“With due respect, lord,” said the sinner, “maybe you should focus on your work more rather than daydreaming.”

  “Is that so…” said the lord of Krimisha, “looks like you souls don’t understand, you are not living anymore, you are already dead, and you are not going anywhere until you don’t receive your punishment fully. If I’m not being able to do it then some other lord will do it, and let me make it clear, you are going to beg for mercy.”

  All the sinners got silent, and all of them were looking at the lord of Krimisha.

  “See, this is how it feels when reality hits” said the lord of Krimisha, “you can laugh as much as you want, but you are not going anywhere until your punishment is complete. Now tell me, who wants to laugh” lord’s eyes passed over every soul “looks like it’s me, hahahahaha…”

  All of those souls were not laughing anymore.

  “Let me tell you, I don’t like this work, but it is lord Yama who makes me do all this work,” said the lord, “I don’t want to punish you, because you all are like me, and I see nothing wrong in your deeds”.

  “Why so friendly, lord? What’s the purpose?”.

  “The purpose,” said lord with a laugh, “you want freedom from these punishments, and I also want the same thing…freedom from this work”.

  All the souls stared at him with confusion.

  “What you are trying to do,” said the sinner, “I don’t understand any of this”.

  “No, no,” said the lord, “you understand what I am saying, but you are not realizing it”.

  “What is there to realize,” said the other sinner, “that we are in hell…”.

  “Yes, but a little bit more than that,” said the lord with a cunning smile.

  “Oh, please,” said the sinner, “if you are done with your riddles…what you are trying to say”.

  “I’m trying to say that you are all in hell… which as a matter of fact you all are aware of,” said the lord, “you all want freedom from these punishments and I want freedom from this work, what if there was a way to help us both out?”.

  “That is not possible,” said the sinner, “the laws of hell are there for eternity, and no one can change that, so whatever you are trying to suggest is all just words, nothing else.”

  “I’ve been in hell for way much longer, than all of the souls and lords present here” said the lord, “yes, it is true that the laws of hell can’t be changed, but as all of you were Sorcerer in your previous lives, you do know that even the magic spells have loopholes, and all the other things on earth orchestrated by the god himself…have flaws in them, then why not hell”

  “It is also quite certain that you will be punished for your sins, and if you try to escape from it, then also you will be punished, but you will have a chance of avoiding this because you will be working with me, one of the lords of hell. Now the decision is yours”.

  All of them grouped around and started murmuring, then all of them gazed at him.

  “Your offer is not bad, lord,” said the sinner and the lord gave him a smile, “but I want to know that what is there in it for you, why are you so eager to help us, I assume it is not because of our mockery, is it” and all the sinners started laughing.

  “Of course not,” said the lord with a forced smile, “there’s a lot in there for me, as I told you, I will get freedom from my work, and after coming out from hell, I will rule earth, and all of you will work under my foot.”

  “What did you say?” asked the sinner in loud voice.

  “You’ll work under my foot!!!” the lord shouted, “or else you can enjoy your punishments given by me or someone else, choice is yours”.

  All of them gathered again and discussed.

  “Alright, we all agree with you,”

  “That’s good, it will be better for all of us,”

  “So, are we free now?”

  “Not so quick, have patience,” said the lord, “before doing any of this, I have to make certain arrangements, until then wait for my command”.

  “Mother, you said that you will teach me magic,” said Ivaan while sitting next to the witch near the seashore, “but all we are doing is just sitting by the seashore, nothing else”.

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  “We are not doing nothing,” said the witch, “before I teach you magic, you should first learn about nature because Magic is part of nature. When we do the spell work, nature is the one who helps us to achieve the goal we are trying to accomplish by spell”.

  “So do we control nature by spell?”

  “Never be mistaken to think like that,” said the witch in a serious tone, “there is no force present on earth which can control nature, and the humans who have tried to do that, suffered a terrible fate. Always keep in your mind that you can work with nature, but you cannot make nature work for you”.

  “Ok mother,” said Ivaan, “I will remember that”.

  “I know you will,” said the witch, “and another thing to remember when you are doing any spell, you should have a complete belief in yourself that you can do anything. The Stronger your intention is, the more powerful the magic will be”.

  “Come with me, there is something that I need to demonstrate,” She held his hand and took him to the cliff of a mountain.

  “Mother, do I have to jump from this mountain to learn magic?”

  “What? No, how can you think like that?” said the witch, “I’m your mother, why would I do such a thing?”.

