I leapt out of the way, and she hit the ground just next to me. However, I couldn’t maintain my footing and I rolled down the slope of the hill without any control over myself. I spotted my other self at the foot of the hill even as my world spun round and round. My other self didn’t seem to have the glowing eyes. His wounds seemed to have healed and he came running up the slope and he was able to catch me from falling further.
“You are me,” he said, panting from the run up the slope. I meanwhile struggled to stop my head from spinning even though I was no longer rolling down the slope.
It was a while before I could control my head from spinning. I sat up, observing the other Rohan. I expected him to do something to harm me, but he didn’t and just kept looking at me in much awe although he was a figment of the deer’s imagination.
Meanwhile, the giant Lovebird and the deer were moving down the slope.
“You are me,” Rohan said again.
“Do you have intentions of harming me?” I asked directly. Rohan seemed to be a bit taken aback by this question.
“No,” he said with a shake of his head. “Why would I harm myself?” Just then Lovebird let out a blood curling cry as she seemed to have spotted me and the other Rohan.
“WH—What happened to Lovebird?” Rohan asked me, and from the look on his face he seemed to be frightened of the giant Lovebird.
“Come on,” I said, “first we need to hide somewhere they can’t see us.”
“But Lovebird—we can’t leave her with the deer!” Rohan said.
“Do you really think the deer is going to hurt her?” I said in a hurry. “Now let’s hide before they kill us!”
I grabbed Rohan’s hand and pulled him down the slope. There was a great forest in all directions around the hill and the forest consisted of the leaf-less trees. We took refuge in the shadow of these trees.
We watched in horror as Lovebird put the deer on her shoulder and she began to uproot dozens of trees even as she searched for me and the other Rohan. Thankfully she was searching for us in a different direction, so we were safe at least for the time being.
Rohan grabbed his hair.
“Why did she become a demon giant?” he asked me.
I hesitated before replying.
“I turned her into the giant,” I said, trying to avoid my own eyes which felt odd, “but it was the deer that turned her into a demon intent on killing us.”
“I- I don’t understand,” Rohan said struggling to digest my words from the look on his face, “how can you turn her into a giant? How did you get such powers? Some new spell?”
I placed a hand on Rohan’s shoulder, intending to give him the ultimate truth.
“I know this might sound strange to you,” I said, “but we are in a dream.”
“A dream?” Rohan said, his eyes on the verge of popping out. “Whose dream?”
“The deer’s.”
Rohan took a step backwards. I decided to give him the even harder truth.
“And you are a mere figment of his imagination, and so are the giant Lovebird and that deer with red eyes.”
Rohan grabbed his hair harder. I continued to speak.
“I received a new spell a while ago which enables me to turn the dreams of people into nightmares and thus make them do something that I want them to do. The real deer was refusing to listen to us, so I used the spell on him. Normally, when I use the spell it is easy for me to change a dream any way I want to. This time when I changed the size of Lovebird so the deer could be frightened, something went wrong. The mind of the deer seems to have realised my intrusion and has trapped me here.”
“But if that’s the case,” Rohan said, “why don’t I feel any urge to harm you even if I am a figment of the deer’s imagination?”
I shrugged. I didn’t know why that was happening.
“Maybe because the mind of the deer does not expect you to side with him since you look like me?” I suggested.
Rohan nodded, looking at the ground.
“I believe everything you say,” he finally said. “But how are you going to get out of here now?”
The giant Lovebird and the deer were going in the other direction, hacking and slashing the leaf-less trees. As such they had gone a considerable distance from the mountain. It was my manipulation of the dream that had turned things against me. Could a different kind of manipulation turn things to my favour?
I squatted onto the ground. I took a handful of grass in my hand. This grass was green, unlike the yellow grass at the top of the hill.
A very old saying that I had perhaps read in some book during my teen years came to me.
Don’t fight the flow. Use it to your advantage for there are no enemies, only friends.
I pursed my lips.
The grass…
I felt like a light bulb had turned on in my head.
I smiled at Rohan who was looking at me.
“You thought something?” he asked me with some uncertainty.
“Care to meet a few more Rohans?” I said to him. I transported myself to the hill and also took Rohan with me. I thought about the time I had rolled down the slope. I could have easily avoided all the spinning of my head with a simple hold on the dream. But I knew better now.
The moment I had transported myself to the hill, the giant Lovebird stopped and turned around.
“There they are!” Lovebird cried.
She was coming fast, taking giant leaps with her giant legs. I had at best a few moments. Luckily, I had transported myself in the place of the hill where the circle of the gateway was on the grass and I feared nothing.
I stood on the circle and I beckoned at Lovebird and the deer, who seemed confused with my actions. The other Rohan also seemed confused. I made the circle glow and made its existence very obvious.
Next I transported myself and Rohan into a different place, which I created in a different corner of the deer’s mind. This new place was a great plain covered with the yellow grass the deer so craved for. And in this plain there were hundreds of Lovebirds and Rohans all of whom were holding blades of the yellow grass, inviting the deer to come and feast.
