The Chronicles of Qi

by J E Kerry

With a knowing nod, she lets go of the plank and falls into the bottomless abyss.

  “I’m sorry!” Lucy screams up to Xiao Wang who stares on in shock as the last family member dies on his behalf.

  ∞∞∞

  “Wang!” Zhao Yun shouts.

  Wang jolts upright off the train window, waking from his dream, “What happened?”.

  Zhao puts on his jacket, “We’ve arrived”.

  Wang immediately grabs his Li-Ning backpack and follows Zhao to the train exit.

  The two friends step onto the platform and melt in with the arrivals. Wang struggles to keep up with Zhao, constantly distracted by the variety of people, their different clothes, accessories, interactions with each other, and the long row of shops that fill the VTH train station hall.

  He is understandably stricken by the sight. Long rows of shops displaying the same type of wares are laden with products he has never seen before. New age Mandroids (mannequin androids) stand in different postures, while holographic images of different AN-CDC specific clothing styles flicker on from one to another, such as winter clothing, light summer Sarees, Salwar Suits, Anarkali, Lehenga, Sherwani, Kurtas or Nehru jackets.

  Since the founding of the AN-CDC, the council had decided for a unified look to suit all citizens around the globe equally and allowed the individual expression through elements such as color, patterns and embroidery. Main reason for the elimination of the former fashion industry, labels and the multifarious chaos of styles was to bring back a feeling of unity throughout all cultures and to create a representable ‘Earth Look’ for the planet, on a universal scale. After months of discussions, the council finally decided for the former traditional Indian and Pakistani ethnic wear to become the new unified look.

  Next to this day wear, the AN-CDC had their own diverse jumpsuits for sports and space activities created, able to monitor all vitals and protect the skin from workouts and tasks under the sun.

  Wang stands gaping at the images of the HBA (Holographic Basketball Association) players for this season. Before he became an orphan, he used to play every day with his father and Lucy in their underground gym.

  “Didi come on, knock it off,” Snaps Zhao.

  “Please tell me we are allowed to play HBA at the SFB?” Wang asks with gusto.

  “I said knock it off bro’,” snaps Zhao again. “I refuse to let you embarrass me in front of the ladies with that childish game.”

  “Ladies?”

  “Just come along.”

  Wang follows his friend but is once again taken by another sight. He stops in front of an electronic store with a DJ and a holographic turntable sending advanced electronic beats out into the atmosphere and images of dancers at the front throwing stunts of different styles. He just stands there nodding to the familiar beats from the floating speakers around.

  Zhao rushes back and yanks Wang away from the scene.

  “Didi! Enough. We gonna shop later,” he says with rolling eyes.

  “This is overwhelming,” exhales Wang, suddenly breathing heavily.

  “I know it’s a bit much, but I need you to focus, o.k.?” Zhao says encouragingly.

  Wang nods albeit uncertainly in response and they begin to walk towards their destination.

  The train station is plastered with signs pointing in various directions, written in English and Putonghua (Mandarin Chinese). A giant holo-screen reads off the arriving and departing trains in those languages as well.

  It is a kaleidoscopic display of colors of every kind. Lights flash and flicker brightly, overwhelmingly overloading the senses with their brightness and compounding the forceful crowd that moves this way, bumping into Wang from all sides. He suddenly gets caught up in the mass, feeling uncomfortable and claustrophobic.

  He has been used to the quiet monastic life of several years and feels better off when he has all the elements few, orderly and in his control. This time around his heightened senses are overloaded with the myriad of sensory data besetting his defenses.

  A young boy on his stylish NIKE Hover-Board almost collides with Wang. Several conversations from so many of the surrounding citizens pile on themselves to form indecipherable strings of words that pull together to a crescendo, feeling more and more to Wang like it is coming from his own head.

  His vision narrows at the edges, tunneling in an attempt to keep him focused on his surroundings. Every face that passes by seems to stare directly at him, looking into his eyes, knowing exactly who he is, until Wang cannot take it anymore, and breaks into sweat.

