Realms In The Firmament

Wan-Er leaned on him softly. Her eyes were blurred with infatuation as her face blushed. She just listened to him quietly.

“Every time when I see these bamboos, I am thinking, the creation of the universe is truly incredibly unbelievable!”

Master Bai blandly spoke, “Look. The bamboos all look the same. Every one of them is showing the same gesture. But if you look closer, every one of them has a different beauty.”

“Every single leaf of them has its own life and its own charm. They are all the same in appearance, but they are at the same time completely different.”

“It seems every bamboo and every leaf has its own life.”

Master Bai took a bamboo branch in hand while he was speaking. The bamboo branch was so green.

“Every time when I see this, I will think, how amazing it is the nature’s creation. How many leaves are there in front of us? How many leaves are there in the world? Not a single leaf that is entirely the same with another. How does the creator create such a mount of different leaves? Maybe that is the extreme power of the sky and earth!”

Master Bai was slowly talking while Wan-Er was quietly listening.

There was some extremely bright color that showed up in her eyes gradually. She looked at the bamboo forest in front of her. She could surely tell the difference between every two leaves. Her eyes were getting brighter and brighter. Some special feeling turned up from her heart and rapidly filled her up.

“This bamboo forest makes me think… In this land, or under this firmament, how many different plants are there like the bamboos? Every kind is different. Every single one is different. They all have their own unique feature.”

While Master Bai was speaking, his eyes were profound.

“And then it makes me think of people.”

“People!”

Master Bai emphasized the word.

“People, in the world, under the firmament, how many are they? Every one of them is different. Everything in a person is different. No one has similar life with others.”

Master Bai fondly said, “Are they not like the bamboo leaves? Every bamboo could be a city, or even a country… even a land.”

“It is just like human.”

“Every autumn comes, every spring comes, leaves fall, and even those that are always green will fall when the new leaves come out in spring. The new leaves pushed the old away to the ground!”

“It is just like the alternation of generations.”

“It is helpless and imperative.”

Master Bai looked at the bamboo forest and spoke in deep sorrow, “Although I have suffered the divine punishment because of what I did, deep in my heart, I know that I don’t care about it at all.”

“We are like the bamboo forest. We are like the leaves. It is so full of vigor and lives. What if this happens…”

Master Bai threw out the bamboo branch.

He didn’t really throw it hard.

The branch fall to the bamboo forest.

- Swished… -

One after another, a mass of leaves fell to the floor.

The floor was covered by the fallen leaves.

The bamboo forest was shaking when the wind blew over. The sound of leaves falling came out. There were countless leaves falling down.

Master Bai quietly looked at it and then asked, “Among the leaves that fall to the ground, are there more naturally falling leaves than the leaves I hit down to fall? Or is it the other way around?”

He seemed to ask himself, but at the same time, he also seemed to be asking Wan-Er. In fact, he might be asking the gods.

Wan-Er looked at it and answered, “Maybe the wind blew down more.”

Suddenly, she trembled.

She finally understood what Master Bai was trying to say now.

Master Bai curled his lips smiling and said, “That is right. It is the wind that blows more leaves down.”

He raised his head and looked to the sky; he gently spoke, “It is you. You killed the most!”

His voice was calm, but there was a sense of hate inside his voice!

It was a sunny sky.

After Master Bai said it, suddenly, a thunder struck down!

The sudden thunder seemed like making a crack in the sky!

It was a loud thunder!

A thunder in a sunny sky. That was real!

A white sharp lightning struck down from the sky. Everybody in the land saw this lightning at this moment!

Everybody, strong or weak, with good eyes or not, was looking at the sky!

The thunder shook the entire land.

The lightning flashed and then disappeared right away.

The sun was still shining in the sky. What a sunny day.

It was like nothing that had ever happened!

Inside the bamboo forest, Master Bai looked at the deep ditch in front of him on the ground.

It was a crack!

It was so deep that nobody knew how deep it was. It was long.

Cracks covered the ground like roots of trees.

It was a horrible and weird scene!

Master Bai was calm and he looked at it. He didn’t change his facial expression. Several streams of hair fell down from his forehead and covered his eyes. He gently spoke again, “You killed more!”

Unlike Master Bai, Wan-Er was shocked and her face turned pale. She nearly sat on the floor because of fear.

[To fight against the gods?!]

There were sweats on her forehead.

Master Bai took a breath out. His eyes turned bright. He started to sneer. “The hatred in my heart, the disaster I have suffered, the nine divine punishments on me, for thousands of years, I am just expressing my feelings, yet you actually struck a thunder on me?”

“What should I do to vent my hate? Should I kill the entire world?!”

Master Bai started laughing.

He said, “Fine. It is nothing but emotional catharsis… I have finally vented the hate in me that haunted me for thousands of years!”

“I am comforted! I feel right about everything!”

“If I want the sky, the sun and the moon, I will also have the stars. If I want chaotic storms, the world will collapse. If I want the mighty throne in the universe, then I shall stir up more waves for it!”

…