Realization

There's a saying that time flies by faster the older you get. But why is that? If time is a law that stays at an absolute consistent pace then why does it feel like it is sped up or slowed down at certain moments?

This is because for each year you add to your life it takes up a tinier and tinier percent of it as a whole. Going from the age of one to two, you gain another 50% of your life's experiences. While going from 99 to 100 is only a fraction of the former.

The longer you live the more experiences you have. And it is generally new experiences that derive your memory. It is new experiences that feel the longest because it is always something new. Something to look back on. And the older you get the fewer experiences you have to gain. At least for the average person.

But there are also sceneries when an extended amount of time seems to go by in a second. Such as when you are unconscious. If there is nothing to perceive time then how could you ever feel it passing? That is why rest always feels too short.

The actual rate at which time passes is something that can rarely be changed, but the pace at which we experience such phenomena can.

Thoughts such as these had always filled Atreyu's mind. Having a constantly questioning mind can be a wonderful thing. A gift that could place you above many others. All the brightest and most intelligent minds had such traits. But it could also leave you with a depressing and exhausting existence.

Having a mind that always questioned everything around it could be one of the worst ways to live. Especially when it was a switch you couldn't turn off. A voice that was there 24/7, asking everything it could about everything it met. Why do you think those with a higher intellect were more likely to fall into a state of depression? Because their minds were existences that could act as curses far more often than blessings.

Asking questions could only leave you with two routes. Either they are answered or they are not. And when you are regularly curious about the reality around you, you are often met with the first. Because the scale of which you are questioning was higher than what you could answer. Which can drive you insane. Why are you conscious enough to ask such things but not to answer them? It was a question itself that plagued any mind that wandered deep enough.

But when you did get answers they were often not the ones you wished to hear. Getting answers to questions that inquired too deeply about the fundamental laws of reality could leave you in a far worse trance than optimism ever would. As it gave you a glance at the emotion of how extinguishable you truly were. How you could never amount to anything. Yet you couldn't stop. It was worse than any addiction.

Different people will deal with such a state of mind in different fashions. Some will seek out help from others. Put up an act and just try to ignore that tormenting voice, although it never works. And some just kill themselves. It differed from person to person. He for one had attempted all three and more. But in the end, you can't ignore yourself. It was deeper than just thoughts, it was your mind itself, not your mindset, it was as if it where ingrained in the physical aspect of your brain. It was your emotions, the very way you perceive things. If it had been so easy to block he would've done so by that point.

In Atreyu's mind, being more dominant in asserting a non-questioning thought process was the greatest gift you could have. Being able to live without such an element seemed like heaven on earth. Sure maybe you couldn't achieve the potential that others did but why did that matter? It's a humans world. In the period that you were alive, any questions you aspired to have by sustaining a highly conscious mind couldn't possibly be answered in your current era. And when they were they were not usually positive ones. Both could only leave you with negative emotions. The rare true happiness you could have was when you found a way to be ignorant of your own conscious with rare exceptions.

The number of times he had fallen into depression was more than he had not. Simply because of his own head Something he could never change. He had considered suicide once, and that number only rose into the multi-digits higher and higher each time his mind wandered back and into the next identity-shattering question. The first ten years of his life were always the best. No matter how he looked at it.

He had never had a sad or abnormally tragic backstory. At least to what he considered. But his own head was enough to make up. And the worst part was that he wasn't above average intelligence either, at least to what he presumed. It was his own natural instincts to tell him death was bad. And even after he had experienced it twice he couldn't be sure of the answer to that. It felt like it had never happened, yet he knew it did.

If you die sure you will go through eternal nothingness. But you have nothing to experience that eternal nothingness. You will never experience death because you do not have a consciousness to experience it with. A hypothesis he had always had but only now confirmed. Something he was rarely grateful to realize. So why fear death any longer? In fact, if he dies he could just consider it a break.

'How am I alive?' He shouldn't be conscious at the current moment. So why?

"Oh look who's up! Awww you're so cute, yes you are!" The paper bag-wearing figure laughed as he attempted to tickle me.

The more he was here the more questions he had. Brought back to life, levitating, witnessing a giant snake, projected emotions. He wanted to know the answers to all of them.

There was a lot more to this world than he thought. He had a ton of theorizing to do, more so than he had thought at least. 'It seems I've underestimated this world' it was definitely more diverse than his last.

'I think I'll call you paper head' Atreyu thought to himself while he gazed at the animated character. It was obvious that they spoke upon a childish tone, still, that didn't stop his curiosity from reaching out and attempting to tug the bag off their head.

'Assuming I couldn't breathe it most likely messed with my lungs. That means such a creature can project killing intent that shuts down my airway in some form or another. So that must mean my savior knows how to repair such things under short circumstances'

He knew well that it was indeed possible to return from the dead. But the period of which this was possible after death was short. Once your cells were beyond repair it was over for you.

'How does one project their intentions? And turn it into an emotion?' what he had felt from that snake was an unwelcoming mixture of dread, terror, guilt, annoyance, all the most tedious and negative of emotions you could imagine. It had effected his own thought process to an extent. Was it an innate ability that belonged to only beasts, or distinctly to that breed of snake? Could he do something similar?

He suddenly looked at everything on this planet with newfound wonder. The possibilities seemed endless, he felt like he wasn't limited by the ground, nor the sky. A fantasy that he hoped would last forever. A feeling he didn't find often.

Sadly he had to come back to reality as he remembered there was still a hierarchy in this world. That snake could've killed him with a glance, it did kill him in a glance. And what could he do? Nothing.

Nothing. Nothing. Nothing! If he couldn't survive a simple glance of a beast how could he ever live in this world? It seemed he was born in an environment where he could die a hell lot easier than he could live.

Sure, he no longer feared death. But that didn't mean he'd chase it. If he had the choice to die or beg to continue living, you could bet he'd choose the ladder ten times out of ten. Even if it extended his mind's invite to be curious about the space around it. And even if that caused him hell, it was a new experience.

And new experiences were one of the rare things that could subtle his brain to stop infecting his head. It was something he could look back on to avoid the current moment. Not fully, but enough. And after witnessing decease, he realized he had been too serious about everything. He only had one life! Well, two actually.

And in the span of the universe, he was tiny, not even an infant. He felt as if he were to blink he'd be dead. Everything had never felt so short. He hadn't appreciated life enough. If he was going to be here for a fraction of a moment he might as well make it worth it. Have a little fun, not to stress things, why should he care what happens if it never makes an impact beyond this world. It was like being upset over a single grain of gravel in an endless monopoly of sand.

If he could get new experiences every day, have fun by conquering new challenges, he saw no reason to why he couldn't set all that in motion. And what better way than to set a goal?

He wanted to be able to match up to such a predator. His mind wanted answers. And his body wanted to be stronger. So he made it his goal at this moment that he would become strong, strong enough to never have to feel terror again, strong enough that he could have every freedom this planet had to offer. no matter what it took. No matter what pain he had to enforce.