A Gentle Dog

Karen could almost see Mr. Hoffen before him, stamping his feet in a panic. In the old man's eyes, Karen turning to this page of notes had most likely been beguiled by the evil god. Karen understood Mr. Hoffen's feelings. No matter how one looked at it, sealed inside Kevin was an evil god. Even though this evil god had slipped into the role of a pet at lightning speed—opening doors and turning off lights as if it were second nature, not only providing him with spells but also serving as Purr's mount to be ridden around all day—Karen had never truly treated him as an ordinary family dog. In fact, judging by human nature, however warm and simple-minded this dog appeared on the outside, just as much resentment and fury was likely festering deep in his heart. Even so, Karen still decided to break Kevin's seal. Not out of kindness, nor out of sentimentality, but because his little circle was already small enough. If he couldn't maintain clear rewards and punishments, leading the team would become impossible. Since the seal came in layers, he would undo it layer by layer, making sure he could keep suppressing him at every step. Compared to the awkwardness of Karen himself being "revered and provided for" if his own identity was exposed, if Kevin's identity leaked, he would face merciless suppression from the orthodox churches. So Karen wasn't worried about the dog jumping the fence to betray him. At this moment, Kevin, who was sitting on his haunches, seemed to sense something. His gaze drifted toward the desk from time to time, yet he kept up his warm, gentle golden retriever smile. Karen began reading the specifics below. The actual method to break the seal began at Step Two. From Step Two to Step Ten, nine steps in all, Mr. Hoffen had basically provided Karen with a set of formulas. All Karen needed to do was follow the steps for solving the problem and plug the formulas in one by one. Though at the end of every step, Mr. Hoffen had appended an annotation: "Step Two... Have you really thought this through?" "Step Three... I think you should reconsider this carefully." "Step Four... He is an evil god!" "Step Five... It's still not too late to come to your senses!" "..." "Step Nine... Are you truly determined to do this?" "Step Ten... You are about to unlock the demon's cage!" After reading through it all, Karen stretched and casually turned to the final page, preparing to hear Mr. Hoffen's parting lecture. Instead, the final page read: "Before Raniedal was sealed, Diss pulled him from your chest and then tore him from his own. His soul... no, his medium of existence, as well as the seal I placed upon him, was inevitably stained with the aura of the Inmerlais family. "Therefore, I have one last piece of good news for you, little Karen: this array of mine can only be successfully undone by someone of Inmerlais blood personally enacting it. "Taking into account the effects of the blood sacrifice ritual Diss performed, there are only two people in this world who can help our Lord Evil God break the seal: aside from you, there is only Diss. "Of course, that doesn't rule out a few truly exceptional beings—such as the supreme entities you seem to glimpse when you look up. They could undoubtedly unravel my seal with ease. The question is, does our Lord Evil God dare seek their help? "Please show this passage to him. I trust that since you've decided to undo part of his seal, he is already capable of reading. "Finally, "I'd like to extend a greeting to our Lord Evil God: "'Being a good dog is your only way out in this life!'" Karen touched his nose, picked up his teacup, and took a sip of water. He felt showing this text to Kevin was truly rather cruel to a dog. Yet such was life. One always had to weather setbacks and hardships to grow more mature. If human life was so arduous, a dog's life could hardly be spared. So Karen pointed at this page of notes. Alfred stepped forward and picked up the notebook. After reading it and seeing Karen nod, he placed the notebook before Kevin. From the slight movements of Kevin's head tilting left, right, up, and down, it was evident he truly was reading—and doing so very attentively. Upon reaching the final sentence, Kevin blinked, let his tongue loll out, and resumed his good-natured smile, his tail wagging all the while. Alfred squatted before Kevin and said, "Whether you are sincere or merely biding your time, I only wish to remind you that you are facing the most precious opportunity of your existence. "The Great Existence is about to reveal his benevolence and boundless magnanimity to you. "It matters not whether you are a golden retriever or Raniedal. Even if you were a stray dog sitting in this spot, you would still bathe in the radiance shed by the Great Existence. "The sky and the earth are not kind; they treat all things as straw dogs." Kevin remained silent. "Can you sense the profound meaning in these words?" Alfred asked. Kevin nodded, then shook his head. Alfred smiled. "None of that matters, really. I only wish to tell you: your submission, your endurance, including your betrayal and your resentment, mean nothing to the Great Existence. "Whatever action you take, the ultimate outcome remains identical: "The Great Radiance shall shine ever brighter! "Your choice affects only your future standing. "Will you be banished forever to the void of eternal darkness, "or "will you earn a place of your own in a corner of the sacred mural?" Kevin stared at Alfred. Alfred, however, was already standing up, turning toward Karen behind the