  “Keep your mind in check Wang,” he snaps at himself but again starts breathing heavily, channeling the years of monastic training into one singular purpose; maintaining his sanity.

  Wang has transformed from the iron-willed master to a scared four-year-old, mourning the loss of his entire family. His eyes catch a car with a small family laughing and cheering themselves up. Out of nowhere the man at the wheel transforms from a stranger to his father. The old Chinese folk song starts blasting from speakers around. The sky becomes dark and the sun is replaced with the moon, reminiscent of the last night he spent with his parents.

  The woman at one of the shop fronts turns and their eyes meet. Wang is stunned at the sight of his mother. He takes to his heels, hurrying towards her, but the woman’s eyes become scared when she sees Wang approaching and she quickly beckons to her husband, zooming off.

  “Noooo. Mom!” Wang screams. His voice is lost in the din of people moving. Most of them undisturbed by a madman’s antics.

  “Are you okay mister?” a little girl asks worriedly.

  “Yeah I’m fine,” Wang responds, the little girl’s top bun reminding him of one of his students.

  Everything seems normal now. The sun has once more replaced the moon and the day is as bright as ever.

  “Keep it together Wang, practice what you preach to your students,” he chides himself again. “You have a stronger mind than this.”

  A child runs from what would likely be his sibling, chasing a drone, moving at high speeds. With this sight a sickening feeling washes over Wang.

  Keeping control of himself and his heavy breathing, he notices a hover-bench near the shop front of the futuristic Chinese fast food restaurant ‘Zhen Gongfu’ and rushes through the people to sit down and catch his breath, resting his fingers on his temples.

  Meanwhile, Zhao has almost reached the exit and suddenly turns around; realizing that his friend is gone.

  “Didi?” Zhao Yun wonders and wades back through the crowd until he spots Wang sitting on the hover-bench, head between his knees, nauseous. Zhao rushes over to him.

  “Brother, you’re okay?” Zhao Yun asks concerned, holding him by his shoulders.

  “Too many people,” Wang responds, looking up with his face as pale as a piece of paper.

  Zhao instantly takes out his translucent SFB travel mug and drops a Chinese flower seed into the hot water.

  “Here, drink this,” he says and hands his friend the mug. The dried herbal flower blooms within the water, turning it into a yellow-greenish color. Wang takes two long sips and relaxes.

  “Breathe...,” Zhao says with his brotherly, calm voice. “Don’t worry, it will all be over soon.”

  Wang breathes in and out a couple of times and slowly recovers. With the aid of Zhao, the two merge back into the sea of AN-CDC citizens and continue on to the exit.

  ∞∞∞

  A white snowy owl spreads its wings as it overlooks the mountainous landscape from high up in the sky. It watches vehicles move and maneuver the busy road toward the AN-CDC that stretches the length of the horizon.

  The city is practically a paradise, with tourists from all corners of the Earth willing to give anything to be in this world-metropole for just one hour. The multilayered road is ever busy, it is a rush to get in and out of the AN-CDC. The roads mostly come alive at night when the colors of the different railings come out to play in the light of the moon.

  The road to the city is like
a large snake coiled around a mountain as if it wanted to constrict it. The spiral nature of the roads is a defense mechanism by the city’s founders to prevent intrusion from strangers, aka the Rebels. As tricky as the roads seem, they are deemed some of the safest roads on the continent. The cars are tireless and fully automated with option for manual override. The lack of tires helps with collision reduction. There is no grip to lose. The AN-CDC has learnt how to manipulate gravity and infuse it in their construction of roads and building foundations.

  The road has about 50 different multilayers with the last one being the metro train. It is fast enough to move from one city to another in a matter of seconds. All lanes are stacked side by side and on top of each other. The railings of the road are made of reinforced fiber glass, preventing a car to fall out while the lanes are apportioned according to average speed. The ones for buses and RVs are way bigger than for EVs (electromagnetic hover vehicle). Every vehicle is capable of land, air and sea transportation.

