Chapter 239
“If Mr. Zane wants you to leave early, don’t be too polite about it. And that woman you ran into today, I had Kendrick look into her. She’s not exactly known for her character, so don’t get too close.”
“You mean Sophia?” Freya asked, curious. “Why?”
“She’s a little off–and she’s already compromised her principles for fame. The last role she got? She used some shady tricks to land it. People like that have a tendency to swing from one extreme to another. She might not do anything to you directly, but better safe than sorry.”
Freya said she understood. Just as she was wondering what to say next, Louis suddenly asked. “Wanna hear a story?”
Huh? A story? Freya assumed he was about to tell her some kind of love story.
“Sure.”
So Louis began.
“Once, a long time ago, there was a scholar named Mateo. After repeatedly failing the exams, he gave up on officialdom, married, had children, and lived off the modest income from a hundred acres of inherited farmland. Though not particularly well–read, he had a fondness for calligraphy, painting, and chess. Lately, down by the city moat, there was a hermit who often set up a chessboard; Mateo would go there every day to pass the time.
One secular, one spiritual–the two grew familiar and eventually became close, able to talk about anything.
One day, after a drawn–out match ended in a tie, the two chatted into dusk. Mateo didn’t feel like going home to face his nagging wife. The hermit said, ‘If you’re not keen to go home, why not come back with me to my temple in the mountains? We could chat all night–it’d be lovely.‘
Mateo clapped his hands in agreement.
and
The hermit lived deep in the mountains, far from town, in a small, weathered cabin that looked like it had stood for a hundred years. After welcoming Mateo inside, he poured him a cup of tea. Mateo couldn’t help but notice several paintings on the cabin walls–stril elegant, clearly not the work of any ordinary hand. He marveled at them and asked who the artist was. The old man just/shrugged and said the cabin had been around for generations,
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and the murals had been there since he was a boy.
Mateo was even more amazed. He stood silently for a long time, hands behind his back, head tilted, completely absorbed in the mystical details of the paintings.
The hermit didn’t know much about painting styles. Seeing Mateo so intrigued, he stroked his beard and smiled. ‘My master left behind a painted scroll before he died. Said it must never fall into worldly hands. Otherwise, I’d have given it to you long ago.”
Upon hearing that, Mateo eagerly begged the hermit to let him take a look.
The herimit, already itching to show it off, pulled a large wooden box from beneath the bed. He wiped off the dust and unlocked it. Inside lay a long scroll. He carefully unrolled it for Mateo to see.
The piece was signed by someone a hemit and titled “The Hundredfold Maul“. The artwork was wildly bizarre. On a scroll more than ten feet long, it depicted exactly one hundred bears, all in different poses and styles.
Yet despite the number, it didn’t feel crowded at all.
The strangest part was every single bear wore clothes and hats, resembling townsfolk, street. vendors, and common laborers. As Mateo looked, he couldn’t stop praising it–for its craftsmanship alone, it was a rare treasure.
Later, the two played another round of chess. But Mateo’s mind was still on “The Hundredfold Maul“, and his moves became scattered and erratic; he lost quickly. They chatted late into the night. Mateo tried to hint at getting the scroll, but the hermit firmly expressed his intent to follow his master’s wishes and not let it out into the secular world.
Mateo lay down to sleep with his clothes on, but all he could see in his mind were those bears -dancing, circling, endless. He couldn’t sleep. When he heard the hermit snoring, sinking deeper into slumber, Mateo quietly slipped out of bed. In the moonlight, he spotted the scroll still sitting on the desk. He grabbed it and slipped out of the temple.
He hadn’t gone more than a few dozen paces when he heard fast–approaching footsteps behind him. The hermit had caught up and called out, ‘Friend, wait! That painting is strange
-you mustn’t take it down the mountain!”
gave hase, and
the pace. The hermit gave But Mateo was too obsessed to listen. He picked up despite the winding, uneven mountain paths, he eventually caught up.
Mateo panicked and, in desperation, gave the old man a hard shove–sending him tumbling off the cliff into the abyss below. It was too deep to see the bottom; surely, the hermit
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couldn’t have survived.
+5 Free Cons
The night was still and silent. They were deep in the mountains, with no witnesses. Mateo let out a long breath, picked up the pace, and quickly descended the mountain..
Before sunrise, he reached the base. Acting as if nothing had happened, he returned home.
His wife and children asked where he’d gone the night before. Mateo made up a lic, saying he’d spent the night at an old friend’s house after staying up late chatting. His wife didn’t suspect a thing.
After a quick breakfast, Mateo unrolled the scroll and studied it with full attention. The more he looked, the more obsessed he became.
He hung it on the wall in the bedroom. Whether going to sleep or waking up, the first and last thing he saw every day was The Hundredfold Maul.
Then, one night, during a thunderstorm, he heard a strange noise. He sat up; lightning flashed and illuminated the room. The bears in “The Hundredfold Maul” looked as if they had come to life–the air was filled with their clamor. Before Mateo could get out of bed, the painting suddenly expanded a thousandfold and pulled him inside.
He felt dizzy, like a speck of dust in the wind. After a long while, he finally stabilized himself. Looking around, he saw he was no longer in his bedroom–but standing in a forest.
Nearby, two or three bears were tilting their heads, staring straight at him. Each of them was dressed and walking upright. If not for the fur covering their bodies, they could’ve passed for people.”
