Why are we here?

2024 Author: Seth Attwood | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 15:55

A group of young men and women continued to move along a small corridor, on the walls of which lighted torches hung. Looking around with curiosity, they walked in the direction of a heavy wooden door visible at the end of the corridor, tied with wrought iron bands. They walked in silence and without haste.

Reaching the door, a strong-looking guy walked over and pulled the hanging wrought-iron handle. After a little effort, the door began to open silently, contrary to the general opinion that it should have creaked. A huge hall was waiting for her teenagers. It was so large that the torches hanging on the walls did not fully illuminate it, and the opposite wall was not visible at all. The ceiling was extremely high, with chandeliers and candles hanging from it through a system of heavy chains. The candles on the chandeliers were extinguished. Tall columns stood throughout the hall in orderly rows, propping up the ceiling.

The young man who opened the door cautiously entered the first, looked around and shouted to the others to come in. His voice echoed in the room and, repeating itself several times, finally fell silent. Everyone entered and began to look around, gradually moving, as they believed, to the center of the hall.

“It’s very romantic,” the girl said to the guy in a multi-colored shirt, whom she was holding by the hand, “to be in a medieval castle… but a strange premonition does not leave me. This is the one who lit all these torches …

Suddenly, low and chilling laughter broke the girl's thoughts. Demonic rumbles of this laughter pierced right through, in the thoughts of each of those present a suspicion arose of a trap, that a certain malevolent creature that had lured a group of young people to its prehistoric castle had achieved some goal of its own, and was now enjoying its own success. There was absolutely nothing to do: the large hall in which everyone had gathered was completely empty. The teenagers fussed about in the middle of the hall and looked around with fear, but a maliciously laughing voice, gaining strength and already forcing them to literally fall to their knees, seemed to be heard from all sides. The running people shouted something to each other, but these screams were completely incomprehensible.

Suddenly it was quiet. The young people also fell silent and everyone again gathered in a group in the center of the hall. The guys were still looking around and huddled together, not understanding what was happening. The silence did not last long, but it made everyone tense up even more. Only a few minutes passed, which seemed to be an eternity, and then the same voice, imperiously and without haste, said:

- Welcome, my dears!

The friends looked at each other, in the eyes of each there was surprise mixed with fear, and the faces of the people expressed the same question: "what" is this and what does "it" want?

- Now I will come out to you, wait. the voice continued to speak.

Resounding footsteps were heard, echoing in the depths of the room, by the sound of which one could guess that a man was slowly approaching them … or, something similar to a man. One by one, the chandeliers lit up by themselves, accompanying the approaching footsteps. A quarter of a minute later it became clear that this was indeed a man, a man, however, looking very strange: he was wearing a black tailcoat, put on a dark red shirt, and in his hands the man was holding a black cane, holding his right hand in the middle, and not like it is usually customary to wear such walking sticks when they lightly rest on the ground when walking. The end of the cane was painted white and the handle was painted a dark red, the same color as the shirt. On my feet were black, but not shiny shoes. On the man's head was a cylindrical hat, low and also black in the color of his tailcoat. The eyes were not visible, since the brim of the hat cast a shadow on them, the lower part of the face had generally pleasant, but firm and imperious features, the lips depicted a barely perceptible smile. The face was clean-shaven.

Approaching the group of teenagers, the man stopped. Everyone was looking at him, and he was looking ahead so that it was unclear whether he was looking at someone specific or at all at once, or maybe he was standing with his eyes closed. It seemed to everyone that he was pierced through by a sharp look, penetrating into the very essence, into the deepest and most intimate that is in a person. No one will remember how long the silence lasted, but the mysterious man spoke first. In an equally confident and penetrating voice, which, incidentally, did not seem so terrible, he began:

- Each of you, apparently, guessed that it was not by chance that you got here. The sequence of events that preceded our meeting was completely controlled by me and gently pushed you to get to know each other, get together and enter my castle. By the way, this castle is not visible to everyone, other people cannot enter here if I do not want to. - the man smiled slowly, showing white and even teeth, his facial features became so more imperious that even the hearts of those present began to beat slower, obeying some kind of inner rhythm of this mysterious person.

This smile made one of the young people in the group tremble, his knees buckled, and he would have fallen if a healthy and strong guy in a white T-shirt had not picked up the young man and helped him to stand up straight again. The girls behaved more courageously and, it seemed, had already realized that it was better not to give out any emotions now. Even the tears in the eyes of some of them could not tell an outside observer anything if he were here. Meanwhile, the stranger continued to say:

- I will not bore you with the expectation of an answer to the main question that you would like to ask me. The question is why you are here. Less than that, you, apparently, should be interested in who I am. Therefore, I am giving you the answer to the main question right now, and the second answer will be found by those of you who will survive.

