Only God
Chapter 37 - 34 Maritime Debate

Chapter 37: Chapter 34 Maritime Debate

The Prophet and his son’s canoe began to drift away from the island; the two of them paddled furiously, circumnavigating the area, as the silhouette of the island became increasingly indistinct.

When the dangerous island had vanished into the night and the sea, at that moment, with the sea calm and the waves gentle, the father and son finally breathed a sigh of relief.

Yarlessto sat in the canoe, now briefly putting down his paddle, recalling previous events and then frustratingly clutching his forehead.

"Father...this is my fault...I don’t know why, but that singing influenced my emotions."

Yarlessto confided, his voice filled with remorse.

"The Sea Demon represents life’s temptations, and clearly, you lack the ability to resist them."

Al also finally let go of his worries; naturally, he wouldn’t miss this opportunity to teach his eldest son a lesson.

"No, it’s not that I lack the ability to resist temptation!"

Yarlessto instinctively retorted, yet found himself at a loss for words,

"I just, I just..."

Following that, he pounded his thigh forcefully; it was evident that he was at a loss for words.

Al pursued the victory, questioning him:

"What just? What just? Did you just carelessly succumb to temptation, leading us into danger?"

Yarlessto bowed his head; Al didn’t know if his eldest son was obediently accepting his lesson or waiting for an opportunity to retort.

The moonlight overhead was bright and clear; Al too put down his paddle.

Yarlessto remained silent. He hung his head for a lengthy period and rubbed the Bone Knife given to him by his mother.

The night was like a translucent curtain, speckled with points of light, the sea reflecting the vast expanse of stars, their canoe moving from one lonely Star to another.

Al looked up at the lights in the night sky, allowing the canoe to gently bob on the sea.

It seemed as if only this father and son pair remained between heaven and earth.

After what felt like an eternity, the long-silent Yarlessto slowly raised his head.

In the quiet of the night, he moved his lips and suddenly blurted out:

"Father, let’s have a debate on the sea."

His voice seemed to vanish instantly on this vast sea surface, yet also seemed as though it would remain in history forever.

Al heard his eldest son’s words; he turned his head and looked at this child.

At last, he nodded slightly, saying,

"My child, what do you want to say? To discuss your poor handling of temptation?"

The tranquil sea set the stage for the imminent debate between the father and son.

"Exactly."

Yarlessto gave a definitive response,

"Father, you speak first, what else do you wish to teach me?"

Upon hearing this, Al readily accepted Yarlessto’s request. He cleared his throat, and after a brief silence, he began:

"Regarding the most important difference between us as a father and son, you believe that God and God’s creation serve as the foundation of all laws, as a starting point, whereas I believe that God is the endpoint of all laws, the supreme truth. You can see, because you are so curious about this unknown world, you dislike sticking to conventions; you favor skepticism. Am I right?"

Yarlessto lifted his face and replied,

"Exactly."

Al gazed at Yarlessto, his hair and beard graying, but his eyes filled with spirit, he said,

"I want to tell you that this world is so dangerous; you doubt everything, not knowing that the paths the ancestors have taken are proven safe. Yet you stubbornly choose a different path, you don’t trust my experience, and in the end, you fall for the temptations of those demons."

Al’s admonishment didn’t suppress Yarlessto’s thoughts; on the contrary, the eldest son, having heard his Prophet father’s words, proudly puffed up his chest, evidently ready to launch into an eloquent prelude.

On both sides of the canoe, silver-blue flying fish opened their pectoral fins, sparsely leaping over the water.

"Father, I must refute you."

Yarlessto said so,

"As I said before, skepticism is closer to the divine than blind faith. Likewise, skepticism is also closer to the truth. You say, the paths our ancestors have taken are proven safe, but are they necessarily the best paths? Might I walk further and faster on another road?

In my opinion, we must doubt. Only through doubt can we think; doubt is the proof of reason."

Yarlessto finished speaking, and Al’s beard trembled slightly; he spoke with a deep voice,

"But you can’t doubt everything. There are some things that are truth."

Yarlessto immediately countered,

"It is by doubting that we can know if it is truth."

Al grew angry and raised his voice,

"But you were tempted!

You were tempted on your path of doubt.

That’s extremely fatal, and you haven’t resolved this problem!"

