The waters flickered around us - far away the lake of mercury glowed red. Above my head fish thrashed, monsters of the underworld: a terrifying head appeared, with green eyes, tentacles and tentacles. A little further away, a shapeless, black mass darkened: the wreckage of a sunken ship - a giant snake rolled out green from its chimney like smoke. The wreck bustled and moved: its deck, masts, and entire interior were covered by bullocks , they worked on it, took it apart and put it back together, eagerly researched it, investigated and learned. Now I knew that they were the ones who helped me when I reached the bottom of the sea, passed out and perhaps even half dead.-120-and they saved my life: they fitted me with artificial gills, with the help of which single mammals can live underwater, - this instrument, the artificial underwater lung, they discovered a long time ago, like we did up there, the airplane and the steamboat. And they left me before I could recover, rushing off to a new task.
They saved me, they undertook solidarity with me, these little monsters - these workers and searchers and inventors and explorers and soldiers and sufferers, whose efforts are spurred and fueled by a single, vague desire: to reach us, out on land, to unite with us in the in the heat of joint, great work.
The artificial gills next to my two ears began to buzz and my head rang, I felt unbearable pressure, I suddenly remembered the terrible column of water pressing down on my head, silently and endlessly - I thought I would drown immediately. I spread my arms and a wailing, appealing complaint burst from my chest. That's when I felt someone put their hand on my lips.
I turned around and saw Opula , who looked at me with surprise and sympathy. I shut up at that moment. He stood straight-121-in front of me, through his huge and yet delicate body, like through a misty veil, I could make out the glimmer of the quaking aquatic plants behind him. It was so unfathomably beautiful that for a moment I felt as if I would cease to exist, my self-consciousness, my self, everything that I had known as my own separate life would dissolve and disappear to make room for this one reality. His face leaned over me and I clearly felt then that I would rather know about this face that it exists and shines above me than to know that I am alive, - that it must be more than me. It covered the green waters above me: I was seized with a happy calm and trust, as if I were looking at the sun, at the Sun, I, the child of his birth and fruit and foetus, the dark, sad Earth: - at the Sun, which I have not seen for so long and which , oh, I wanted to see it again.
And meanwhile, while I felt this, I didn't even notice that I was talking, stammering something, tossing and turning and with passion, which had nothing to do with my happy and calm, reconciled feeling. What I said was fragmented, back and forth, meaningless, that much, or it could have been something like this:
"You're unlike anyone I've ever met."-122-I saw, Opula , queen of the deep. You are unlike anyone else, but you are who I always knew you were - up there on Earth, in a smile, in a look - in a field of flowers, in the smell of spring, under a gentle starry sky, in storm and sunshine. I always knew that God was present somewhere, hiding, maybe behind me, or just flashed past me, faster than light. I also knew that it was hiding, in the grass and in the trees—and that I could find it if I looked very carefully. I watched as best I could, tensely, with wide eyes - and sometimes I thought I had found it: I found it in my attention, I found it in myselfand that it is me. But now I don't know what to believe. Whether it's me or you, it might be you. Let me kiss your swaying golden hair, the sunshine. Or not your hair, but your eyes - or your knees, perhaps. But no - because you would have to bend down for that - and I already know that you shouldn't bend down. So tell me what I should do, - tell me who I am? No, I don't want to be mean to you - for I know you are indifferent and do not care about the starry sky. You don't care - but maybe just because-123-because you are yourself—because you don't have to rise as high as I do. So tell me what should I do? Who are you, god or animal? because you don't look like me, that's all I know. I suffered a lot, fought and fought with myself and others like me. You must not bend down. You must not lean out: this is what is written on the windows of our cars. Right, you understand. I'd like to kiss you - no, I'd rather not, I have to go, I have work to do, I can't stay here. I have work up there, it's very dark here and the environment is very warm, - they are waiting for me up there. I love you. I have nothing to do with these ugly animals - understand? It is not true that I do thisI wanted, isn't it true that I am one with them - oh, I know well what you preach, without you saying: that beauty, goodness and truth are one and the same, - that ugly cannot be good and cannot be true, - but so who will say what is ugly and what is beautiful, if not my own soul? And the mirror in which your beautiful face is reflected, can it be ugly, can it be broken and scratched, if it looks beautiful? No, that which returns beauty is itself beautiful—am I like you? I am not like you, because I want more than you - I want you.-124-Let me, I have work to do, tell me what to do? Above, some light squints, - I have to reach it, will you come with me? I will take you out of here, from the depths and the darkness, so that you feel what I feel, because you deserve it: I will break the lid of your coffin. Do I need to return to you this intoxication and beauty that you created in me - or do you not need it? Enough, enough, - you are calm and waiting, but I can't wait, I can't wait any longer, - oh, how bad you are and how good I am, - oh, how dirty you are and how clean I am, - I want to be bad too - I I want to get dirty too - I can't wait!…
I stuttered things like that, I remember well: such stupid, dirty confusion bubbled up from me. I wiped my mouth and looked at my hands afterwards: there was mud and pus and pus on my hands. I didn't dare look at Opula because I was convinced she was laughing. I was terribly excited, waiting to recover from this fit of madness. But then I heard a cry of wonder - I looked at him in fear.
