Ch 3 - Earth's Entitiy

The next few hours were a bit tiring. We traveled through trees and shrubs that thickened the forest. There were strange animals that would appear in a tree or scurry across the ground. During the long walk to the village, I wondered why they would settle down so far from the tree that birthed everyone. Aside from my curiosity and a few stops along the path, I learned a lot from Iri. He taught me basic math by counting the trees with my fingers. He taught me which plants are good for medical use and which plants are poisonous. He showed me what animals we eat as food and which ones we leave alone. Then he showed me how to listen for different sounds and what animal those sounds came from. These were all basic teachings and he assured me that I would be learning much more in my first few weeks in the village.

We stopped to rest and eat a few squirrels and a large vulture that Haenami caught right out of the sky. Inau grabbed some sticks from nearby and piled them off to the side of the path, where Hwajay blew a long hot beam of fire at it from his mouth. I stared in amazement. I had never thought of adding that trick to my body. The sticks caught fire and soon we were cooking the squirrels, and the Vulture. Inau and Ounsu came back with a few plants that they found for us to eat with the meat.

While we were eating, the big tree-like creature with huge muscles and stumpy feet, named Ambyok spoke, “Sachi, let me tell you a story of our history.” He said in a deep groggy voice. I was shocked at the sound; so different than the others. Then he cleared his voice. “Alright,” His voice sounded a bit less groggy, but still very deep and somewhat chilly. Everyone sat and stared at him, but I noticed that some were rolling their eyes, and others gave a light smirk of irritation. None the less, I was interested in what he was going to say.

“This all began hundreds of thousands of years ago, when the world was created by the first Byol.” He looked at me and realized I didn’t know what it was, “A Byol is a dark entity with no form but has just a small light in its center, which was what we started out as before creating our bodies. However, the first Byol didn’t have that light. The first Byol was locked away in her darkness with no way out and no hope of life until a different light came from afar and crashed into her realm. This light was bigger than any light you could ever imagine. It was so bright that it erased all the darkness in the Byol’s realm. This light hit the Byol with such strength and force that her dark entity and the light both exploded into trillions of smaller lights and darkness. These pieces each united with each other to have one piece of light with one piece of darkness as one developing entity.” He paused as I realized my first memory was similar to that.

“Yes, all those pieces of light and dark are what we have been made of. The first Byol, lives inside us, and we can see the other Byols in the sky.”

I looked up at the sky that was nearly dark now and I could see small flickers of light in the sky. Those are the Byols that he was talking about. I was there. I stared at them and as the night got darker, more and more became visible. It was beautiful.

“Yes, and when you see a running Byol, that means one has found their inner light and is taking it to Namu to create their body and become one of us.”

“That’s how we knew you were coming.” A small voice said next to me. I looked down and saw Ounsu looking up at me and smiling.

“Well,” Ambyok continued with his deep voice, “when this Byol came to the world, she decided to grab hold of the largest light she could find, and since the light was more powerful than the darkness, her other half was devoured into it and did not give her the necessary balance to control her light.” We all stared at him in wonder.

                “So when it was time for her to form on the land, she couldn’t direct her light to bring her to a safe place. The earth was not created yet, so there were no trees, or plants, or animals, or even water. Sadly, she didn’t have a mother tree like Namu. She fell from the sky as a huge ball of light and pierced the earth’s core. Her new entity body was so bright that soon she became hot and warmed the earth from the inside. She became sad and angry for not getting the life she hoped for, and was trapped in the center of this planet. She began to pulse with anger that created shifts in the earth’s surface and caused volcanoes to erupt and craters to form. She cried in her prison and from her hot tears there became hot springs, and from the hot springs became clouds, which her tears fall from when they have too much water in them, and these clouds dropped onto the land, and formed that rivers and lakes and oceans that are here today. After she finally calmed down, she realized that she could influence the earth to do what she wanted. So instead of her making her own body, she made a place for us to make ours. She placed hundreds of mother-trees all over the lands and on each island, and even made some that could survive in water for the sea creatures to be born in. Ours is called Namu, as you already know. Then she experimented with her powers by making millions of different insects and birds and fish. She then thought she could make a more complicated body, but it was a disaster. This creature is called a human.”

Everyone gave a sorrowful or angry shake of their heads when they heard about the Humans. He continued as I wondered what they were. “These humans are savages that have no love and no souls. The first Byol knew this was a disaster and tried to kill them with her natural powers of weather and earth quakes but these humans were strong, and then they started to multiply.  They didn’t need to come from the stars. While we were being made, humbly in Namu, these humans spread like a virus on our land. The first Byol regrets this and continues to sob and cry and have temper tantrums by making volcanos erupt and giving us thunder storms and blizzards. If it weren’t for her mistake in making these humans, she would be happier and the world would be a safe place to live in.” He explained.

“That’s why we need to…” Hwajay started.

“Get rid of that race and make the first Byol happy .” Haenami cut in. “Only then will we be safe and not have to worry about moving our village every year.”

“I don’t see why we don’t just pack up and head over the mountains to the northern clans.” Inau grumbled in.

“Because we are one of the only clans left responsible for Namu!” Haemani snapped. “If we abandon that tree then any new souls that are created there will be as good as human food. Not to mention the other clan will be angry that we don’t do our share.” She stared into the fire with a haunted expression as the flames reflected in her eyes and glimmered off her smooth black fur.

“Not to mention Daegom would never allow us to abandon our land and territory.” Kisang piped in.

“Even if our land is overrun by humans?” Eijong asked, “What if it’s a life or death situation?”

“Daegom is extremely loyal, even to his land. He would never abandon his home. He has been here longer than anyone else.” Iri mentioned. “I should know, I was the first one to join his clan nearly 250 years ago. Not soon after that Haenami joined us.” Iri glanced at the large black cat who stopped grooming her bat-like wings to smile at him.

“Well after, what?... 500 years?... you get pretty attached.” Eijong said. The group laughed and a few of them nudged one another playfully. Jonsa came to sit next to me.

“Daegom is a great leader. I can’t wait for you to meet him.” Jonsa said into the fire next to me. I watched his face glow from the light of the flames. I smiled at how his faint blue nose changes to orange from the light of the fire.