Plague Doctor

Chapter 72: Son of Misfortune

Shouldn’t childhood memories bring back the taste of sweet innocence? Running through the field without a care in the world, crying in the mall because your parents wouldn’t buy you your favorite toy, listening to the bedtime stories while slipping into sleep. But if… childhood memories only brought pain, horror, fear, and anger, then perhaps it was a good thing that they were lost at some corner of one’s subconscious.

At that moment, when Gu Jun saw the scene from the illusion, some broken memory fragments rushed out from the corner that was long sealed. Like a nightmare returning, it disturbed the peace of the dreamer. He saw himself when he was still a toddler, the period when he was still trying to speak and crawl. At the time, he was already being given some strange training. Around him, there were many other children. They were all studying one picture after another. They were filled with that strangely-shaped trees, clustered vines, twisted branches, and dead leaves.

These pictures had planted something unknown in their youthful and empty souls. Would the seeds grow into… dark fruit in the end? When they slowly grew older, after they learned how to run, walk, talk, and think…

Gu Jun felt nothingness around him. He was the one still standing there among the many strange trees. He had forgotten the faces of the other children. He could not bring himself to picture any of them anymore. It was as if they had not interacted with one another after they parted. He was special. The gaze of many people told him that there was joy, anticipation, and curiosity. But behind every gaze, there was a latent fanaticism like they were laying their eyes on a surprising treasure, reminding him of how his mother had looked at him. Was that woman really his own mother? That was the first time Gu Jun had been suspicious of that, but it went no further than that because of the gentleness when she put him to bed, the smile when she fed him meals, the concern on her face when he fell… That was all real; they were the emotions of a mother. He believed that. But as a mother, how could she even fathom to treat her own child like that?

It was this same woman who asked him to label the things on the drawing, to write down all the foreign letters. It was also this woman who placed the crown of Banyan tree leaves and roots on his head. “Xiao Jun, just sit there and don’t move.”

Her voice had an undercurrent of nervousness and melancholy. Was she hesitating or sad? But obviously, the fanaticism and feverishness had won out. She looked at him like a great experiment was about to bring upon a great result.

With regards to this result, she could never give it up. The experiment began when his mother was pregnant. Gu Jun had a feeling those whisperings had already begun deep inside his implicit memory. He was an experiment of the Afterlife Cult; that had already been decided before he even arrived in this world. But the question was, what kind of product was he?

The illusion started to shake, like static going through, but Gu Jun could still see some of the images. The icy voice made it feel like the dark sky was about to fall. Those people in black and red were still kneeling before the tree. They did not raise their faces that were slowly morphing into one, not even to glance at the tree hole before them. It was as if once they did, they would lose their mind and sink into the endless hallucination forever. It was a dangerous temptation, like Orpheus going to the underworld to save Eurydice, and Hades telling him not to look back, but when they crossed the gate of hell, Orpheus could not resist the urge to glance at his wife, and for that Eurydice was pulled back to hell for all eternity. Or like how, when Abraham and his wife were escaping from the God of Destruction, Sodom, Abraham’s wife turned back to look and was instantly turned into a statue of salt. When God told you not to look, you’d better not look. Humans were never supposed to test God.

“It’s like you said, Son of Misfortune,” the person in red who knelt at the front said in a self-effacing voice. The ground underneath reeked from decay, but the ugly face budged not an inch. “We are a bunch of filthy, foolish, perverse parasites, the disciples abandoned by the so-called Goddess of Life…”

None of the kneeling members made a noise. There was complete silence, but above that stillness, there was an undercurrent of danger.

Goddess of Life? Gu Jun had encountered that term in Raybundy’s diary. She was the deity worshipped by that civilization. Abandoned disciples… These members of the Afterlife Cult were speaking as members of the foreign civilization? But why? Where did they come from, and how did they know about this?

“The old world has already been destroyed. We made it to this new world, but we have lost our knowledge and power. We still cannot recognize the language from the old world,” the person in red uttered softly. “But we still remember the promise the real divinity gave us…”

Gu Jun’s heart quivered. The Afterlife Cult still had not laid their hands on the foreign drawings that he painted? Were they hidden away by his parents? Perhaps they had a different goal from the Afterlife Cult…

“Inferior lives.” The child in the tree hole responded in a strange voice devoid of emotion. “With your inferior request.”

There was only derision in this reply. But the leading man’s voice lowered even further. “Is it because this shell is not to your standard? Because his body cannot support the energy from the old world? Is there a need for us to commit a blood sacrifice of him?”

The child did not speak, but a lack of response was also a response.

“This shell is the sacrifice?” the person in red mumbled. “The beginning of misfortune?”

The other disciples were still silent, but thunder tore through the silence in the sky. It started to rumble. Suddenly, Gu Jun felt a splitting headache. Everything was twisting, but he could feel a fire burning in his heart as well. All the complicated emotions collided within him as they tried to find an exit. Suddenly, he opened his lips to speak…

‘Is the past real? Why would the double-slit experiment in quantum physics show that the future can change the past?’

The dark sky finally collapsed, and heavy rain fell on the world. The voice of the boy in the tree hole turned harsh and throaty, like two voices twining together. It tore through light and darkness, causing people to go mad.

“This child has his own destiny.” The boy’s strange voice rang through the void. “I will not allow inferior animals like you to lay a single finger on him.”

The people in black and red still did not move, and they still did not raise their heads. They did not see that some brilliance had come into the child’s eyes like a ball of fire lighting up deep inside the abyss.

“The boy will grow into a real man. You shall not disturb him or injure him. Have him forget everything, but one day in the future, this boy will once again stand before you.”

The boy in the tree hole announced that. It was absurd yet logical. The statement rang through in the past, present, and future.

“When the time comes, all debts will be cleared. That is my promise to all of you.”

Gu Jun repeated the sentences word by word, but the last statement was only spoken in his heart.

‘And that day will be your day of reckoning.’

The large banyan tree stood unmoving in the storm, but it somehow rustled noisily.

The disciples kneeling in the mud finally responded with some inexplicable mumblings, accepting the prophecy that was blessed upon them by the divine.