Opula watched with wide-eyed, dreamy, almost frightened eyes: she held out-125-one finger at me. Confused, I looked over myself and discovered the reason for his surprise.
What can I tell the reader? To make myself understood, so that they don't think I'm indecent, when in fact I'm not. Well, - the sight that appeared in front of Opula without my knowledge , and the development of which I myself did not notice in the fit of excitement with which I professed my unearthly love for her - this sight was suitable to enlighten her that I was not oiha , even in that contorted form nor, as the image of the earthly woman lived in his imagination, based on my presentation. His surprise, although very great, was in proportion to the phenomenon that caused this surprise. I also stared intently at myself, but I had no way of removing the treacherous symbol, which her beauty and my admiration had evoked with resounding openness from the obscurity where it had been hidden until now.
" Bullok ..." Opula then said , not taking her eyes off me... " Bullok ..." she repeated and started backing away slowly.
I wanted to throw myself after him, but the Bulls , as if they were standing between the two of us to now openly, threateningly and commandingly separate us, forced me to stop.-126-
I was covered up, I could no longer deny that I essentially belonged to that despised breed, which was only good for food and house building - I felt that I was completely lost in Opula 's eyes and that she could never trust him again.
I felt an irresistible desire to leave Capillaria and escape if possible. But the object described above did not allow me. How can I understand myself properly with the reader? I had quite forgotten about this subject during my stay in Capillaria—you must not forget that I had been in the water for a year and a half, which rendered unnecessary the peculiar and cumbersome arrangement of certain operations, as we are accustomed to do on land. Now, when the color appeared unexpectedly, and in such a self-conscious and significant form, I had the strange feeling, as if it were an independent living being independent of me, which unexpectedly, like a deus ex machina, intervened in the course of events. It was a sensual disappointment, a momentary vision of madness, or a recognition of reality, I don't know - but it seemed to me that a huge I was grabbed by the waist by bulls, who, or whom I thought,-127-that I have it in my power, and now proving to be stronger than me, he openly and confessedly showed that I must go where he leads. I struggled to sit down or turn away. In vain. The water swirled around us, panting, I ran, swam and floated like someone carried away by a horse. We zigzagged between the towers - a mass of bullocks passed us on our way, heads pointed forward, stiff as so many winged arrows shot through the blue water.
I knew that I should run in the opposite direction, I felt that we were going to lose. At a bend I saw the huge building with its winged facade, at the gate of which I first saw an Oiha native on the day of my arrival in Capillaria. Now the door was empty. I rushed through the empty door, knocking over everything around me. A few oiha darted past me, alarmed - there was no stopping, the bulls were taking it with them. Doors slammed shut around me, I slammed into the wall like a propeller that had lost its rudder - everywhere, where an oiha disappeared and where empty boards were staring at me the next moment. For a moment, Opula 's frightened, alarmed face appeared on her lips-128-with a kind of distorted smile - the Bullok got angry and caught up with me: it hit the roof, from where I languidly fell back. He thrashed, he rose again, he began to spin with me, he spun faster and faster, he set me on my head like a snail, he roared and roared... and I don't know what else happened, what he did, how long this rage lasted, because the world went black around me and I lost consciousness .
