musicians of old

Chapter 977 The Last Metaphor! (The Finale, Part 1)

Fanning paused almost imperceptibly.

"Speak." He quickly resumed walking.

"What do you think of this phenomenon?" Mr. F asked with a smile.

"How do you view this?"

"Biological principles and the like."

"The symbiotic cycle in nature is somewhat cruel and bizarre—if we're judging it from the host's perspective." Fan Ning's gaze was level with the front of his head.

"Very objective."

Mr. F nodded, his face devoid of any mockery or sarcasm, displaying only a calmness akin to an academic discussion.

"The eggs of the trematode are usually spread through bird droppings. Bird droppings, a metabolic or excretory substance of birds, contaminate plants, and snails that accidentally come into contact with or eat the plants become infected with the eggs."

"The eggs hatch in the snail's liver and grow into a 'spore cover,' which initially appears as a small white dot and then gradually invades the eyestalk to form a brightly colored hatching sac."

"They wriggle conspicuously, while subtly influencing the snail's brain, making the snail's behavior more aggressive, phototropic, and excited, eager to climb higher, thus making it easier for birds to prey on it. The eggs are spread with bird droppings, infecting new snails, and the cycle is completed."

"An efficient breeding strategy," Mr. F commented.

Fanning listened in silence.

He had read through these materials countless times, from various sources.

The white pebble path beneath our feet has now turned dark gray, and the edges of the pebbles gleam coldly in the dim light.

"That word."

Images from the past flashed rapidly through his mind: a private screening room in a pub with a romantic ambiance; the light and shadow of rotating grilles projected onto Sheeran's fair cheeks; Fanning, deep in thought, tapping his fingers incessantly on the table.

"That should be the meaning; it's a term from a specific academic discipline."

The girl's pen flew across the paper, correcting several spelling errors in a word in the "Silence!" video.

"Haustorium, known as 'haustorium' in botany or microbiology, usually refers to the structure formed when a parasitic bacterium invades the host cell with its hyphae in order to absorb nutrients, and its morphology changes."

The other side of the "Dome Gate" should actually be called...
The door of Haustorium.

"The Gate of Suction".

Fanning narrowed her eyes as she thought of the word again.

Previously, he may have equated "worms" with trematodes more in his thinking, or even felt that "worms" posed a greater threat than trematodes.

There's nothing wrong with that. After all, the "worms" were the essence that brought about the collapse. Any one of them is on the same level as the Witness, while the latter is just a worm in nature, or perhaps just a type of worm in nature.

But thinking about it from here today, that might not be the case.

If we're talking about the chilling nature of metaphors...

“What does it look like?” Mr. F asked. “An infected snail.”

"You and me?" Surrounded by silk threads, Fan Ning put his hands behind his back.

The man laughed upon hearing this.

Fanning also laughed for no apparent reason.

What a final metaphor!

Those who know.

Those who possess knowledge, with tacit understanding and inspiration at their core.

The so-called "law of implicit knowledge transmission".

Hidden knowledge comes from spiritual knowledge, spiritual knowledge comes from true knowledge, and true knowledge comes from the settling and remnants of "Purely Hemp".

The colors of truth are complex, magnificent, and mysterious; once you come into contact with it, it captivates you, excites you, and drives you to seek it day and night.

And the eyes are the windows to the soul.

That yearning for higher promotions is something that cannot be concealed in the eyes of anyone with knowledge.

The infected, multicolored, swollen eye stalk.

Everyone is infected.

The "worm" is the enemy, the destroyer, and a conflict must be launched to eliminate it.

But not the double-disc trematode.

The double-disc fluke is the hidden knowledge itself, the object of study for everyone.

There are no enemies here. Since the beginning of the new world after the Symphony No. 8 in E-flat major, there are indeed no enemies here, from top to bottom.

But the abnormal zone never disappeared.

The abnormal zone is right there in the eyes of every single person!
And those creatures that were able to rise higher, to a sufficiently high place...
Fanning stopped in his tracks.

The two had reached the end of the path.

The background in front is no longer pure white or yellowish, but rather like a textured "wall" that radiates outwards, or like a piece of "glass" that has been struck by external force.

The material of the "wall" is hard to describe. The outer edge is still the twilight sky of pure light, but the closer you get to the convergence of the radial patterns, the more it looks like some kind of dark amber-colored gel.

Look along the "chiseling point" of that crack.
An irregular, rough-edged notch, with a gelatinous texture at the edges, gives the appearance of a scab that has been repeatedly torn and healed.