Yarlessto lowered his head as if Al’s rebuttal had left him speechless, merely gazing at his father in the darkness.

"Father, do you think we can avoid temptation?"

He asked softly.

"Why not avoid temptation?"

"If we don’t, it could lead us to our death,"

The Prophet questioned his eldest son back.

"Then I have to say..."

"We can never avoid temptation!"

Yarlessto suddenly raised his head and declared.

Al’s pupils contracted as he gazed at Yarlessto.

"My father, isn’t that temptation on our essential path?"

Al nodded slightly and then countered,

"Yes, that’s why we must avoid it."

Yarlessto said thus:

"But that’s impossible.

Think again, is temptation really the song of those demons? Are those songs truly hands that drag our boat over forcibly? No, they are not! It is us who row towards it actively."

"Temptation is not a pair of visible hands, not something you can avoid just because you wish to, it’s right there on the essential path.

We cannot avoid temptation because there is no temptation."

"It is us who actively approach that island, it is our own choice!"

"So, why can’t we avoid temptation? Because the temptation is us ourselves!"

"We humans want to explore, to doubt, not willing to stay in a closed world."

"On this journey, the only paramount question is that we know nothing about this world!"

As Yarlessto’s solemn declaration fell, Al felt a force from these words that could not be ignored; his eldest son was not only defending temptation but also defending something more exalted—the exploration of the unknown.

Flying fish skimmed by, becoming more and more numerous. However, neither father nor son paid them any mind.

Hearing his elder son’s words, Al couldn’t help but become furious, not only because of Yarlessto’s forceful arguments but also because his son was pointing the finger at him and the closed world he saw.

"You only see what you want to see,"

Al suppressed his anger and said,

"Little do you know, your arrogance is extremely deadly!"

Yarlessto too felt a surge of emotion, also suppressing his anger and saying:

"Father, do you deny that we know nothing about the world?"

Al stood up abruptly from the canoe,

"When did I not know that we know nothing?"

"You haven’t experienced that era, everyone in the Kingdom was troubled by a great question, not a single sage could ponder the answer to death."

"I am telling you, I saw the truth earlier than you! The truth that we know nothing!"

As he listened to his father’s lofty words, Yarlessto suddenly calmed down. He had a sudden change of heart; so, his father knew, knew that the Logos people knew nothing about the world.

Al’s beard trembled incessantly as he stared at Yarlessto,

"Yarlessto, my child.

Do you think a closed world is bad?"

"A closed world is bound to have an end; as long as we see the end, people will know where to go, and they won’t fall into that crisis that swept the Kingdom."

"Yes, you are right, we know nothing..."

Al stood on the canoe, with waves surging behind him,

"However, however..."

"Exactly because we know nothing, we need a closed world!"

Listening to his father’s argument, Yarlessto’s eyes widened. Although he and the young priests led by him had made many guesses about why his father chose a closed world, he had never thought the answer would come with such a stunning reversal, so striking and compelling.

Yarlessto lowered his head, pondering the words to counter-argue, but the flying fish around them were getting more numerous, rocking the whole canoe.

Both father and son had to break away from their debate and began to grab the oars in a hurry.

Yarlessto looked over his father’s shoulder and saw with astonishment the vast waves rolling up from underwater.

The school of fish around them grew, not only flying fish but various sea fish were fleeing in panic.

Following that, the swaying of the canoe became even more severe, reminding both father and son of landslides.

"There’s something under the sea!"

Yarlessto shouted, seeing the shadow under the sea as vast as a mountain.

The shadow grew bigger and closer to them.

Father and son began to paddle desperately, attempting to escape from this place.

Contrary to their hopes...

They encountered a predacious primitive whale.

That’s why flying fish were constantly skimming past both sides of the canoe.

The canoe was slapped by the sea, and despite their desperate efforts, they didn’t escape, but under the influence of the waves, they drew closer to the shadow.

Boom.

A gigantic creature suddenly leaped out of the water, and Al and Yarlessto lifted their heads in astonishment to see it all.

The huge Unihorn whale cast darkness in broad daylight, swallowing the father and son into its mouth.

The sea debate between the Prophet father and son started with calm seas,

And soon after,

It ended with them being swallowed by a huge Unihorn whale.

Undoubtedly, this will become a tale for the epics.

Search the lightnovelworld.cc website on Google to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.