Beyond Doubt: Whispers of the Unseen - Chapter 20

Welcome to my seemingly endless journey.
A trip that will take you to places I might have visited many moons ago.
It´s a tale that came back to me when I meditated on one of my past lives. A life I told you about in my unbelievable true story.

As promised in that story I will now share this story with you.

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Chapter 20

Dear Reader, you took a trip and now you are far away from your familiar surroundings, and you feel all energy leaving your body.

You are now in the middle of somewhere. No support, no comfort. At the mercy of the unknown.

At that point, your body gives up. The one thing you should be able to rely on is refusing.

It leaves you sitting here, in the middle of nothing, completely thrown back to the essence of yourself. How would you handle yourself Dear Reader?

How would you handle yourself Dear Reader?

All goes silent and I open my eyes.
A dark sky is filled with stars. The clouds have cleared, and I am drenched in sweat. I gasp for breath and feel the shortness of it slowly leaving me. I feel nothing, and then I laugh, partly from nerves, partly from the realization that it was a dream.

"It is Numico," I say aloud, rising to throw new branches onto the smoldering remains of the fire. When the fire burns again, I sit down and take a deep breath. I am still in awe of the speed with which I moved through the air and the impact, which I never received.

My body still feels tired and feels limp. In my memory, it has been a long time since I felt this way. Somewhere in my childhood, I sometimes have moments like this. It is called being sick.

It is something that really only happens to young children. Sometimes an adult has it too, but that is almost never the case. This is no time to get sick; the stakes are too high.

The flames make the wood crackle. To prevent the illness from continuing, I focus on the dancing flames to reach my core in meditation. There, I strengthen myself so that the sickness no longer influences me. Cold shivers run through my body, only to break out in a bout of cold sweat after a while. All my pores let the moisture run, like an unstoppable stream leaving my body.

Then, the blood drains from my face, and I feel like I am going to lose consciousness. Am I poisoned? By whom or by what? Would Numico tell me anyway? Would they poison the remains of the stores to punish me? Would they...

I can´t seem top open my eyes, it´s hard they feel so heavy. When they are open, they are immediately blinded by a bright light. General disorientation seizes me. I can't remember where I am or how on earth I got there. With great effort, I lift my head a little to explore the area.

Before I have properly lifted my head, it sinks back to the hard ground. It feels like my brain is covered in bruises, as if they are being rammed into my skull with every movement. I close my eyes and lie there for quite some time until the pain subsides somewhat, and I muster up the courage to try again.

This time it goes a little better, partly because I am prepared for the pain this time. Raising my neck, I prop myself up on my arms and look around at the barren wasteland that surrounds me. The sun is already high in the sky; it should be around noon.

The memories of the previous day and especially the previous night come back steadily. I realize I must have been unconscious for quite some time.

Something must have poisoned me. I go over everything I ate, but nothing is new or unknown. Everything is standard fare, which I have fed on for years. Yet something must have caused this illness; all symptoms point in the direction of poisining. But with the best will in the world, I can't put my finger on the source of the sickness.

It seems highly unlikely that our village's supplies are poisoned. So it isn't the food. A logical consequence is that it must be in the drinking water, but the water is brought from our part of the river. That, as far back as the stories go, never bothers anyone more than a little diarrhea. Well, whatever I have, it isn't diarrhea.

It is strange, very strange.

As I heat up some water to replace the thè ritual, it occurs to me that the only possibility I can think of is that there is something in the air that I can't tolerate. But why is it bothering me less now than it did last night?

Has the substance entered my bloodstream through my airways earlier on this journey, or am I slowly becoming resistant?

Still a little unsure, I start on a piece of dried meat and wash it down with the heated water. After eating, I start to meditate. I focus on my core, trying to summon the strength to expel the sickness so that I can continue my journey.

It is more difficult than usual; it seems that every time I come near my center, I am sucked out of it. Again and again, I try to reach my core. Thoughts keep driving me away from my center.

What is causing this distraction?
Would my departure from my safe haven disturb my insides to such an extent that I can no longer reach it?

It doesn't make sense, as things have happened in my life that have made a lot more of an impression on me. But never have they taken me so far from my center.

After a large number of wanderings in my mind, I finally manage to find the peace to reach the core of my being. From there, I send peace and strength throughout my body. It feels like a relief to be in the stillness and power of my being, to experience the certainty that ultimately the only thing that directs and influences me is myself.

I manage to locate the disease in my body and neutralize it with focused energy. I can even make it leave my body little by little every time I exhale.

It seems as if the feeling is more powerful this time, as if I have found my core even more than ever before. This may be a delusion, as I have never put in so much effort before. That feeling probably gives me a stronger sense of satisfaction than I am used to. But despite that, it is still very pleasant.

After the sickness has completely left me, both mentally and physically, I open my eyes again. Again they have to get used to the bright light, but the pain that has plagued my head is gone.

Right above me looms the shadow of a huge dragon's head, complete with neck and horns. Its mouth opens and aims at the platform where I am sitting. For a moment, terror grips my heart. I carefully back away until my back is against the stone wall, then look up again.

Coincidentally, I have been meditating in the direction of the dragon point, and now my eyes are used to the bright light, I understand the stories about this rock.

Laughing loudly, I continue to look at the place where I have just seen the dragon. It is truly a special spectacle. Because as it turns out, the shadow cast by one of the rocks on the wall on this plateau really looks like a huge dragon bending towards you.

Apparently, it can only be seen for a short time, because the sun has to be in the right place, so I hadn't noticed it yet. But it is really shockingly lifelike. I have no doubt that it has frightened many a traveler.

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Picture By Me And My Artificial Intelligence