  “Stop worrying, mother, I’m just kidding, you’re so naive,” he said with a laugh

  “I’m…naive…” said the witch with a smile, “what to do with notorious kids like you, you’ve just reached my height and you started calling me naive”.

  “Ok, mother, what did you want to demonstrate?”

  “Look at the other cliff of the mountain in front,”

  “What’s there to look at?” he said, “There’s a huge distance between both the cliffs”.

  “Yes, there is,” said the witch, “what do you think, can you jump from this cliff to that cliff?”.

  “What? no mother, you know I can’t” he said with surprise

  “What does it matter what…I know, the thing which matters, is what…you know,”

  “Is this supposed to be some kind of riddle?”

  “It isn’t a riddle, it’s the truth which other people can’t see” said the witch, Ivaan gazed at her with confusion, “this is the most important thing to learn, you are doubting yourself by considering what…I know, don’t you know yourself”.

  “So, are you telling me that you can jump from this cliff…to…that cliff?” he said while pointing at the other cliff.

  “It doesn’t matter if you can reach there or not; the thing that matters is what you think,” said the witch.

  “Please, mother, don’t play a joke on me,”

  “This is the problem with the people, they think that the other person is a fool to think of doing the impossible” said the witch, “but the reality is they are fooling themselves, when you can think of doing the impossible that is the point where your intention and belief in yourself is too strong to be broken by what other know or believe”.

  “So, are you saying that if I believe in myself, then I can jump from this cliff to that cliff?”

  “No, I didn’t say that,”

  “Then what are you trying to say?” he asked with irritation

  “What I am saying is that you should have a belief that you can achieve the impossible, even if you aren’t capable of doing it,”

  “Even if I believe that I can jump across this cliff…” he said, “it is definite that I will fall while doing so and I will not survive”.

  “That’s the biggest weakness of any person who is casting the magic,”

  “The weakness of knowing what will happen?” he asked with a smirk

  “No, my son,” she said, “it is fear.”

  “Fear…” said Ivaan in a low voice

  “Yes, fear,” she said, “you shouldn’t have any fear while casting any spell because that will make the spell ineffective”.

  “Well, as far as I know,” he said, “fear is common in people”.

  “Yes, that’s true,” she said, “but one cannot do magic if he is in fear. What do you think, why will someone have fear in their mind while casting the spell?”.

  “They can have fear that the spell will not work, or something wrong will happen…” he said, “but I think it is common to have fear, even the soldiers who fight in war have fear of dying, but still, they become victors.”

  “You are comparing the wrong things; you are comparing the teamwork and individual work, which are not equal, are they?”

  “No…”

  “The soldiers who fight with fear in their minds are not great soldiers, and the great soldiers are the ones who don’t have fear in their minds. Fear is the thing that stops you from unleashing your true power, and whenever you are under fear, you will perform much below then your true potential,”

  “So how can I overcome my fears, mother?” he asked

  “… there’s a simple answer to your question,” she said with a smile, “First, ask yourself, what do you fear. Second, when you know what your fear is, for example, your fear is that you will fall while jumping across the cliffs and die. Then you can understand that you are not afraid of jumping across the cliffs, but you are afraid of dying, your real fear is your death, which is, from my point of view, is baseless.”

  “How thinking about death is baseless?” he asked, “Life is all about survival, right?”.

  “Thinking about death is baseless because everyone dies, it can’t be stopped,” she said, “you can delay it, but it is sure that death will come to you, then why be afraid of dying?”.

  “But then how will we be able to make the decision needed for our survival?” he asked, “nobody can throw themselves at death every time”.

  “That is where your wit comes in,” she said, “you should be considerate about your death, you should know when to risk your life, but you shouldn’t be that much considerate that your consideration takes the form of fear.”

  “Taking some decisions in such a way that no harm will come to you, are called the smart decisions but there are sometimes, where you have to take risk of your life to achieve something, in such decisions you can die, but your desire to achieve your goal is so strong, that you are ready to risk your life which ultimately means you are not afraid of dying for your goal.”

  “You should be considerate of death, but it shouldn’t be your limitation, which you fear to cross,” she said, “fears are nothing but your limitations.”

  “I understood, mother,” he said

  “Good, now that you have understood the basics of spell casting…” said the witch, “now it’s time for practicing”.

  “I’m very excited, mother,” said Ivaan, “I always wanted to do magic and now I will finally be able to do it”.

  “Well, that’s true,” said the witch, “but there is another thing about magic…”

  “What is it, mother?”

  “It is the other side…” she said in a low whispering voice.

  “What about the other side?”