The Children of Zegandaria - Atanas Marinov, Atanas Marinov, Atanas Marinov, Atanas Marinov (world best books to read txt) 📗

a soul. But one final blow finished him. The secret of the tremendous abuse would die with him forever.

Someone had poked around and actually put away the plans for the virtual relocation of the planet. They doubted it would help, but Arrudoth ordered them to investigate just in case.

It didn't take them too long to realize clearly that they held a treasure in their hands. But Equius was a problem. They didn't know if he had told anyone else about his trip to Kickluk Sor . But even if there were curious people trying to find it, they would deny it to the last.

His dead body had been left in a special capsule, and sunsequently vaporized to molecules for greater safety. No one would ever hear of Equius Mon again.

THE FOURTH LEVEL

"And where was happiness?"

Unknown author

 

CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED AND ELEVEN: THE FOURTH LEVEL

 

Archie had scoured the third level, had peered into the fourth. If only for a little while. They were almost uninteresting. Other than the change in brain load, he saw nothing else to cause any excitement in him or get his attention. The third level was full of various loners just wanting to test their intellect or emotions. Archie realized that if he was actually seeking to learn something about human nature, this was the place to be. There were a variety of types.

But when he looked around more carefully, he could sense the visualized ghost warriors carefully watching what was going on. It was a sign that Om Gur Nal was keeping everything under control with his invisible hand. There was no emotion on their faces simply because they were hidden behind the usual Eronian helmets. Their powerful bodies stood like statues waiting for something.

Some of the test subjects dreamed of greatness as dictators and warlords of vast armies, while others simply could not find their calling in life. Some struggled desperately for love, while others had it in abundance. Military developments were concentrated in various psychotronic weapons to deal with the population's whims and keep it under control - at least formally. This was what was happening in real life. Through various electromagnetic waves different emotions could be imputed to characterize individuals. Everyone waited for a convenient moment to act. However, when his deviation from all this sociality became too great, there came the third level of virtual reality, which was a sort of "straightening house" for those rejected individuals.

This was all secretly funded by the New Life Corporation of the infamous Equius Mon.

On the third level, there was a super-futuristic space capsule that blasted the willing into nothingness. That's right. The goal here was to become something from nothing - the process was called emancipation, or in other words, personality shaping. Many had no idea what was to happen. But people seemed to be peeling off from that same nothingness and returning to the thing like mold castings, and only the strongest in spirit fought for their survival. That was impressive. The whole struggle made their lives meaningful.

The Divoran capsule was moving at superluminal speed, and that defined the experimental studies that said that was the only way to go to another dimension.

He remained amazed at the quantum mechanics that apparently dominated the principles of level construction.

Archie walked away though he remained slightly disappointed. He had expected to see some amazing wonders. No one noticed, nor did he care what exactly he was looking for. He was just left with the impression of some kind of underthought by the architects of virtual reality.

The soul, wanting to reach new heights, struggled with the prejudices of the scientific community. And the military status quo guarded it. What could be better than that?

But a little while later, he was overwhelmed and felt a genuine humility. He realized what the true nature of it all was. They wanted to test something too exotic. The microtubule formations in the brain cells, what some scientists perceived as consciousness, was actually the result of a gravitational quantum reaction within the microtubule structures themselves[75].

Had that stranger who had given him a hand and pulled him out of his father's unsightly house suspected that Archie would still come this far and see it all with his own eyes?

Wasn't the idea of the reincarnation of the soul so much more appealing than Doctor Gad ‘Di Enn's costly chipping and his brutal treatment of the human population?

These questions began to plague Archie, not because of their complexity, but because of his inability to find an acceptable solution. If the soul were free, it would merge with this universe.

Of course there was also the possibility of mistakes, and such did happen from time to time.

Only now did Archie begin to realize the meaning of the word compassion. It appeared that Om Gur Nal wanted all this wealth to correct the ills of this society. But then why had he tried to kill him? Or at least he had had that feeling in the past.

He felt he would soon find the answer to his questions. And all this talk of demons. Where was the truth, after all?

THE STRANGER

"If the morning did not awaken us to new joys, if the evening left us no hope it would not be worth living."

Goethe

 

CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED AND TWELVE: THE STRANGER

 

The stranger who had pulled Archie out of his own routine had given him eyes with which to see what was really going on, and the moral part of the question was primarily where the line was and how thin it really was.

He'd had some doubts about his choice, but in the end he'd decided that the boy was the right person who could see the true reality with the eyes of an unbiased bystander.

"This future is dead!," thought the stranger. "And the eyes of a child could know it best! And then the whole degenerate reality would shine through better than ever."

He stood and did nothing. He had long since left Zegandaria, for he was sure of the end result. It was a matter of coincidence. It had to happen - sooner or later.

The stranger still carried in his mind the astonished face of the poor farmer, who was perplexed as to what had caused this guest to show such a high degree of consideration.

The stranger was also conscious of the moral side of cornering one who had kept his identity incognito.

Archie had not dared to ask his name. Nor had he dared to inquire where he had come from or where he was going. It was none of his business - so the stranger thought.

And so it was indeed!

When he opened his eyes, he knew he had done the right thing. He had the chance to change things. He had the chance to cast the stone of change into all that collective consciousness. Even if only for a short time.

He wanted it with all his soul.

The stranger had never taken an active part in Zegandaria's life, nor had he cared what exactly happened. It was just that his inner impulse took over.

Archie was a good fit. It took him a long time to find his exact location.

From the outside, it seemed odd that he had stopped his attention on Archie in particular - there were so many seemingly more suitable candidates, but the scales of fate had tipped in his favor.

When he thought about it, he realized that the farmer's odd look as he held the boy to continue his work was telling in that regard.

The stranger did not regret for a moment his choice. It was the way it was to be.

It took time for a soul to realize exactly where it was. And sometimes to go to Hell or to Heaven. Or to remain stuck in between.

The great poets had given more than one or two definitions of such a situation, but in the end the reality remained the same.

The stranger coughed. He remembered the words of one who had left this world, who had said the following above and below, "I have a problem. Forced to describe what I see in three dimensions, but what was happening was simply not in three dimensions. The sensation lasted between a few seconds to thousands of years."

It was time for everything to fall into place.

The stranger wasn't religious - he didn't believe in all the newly minted beautiful nonsense about the god Erduk. Somewhere in there he sensed the ramifications of the religious cults that had spread like leprosy and were plaguing people's heads. And were making huge, even fabulous profits on their backs. It was disgusting. He was no extremist in his beliefs, but stamping them out could only benefit everyone.

The stranger didn't want to be blamed for the coming change, he just had the desire to be its catalyst.

That intruder who unwrapped the bits of matter to verify their purity and certainty.

And the matter on this planet stank. And he knew it. So were so many other people who were part of the status quo every day and continued to live in their fictional world of success.

They were doomed. They were not going to survive. Unless the situation changed.

Trade union reforms of the working and impoverished people were only a partial solution, but not the complete change that was needed.

In time, there would be no more room for compromise.

The futuristic rain, which was an invEntion of Governor Elmbaum himself, was going to dew minds and make them come to their senses. That was his real goal!

The streets that housed so many strangers who wanted to blend in with the crowd where they sought safe haven. This was not to be the future!

HELL OF ZEGANDARIA

"The sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and hell gave up the dead which were in