But Fanning couldn't sense any life through that gap.

At least you can't feel it when you're standing in front of it.

Countless threads still surround Fanning.

“We’ve arrived.” Mr. F stopped and stood beside Fanning. “The location of the destroyed ‘Gathering Point,’ the other side of the road.”

“Connect to the ‘path’ you have chosen, Master Fanning. You can either guide it along as before, or you can accompany it yourself. The choice is yours.”

The person turned to the side and made a "please" gesture.

Her posture was elegant and impeccable.

The "Gathering Point" is located at the highest point in the world. The earliest concepts and forms in the world were continuously thrown out from there, some of which descended to relatively lower places and turned into "radiance"? Fan Ning looked at the man's gestures, at that calm face, and at the scab-like hole in front of him.

He recalled again the "conclusion" that Lasus had presented to him.

His expression was calmly stern.

Then, he took a step forward, carrying the luminous threads with him.

Footsteps fell on the dark gray pebble path, the sound absorbed by the heavy air, leaving only the faint rustling of boot soles against the stone surface.

The gap magnified in view.

But just before the threads of the "Path" were almost touching the "Gate of Suction"—Fan Ning leaned forward slightly and reached out first.

! ! ! ! ! ! ! !
!! ? ? ? !! ? ?
What is this?
He had a vague premonition, but where the hell was he? Where the hell was he? What the hell was this thing?!?!?!?

Shape!? Color!? Texture!? Spacetime!? Smell!? Logic!? Having transcended the realm of ordinary beings, Fanning's cognition nearly collapsed in an instant. Outside, crowded yet vast, those shapes screamed—absolutely infinitely extending and infinitely contracting shapes, simultaneously possessing all shapes yet refusing to be identified as any shape, frenzied shapes filled with infinite fractal folds and holes. Consciousness dissolved and diluted within these shapes, becoming a mass of noise. Colors began to sing, stretching, twisting, knotting, burning, drowning, taking root, sprouting, and rotting within these shapes. His skin sprouted countless tongues, so many tongues. Tastes simultaneously played out in a way of mutual negation, devouring, and infinite recursion. Taste became meaning, meaning became juice, and juice... The sacred, pungent stench disintegrated and fractured, transforming into a massive, festering, pus-like stench that then boiled and decomposed into a fragrance filled with self-awareness. These fragrant pores formed countless jars of Fanning's cerebrospinal fluid, soaking countless rotting musical organelles, nebula limbs, mathematical formula suction cups, musical spores, the sky of human faces, a novel written from all memories that exists outside of memory, and so on—all known and unknown things crudely stitched together into a self-devouring shape. Those shapes screamed, absolutely infinitely extending yet infinitely contracting shapes, simultaneously possessing all shapes yet refusing to be identified as any shape, frenzied shapes filled with infinite fractal folds and pores.
And at the very center of this avalanche of sensory and cognitive experiences, beyond what could be "seen" yet forcibly "imprinted" into the deepest recesses of Fanning's consciousness, lay that terrifying external world—

There was also a small piece of "thing" that had stuck in there.

It could be a single hair at the very end of a tiny limb of a massive, broken, withered, yet slowly pulsating being; it could be a simplified line from a thumbnail of an anatomical profile of "knowledge" so complex that it surpasses any known truth in its description; or it could simply be the "excrement" that some unimaginable lower being inadvertently left behind over a long period of time, which has now solidified, proliferated, and "swelled up."
This is the location of the so-called "convergence point," the thing that was reset to its original moment and split and killed by the "Oracle of the Sun"!

Beneath Mr. F's welcoming expression, a more genuine, almost joyful anticipation finally emerged!

It's been upgraded; everything is about to be upgraded.

That cage is about to be broken.

He was genuinely delighted by this event. His original vision for *The Apocalypse Realm* had finally been realized in a different, but truly more successful, way! A higher level of replacement and ascension was imminent! Everything would be without birth, everything would be without death, everything would be intoxicated and sung in blissful ecstasy! He could almost see the jubilant trembling of this "path beyond calculation" as it reached the highest point of the world, and he could also see the reactions of those observing from below the mortal realm upon witnessing this spectacle and Fanning's reaction—

His thoughts were interrupted.

Fanning turned around in front of the gap.

Fanning slowly turned around from that indescribable terror.

His movements were slow, as if he were fighting against some enormous resistance, or as if his body would disintegrate into a large, unidentified mass if he moved any faster. But when he turned completely to face backward, there was no collapse, no madness, no despair on his face.

