudite than my elderly one day. Mum always tells me that the world is subject to science and technology, and all the insoluble enigmas and unfathomable phenomena nowadays will be explained in the future after the human have had enough knowledge of the material world. However, I do not quite understand those terms actually.

Today our politics teacher had lectured us on "truth" again. He said: "The truth does exist. There are many basic rules that have been examined to be true, for example: the society will develop non-stop to the highest and final stage named socialism, just like our country. There will be no exploitation, oppression or ignorance; citizens have fine qualities, using knowledge on science and technology to enhance the productivity of our nation!" "Excuse me, Sir. Is what you have said all truth?" One of my classmates raised the question. "Err… no, no. But the truth is that at least everyone believes in materialism, one theory explaining the present world of reality."

I didn’t follow what the teacher wanted to express. Yet I am amazed to have noticed so many similar versions between him and my mother. Did the same people before teach them? I won’t mind this since I have learnt something anyhow: the reality that materialism can judge everything.

Strange to say, today my grandma and parents quarrelled about something that is a hidden secret to me. When I went to ask about it, my mum unexpectedly urged me to stay in my room quietly, said it was none of my business. But that made me more curious, so I cracked the door and listened to their conversation stealthily. "This house is sinister…" That is dad’s voice. "What’s the era now? Don’t be whimsied!" Mum then chastised him. "No, you are both wrong," grandma stopped them. "It is really down there, but guarding us." "Simply not!"… They went on their violent argument for almost an hour.

I don’t know what is wrong. My parents are all well-educated people and on most occasions, they had similar opinions that I considered as correct, i.e. scientific. How does today’s debate come? Are they doing anything that can’t be exposed to the others, as against the truth? At the moment I am a bit blurred and worried, beginning to doubt what our teacher told us yesterday.

My mood is as bad as the weather in autumn. The reason is that the brush about our house goes on today despite of my sincere hope that it was all a thought misunderstanding. In addition, there joined a strange uncle, who seemed to be brought by my father. Similarly, I continued to peep at them, willing make a big discovery.

Dad introduced the stranger to my grandma and mum, who were already irritated: "This is the famous geomancer I met in the temple, I mentioned him to you yesterday. He will devine whether this house is auspicious or not." As soon as she heard this, my ordinarily tender-hearted mum surprisingly sprang out of the sofa, pointed and the two men and shouted: "When did you become so superstitious? That doesn’t fit in the world now." "Just a minute and listen to me, dear. This is a totally upgraded modern method, very scientific: computer future telling!" "Right!" The stranger followed on, starting his laptop. "It is very simple. I only have to input the data of this house and the flagstone you discovered…"

"See! The results have come out…" Dad seized the computer and started to read with excitement: "Oh, this house is extremely malignant, especially the storeroom, directly under which the flag is buried! How accurate! Don’t you believe in me now? Let’s move out of this evil place as promptly as possible!" "Sheer nonsense." Mum sneered at the outsider and left straight for her room. At this time, grandma opened her mouth: "You loafer! Although I am not sure how you are tricking, scram out of my holy palace immediately! Souls won’t do harm to me but deities will strike you. I won’t leave my house anyway."

Speculating everybody was flustered, I closed the door of my room and went back to my desk to jot all these down. This time I have fallen into confusion. How to connect god and devil with a flagstone? There must be a mystery under the storeroom in my home.

Last night I couldn’t wait to find out the origin of the trouble. Around eleven o’clock, guessing all my elders had fallen into the arms of Morpheus, I took a torch and tiptoed into the dank storeroom at the back of our house. Noticing cobwebs all over, I wondered whether it had been abandoned or not. "Is here a forbidden area or a shrine?" I asked myself.

I searched for more than half an hour without discovering anything. However, just after I had sat down wearily and closed my eyes to have a rest, I felt a beam of cold greenish blue fluorescence glimmering in front of me. Turning inquiring and fearful, I stared at one corner of the room where the light was emitted, gripped the torch in my hand as protection and moved towards the source cautiously.

The light seemed to be sent out from underground. Knowing nothing to do next, I fumbled on the dusty floor and wall purposelessly. Abruptly, as if a secret button had been pressed, a hidden entrance appeared in the ground, which was connected with one dug corridor covered by a cluster of stars. I tried hard to calm down, telling myself: "Believe in the materiality of world and the non-existence of supernatural being and forces!" In fact I fairly doubt that "truth", but that thought was effective enough to muster up my courage.

I went down the steps to go on my "expedition". I found that the interior of the descending tunnel is quite rough, it was only one meter wide and I had to arch my back to move forward. At the end of the five-meter-long winding passage, lay a huge celadon flagstone! So elated I was by then, that I rushed to the stone, hastening to scan on it, suspecting if there is any magical speciality with it. Disappointedly, it could be referred to as barely a common cuboid rock with its mass still under the soil. The "flag" was well polished, but without one word on it. Hence, I suspected how all those strange opinions come from, "merely because they once caught a glimpse of it after had accidentally found it"? I even thought that the quarrel wouldn’t have come out if they had used a scientific as me.

However, I began to regret for what I thought soon after that: an unexplained thing happened! All of a sudden, with a flare of bright azure splendour from the flag, the corridor trembled as if it would fall down at any time. I was terrified, therefore staggered out of the tunnel as quickly as I could and ran on to the ground to get a shelter…

That is all I can remember. When I woke up again this morning, I found myself sleeping on the floor of the storeroom, which was as quite as grave and as peace as the paradise. I was not hurt and there wasn’t any sign to show what happened here last night. In spite of trying hard, I was not capable to open the entrance again. Was it only a dream? Probably I am a bit ill these days, so forget all about it!

Ultimately we moved out of our previous house due to dad and the uncle’s continual persuasion. In reality we sold it to the strange uncle at a rather high price which at least satisfied my grandma. "The god of wealth under my house has made his power felt!" She grinned while counting the cash. Quarrels haven’t ever taken place after that. Mum doesn’t seem to be affected, working as usual but rebuking dad more frequently for his idealistic thinking. " The reality is that idealism can’t be tenable any more." She insisted.

When I turned on the television this evening, a piece of accident news astounded me: our former house is destroyed! "One of the residents lives nearby said that he heard the house collapsing at about four o’clock this afternoon. It then burst into flames. The police are investigating this case now. So far, they have found out one body of a middle-aged man, which is amazingly not charred, in the soil under the ruins. It is recognised to be the leader of one infamous relic-stealing group…"

"I have told you he wasn’t a good guy, darling," mum frowned to dad after watching the photograph of the dead person. "Why are you still blaming me? It is proved that the house is haunted, nothing propitious! You should have thanked me for bringing our family such good fortune." But grandma was sighing with a mixture of relief and pities: "Ah, that opinionated fellow must have annoyed the god beneath!"

The reporter went on: "The cause of the incident hasn’t been found out yet while there is one doubtful point that most eye-witnesses claimed that they caught bright greenish blue flame during the fire. Scientists cannot explain it." Now it was my turn to be astonished.