  The AN-CDC, protected by an artificial river and electro-magnetic walls, is divided into radial sectors and circular belts. Eight white jade obelisks frame the surroundings, each topped with a crystal pyramidion, radiating with energy from the sun and the moon. These pyramidions are the power plants of all A-Nation cities, generating free energy.

  Each of the eight towers is wrapped in a symbolic and neatly embellished Jade layer that depicts the five elements of life: water in the north, earth in the northeast and southwest, wood in the east and southeast, fire in the south, and metal in the west and northwest.

  The towers are built on ‘vital’ dragon lines that are used to enhance the vibrant energy of each power plant with the central dome of the city, affixed to a vortex point of such lines.

  In China, dragon lines go far back to ancient times and Feng Shui (translated: wind and water), the earlier mentioned traditional Chinese geomancy. These lines are the Earth’s meridians, comparable to a body’s meridians. They are pathways for the Qi, the spiritual, and the electro-magnetic energies to travel and connect at vortex portals. In Irish and Scottish myths, they’re also called ‘Fairy Passes’.

  As for the inner surface of a tower, right under the pyramidion, it uses dolomite material to increase electrical conductivity relative to the amount of pressure put on it, as high pressure creates more electrical current.

  The passageways on the other hand are built of enhanced radioactive granite which contains a high amount of quartz crystal with metal that is well-known to be a conductor of piezoelectricity. This kind of electricity usually occurs as a result from pressure and latent heat.

  With the crystalline pyramidion on top, storing the heat of the sun, the granite ionizes the air inside the pyramid and creates a chemical reaction that increases the conductivity of electricity which is led through carefully crafted copper wires on the walls and floor, consequentially releasing electromagnetic energy into the confined space of the ‘Alpha Chamber’.

  As a second catalyst, the river surrounding the city is used as a source of power, travelling up the Jade-decorated limestone due to the principle of capillary action which we find in nature as well wherein water in soil is absorbed by a plant’s roots and propelled upwards to the rest of its organs with absolutely no external assistance. Hence, a capillary action usually occurs when the adhesion to the walls is stronger than the cohesive forces between the liquid molecules.

  The main tunnel under the Alpha Chamber leads to an aquifer, an underground layer of water-bearing permeable rock, rock fractures and unconsolidated materials. The water is being absorbed as it passes over the limestone, producing a vibrational energy that activates the mentioned piezoelectricity effect.

  The pyramidion on top of each tower magnifies the electromagnetic forces of the central vortex of the octagon-shaped city. Creating their very own joint crystal grid, the pyramidions absorb and direct the energy upwards, right into the ionosphere.

  The frequency that is being released from the crystal pyramidions matches the one of the nearby Jade obelisks which are placed with geomantic precision across the city’s landscape, holding quartz pyramidions on top of them, and acting as receivers to close the larger spiral of the 3-6-9 equation between crystal obelisk, ionosphere and quartz obelisk, within the city’s octagon map.

  At the bottom of each obelisk rests the famous quote by Nikola Tesla, revealing the ‘Print of God’, underlying the principles of Vortex Math, and proving that numbers are elementary particles of which everything in life and in this multiverse is composed of:

  “If you only knew the magnificence

  of the 3, 6 and 9,

  then you would have the key to the universe.”

  The owl follows the line of light down to one of the obelisks, through the irrigation and filtration systems, and close to the agricultural belt that boasts a wide variety of organic plants of lively colors. He passes through the stream of rainbows, a mysterious river which flows with the seven colors of the rainbow. Some in the city even worship the stream of rainbows as a minor deity.

  To this day, nobody knows why it is called a stream, when it is in fact one of the fastest flowing rivers in the city. Though, it could not be compared to the Argun (额尔古纳河), the largest and most dangerous river in the city that once connected China with Russia before the terraformation took place.

  The owl continues its journey around the city and lands on the ‘Sympan’ (Greek: universe, macrocosm), the major stadium in the city. The stadium has the capacity to contain twice the number of people in the city and all the major sports are played here. It is a common gathering spot for every citizen, young and old, rich or poor, everyone is equal in the Sympan.