When I regained consciousness, my first feeling was as if I had just arrived in Capillaria: I was reliving the strange adventure of the first day. I was lying on the ground, tied up: a cobweb of that delicate, golden silk that starts from the head of the oihás and swings all over the water like a cloak.
I tried to raise my head, but I barely managed. A few moments after I gave a sign of life, they lifted me up, without untying my hands or legs, and sat me down on a low chair. Next to me, on another chair, sat Opula , with a veil on her head - there was a small table in front of us, behind the table was a respectable oiha .-129-
It was the Supreme Court of Capillaria, as I saw it before me - Opula represented the prosecution, that's why they sat next to me. I don't know why, the whole scene that followed, my sentencing, with all its gloomy solemnity, reminded me of something I had experienced once - I tried to think about what it could be, but it only occurred to me when, after being sentenced, they were already taking me outside - and it got boring even in my indifference, it annoyed me that what kind of association could have brought this very serious act together in my mind with the memory of my wedding - because the whole thing reminded me of my wedding, I don't know why.
Accusation and judgment followed each other very quickly. Opula claimed that I had misled her, using some devilish art to make her believe that I represented the Oihás in the country where I came from . However, after it turned out that I am essentially a Bullock , as you might have already suspected from my special sympathy for Bullocks , he does not think it right for me to live among them and contaminate the air. He asked the Law to make a just judgment.
The verdict was in a few minutes. The country's strange, but decidedly humane customs-130-it was a properly alternative sentence, two types of punishment, from which I could choose which one I wished to suffer. One was fatal, the other not much less. It was about what I wanted more: to be killed, served and eaten on Opula's birthday, as a bullock , or whether I would undertake life-long fortification work as a strong and useful bullock , among my other companions, in the construction of the towers that the Oihás they serve as living quarters: which latter punishment I would naturally serve in chains, as befits prisoners. It is interesting, but it seemed that according to the perception of the Oihás , the death sentence was the mildest: during the reading of this, Opulashe turned to me and seemed to smile graciously and encouragingly - her smile was so delicate and gentle that I was momentarily offended by the thought that even if dead, this beautiful mouth would bite into me. But then common sense prevailed in me and I respectfully and humbly announced to the Tribunal that I would rather undertake forced labor for life.
They took me to a dark room, untied my hands, and tied a long string around my legs. That was the last time I saw Oihás . They left me alone and-131-they closed the door on me. I was alone all night, among sea spiders and crabs in the dark. I cursed my fate and the fatal decision to set out again after so many unsuccessful ventures: I swore that if I ever got free from here, I would never leave my beloved country again - then, dead tired and desperate, I fell asleep. Apparently, it could have happened in this deep dream that they put me in a large wooden box and transported me to the ramparts, because I woke up there in the morning. I was lying on a protruding ledge, bulls were working serenely around me . They looked at me with longing and sympathy and encouraged me to work too.-132-
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Author begins his forced labor among the bullocks // Description of Halvargó, the tower of which the author became a citizen // Author meets Xa-rá, Halvargó's secretary of state // Some information on the origin of the Oiha legend
The second chapter of my life spent in Capillaria, which was by no means so happy and cheerful, although it was much richer in events, and which I spent among the working bulls , from my conviction to my release from Capillaria, I will only tell very briefly, strictly adhering to the facts that deserve to be listed the reader can expect from a travelogue of my kind, whose only merit in terms of writing and poetic virtues is to faithfully and conscientiously tell what he saw.
