Free Web NovelChapter 792: Earth Vein Chains are But Shackles of the Heart
Since the conclusion of that meeting, the situation of the Hawthorne Family had taken a sharp turn for the worse within just a few short days.
It was like a curse, gradually coming true.
April’s situation within the family was similarly difficult.
Her only reliance within the family was her own lineage.
A family is a massive concept, so much so that its vastness dilutes the affection of blood ties.
Her only reliance was her father, while other relatives… there was no so-called familial affection within the family, except for the relationship between direct bloodline children and their parents.
But even this final sliver of connection appeared precarious at this moment.
Her father was suspecting her, questioning whether she had been brainwashed by the Witch Academy, demanding to know if she had hidden the Frozen World.
Ultimately, she was interrogated over and over again about what exactly happened at that time.
But the truth was… she had absolutely no idea what had happened.
“Mom… I’m not sure… I don't know what’s happened to Dad… I really don't know… I don't know how the Frozen World just disappeared……”
At this moment, April was crying with great sorrow.
She was half-kneeling, burying her head in her mother’s embrace, while her mother also crouched down, lightly stroking her hair.
She still remembered that when she was a child, her mother loved tidying her hair the most.
“Little April, be good, don't cry anymore. This is definitely Father’s fault. I’ll go help you……”
The woman reached out to wipe away April’s tears and spoke softly.
Accompanied by the soft, hallucinatory voices in her ears, April was half-kneeling by the bed.
What her hands held was merely the blanket on the bed.
The dripping tears were wiped dry by the fabric, and a corner of the lifted blanket rested lightly on her head, as gentle as a mother’s caress.
As the soft sobbing was gradually replaced by peaceful breathing, the two figures in the quiet corner of the bedroom were no longer silent.
“She’s a child severely lacking in love.”
“Indeed. This world’s discipline of girls is also quite severe… to have reached this point yet still lack a single thought of resistance.”
I glanced at Big Sis Bai and gave my evaluation.
However… such things cannot be forced upon others.
I was gradually beginning to learn not to use myself as a comparison for others.
I was similarly someone lacking in love; the void missing in my heart always needed other things to fill it.
And the “thought of resistance” born under the lack of love is merely a self-love protection mechanism.
If one does not establish this self-protection mechanism, then such a person will ultimately be controlled completely in their original environment until the last sliver of self is thoroughly squeezed dry.
Perhaps this reactive thought of resistance isn't necessarily a good thing, but it allows one to maintain a final sliver of self within their original family.
I looked at April, who was currently sitting on her knees by the bed.
This was my first time formally and seriously observing the Earth Vein Chains.
Back when I observed my own Earth Vein Chains, I relied on my Floating World-level Spirit Vision to directly trace back to the source of the Earth Vein River.
Only after recognizing the connection between the “Earth Vein River” and myself as an individual did I completely “see” the form of the Earth Vein Chains.
Before I achieved that, the past me couldn't even understand what the Earth Vein Chains actually were.
But after observing the Earth Vein River, I understood.
They are everything that constitutes a person within this world, everything that governs matter and soul-substance, allowing them to function!
If a person being alive refers to being a product under the operation of rules within a world, unable to survive on one’s own once separated from the world's swaddling clothes.
Then Transcendent is a metamorphosis relying on a life level that touches True Time, self-mastering the operation of life and breaking free from the swaddling clothes.
Therefore, only Transcendent lives are qualified to say they are individual living beings with independent cognition.
When I was severing the Earth Vein Chains, Academy Head Mei also told me that individual Earth Vein Chains can only be perceived by oneself.
That was why when I confessed to the Academy Head that I saw the Earth Vein River, it surprised her.
Once my Floating World-level Spirit Vision became familiar with the data of the Earth Vein River and Earth Vein Chains, I could cross the boundary between others and the self to observe the traces of Earth Vein Chains on people other than myself.
And at this moment, I was observing April’s Earth Vein Chains.
And the more I observed, the more I seemed to be recognizing the truth.
“Earth Vein Chains” is ultimately just a noun.
It doesn't seem to be a shackle that binds a person.
To use an analogy, every person within the world is a puppet that can move.