  The owl always makes sure to perch at the peak of the highest dome-shaped hotel in the city, the Mandigo. From there, its sharp eyes scan the city for signs of movement.

  The people of the city work very hard for the community, but they also rise very late to fully enjoy the morning with their families. They are not anywhere close to being minimalists. They are flamboyant and expressive with their colors and it is very pleasing to the eyes. AN-CDC citizens never miss a chance to display their vast array of colorful clothing and other properties.

  The owl keeps soaring along the row of wind turbines until it gets to the residential districts where each of the free-form houses are fenced by lush landscaping.

  The skyscrapers are draped in so much color that it is impossible to miss, notwithstanding the fact that they are shaped in organic fashion, each of them distinct from another by their physical form, yet you could tell it was all planned and built by one person, the former German star architect, Edmund Neuss.

  The mysterious bird proceeds further through the Design and Development Complex, the Cultural Activities Center, and behind the Opera House. It finally arrives in the heart of the city and looks down at the Dome Complex, spotting Counselor Tsung.

  ∞∞∞

  The AN-CDC Dome Complex is a beautifully constructed dome-like structure which breaks off into other, smaller white domed sections that reach out from it in a manner not unlike which planets take around a sun.

  Tsung enters the Dome Hall. An octagon-shaped platform hovers in the distance above the water. There is no bridge to get there, except for floating stones and some orgonite-shaped crystals towering out of the clear water. The counselor is the only one with total knowledge of the entire Dome Complex. He knows every nook and cranny of the place and even the secret portal to the Higher Realm Shambala.

  Tsung walks for a while and then pauses, peering into the dewy distance. His eyes look eerily like glass. He collects his Qi, and after executing a few powerful Qi-Gong hand movements, approaches the hidden platform of pure uncut diamond, leaping onto the closest stone in front of him.

  With the support of the stone, Tsung wills himself to jump upwards and just like that, a mysterious gust of wind comes from nowhere, surrounding the counselor and off he goes, almost flying like a supernatural Kung Fu Master through
the air on his way to the platform.

  As Tsung arrives at his destination, the water around him begins to vibrate, sucking the stones under its surface and leaving only the formation of eight identical crystals matching the octagon platform’s geometric design on sight.

  The counselor positions himself in the center of the octagon and regulates his breathing by harvesting the crystals’ energy around him, once again through his Qi-Gong movements until he abruptly does a little jump straight up from his spot, floating in the air, as his astral projection slowly rises from his body in the shape of a phoenix.

  The golden light of the spiritual phoenix is blinding, radiating power in its raw form; the strength of it unmatched and only rivaled by that of the sphinx.

  ∞∞∞

  The most easily observed aspect of the Higher Realm Shambhala is the strong contrast of colors, from the bright pink and brown of the plentiful trees to the green trims and golden walls of the buildings; so exquisitely built after the ancient Chinese fashions. Too different from what the people of the city were currently used to. Everything here is serene and golden, the power which the place exudes is on another level.

  In Hinduism and Tibetan Buddhist tradition Shambhala (Sanskrit: ‘place of peace’ or ‘place of silence’) is an etheric kingdom somewhere in the still intact and existing Chinese Kunlun mountain/volcano (昆仑山), at the margin of heaven and earth, said to be spread out in unequivocally indistinguishable shape from an eight-petalled lotus bloom encompassed by a chain of snow mountains, protecting the lush center with its palace.

  The Kunlun Mountains are not only famous for their myths of Shambhala but also because of the white color of jade it produces, which has been used for the earlier mentioned obelisks powering each A-Nation city around the globe. In general, Jade has been the most treasured gemstone in China for thousands of years. It is considered indestructible and gives immortal powers, wherefore back in the Han dynasty emperors were for example buried in suits made of thousands of tiny jade rectangles, sewn together with gold wire in the belief that the body would be preserved.