That is why I am omitting the story of the first three months - another, larger work could be the subject of a fiery description of how -133-I got used to the company of the strange little monsters, that I fell in love with them, that I discovered their souls and their many good qualities, that I learned their language and customs; that I became, at first forced and rebellious, later of my own free will with enthusiasm and ambition, a useful member of their society; that I overcame their mistrust and ingratiated myself with them, because at first they distrusted me: the initiates knew about me that the oiháI came to them and to my greatest surprise, this news did not elicit the respect and envy from them that I had expected - rather, they spoke mockingly of me and about me in relation to this adventure. The reader can rightfully ask me not to bore him with complaints about my emotional life, - so I will only note that it was my fault if they could not take me seriously, in the early days: my separation from Opula had such a painful effect on me and made me so depressed and it made me miserable that I was truly unenjoyable in my gloom at that time.
This is my personal spiritual matter, my hopeless love for Opula , biased and-134-it made me selfish and justly created a dislike for me among the Bulls , who at the time, when I came to them through no fault of my own, were preoccupied with very important social and political questions, it is full of ideas that demand self-sacrifice and altruism from the individual for the sake of the public. I am talking about these instead, hoping that I can make myself useful if you provide some modest data for the distinguished and serious men who are today managing the destiny of Europe and leading them towards prosperity and perfection, and I will gladly give up the more reliable and cheaper, but unworthy of a serious man about the success I could achieve in the ranks of bored girls and dreamy little students if I filled these pages with the outpouring of my love rants.
The tower they were banished to was not the largest, but certainly one of the oldest and most advanced in Capillaria. Its foundations were laid many years ago by the ancestors of the bullocks who are currently building (the life span of the bullocks is much shorter than that of the oihás ) who were led to this by the prince who reigns in the tower today, the ancestor of Kar-kar-ka , Kol-ko . to the countryside. They lived in peaceful harmony with the neighboring towers for a long time-135-for a while in the last century, until a gonsargo (that's what they call the catastrophe when the Oihás smoke them out and occupy their towers: they mean a natural phenomenon like our earthquake) gave occasion for certain clashes, the consequences of which were the next, last chapter, I will try to tell you briefly. This goncsargó has the bullshistorians give several explanations: some analyze it on a strictly scientific basis, others mention mysterious forces. Both concepts had their own party in the different towers and the victorious parties mercilessly exterminated the defeated. But these barbaric times are now gone, and the people of the towers built in the area have begun to develop at an unheard-of rate in terms of culture and civilization. The sciences and arts took off - the former aimed at perfecting the bulls' physical and mental qualities in terms of suitability for tower construction: the latter in the direction of the spiritual education of the bulls . Excellent researchers have dealt with bulls with its individual and racial structure: their natural scientists researched the laws, the application of which led to great discoveries in practical life.-136-
In the early days, I myself worked as a simple worker carrying plaster and I did not have the opportunity to see the work of the upper classes who planned and managed the construction of the tower. My relative size and corresponding physical strength soon made me irreplaceable: I alone did more than eighty-hundred bulls in the same amount of time. But it was precisely this physical superiority that later gave me the opportunity to be separated from my social class and enjoy certain privileges, which gave me the opportunity to get to know the cross-section of bully society. I made friends and connections: from them I learned the following.
The towers were created as a result of the consolidation of a bullock nation in state life. The states were headed by kings, princes, presidents of the republic, or simple authority organizations, according to the political mood or traditions of the respective tower. These leaders ensured that all individual work worked in harmony towards the common goal: the further construction and completion of the tower. In addition, they managed the maintenance of order and the internal and external protection of the tower, - for the latter-137-it was necessary, because the danger that the people of one of the nearby towers would simply occupy the building hovered over every tower. The "tower defense law" was established, which, in addition to the incredible ingenuity and technical skill of the bullocks, brought fantastic results . So that the reader can form even a vague idea of what follows, I must emphasize something else. What we here in Europe call "homo faber" or "technical man" has developed to such an extent that bulls- about which only authors with the wildest imagination here: a Wells, a Shaw dared to fantasize in their wildest dreams. This technical ability, which, for the time being, has only produced miracles in the world of power plants, extends to all areas of organic life with them. In our country, only in recent times, and only with careful groping, have they begun to deal with the transformation of living organisms, - with bulls , the problem is to replace an eye, a liver, a brain, to transplant two kidneys in place of a lung, to replace two brains, or cut them in half to grow wings and fins in place of other organs, to insert the gills of a fish-138-into the heart of a bullock ; no bigger issue than with us the telephone, telegraph, X-ray light, steamboat and airplane: while the production of the latter technical devices was reduced to simple child's play for the Bulls .
