Blade and Poetry

I decided to stay with the Karajans for the rest of the year.Although I didn't get a lot of information from him about my past—he told me he didn't know me well enough to get in touch with his old acquaintances—I felt that he didn't mean any harm to me.

"A year from now," he said, "after that person returns, everything will be sorted out. In the meantime, you don't need to worry about your memory."

"Where are my parents?" I said to him. "Do they know where I am?"

"Maybe, maybe not," he said. "You told me you had a school-age brother—maybe they weren't paying attention to you."

I searched for the pitifully few impressions in my mind, and said, "It seems to be the same."

I choose to trust what he says.He lived in a large place, a little like a small castle, with no people around, backed by mountains and gardens below-he said his residence was in a desolate corner of the country.I got dizzy walking up and down the castle on my first day.He drew a map for me, marking a few practice rooms and others that were dangerous, leaving the rest for me to explore.

In the room specially provided for magicians, there are wonderful reflective curtains on the walls, which can create an effect of single-person throwing magic at each other; It's amazing and improves with my reflexes.In addition, there is an equipment room for exercising the body, an indoor archery range, swamps, rock springs, and sand nest houses that simulate the living environment, and a stone wall for climbing—this one is hidden behind a wall, which runs through several floors. ——The above and so on, and so on.

Of the rest of the rooms I only had time to get in two.In one, a group of small hammers floated leisurely, and a series of musical instruments such as pianos, water instruments, and clarinets sat in a circle underneath.I walked towards the center of the quiet room, tried to pick up the baton on a small round platform, and saw the walls and the ceiling blowing air against the wind instruments; on the various keys of the orientation.The other room raised a starry wave the moment I opened the door, as if with the ambition to engulf the visitor at the door.I stood at the door and saw the spray almost brushing the tip of my nose, thinking it was a bathroom—because I didn't change my shoes, I didn't continue walking inward.

But my favorite room is the dining room with long white wooden tables on the fourth floor.It has artistic landscape carvings on its vaults, and there are many paths leading there.There are copper candlesticks placed on the long table, and one end is close to the spiral staircase that descends from the floor of my bedroom. There are two large windows on the wall, which provide good lighting.

The fruits and vegetables stocked in the kitchen are often refurbished.Karajan told me earlier that he doesn't keep meal times and doesn't mind if I do.The only way I could be sure he was still home was that if he wanted to cook, he would warm an extra copy for me in the kitchen on the ground floor.

I thought maybe I wasn't familiar with Karajan in the past; I practiced and wandered freely in this huge fortress alone, and I didn't meet him for several days.If it wasn't for the reason I couldn't think of, I almost thought he was avoiding me deliberately.

On the fourth day after my arrival, the weather started to turn cold, and the sky outside was faintly overcast.I finished my knife practice early, went to the closet on the fifth floor to pick up a thick dress to wear, recalled the content of the map, and wanted to visit the library here.I turned all the way and stopped in front of the door, only to find it half-closed.

I stood in front of the door and thought for a moment, tapped lightly on it, and pushed the door open.

The indoor space is very small, mostly rows of dense bookshelves, and I can't get a glimpse of the whole interior at the door of the library.There is a fireplace at the base of the wall. The interior of the furnace is empty and clean, without any smoke, and it looks like it has been vacant for a long time.Karajan was leaning against the wall, sitting on the thick carpet with his legs bent.He was holding a book in one hand, his eyes were lowered, and his eyes seemed sleepy and focused on the pages in his hand.

"Good afternoon," I said, "the weather is terrible."

He nodded and looked up the window.

"Yeah," he said.

He was only wrapped in a thin garment.

"Can I stay and pick out a few books?" I asked.

"Go ahead," he said, "I promise you the right to use everything here."

I went to the bookshelf and selected a copy of The Fall of the Tower, then asked Karajan if I could sit across from him.After asking permission, I sat down against a set of bookshelves, carefully tucking my legs in.

For a while, the only sound in the library was the sound of the two of us turning pages.About two-thirds of the way through the book, I yawned and began to wander and relax my eyes.Karajan was still sitting across from him in that posture, as if he hadn't finished reading the original book.I noticed that on the dark blue cover it seemed to say "To Parrier".

"You like McCaw?" I asked him.

"Not really," he said, the book still propped on his knees, "I like Mendursson better than him."

"You prefer Mendursson?" I blurted out in disbelief, "but the latter's work is obviously worse—"

I swallowed back the words in time, but Karajan seemed to have noticed the whole picture.He glanced at me, "slapped" the book in his hand on the ground, and leaned his upper body towards me a little: "What rubbish are you talking about?"

"Mendursson—no," I corrected under his gaze, "it's not rubbish, it's just—not very good."

"You understand," he said, "I'm all ears."

Immediately, I felt unconvinced, and leaned over like him.

"He is a dreamer, and what his protagonist says and what he does have always run counter to each other." I said, "His "Deep Mountain Country" clearly promotes equality, but in fact it only achieves the carnival of a small number of people; boasting of independence and freedom first , then openly abandon social justice, and completely deny the chain of care between people; all the real warmth only appears in the protagonist - what a cruel society, it really can be a reason for him to abandon everything! He wants to seek Truth-like love is to label other people's love as vain, and only allow oneself to be unfaithful, and hang around with hints of 'ending the fake family'. In the end, all old loves will be abandoned in order to fulfill one's own supreme What's more, all the other people who are described as 'sane' by the author are very relieved by the protagonist, and think that he is comparable to the spokesperson of his social group. The background is ridiculous-I can't see where it is written .”