He is laughing.

It wasn't a fake laugh, nor a crazy laugh; it was an extremely calm, almost gentle laugh, with the corners of the mouth curving upwards just right, and the corners of the eyes even slightly upturned, as if they had seen something comforting.

Then he spoke.

Fanning's voice reached Mr. F's ears, and all the observers who were still barely maintaining their consciousness; it was clear, steady, and carried a hint of relieved ease, as if saying, "Finally, after all that hard work."

“It’s nice here.”

It should be describing a sunny garden, a sacred and clear spring, and a sense of relief and joy after seeing the highest truth.

The expectation on Mr. F's face froze.

It wasn't anger at the failure of the plan, but a deeper, cognitive bewilderment.

He doesn't understand.

He couldn't understand.

How can it be?

That wonderful premonition was already so close.

Based on long-standing insights and deductions, logically speaking, the area outside that gap should be...
"Hahaha, what! You liar—" Mr. F laughed twice, but stopped abruptly after only a few syllables came out.

Because after Fan Ning said those four words, he turned back around.

We must confront the "corpses at the gathering point" once again, and face the unreadable horror outside.

Then, Fanning did not try to understand how those things came to be.

There was no attempt to resist.

They did not attempt to escape.

He chose to "become".

He deliberately "stuck" everything about himself—memories, emotions, cognition, self-awareness, and the "grid" of his artistic achievements—at that gap.

He personally took up the position at the assembly point!
He is now the "gathering point"!
Mr. F's smiling expression was erased.

His last conscious thought was of the expression on Fanning's face as she turned to look at him.

The power of will from the "convergence point".

A gentle swipe.

The head, torso, and limbs of the gentleman in the vintage suit have all disappeared.

It wasn't an explosion, nor was it burned to ashes; it was as if it had never existed, completely "erased" from the network of concepts and forms in this world, at this level, and in this realm!
Where Mr. F stood, only a perfectly neat, mirror-smooth human-shaped blank space remained.

Then it is quickly filled with other "background" elements next to it.

Inside the hole
No, it's not a hole, and it's not the highest point of the house.

It's not the "gateway to the suction device."

It's Fanning.

Fanning is now the new "focal point".

He no longer has the concept of "body," or even the concept of "Pureromah," because the latter is merely "pure knowledge," which actually still belongs to the realm of the Witnessing Lord.

Fanning's status is higher than that of the Witness, and higher than "Radiance".

Of course, the concept of "existence" still exists. It exists in various forms, and the first element of its existence is that it exists as a continuous, intense, and ineffable "filter".

The terrifying and incomprehensible information from the outside world, after passing through His "filter," is forcibly "translated" or "buffered" into knowledge that the dwelling can barely bear. Only then is it further diluted through the "three paths that are beyond calculation" and flows to the "radiance" in the mountain stream.

It is further refracted into visible light and cryptic light, illuminating the tower below.

It flows into the vast and boundless migratory currents, eventually settling on the surface of the world.

The feeling in this location is hard to describe, but it can't be described with words like "pain," "loneliness," "nausea," or "noise pollution." Those categories are too simplistic and too concrete. In short, the feeling in this location is hard to describe.

There was almost no sense of the flow of time, no beginning, no pause, no change in intensity. It was like background radiation, like gravity, like breathing. No, breathing stops, but this feeling doesn't. It was evenly spread across every inch of Fanning's "surface" and penetrated inward, reaching the "core" that no longer had a physical form.

But that's the price to pay.

It is also a necessary choice.

Fanning can still sense the existence of the world below. It can be felt everywhere in "noon," very far away and very faint, like looking at a candle flame through a thick layer of frosted glass. For now, he can still distinguish those important "spots of light"—the memory of New Year's fireworks, the clinking of glasses in the tavern, the slight tremor of the key coordinates in his body, the tension of the spiritual connection, the heartbeat-like steady resonance, and the strength of his knuckles when holding the sheet music. But this is only for now; it's hard to say what will happen later if he actively tries to feel it without any requests from below.

For now, Fanning must choose a somewhat understandable way to pass on the last revelations, and he cannot be too laissez-faire; he must handle things with some ambiguity.

But no one can understand the concept of a "gathering point".

A slightly lower rank, "glory".

Go a little lower, let's say "the Lord of Witnesses".

It was difficult and required great caution.

"call out"

Despite their best efforts, a stream of information still managed to flow down towards the "glowing light" in the mountain stream.

There are about 1 words left. I'll release them in two chapters tomorrow night.