This must be understood before starting the history of the development of "tower defense law". Since this question, in the form of compulsion, was thrown to the surface, a peculiar transformation began in the development of bullock society, which could perhaps be characterized by the words "duality", "split". Every organ and every tool began to take shape in such a way as to serve a dual purpose: building the tower and at the same time protecting it, which is, of course, clear with the attack. All bullstransformed into a worker and a soldier in one person. Plastering shovels could also be used as plaster scrapers when turned by a person, and the brick forms were designed in such a way that, filled with explosives, they could also be used as a brick-exploding mine. With the same clamps used to connect two slats in one tower, they could be stretched apart in the other tower. The tool that built here, destroyed there - which is a soup spoon in one of the towers -139-was, it turned out to be a six-shot revolver in the other, - here they ate the same thing as poppy seed, which made the bulls over there turn up like rat poison. On the complex body of bulls , the role of all organs was doubled: sharp claws developed at the end of the wings for flight, which could be used to split wings magnificently; the eardrums were formed in such a way that, if necessary, a terrible noise could be made with them, which would deafen the enemy bulls ; in the sockets of the eyes, in the place of the lacrimal sacs, small glands developed, whose poisonous discharge blinded the person who was sprayed. There were bullsthose who lengthened and sharpened their fingers to stab; others, besides their two arms, grew a third, which dangled sideways from their waists, sharp and pointed and hard as iron.
The great development of "tower protection law" also had an impact on the intellectual field. The feeling of togetherness, if possible, was further enhanced by the fact that this togetherness was threatened by separation - the relationship between the individual and society was perfectly clarified. In the large-scale movements in which before my liberation-140-I participated, I had the opportunity to meet Halvargó's (narrower homeland) most outstanding social scientist and statesman, Xa-rá , the same person on whose side I later fought when the great war occurred. This Xara enlightened me on many obscure issues, - I can thank him if I can boast of some proficiency in bullish social science and can modestly comment on social, political and economic issues.
On one occasion, we talked about the future of bullock society with Xa-rá . I expressed my admiration for everything that I had experienced so far in the field of culture and civilization, - I listed all the sciences and arts and showed what great results they could boast of. It's unbelievable how many different things the bulls Halvargó deal within and elsewhere: and they deal with everything with the infinite reverence and seriousness that the common great goal suggests - the goal that only excellent minds see clearly, but which even the last worker instinctively feels. All branches of science were discussed: physics, chemistry, astronomy, astrology, geodesy, numismatics, history, histology, philosophy, philology, philately, philanthropy, philharmonic,-141-palmistry, criminology, physiology, psychiatry, psychiatry, psychophysiology, psychogeodesy, physiopsychopathology, pathophysiochemgesia, physioastronomy-philchiropsychogeospectri-gonometrical-judical anthropoanthropology and the rest. All of these, methodically explained and reconciled, checked and drafted, unified and analyzed, form the whole on which the Tower is built. to Xa, one of the most wonderful minds, a real polymath, he could talk about everything: - he knew the development history and state of each science, its current position, he spoke with the greatest ease about practical and theoretical issues, professionally and generally. However, he was mainly interested in the social sciences, in this field he was not only perceptive and understanding, but also creative, - in some of his wonderful, eternal works, after he had nailed down the results of the theories, reaching a moral high ground, he also found the way and the way through which with its help, society must progress in order to reach the status of a better opportunity, a station indicating the height of its recognition, following the clear command of the necessity that reconciles the fact of instinct and will.-142-