desk. "Young Master, I have prepared the materials. Would you like to begin after you wake tomorrow, or begin now?" "Now," Karen answered. "I'll rest once it's done." Sleep had always been important to Karen; he preferred facing each new day refreshed and energized after a good night's rest. "Understood, Young Master. Please wait a quarter of an hour; I will have everything arranged." "Mm." Alfred walked out of the study and headed for the storage room. Karen stood up and went into the bedroom. Purr lay under the blanket on her side, sound asleep and snoring softly. She looked to be sleeping peacefully. Alfred had mentioned that today, in her excitement, she had used what little power she had recently recovered to heat the boiler, only to overexert herself completely. Imagining the scene, Karen couldn't help a smile from creeping onto his face. Before long, sounds came from the study. Karen walked back in and saw that Alfred had already prepared the ritual environment. Kevin sat directly in the center, his smile put away, looking serious and a little tense. In front of him stood a small stool with a backrest, prepared specifically by Alfred for Karen. Karen took a seat on the stool. Alfred then brought over two small side tables: the one on the left held the notebook, while the one on the right bore a glass of ice water, a plate of dark chocolate, and a plate of small cream cakes. Sensing that this would take quite some time, Alfred had prepared everything for the Young Master in advance. Holding the notebook, Karen started from Step Two and followed the procedure. Gradually, the array surrounding Kevin began to glow with light. Karen kept holding the notebook in his left hand while reaching forward with his right, crooking his fingers continuously toward Kevin. It was like solving a problem: even if the formulas and procedural steps were given, setting aside unfamiliarity, the fundamental calculations still had to be done by oneself. Naturally, the process could not be rushed. As Karen delved deeper step by step, rings of light radiating the aura of Principles surfaced around Kevin. When these halos appeared, the figure of the old Light remnant emerged in a corner of the study. This was the first time Alfred had "seen" the old man, though he had known of his presence for a while. He gave him a slight nod. "Hello." The old man nodded back. "Hello." Then, the old man moved a bit closer to the ritual to observe quietly. Alfred also took a few steps forward and stood beside him. "Rest assured, I cannot affect you," the old man said. "I exist only in thought, and all I can influence is thought. Do you think I could influence him?" He pointed at Karen, who sat there engrossed in the array's steps. "To engage in an exchange of thoughts with the Young Master is your blessing." "No, it is pollution," the old man said without hesitation. "I have already begun to doubt." What he doubted was his own faith. "To receive the Young Master's guidance and see the truly clear path ahead is your opportunity." "I am merely an imprint of thought. I am not myself, nor can I affect the real me." "The sky and the earth are not kind; they treat all things as straw dogs." Alfred quoted the line from the analects once more. It wasn't that he had run out of things to say, but rather that he found the quote very fitting. Earlier he had said it to a dog; now he said it to a mental imprint. Neither was human, and the latter wasn't even a living being. "What are 'straw dogs' referring to?" the old man asked. "In my understanding, they are offerings used during sacrificial ceremonies within a particular cultural context." "Sacrificial offerings? Then does 'the sky and the earth' refer to the gods?" "Yes, though I consider it an even grander designation than gods—at the very least, a collective will of all the gods." "I understand. There is great depth to those words, but they are also profoundly subversive, for every religion preaches an intimate bond between their god and the faithful. "I recall the scholars of the Church of Principles developed a theory that treated divinity as a point and a plane. "Your exposition stands a level above their theory. "Very good. It actually brings me comfort, for I too, just like my true self, can be called a straw dog. "Alas, I can already feel my faith peeling away, and with it, my perception of my own identity." "It is the Young Master who allowed a fresh version of you to be born, giving you a self." The old man looked at Alfred in slight astonishment, then instinctively felt a sense of crisis. He had a foreboding that in the future, he might very well trend toward becoming like the man in the red suit before him. And so, the old man promptly changed the subject, pointing at Kevin in the middle of the ritual: "Does this dog have something sealed inside him?" "Yes." "What is sealed?" "An evil god." "What?" "The evil god—Raniedal." "Er..." The old man's expression grew somewhat exaggerated, seeming to have completely forgotten just how composed he had been when he first appeared. "So what is being done right now is...?" "The Young Master is personally breaking the evil god's seal." "Did I hear that correctly?" "You did." "You haven't gone mad?" the old man asked again, his expression shifting from shock to petrified disbelief. "Or has this thought imprint of mine warped into hallucinating?" Alfred smiled gently. "In the Young Master's eyes, both you and this evil god are straw dogs." "Oh." The old man gave a numb response. His figure distorted heavily, and his voice began to fray: "I