This movement broadly refers to “consciousness,” “cognition,” “behavior,” “communication,” and other behaviors of a living individual.
And the Earth Vein Chains are the threads that respond to the puppet and make it function, endowing it with the concept of “life.”
And the act of advancing to Transcendent is the process of gradually breaking free from the external force of the threads, allowing oneself to have the power to govern one’s own movements.
After advancing to Transcendent, one no longer needs to be swayed by the threads.
This is a process of gradual metamorphosis, but one cannot blame the threads that once endowed one with action as being evil.
This is the proper analogy for the truth of the world’s operation.
The Earth Vein Chains merely give non-transcendent lives the ability to survive.
But all of this is only the ideal state.
The more common situation is that those threads, after every puppet performs various actions, will interweave, entwine, and shackle every joint of the puppet.
This is the true appearance of the Earth Vein Chains: a tangle that binds the puppet so tightly it cannot move, forced to constantly repeat a few predetermined movements.
This is the essence of the shackles.
Before advancing to Transcendent, these threads need to be carefully straightened and untied, stripping away the entwined threads and returning to the original self, before one can calmly bid farewell to the threads.
And the manifestation of these threads are “familial affection,” “love,” “family,” “friends,” and even the inner “fear,” “desire,” “greed,” “inferiority,” and so on.
As long as every concept that can drive a person to do something can be seen as a thread, then how many threads are on a single person?
They are uncountable.
Any slight movement could lead to threads entwining the body.
Therefore… sometimes the purer and simpler a person’s mind, the happier they live.
This is not without reason.
But the ultimate cause of all this is this world.
This Main World is sick; at least for now, there is no one who can cure her…
And I observed the Earth Vein Chains on April’s body, then coordinated with the Great Tree of Knowledge to acquire her life history.
After comparing them one by one, I could generate shackles that I could understand.
The current April was very fragile, like a puppet whose threads were constantly snapping.
If her threads all snapped before she advanced to Transcendent, then… she would become a discarded puppet.
In other words, she would choose to enter the soul-substance cycle herself.
On these Earth Vein Chains, I saw many traces of the witch Chris.
April spent ten years in the Witch Academy.
In her fourth year, her choice of mentor was to follow the witch Chris.
Subsequently, in her eighth year, she could have independently conducted research to break through and advance to Transcendent, researching a Witch Project.
Yet she chose to become Chris’s assistant.
So the relationship between April and Chris had been maintained for seven long years.
And this pure relationship, around the fourth or fifth year—specifically at the end of April’s eighth grade—gradually lost its original pursuit.
At that time, the witch Chris had deliberately guided April to make a choice.
Whether to follow the academy’s arrangements and conduct Witch Project research herself to advance to Transcendent Witch, or choose to become the assistant by Chris’s side.
April, under the influence of her family, ultimately insisted on choosing to become an assistant.
After all, as long as she had this status, she was among the top group of people in the Witch Academy!
And the status she obtained could further prove her value within the family.
So, if one were to remove the family’s influence, April’s own abilities were absolutely beyond reproach.
I was beginning to understand what the witch Chris said to me back then.
If I were the Chris of that time, I would also feel troubled by April’s proposal to become my assistant.
Wishing for it and not wishing for it at the same time.
April’s own ability was absolutely no problem.
Chris was happy she could become her assistant, but at the thought that April wanted to be an assistant at her family’s “bidding,” she similarly felt uncomfortable.
So Chris decided to accept her as her assistant, hoping to rely on herself to guide and counsel her, and had unreservedly recounted the concept of Earth Vein Chains, hoping to guide her to break free from the shackles’ troubles herself.
Because of this, April, as a girl poisoned by her family, would have the fragility of her heart and her “suspicion” of the family triggered by me in these few short days.
Even back when the match ended and April was taken back by the witch Chris, Chris didn't drive April away at the first moment.
Instead, after April chose her family, Chris gave her one last chance.
Chris originally thought that after experiencing this, April could wake up.
And April indeed woke up a bit, but… ultimately chose to give up her status as an assistant.
Because the inferiority and pain in her heart made her afraid to face her former mentor again…… or rather, she believed herself unworthy of being saved.