Having reached this point, I was glad that I might be able to relieve my anxiety, which had been increasing during the whole conversation (that morning I woke up very depressed: I dreamed about Opula again) and raised the question of how we stand after all this with the goncsargó , that is, with the natural phenomenon that the bulls imagine it to be some kind of earthquake that will topple their towers. The word " oiha " left my mouth for the first time since I came to Halvargó . Xawas apparently adversely affected by this object. He began to brood, smiled petulantly, gave amused answers, wanted to talk about something else, - then suddenly broke out and expressed his astonishment that an educated and enlightened person like me was dealing with such useless and childish things. As for the goncsargó , bored and uneducated philosophers, in past centuries, when bullish society , deprived of natural scientific thinking and methodical research, produced vain cosmologies, myths and legends, tried to lull the uncultured masses thirsting for knowledge to sleep with such tales. One of these tales is the gonczargo , the theosophical or mystical assumption that-143-some wonderful, higher will or intelligence manages the fate of the towers: it created us, bullocks , for its own beauty or need, and it also destroys our ambitious dreams at a certain point. He, for his part, without being an unbeliever or a denying spirit, is convinced that this kind of transcendent or metaphysical concepts are harmful to development, quite hopeless and unproductive games of the bull's -mind, which moves within certain limits and the Inconceivable cannot be among the positive objects of his work. Anyway, the history of development is starting to show that the gonczargo, which periodically sweeps away culture, can be traced back to the action of certain pathogenic substances that cause atomic decay - the existence of these pathogens or comets has been demonstrated without doubt: they are always present when astronomers indicate a blizzard in the sky, bright masses, or in the form of billowing, transparent patches of fog, which circulate above the towers in an orbit that our mathematicians have not yet determined. Spectral analysis has already established their composition: there is no material in them that is similar to bullocks .-144-would not occur in his body. It is very natural that the naive ancient bulls called these mysterious, swaying fog patches, whose long, golden barges sweep across the sky and cover our towers with their light, as some higher power or will, called them oihá , feared and adored them, but in fact these are helpless, unformed masses, whether organic or inorganic, primitive materials left in a rudimentary state. The uneducated peasant and the ignorant, imaginative poet see in them a mockery, which he then christens as oihá , keeping the expressions of ancient mythologies.
I was a little confused listening to the explanations of the excellent scientist and reluctantly reminded him of the paintings and sculptures of bullock artists, which depict oihás in peculiar situations. He smiled at Xa with fatherly benevolence and repeatedly assured me that there were no oihás . These images and figures can be considered as idols: their positive core is partly the pathogenic substance mentioned above, partly the mass psychosis that occurs during the gonsargos , which stuns and fills the senses with brain fog: not being used to the strong stimuli that such natural phenomena-145- trigger. In this peculiar mental disorder, the bullies , among them, as individuals with a particularly sensitive and therefore easily disturbed nervous system, the so-called poets and artists, behave in a typical way. They begin to squirm, stretch, their eyes roll out, their heads swell, they stammer incoherent words: as if they are tormented by wonderful visions. It must be stated that the above-mentioned stimuli are very strong and a very disciplined mind is needed to overcome them: - he himself, who once observed from an observatory such an ordinary oihácalled the approach of a patch of fog, he was almost confused by it, burst into cries, uttered inarticulate and meaningless sounds, which he later wrote down to himself in phonetic letters, such as "oh, oh, oh, sweet, beautiful, My baby, my baby, my baby, my baby , my pussy, my life, my star, my everything, my fairy, please (or be?) my wife, etc.“
It is clear, explained Xa further , that these otherwise very effective and suggestive utterances of poets and artists should only be viewed through the lens of strictly controlling criticism if we want-146-we can also connect the operation of these bulls to the flow of education and development, which aims at the radical organization and transformation of society: we must remove from it what is sickly overheated imagination, fantasy, madness, delusion: we must reduce it to reality, which distorted, exaggerated, confused, and unanalyzed pours out through their souls - simple, general abstractions, real facts, great social truths, such as historical materialism, the struggle for existence, the struggle of the sexes, must be extracted from this confused, glittering mass , the stronger detachment and the species protection detachment. These must be kept in mind in order to draw ever wider layers into the great work, enlightening the masses, even those fog patches thatare called so that they can become useful, working members and supports of the bullock society .
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