still... firmly believe in... the glorious light... the God of Light." Alfred replied, "Yet the God of Light is too far from you, while the Young Master has always been right before you." "You are... quite right..." The old man's figure began to dissipate. His appearances were growing shorter each time, yet the shocks he received grew greater every time. By this time, Karen's unsealing process had reached a critical stage. Kevin, along with the entity inside him, completely opened his mental defenses to Karen. Under such conditions, with two soul auras drawn so close, the stronger party could often glimpse memories buried deep within the other's soul. Out of professional habit, Karen did not pass up the opportunity. ... Crash... Crash... The sound of surging waves rolled endlessly. Karen found himself standing on a sandy beach. Ahead of him, the figure of a man sat atop a coastal rock. Karen walked over, climbed onto the rock, and stood beside the man. Then, on the other side of the sea blocked by the rock, Karen saw a massive harbor crowded with numerous pirate ships. Densely packed crowds filled the harbor docks. Next, Karen saw a woman in a long white dress. Surrounded by the multitude, she walked to the edge of the harbor and boarded a small boat all by herself. On the shore, the women all prostrated themselves before her, chanting and singing praises. Around them, the fierce and menacing pirates had fallen uncharacteristically silent. The small boat carrying the woman began to drift toward the depths of the sea. A soft white light gradually emanated from her body, like a gentle moon descending upon the ocean. Deep in the ocean, a wall of water suddenly surged upward, rising higher and higher until it nearly blocked the sun behind it, plunging the harbor into darkness. Yet the moon the woman represented took its place, shedding light over the sea. From within that wall of water, a colossal maw appeared, looking capable of swallowing everything in the world. The woman's boat drifted into the great maw. In an instant, the maw snapped shut, the light vanished, and the entire scene seemed like an illusion—yet rain began to fall from the sky. Wails of women drifted from the harbor. Beside Karen, the man faced the sea and spoke: "I swear that one day in the future, I will wipe out the Sea God Religion. I will make the Sea God... fall!" ... The memory ended there. Before Karen's eyes appeared a ring of halos—twelve halos in total, symbolizing the twelve layers of seals. Karen placed his hand on the first halo, and before long, it dispersed. Immediately, Karen brought the ritual to an end. His consciousness returned to his body. When he opened his eyes, he didn't see a golden retriever wild with excitement from having part of his seal undone; instead, he saw Kevin crouching where he was, tears glistening in his eyes. The dog had buried his head beneath his paws, hiding it as deeply as he could. Karen said nothing, merely signaling Alfred to clear away the arrangement. Then, Karen stepped out of the study and went into the bathroom to shower. As warm water washed over his body, Karen couldn't help thinking back to the scenes he had witnessed from Kevin's memories. Was the woman on that small boat drifting into the maw of the sea Goddess Mills? Was Raniedal's lover Goddess Mills? According to the information Karen had looked up: To ensure the survival of the prostitutes on the island and to protect them, Goddess Mills had willingly ventured deep into the ocean to be swallowed by the sea, becoming the Sea God's lover. Ever since, a rule had formed among the pirates: Under no circumstances could anyone withhold pay from prostitutes! Otherwise, when you set sail, the moon would notify the sea of your departure, and the ocean waves would overturn your ship and swallow everything you had. This was the agreement Goddess Mills had struck with the Sea God. After all, the only thing those lawless pirates feared was the ocean itself. Strictly speaking, therefore, Goddess Mills was not a principal deity; in fact, the orthodox churches did not even recognize her as a true god. She was more like an offshoot deity anchored to the Sea God. Later on, however, along with the collapse of fundamentalist Sea God worship, faith in the orthodox Sea God fragmented, and Goddess Mills—originally merely a secondary offshoot deity—gradually stepped into the foreground. Her believers were no longer confined to prostitutes servicing pirates on the islands, spreading across the continent. Was the collapse of the Sea God Religion orchestrated by his own dog? Yet why had he been branded an evil god by the Church of Order and sealed away in the first place? After finishing his shower, Karen walked out of the bathroom and climbed into bed. Tucking in the corner of Purr's blanket, he turned off the light and closed his eyes. Under the night sky, a dog sat atop the roof of the funeral parlor, looking up at the moon. He raised his neck, opened his jaws, and neither howled nor barked wildly. Instead, he reached out a paw, tentatively grasping toward the sky, yet caught nothing at all. Helplessly, he lowered himself into a crouch and curled onto his side on the rooftop, as if lying side by side with the moon. Deep hatred and unwillingness filled his eyes, only to give way to enduring loneliness and exhaustion. Finally, he reached out a paw once more, imitating the gesture someone in the house often made toward the household cat at night. Tucking in the corners of the blanket for the moon in the sky, he let out a gentle: "Woof~"