Chapter 2: Mysteries about the Soul (2/2)
Noticing my terrified eyes, Yan continued, ”If you try to take a living human’s soul, you will be investigated by the nether world. However, there is one situation that will get rid of the investigation. It is that you kill yourself, because that means you give up the right to live. That man walking over was not others but your body, and he picked up a rabbit that contained your soul. Killing a human is a crime, but killing an animal is not, especially it's done by yourself. This is somehow that your body kills your own soul, and no one could blame you for such self-inflicted thing. As a result, as long as this soul was handled properly, in most cases, no one would care of it. You die and leave a piece of skin, but they seem to have nothing to do with your death. What a perfect intrigue!”
”Have you offended someone?” I ignored Yan's muttering and asked Zhou Yuan patiently, ”Is that Sister Lan?”
”No. We've known each other for a long time. In the past, she did not work well, and was not happy.” Zhou Yuan, the soul frowned as he recalled his memories carefully. ”Afterwards, in a while, every time we had dinner together, she was very happy, and kept telling me how successful her work was. I was very envious, so I asked her how she did it, but she didn't answer my question. Instead, she asked me a question …”
Just as Zhou Yuan's words fell, a voice came from outside the door: ”She asked you how you understand these words: people's steps are too fast, but their souls can't catch up. ” The door opened, and another Zhou Yuan walked in. To be exact, it was Zhou Yuan's human body that walked in.
Zhou Yuan’s human body sat on the sofa and stared at his soul for a while, then suddenly laughed: ”I am really appreciate your answer. Although it was a little self-deprecating, till now I still believed that your answer was correct. However I did not expect that inside the rabbit what I killed was my own soul, which is you. But it doesn't matter now. I don't care. The body of me and the soul of you have finally separated. ”
”I know, these are the exactly what my body speak.” Zhou Yuan's soul said in a lower voice. In the end he sat on the ground and buried his head in his arms. However, I could still hear his voice, ”At that time, I said that nowadays, those who cannot catch up will fall behind. If the soul cannot catch up, then we will fall more behind after waiting for our own souls. So we can only choose to go forward, and forget the soul. ”
”What are they talking about?” I was a little confused and asked Yan with a puzzled face, ”Why can't I understand?”
”Hum, what they are talking about really exists,” Yan didn't mock me at this time, but instead explained in a serious tone, ”Many people live very struggling lives. It's not that he doesn't have the ability, but he has to do something that his soul doesn't agree with every day. Because there are his family's expectations, his colleagues' gazes, and the comparison to others. When the soul clashed with the mind, most people will choose to compromise with reality. However, your friend was a very extreme person, and he directly chose to abandon his soul and only kept his physical body.”
”I didn't know if I should give up my soul in the beginning,” Zhou Yuan, the physical body, who was on the sofa, replied with a smile. ”But after being educated by Sister Lan today, I realized that I was much better. I don't need to care about whether those things are what I want. As long as I'm willing, I can fully concentrate on it. I don’t want to check my designs before, but now I can easily find that there are a lot of mistakes and problems…”
Speaking to here, Zhou Yuan said to me, ”I only spent five minutes to make the design drawing and you all praised me. This feeling is simply too wonderful. This is only just the beginning, and there will be a big success in future.”
So that’s why the drawing showed by Zhou Yuan was so outstanding, as if it was made by a different person! I thought in my heart. So it turned out that the Zhou Yuan at that time was already soulless.
”That's because I don't want to be a designer at all!” The soul Zhou Yuan suddenly raised his head and roared. He shouted, ”I just want to write stories, to be a writer, to record my thoughts, and to live my life. That’ll be my all life.”
”What the fuck nonsense you are talking about!? This sort of person you said can't survive! ” Zhou Yuan’s body roared at him. His expression was extremely fierce, and that made me feel uncomfortable. ”The truth is, you don't want to do this, so you are mindless, and you can't concentrate! You know what? Every time other people criticized my work of being so bad, how sad my heart was! And you just pretend nothing had happened, but I would be completely twisted! Just because of you, just because of your lousy soul, that dragged my back! I'm 27 years old. When I lay in bed every night, I ask myself, is this the way to expect my 30th year? If this continues, I will have no future, no good living conditions for wife and children in future. What a failure man am I! Compared to this, it’s doesn’t a matter if I don't have a soul. Since you can't change it, then I can only make this decision by myself. You will be a ghost, and I will be a human body! ”
”Didn't you want to write stories?” The body Zhou Yuan sneered as he looked at his soul, pointed to Yan and said, ”Then follow him to the nether world to write! Do not interfere with my life in the mortal world! ”
Interference... My heart couldn't help feeling uncomfortable. Since when did the soul become the interference of a human in the mortal world?
Zhou Yuan, who was on the ground, couldn't say a word. He looked at me in despair, hoping that I could say something. I never thought that Zhou Yuan would take care about his own future so much, nor did I expect that he would actually have such a huge conflict between his current status and the soul in his heart. But what I had to admit that what he said was truth. The two in front of me were both Zhou Yuan, so I don't even know who I should help.
”Did the person who made this happen tell you that,” Only now did Yan sneered and said, ”that you can only live seven days without a soul.”
”What?!” Zhou Yuan’s body and I asked at the same time. There were too many strange things happened today. I actually forgot to ask Zhou Yuan why he did not know the whole thing. According to what Yan had said, did it mean that Zhou Yuan would only live a few days?
”You are right, there is indeed the possibility that you and the soul in your heart might not be the same. But don't forget, in this world, you're not the only one who does a job that what his soul doesn’t wants to do. If you can solve this problem so easily, then why there are few people who can't give up their souls? ” Yan shook his head, looking like an old pedant, which didn’t match with his handsome face. ”Except cultivators who can make their souls leave their bodies freely, for normal people, the souls can't leave their bodies in seven days or there will be problems with their bodies. Although their souls can't keep up with their minds, their souls are the most important elements in people's lives, otherwise, how could so many people die from overwork? They are constantly weakening their souls, and at the last moment, their souls are almost used up. The reason why you are alive and kicking right now and blaming your own soul, is probably that…”
“The talisman water could protect your body.” The door opened, and a bald man entered. It was Liu Shuai. I realized that he was staring at the soul Zhou Yuan on the ground, as if he could see him. Could a normal human see the soul?
”You can see him?” Liu Shuai and I asked each other at the same time but he realized that he seemed to have leaked something and didn't return this topic anymore. ”In the past, Jiang Zi Ya the immortal Taoist had given Bi Gan something similar, but there were different effects. One could protect human body, and the other could protect the soul, but they can’t protect a man for his entire life, and they had flaws.”
I suddenly felt that I was a fool among these people, and they all seemed to know more than I did.
”Then why Sister Lan was safe?” Zhou Yuan did not give up and asked, ”Why she isn't dead?”