"You said that the background of "Deep Mountain Country" is absurd, but it is not realistic literature in the first place, and has an absurd and exaggerated structure." Karajan stared at me and said, and I could feel his breath from here, "what happened in a huge society A small injustice does not affect the operation of the whole machine, and often few people notice it-it happens there, and then it does not happen again. Until the new happens, the old is dead and does not affect the overall situation Bits and pieces. The absurdity of the events in "Deep Mountain" just magnifies the chain reaction of injustice."

"I don't deny your point about the 'working of the machine'—I've always believed that there is no obvious good or bad social structure, only the balance and imbalance within the machine, and exaggeration can indeed reflect artistic effect," I insisted. "But the author didn't amplify the whole chain reaction. Everything is as usual in the protagonist's self-centeredness, and the collapse of the whole world is just to highlight his personal charm."

"You're not right," Karajan said.And he only said this in a low voice, in a rather unreasonable tone.

We stared at each other, getting closer and closer.My eyes accidentally slipped to his lips—there was a little moist shimmer on it.

Karajan suddenly leaned back against the wall behind him again.

"Let's count it as your win. I've actually just finished the first two volumes of "Mountain Country" and put it on hold for a few days," he said. "I've read all the other Mendursson books. I like him. of the text."

"The other ones aren't that bad," I said, "if it wasn't for the literary talent—oh, I knew you wouldn't have read the third one! When I saw the third one, I smashed the book on the table."

He smiled and imitated my waving, pretending to throw the book again.

"Is it like this?"

"Beautiful." I paused and said.

He flipped through a few pages and asked me again, "You don't like McCaw?"

"Not one of my favorite authors," I said, "but I like some bits of him very much."

His fingers were searching for something between the pages of the book, and the paper made a low sound when rubbing against it, conveying a leisurely rhythm.Then he pressed a certain page and fixed his eyes on it.

"I just saw a passage I really liked while reading it," he said. "I really like it personally. Would you like to hear it?"

"I really want to." I said. "I'm always ready to listen."

He turned his head to look at the sky outside the window, said a spell, and a small cluster of light flew up to the ceiling, lighting up the lamp above our heads.A wave of warmth floated over one side of the library; shadows cast shadows on the carpet around me and him.

"'Standing in front of Parryer, she feels that she does not exist. She can't help but reduce herself to a speck of dust, which has nowhere to hide in the sun, and dies in the mud-just like its peers She has many fiery words, but they only burn her heart, and cannot be conveyed by those two scorched lips; she has many secrets, about the universe, about the progress of human beings, about signs unknown to Parrier, About her soul; she has the solitude saved by Parrier, and though she has never been in Parrier's world before, she has stayed in her dark place and thought she knew it.'

"'She thought, love is always so difficult in front of her kind of life. She took one step, and she took a long step to Parrier.'"

Karajan's voice stopped here.He slowly closed the book and leaned his head back against the wall.

"I also like this passage very much-it still impresses me." I was moved by his voice and couldn't help but say, "But I remember there is another sentence at the end. I like it added at the end."

"Really?" Karajan said.

"Yes." I said.

I saw that he had no further indications, so I recited that sentence to him:

"But they will meet, just like the brightest starlight in the sky that night; even if two stars fall and sink at the same time, they will merge into dust on a piece of land, making the most deafening noise."

The book in Karajan's hand hangs down—his fingers are on the edge of the cover.

I sat next to him, and asked him with great interest: "Tell me which of the following authors' books you haven't read?——I especially want to recommend something to you. Agle Linsinde? Doriana .Stone? Merivitch Guillaume? Eric Watson?"

"Merivić Guillaume," he said after pondering for a while, "there are her books in the library, and I haven't had time to read them yet."

I immediately felt very happy: "Wait for me, I'll find it for you—her criminal investigation series is very exciting!"

I ran through the bookshelves one after another, and found Merivitch according to the name index. After weighing it, I chose one of them, and returned to Karajan with it.

"That's it. It's very beautiful. I really like the puzzle-solving process." I said to him, "Let me tell you..."

We shoulder to shoulder, heads together, fingers lightly across the same page.After digging through some occasional quarrels, I found that his interests and concerns overlapped too much with mine—we chatted for a long time until my mouth became parched and it was completely dark outside.

"Student Alvin, how old are you?" I finally put my arm on his shoulder and said.

"I was born in 829," he said.

"You are five years older than me." I did the calculations and thought of his small castle again, so I couldn't help saying seriously, "You are really young and successful."

He looked a little bit like he was holding back a laugh, I don't know why.

"What are you laughing at?" I leaned close to him, turned my head around to see his expression, saw that he was holding his laughter in his hands, and continued to sigh, "I can't imagine how I didn't get to know you earlier .I have a slight feeling that I have wasted my time—maybe my eyes were wrong at that time, and I missed a part of the past that should be at your disposal; but it doesn't matter."

I patted the hand on his shoulder, "Look, why don't we just treat it as a new acquaintance today?"

His laughter stopped, but there was still a smile on his raised face.He looked at me deeply, and sighed, seemingly imperceptibly.I suddenly didn't understand—it seemed that at the moment he sighed, a certain will in the depths of his soul finally surrendered to something.Like a warrior throwing down his clenched knife, a saint uses black magic to sacrifice himself.

"Okay," he said. "Nice to meet you."

The author has something to say:

Note: "Deep Mountain Country" has allusions to real works.