novelraw Chapter 726 293: Please Bestow Me a Sword_2
Chapter 726 293: Please Bestow Me a Sword_2
Old Qian chuckled: "This third realm is called Life Illusion. If you can thoroughly understand this realm, you may not be invincible in the world, but at least in the art of illusion, you are almost at the pinnacle."
"What is Life Illusion?" The young man grew more curious.
"To understand what Life Illusion is, you must first clarify what is true and what is false." Old Qian said.
"Is there a need to clarify truth and falsehood?" The young man was puzzled by Old Qian's words.
Old Qian chuckled: "Of course there's a need to clarify. What you perceive as true may not actually be true, and what you perceive as false may not necessarily be false."
"For example?" The young man asked.
"For instance, do you consider yourself a man or a woman?" Old Qian asked the young man earnestly.
"Of course I'm a man, is there any doubt about that?" The young man replied.
"Isn't there a possibility that you don't actually know, and that the real you is a woman?" Old Qian said seriously.
"That's impossible. Everyone can see that I'm a man." The young man said.
"Everyone can see you're a man, but what if they're all lying to you? What if, in reality, you're a woman, and they just told you you're a man, making you believe you are a man, while actually you are a woman." Old Qian's words left the young man somewhat confused.
"Even if they don't tell me, I can judge for myself that I'm a man. Physiological characteristics don't lie, right?" The young man said.
"Why wouldn't they? Your basis for judging yourself as a man from physiological characteristics is just the knowledge you've acquired, isn't it? And knowledge is created by humans. If that knowledge has been altered, and the knowledge you learned is wrong, how can you judge whether you are truly a man?" Old Qian further explained.
"This question seems meaningless. Even if the whole world is deceiving just me, what's the significance? Whether I'm a man or a woman nominally doesn't affect me. It's like color blindness that mixes blue and green. Though they confuse blue and green, they know what true green is when others talk about it, although the color they see isn't green but blue. They don't know it's blue themselves, yet it doesn't hinder their normal communication with others." The young man pondered.
"Of course it has an impact. If all the knowledge you've learned is false, how can you be sure that what you perceive is true? Perhaps the act of giving birth doesn't only belong to women, or maybe the places you've never been to don't actually exist. Perhaps Earth isn't a sphere but a plane. Anything you haven't personally verified could be false, but you just don't know." Old Qian said earnestly.
"That's nihilism, isn't it? According to you, even what you see with your own eyes might not be true, perhaps staged intentionally by others." The young man felt this question was indeed meaningless.
"Yes, so when you can't distinguish truth from falsehood, what standard do you use to measure what's true and what's false?" Old Qian asked again.
"Then you can only rely on your own feelings." The young man mused.
"Exactly, relying on feelings. But by feeling, people often believe things that are advantageous to them are real." Old Qian continued: "In ancient times, there was a legendary story about a very powerful person who asked a fortune teller for a reading. The fortune teller said that two people were his lucky stars, with their help, he could dominate the world. So the powerful person found those two people and made them his beloved generals. With their assistance, he indeed conquered the world."
"But the fortune teller's reading had a second part, saying that those two people who helped him gain the world would eventually cause him to lose it. If you were that powerful person, would you believe that second part?"
"Of course not." The young man sighed, having understood Old Qian's point.
"Indeed, even if the fortune teller's prediction was accurate, people wouldn't believe truths that are unfavorable to them. When fate favors you, you believe in fate; when fate is against you, regardless of the truth, people are more inclined to believe in their own ability to conquer destiny."
Old Qian continued: "For example, say you are overweight. If someone tells you that you can lose weight effortlessly by indulging in food as you wish, while another says you must undergo painful exercise and give up all delicious food to lose weight. Before knowing which one is correct, once you try, which person's advice would you choose to believe?"
"Without knowing the truth, upon trying, I suppose most would choose to indulge in food freely. But how could one not know the truth in such matters?" The young man countered.
"What if what you know as the truth is false? Imagine you need only indulge in food to lose weight, but being unaware of the truth, you keep hesitating, seldom indulging, and occasionally exercising, ending up not losing any weight. Would you think, perhaps, the lack of results is because you haven't adhered to dieting or exercised enough?"