This is my entry into the #finishthestory contest by @bananafish (please check out the post for further details on how to enter: https://steemit.com/finishthestory/@bananafish/finish-the-story-contest-week-44
The idea is simple: in 500 words or less you need to complete the story. This week the story is begun by @marcoriccardi…
And now here is my part (written in 497 words)
...that the corpse was not a corpse at all. The thing, rising from the river, lumbering towards him was made up of lots of tiny creatures that hissed and complained and shifted as they moved.
"What is this nonsense!" Mr. Renhe Ren said. Behind the not-corpse was the wise old man, followed by the entire village, who walked single file heads bowed.
The wise old man looked at him and to his surprise Mr. Renhe Ren saw he was no longer old, nor wise, nor was he strictly a man: he was a corpse. And so was everyone else.
"What is going on?" Mr. Renhe Ren cried.
The line of dead people marched past in silence. Mr. Renhe Ren followed as they marched along the river. He recognised his neighbours and friends - well former neighbours and friends - and he tried to speak to them, but they remained dead and silent.
He ran to the front of the parade. The many-creatured, hissing, shifting thing marched on, and Mr. Renhe Ren had to fling himself in front of the beast in an effort to halt its progress.
“Stop!” he commanded. The thing walked on. As it collided with him it fell apart into its many creatures and he shivered as he felt them crawl all over him before jumping off his back and coming together into the form of the walking corpse.
One of the little creatures did not jump down. About the size of his thumb the creature crawled up Mr. Renhe Ren’s beard and stared him in his eye.
To his surprise Mr. Renhe Ren found that he was looking at a smaller version of himself.
“What is the meaning of this?” he shouted.
“We are all your regrets, your procrastinations, your should bes, your should have dones, your petty hates and your jealousies.”
“Nonsense!” Mr. Renhe Ren said. And to his surprise the creature split into two.
“And your lack of faith!” said the new creature.
“But what has happened to the village?” Mr. Renhe Ren asked, staring at the line of his dead friends and neighbours as they stumbled past him.
“You have been sitting by the river for too long,” the creature said, sticking an arm all the way up Mr. Renhe Ren’s right nostril and pulling out a piece of what looked like brain. “They have all died.” The creature tore the piece of brain in two and shared it with his friend, both munching on the grey-green globule with gusto
“But,” Mr. Renhe Ren said, beginning to see he had been a little foolish. “There must be something I can do!” The little creatures stopped chewing and looked at him, with a smile on their faces. “Something I can change, to make this all alright?”
The creatures nodded and looked each other and then looked back at Mr. Renhe Ren. And then they shook their heads.
“No,” they said, together. “You only get one chance at life. And you wasted yours.”
...
....
…
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Terrific story, Felt.Buzz! Your graphic representations of the hatred, jealouies, et al. that consumed him to distraction gives us a strikingly powerful lesson. There aren't any do overs and the truest horror is wasting one's life.
You gave me legitimate shivers with this image! 😎
Thanks!
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Love how you finished the story off. Every good story needs zombies, oh and a great moral of course. Nice touch with the one creature reaching up his nose to pull off a piece of brain to "munch" on.
Thank you!
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If @amirani was an existentially spiritual vision, you are an existential nightmare that haunts Mr Renshi Ren. While I do want to draw parallel to a march of vices/sin and the Xtian tales of hellish experiences which then I take it to a psychoanalytic twist where Mr Renshi Ren is still narcisstic even if he was right to think such. Instead of talking how Mr Renshi Ren thinks himself leader of all things in the village that requires him there (which then I bash Neo-Confucianism / Zen Buddhism here), I shall instead focus on how he basically knew (but didn’t believe) that he basically forfeited his lot in life and how he tortured himself for being foolish to wish death upon someone (in general).
It’s clear with each vice/sin marching, that he begins toturing himself at the sudden realization of what he had been doing. More than that, he realized his lack of communication with society, thus beginning to loose focus and fearing (playing off the anger in the prompt) for the worst. With more thought being put into the vices/sin, the more existential dread and how pitiable his position was in the wide array of his area alone. He only serves to be the high figure, but he had, in his hay day, moralized and developed a class consciousness believing and willing to die for his class position. Looking at the prompt, it’s clear that how he despises any person rivaling his class position. Yet, with not only dreading during his time of meditation, he began worrying about abandoning his position to hopefully be granted a wish.
Yet at the obscenity of seeing an existential nightmare which drags him so away from even his rival, does his began loosing control over himself and letting himself be devoured by failing to meet the rituals of his class. And then, in a classical twist, the ending beast, which really is his Unconsciousness, tells him what he already knows but dares not to believe: he fucked up and now he must live out his punishment. That the failure to do what is required of his class, even when it connects not to actual events, is the worst for those he rules over. As the Partriach of the village, his sense of fatherliness betrayed at the moment he realized what he has done was foolish and not an attempt worth chasing.
Wow! This comment is way better than my story! :)
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Yer head done spinning to tell me what yah thought about me story?~)
It seems that all that meditation did not bring calm to Mr. Renhe Ren, after all, but the frightening of the vision to which it is subjected justifies his sudden surrender to emotions.
At least, however, the real enemy is identified, even if it has cost the loss of a large part of his life and all his affections. There are people who can not even hope so much, and they live in unconsciousness their whole life.
Ouch, no mercy in the end. Guess he should have done something more productive.
Yeah, sitting by a river waiting for a corpse isn't the wisest advice I've ever heard!
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Well, it's true you don't let him off the hook. But then, that is life. We don't get an eraser. We make our mark and there it is.
Very well told, effective. Does make us stop and think for a moment. That is the function of such a tale, isn't it?
Thank you! :)
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Amazing tale. Dark Stirrings in the mind this caused.
Liked Voted and Resteemed.
Thank you!
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Thank you so much for participating the Partiko Delegation Plan Round 1! We really appreciate your support! As part of the delegation benefits, we just gave you a 3.00% upvote! Together, let’s change the world!
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Oh this is just brilliant, there is a touch of brutality in how you paint the ending that feels very appropriate for the tone set in the first half, and has the dark vibe of a fable. I was really hoping we'd see a parade of the dead, and you delivered it so very very well! <3
Thank you! :)
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Wonderful story. It's sad that we waste so much time on things that aren't important. By the time we realise that those things were never important. Love how the story ended
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Thank you
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Welcome
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At long last you made plenty to fell for it to the end. Great piece in their and I must say I really enjoyed every second I spent on reading your story
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Thank you!
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You are welcome
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Oof, a strong contendent for my vote this week! haha! I love myself some existencial nightmare (to follow what good @theironfelix said), which feels intense and unsatisfying as every nightmare is; and this did not fail to (dis)please me. An ill retribution for ill-intentioned thought and action.
I also liked how this rival loses all importance from the start of your entry, leaving us with the only "bad guy" in the story, careless, hateful Mr Ren. This is not one who will go down the path of balanced living, or any other path for that matter.
Thanks for a magnificent read and congrats on a well deserved Curie!
Thank you
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shivering story you brought us here, but like in real life don't waste your chances, most of the times you only have one chance to do things right. Life ain't a fairytale! :)
Thank you, very true my friend
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Ha! That was a cool creature.
Very fun read.
Wow, meaningful and well written. It captured my attention from the beginning till the end!
thank you, my friend
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An unexpected ending, but a very honest one.
This is a hard to accept truth. World literature has plenty of stories that do provide a more promissing ending, one that makes readers feel they still can change courses and get things right.
I find this ending more persuasive.
Thank you!
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