The Silver Doesn't Shine

“Lord,” asked Vaz Vashe, who was a daring adventurer with no dull moment in her life, once, “how do you define misery?”

YISUN, who was knowledgeable in all things, considered her question. Then he smiled in the 7th way, and pointed Vaz Vashe towards the long and winding road that stretches from here to the center of all things. “To know the answer, you must walk this road and back again. Each time you find your path blocked, you must destroy the obstacle save for a pebble-sized fragment, which you must carry with you until you find your answer.”

And so Vaz Vashe packed her belongings into a traveling bag and slung it over her shoulder and set out on the road.

The first obstacle she encountered was a slab of stone, and she shattered it with her fists. From the rubble she picked up a piece of granite no larger than a pebble, and put it in her pocket. Then she continued onward.

The second obstacle was a tree and she cut it down and kept a piece of a branch; and the third was a man of frail age and she cut him down, too. And in a similar manner she dealt with all the other obstacles and distractions littering her path, and over the course of two kalpa she collected a pebble-sized fragment from each until her pockets were filled with mementos and they became too heavy to carry.

It was then, unable to move, that she finally called for YISUN again.

“I have seen both ends of the road,” said Vaz Vashe, “so why am I still journeying? I have walked this road a thousand thousand times. There is nothing new to be found here save for ever more obstacles.”

This cracked me up.