However, I allowed the place to be accessible only through the circle and didn’t allow the deer to come to the great plain of the yellow grass by any other way.
“Come,” I said to the deer, and the hundreds of Lovebirds and Rohans spoke together with me, “eat as much as you want. It is all yours.”
All violent intentions seemed to have left the deer, and his eyes no longer were glowing red now. The giant lovebird also shrunk in size and I made her disappear.
The deer walked closer to the hole. He seemed to be wondering if he should indeed take the step into the circle.
“Come,” I said. The deer, driven by the greed for the yellow grass, took a step forwards. However, he couldn’t enter the plain of the yellow grass. He tried again but he couldn’t.
Because I hadn’t allowed him yet.
I made the hundreds of Lovebirds and Rohans gasp. And I made them say to the deer to give up the defences of his mind so that I could get out of it if only partially and access my body which was probably still beside the boulder and I suspected Lovebird was having a real problem figuring out what exactly happened to me. Only then would the circular portal work for the deer and he could come to the plain growing with the yellow grass.
The deer was initially reluctant, but his greed for the yellow grass was too great.
He loosened his defences, and the moment he did so I could return my consciousness to my body. I stirred.
Lovebird, who had been observing me with great concern, breathed a sigh of relief.
“Rohan, for a moment I thought you wouldn’t wake up,” she said.
“It isn’t done yet,” I said to her, “let’s get to the circle.”
“But the deer?” Lovebird said.
“Don’t worry about him,” I told her, “I have him in my control.”
Chapter 36
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sp; Lovebird and I moved up the slope of the hill to the spot near the top where the gateway was. The deer was standing near it, much like I had asked him to in his dream. This deer was surely one greedy deer. He believed we were going to take him to an entire plain covered by the yellow grass. His eyes were dazed and quite unfocused for I still had my hold over him with my spell.
The three of us stood inside the circle and we three barely fit. But it was enough. We repeated the new name of Kapilpura thrice and soon found ourselves in the spot next to the pixies. I could feel the deer’s mind get confused seeing that there was none of the promised grass here, and I knew that we only had a few moments before the deer would be out of our control.
But the pixies were overjoyed and they already seemed to have planned for this. They came flying with a great black cloth and they put it over the deer. The deer was made of light and there was no escape for him from the black cloth, which had some sort of charm placed over it.
“The deer has been brought!” the overjoyed queen cried flying round and round me and Lovebird.
“And now we shall sacrifice the deer and the Pain will forever go!”
I gulped.
With the deer sacrificed we would be stuck in this time forever.
“Um, can I say something to you?” I said to the queen hesitantly.
“Anything!” the queen said, “Anything you say or asked shall be done and granted!”
I was about to open my mouth to speak when the sound of thunder tore the sky above. I looked up. The sky had gone entirely black. The stars had disappeared and there were no clouds either. The blackness in the sky was of a strange sort, an eerie sort.
“Oh my,” the queen said, “the Pain would be falling shortly! We must hurry to make the sacrifice!”
Hundreds and thousands of shapes began to appear in the black sky. First I thought they were stars, but then the glowing shapes began to rearrange in the sky which was something no real stars would ever do. The shapes then began to take the forms of zeroes and ones.
So this was the Pain.
I could bet that the zeroes and ones would soon fall from the sky.
The pixies who had been overjoyed only a minute ago were now in a state of panic. The queen was shouting orders to the soldiers to prepare the sacrifice.
“How exactly are you going to sacrifice the deer?” I asked the queen.
“We have always known the procedure for the sacrifice from the beginning of time,” the queen said, “it’s pretty simple, we just have to bathe him with the black Pain.”
“The black Pain?”
“Yes, some of the shapes in the sky that constitute the Pain turn black as they fall,” the queen said, “If we can bathe the deer with the black Pain then the deer will die and hence our sacrifice will be complete.”
“I know this might sound a bit strange to you,” I said as I prepared myself to tell her not to sacrifice the deer, but just then there was a grunt from the deer that was covered with the cloth.
“I will help you return to your time,” the deer said, “please let me go.”
Lovebird and I exchanged glances. I turned to the pixie queen with much determination.
“Can I know the actual crime of the deer?”
“Crime?” the queen said, seemingly taken off guard.
“I mean it would be wrong to kill the deer if he didn’t do anything bad to the pixies.”
The pixie queen shook her head.
“Doesn’t matter,” she said, “what matters is that the prophecy says that sacrificing the deer would forever free us from the Pain.”
“But still, it would be a wrong thing to do,” I insisted.
“No, no,” the queen said, “this is what we have been waiting for since the beginning of time.” A change had overcome her tone.
“All I wanted was to eat the grass,” the deer said from underneath the black cloth, “was that my crime?”
“I don’t know of what grass you are talking about,” the pixie queen said.
The other pixies had gathered now. There were only a few shapes in the sky that had not arranged and most of the sky was now teeming with glowing ones and zeroes.