“Again with being…… sigh…”
I originally wanted to say this was another problem of communication between the two.
If April could understand that her mentor, Chris, had always been encouraging her, how could April not discover that there was actually someone in this world who cared about her?
But this was merely my perspective as a bystander.
I still understood the principle that those involved are blind.
“Xiao Han, what are you going to do next?”
“Let April break with the Hawthorne Family.”
I pulled out a crystal that looked like an ice crystal, with peculiar patterns flowing within it.
This was the [Transcendent Knowledge] fragment, Frozen World.
I walked to April’s side and silently stuffed this fragment into her right hand.
The chill rising from it made April’s whole body shudder slightly.
But very quickly, she was once again immersed in a dream state without troubles, and the corners of her mouth gradually revealed a yearning for illusory beauty.
“I wish you a good dream.”
This could be considered a sincere blessing of mine for April.
After saying this, I returned to Big Sis Bai’s side.
“Leaving already?”
“Mhm, let's go out, it's not good to disturb a girl’s sleep. Let her enjoy her remaining beauty for one last period of time.”
After I finished speaking with Big Sis Bai, our silhouettes vanished directly from here.
But after leaving this bedroom, we did not leave to a very distant position.
***
“Alright Mama has already scolded Papa severely for you. Next time you encounter something unhappy, remember to tell Mama.”
“I understand, thank you Mama…”
April’s small hand pulled the large hand of the person beside her, holding on tightly as if she didn't want to let go.
“Why are you squeezing Mama’s hand with so much force? Little April has grown up; surely you still don't want to avoid going to school?”
“School…… mhm?”
April repeated those two words.
“In the academy, you can learn many things. Your mentor will also teach you many principles. Then, once you’ve learned it all and grown up, you will become a useful witch.”
“Witch… oh… I will…”
April subconsciously ignored the word “witch” in her mother’s mouth, as if listening to something as common as “growing up to be a useful person.”
“We’re at the academy. Mama can only send you this far. Little April, didn't you say you still had an agreement with Mentor Chris? Go quickly.”
“Mhm… goodbye Mama. You must come to pick me up after school… I don't want to wait at the gate for long…”
“I definitely will, little April. You are the only important person to me now. How could I forget?”
“It's a promise!”
April reluctantly let go of her mother’s hand and turned her head to look at Mentor Chris, who was welcoming her at the school gate.
“Mama is heading home now. After all, Mama can't leave home for too long.”
April walked to Mentor Chris’s side and instinctively looked back.
She saw her mother walking on the road home.
There were neat villas there; looking from a distance, those houses looked like tombstones arranged in rows.
Subsequently, April’s gaze was drawn by Mentor Chris’s voice.
The mother, whom no one was watching, was now standing peacefully before a vertical stone monument, watching April yet afraid she might turn back at this moment.
Dreams are just this absurd and illogical, yet they reflect facts a person is willing to see and unwilling to face.
“Little April did you properly carry out the project I assigned you yesterday?”
“I did!”
April nodded and spoke happily.
“Really? Then tell me how you went about it.”
“First, I accompanied Papa to his workplace. Although I didn't like it there much, I still went along. Papa was in a bad mood, and I comforted him… mhm…”
“And then?”
“Then I don't remember very clearly… something unpleasant should have happened, but Mama went to lecture Papa, and then Mama took me to a fun place to play… we ate a lot of delicious food…”
“Then, little April do you like this kind of ordinary life?”
“I do!”
April spoke without a second thought.
Although she didn't know why she liked it, she answered following her instinct.
Clearly, such a flat life seemed to have nothing brilliant.
Even looking back at memories, she couldn't even summarize what exactly she was doing.
But at the thought of such a life, April felt a wave of peace in her heart, as if her weary heart had received a sliver of comfort.
“Then, will little April use everything she has to defend such a life?”
“I will… I suppose…”
April became a bit uncertain, or rather, her tone was not firm.
She was still a child at school; she shouldn't understand such a heavy principle.
Defending her own life or something……
“Little April follows me and says it. You must respond to this question with a firm tone. I will!”
“I will?”
“Louder I will!”
“I will!”
April also shouted along, even though she wasn't clear what she was doing.
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