One of the girls screamed and threw herself into the arms of a young man in a summer multi-colored shirt with short sleeves. The girl pressed against his chest and sobbed quietly, the guy hugged her and continued to look at the man in black.

-… I followed you and realized what is the main drawback of each. This disadvantage has already caused many difficulties for each of you and for other people around you, but your bad qualities harm not even the culture in which you grew up, but the general design according to which our World develops. You hinder by destroying what was created before you instead of developing and improving, having such incredible opportunities for this. You know what needs to be corrected in yourself, but you do not do it, thus continuing to mock common sense for the sake of your pleasure. I decided to help you get rid of this shortcoming. Here, in my castle, we will play one Game, the meaning of which is to survive. No, you don't need to think that you have to jump over traps and fight monsters, - the man smiled again, - it would all be frivolous. You will need to live in my castle, and I will arrange different situations, in the course of resolving which each, I emphasize, each of you will have to come face to face with your main drawback.

The man was silent for a while, slightly bowed his head down, as if remembering something, then raised it again and spoke again:

- Meeting your shortcoming will be difficult and you will have to fight it first of all …

- And if we do not defeat the disadvantage, will you kill us? - said suddenly, overcoming excitement, a healthy guy who opened the doors and supported his friend, less gifted in appearance.

The man turned his head to him and the guy turned pale.

- No, that would be wrong, - the stranger continued to say calmly, - I give you such "tasks", the failure of which will end tragically for you, not at all because someone will kill you or you will die. You will kill yourself. Having failed the task, you simply will not be able to live on, knowing and understanding how much you did a terrible thing. I will do everything so that you clearly realize what kind of crime you committed without taking advantage of your last chance to improve. At the same time, I did not mean at all that you would kill yourself physically, your death will be psychological, your personality will die, the loser turns from a person into a weak-willed creature, unable and unable to do anything and even think independently. You will lose an already weak sense of responsibility, as it will prevent you from living on. You will remain philistines, and you will be returned back to Earth, where such as you are the very place where you will drag out a miserable existence. At the same time, I will take all your talents and skills, because of which, in general, I took up your training, and I will give them to other people who deserve them more than you. For you, this will be a spiritual death, which, however, you will no longer be able to realize, for I will erase the memory of your last events. You will think that the way you live is as it should be. You will, as it were, start your life anew from one of the lowest human levels, climb again this ladder of development … and, perhaps, in a few thousand of your earthly years, I will see some of you again. But I hope this does not happen. After all, you have already understood what this meeting will mean.

- So we are not on Earth now? - asked a slender girl with blond hair, slightly only red in the glitter of the fire of candles and torches burning everywhere.

- No, - simply answered the man in black, without even turning his head to her, - I answered your question, young man?

- What if I break your head now? - instead of answering the young man spoke up.

- My dear friend, you cannot do it with all your will. I will defend myself, cripple you, and as a result we will get that the strongest and smartest member of your team at the moment, whose positive qualities everyone will need very much, will be unable to help others. And why? Because you do not want to overcome one of your most serious shortcomings - unwillingness to think before doing and an overly assertive character, the habit of solving everything by force and inattention. Thus, by showing this flaw, you set up your friends and you will not achieve anything at all. Everything is according to my plan.

The young man silently lowered his head, but it was clear that this restraint was not easy for him: he clenched his jaw and fists, his hands trembled and it seemed that he could not stand it and would throw himself at the man. Although he had already turned away from him and paid absolutely no attention. The stranger looked at the blonde-haired girl who asked about the Earth. Having understood the meaning of this look, regarding it as an invitation to ask the question that tormented her, the girl confidently said:

- And what will happen to those who pass the tests?

- If you manage, you will become completely different people, your understanding of the surrounding reality will become different, your values will completely change, but I will still return you to Earth, albeit with a different goal. To teach others. Not because I decided so, but because you cannot do otherwise and you yourself want it. What exactly you will feel and think, I do not see the opportunity to explain now, it will not be clear to you.

The stranger in black smiled lightly at the girl, but not imperiously, but as if an old acquaintance, then the man nodded to her with an expression of complete deference, slowly looked around all those present, turned around and walked away.

A group of teenagers stared after him in a daze.