“Okay,” I told the pixie queen, desperately searching for a way around the problem, “Is it possible for you to transport us to a different time?”
“We can transport you to any place you want to go,” the pixie queen said, “but not to a different time.”
“Then the two of us require the deer to be alive so that he can transport us to our own time,” I said.
“No,” the queen said, adamantly. “The deer must be sacrificed.”
“But you said just minutes back that you were ready to do anything and everything for us,” Lovebird said to the pixie queen.
It was a moment before the pixie queen replied. Below some of the pixies without wings were carrying what looked like ones and zeros of black gas. How they managed to carry them only they knew.
“Look, I really must do this,” she said, “You can ask me anything else you want. What would have been the entire point of capturing the deer otherwise?”
And then Lovebird said the words that I should have said earlier. For it totally changed the queen’s mindset.
“We are your saviours,” Lovebird said. “We came to save you and you shall be saved. But the deer needn’t die, not if he hasn’t done anything wrong to you.”
The queen went quiet. After a while she raised a hand, signalling her subjects to stop proceeding with the sacrifice. She then turned to them.
“Our saviours want us to free the deer,” she said in a loud voice. “They say it will be wrong to sacrifice the deer, especially because the deer has not caused us any harm.”
The thousands of pixies began to look at each other, as if trying to see how the others were reacting.
“But the Pain?” one of the pixies asked. “Have we not suffered enough?”
I cleared my throat.
“We are your saviours,” I said, “and we will find a way to save you. But I think it will be wrong if you sacrifice the deer. Of course the decision is entirely up to you all.”
“I promise never to eat the yellow grass again,” the deer said from underneath the black cloth in a miserable voice.
A great mumble swept over the pixies. Some wanted to sacrifice the deer while others were ready to be subjected to the Pain and refused to sacrifice someone who had not really harmed them.
A great thunder like sound came from up above.
“Make your decision quickly!” the queen said to the pixies. “Those who want to sacrifice the deer can raise their hands.”
Only a small percentage of the pixies did so.
“It seems most of us are confused as to whether we should sacrifice an innocent being for our benefit,” the queen said and there was some sorrow but also some pride in her tone. “The pixies shall face the Pain. As we always have with courage. We are noble beings and we shall do what is right. I thank my saviours for showing me this and also to my subjects for sticking to the right decision even in the face of the Pain.”
It was at this point that I happened to focus on the queen. I saw the Karma of the queen suddenly shoot up to three million from the few hundred thousand that she originally had. I focussed on a few more of the pixies and their Karma had also risen to millions! And then it dawned upon me why this was happening. By deciding to not sacrifice the deer the pixies had actually made the ultimate sacrifice. They had stuck to the right decision and hence their Karma levels had shot up. That it possible to gain lots of Karma in this time period had also helped.
Lovebird’s jaw dropped when I told her about the Karma rise in the pixies.
“They must have at least four billion Karma in total,” she told me. Her calculations were more or less right.
“If they give us their Karma we might actually be able to stop the blast that would occur when Death13 and Ravana met!” I said.
“We might be able to save the pixies too,” L
ovebird said, “If the blast doesn’t occur then the players wouldn’t turn to pixies and the Pain wouldn’t exist either!”
“We promise that we would save you all,” I said to the pixies, “and it is the deer that is going to help us do it. Can you all remove the black cloth from the deer?”
Some of the pixies immediately came forwards, picked up the cloth and took it away. The deer looked at us all with some uncertainty. Was he going to run? If he did we would have a hard time catching.
“Please don’t make me repent asking them to free you,” I said to the deer.
“I am not eating the yellow grass again,” the deer vowed so that I felt like a great weight had been lifted from my chest. “Come… let me take you to your own time.”
The pixies followed us to the pond in the other side of the river of blood. The pixies brought along their black cloth as if they didn’t trust the deer, which was good for even though the deer had made his promises he might still run away thinking of the yellow grass.
Lovebird and I asked the pixies if they could give us their Karma.
“Take all of the Karma we have,” the queen said. “It’s of not much use to us anyway.”
And so it happened that in the matter of a couple of minutes all the pixies had transferred their Karma to us, such that Lovebird and I became billionaires as far as Karma was concerned. Each of us now had two billion Karma.
It was the deer who first leapt into the pond. Lovebird and I waved bye to the pixies and then the two of us as well jumped into the pond. We dived underneath the surface and soon the water turned into the magical breathable substance.
“So you want to return exactly to the time from which you came?” the deer asked us, who was a good distance below us.
“Yes,” I said.
“Okay,” the deer said, “I will always remember the delicious taste of the yellow grass… but I guess it’s not that bad to be a stationary portal either, helping players to go from one place to another.”
It was after a moment that the magical place changed and the water became un-breathable so that the deer, Lovebird and I swam up to the surface. Once we swam to the edge of the lake and pulled ourselves up, I asked the deer for the final favour.
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