I’m Trapped in a Cube - Chapter 84

As the ghost recounted, the story of the Natural Gas Tribe slowly surfaced.

……

Long ago, the Natural Gas Tribe lived only within a single pillar, which they called-the World Pillar.

Countless Natural Gas Tribe members, in liquid form, lived in the World Pillar’s internal fissures.

Though the pillar was hard and dense, its interior was riddled with fissures, branching like tree limbs throughout the World Pillar.

At the center of the World Pillar was a great fissure running from top to bottom, where most Natural Gas Tribe members lived.

But the idea of the World Pillar wasn’t there from the start.

The Natural Gas Tribe was born in the World Pillar, and they once thought those fissures were their entire world.

All mineral tribes in the Needle Stone Forest  are born with innate wisdom, names, and some knowledge-the Natural Gas Tribe was no exception.

But this knowledge didn’t match their environment at all.

“What was the world? Was it the space made by these fissures?”

“What was the sky? Was it the branch of a fissure going up?”

“What was the ground? Was it the rock wall reached by going down?”

……

Though their heads were full of theory, their environment limited them, and they had no curiosity, so they couldn’t connect theory and practice.

As new generations appeared, their worldview grew more twisted.

If the world was completely unlike what they knew, then they wouldn’t explore, and nothing would change.

The Natural Gas Tribe, like the other mineral tribes, had only one emotion-fear.

No curiosity, no desire to explore.

Ignorance was bliss.

With no sense of crisis in the fissures, they just drifted around, sinking as liquid to the bottom, floating as gas to the top.

They were even more bored than the mineral tribes outside.

At that time, they could have explored all the fissures in their world, but no one wanted to.

But with enough numbers, there are always a few outliers like Shi Beng, those who get bored and go looking for something to do.

These outliers began exploring the fissure space-their “world.”

At that time, all the Natural Gas Tribe were concentrated in the central fissure, moving up and down in gas and liquid forms.

One outlier, bored, decided to look around, so he set off.

He didn’t, like the others, he decided to explore up and down the main fissure, but found a tiny lateral fissure and squeezed through.

He followed it for a long time, memorizing the route, until he hit a rock wall.

At that time, a rock wall meant the ground, which clashed with his knowledge.

“Why was there ground everywhere?”

He was scared-it was all too strange.

But he didn’t go back; he followed the wall in one direction.

Until he made a circle and returned to his starting point.

“The world was a circle?”

A strange sense of wrongness returned, filling him with dread.

“No! I must figure this out and get rid of this fear!”

Driven by awe, he kept exploring the fissure space.

As he explored, his awe faded, and after a long time, he memorized the map of the whole world’s fissures.

On his journey, he returned countless times to the main fissure, sharing his knowledge with his tribe.

After finishing the last fissure, he stood before the rock wall and, recalling the world’s map, saw the world’s shape in his mind.

“The world… was a pillar?”

When he had this thought, that overwhelming sense of wrongness returned.

No! No!

Terrifying.

Overwhelmed by the horror of a knowledge so different from his world, he went mad and returned to the main fissure, telling his tribe:

“The world is a pillar! The knowledge in our heads is fake! There’s no sky, no ground, no ocean! It’s just a pillar!”

“Hahahahahahahaha! It’s all fake! I’m fake too!”

Unable to bear the crushing terror, he did what no mineral tribe had ever done, committed suicide.

Nothing is more terrifying than knowing your own mind is false.

Driven by fear, the Natural Gas Tribe began exploring the fissures.

They were shocked to find the outlier was right!

The world was a pillar!

Countless Natural Gas Tribe members followed the outlier’s path and went mad with fear.

The emotion was contagious, the whole tribe could no longer live as before.

The more they knew, the deeper their understanding, the more terrifying it became!

Finally, the Natural Gas Tribe decided to execute all those who had gone mad and spread the “World Pillar theory.”

During the mass execution, something appeared-the red cloth.

In front of everyone, the red cloth appeared out of nowhere where the mad ones died.

That’s how the red cloth originated.

The red cloth was quickly hidden as part of forbidden knowledge.

As time passed, the Natural Gas Tribe gradually returned to their idle, drifting ways.

That forbidden knowledge faded from memory.

Until the war in the Needle Stone Forest reached beneath the pillars, opening the Natural Gas Tribe’s fissures to the underground caves, and they began to contact the outside world.

After that, the Natural Gas Tribe communicated with other mineral tribes and gradually learned about the Needle Stone Forest.

So, there was so much outside the rock wall.

At this point, the forbidden knowledge was revived, and they began to re-examine the world.

The Natural Gas Tribe realized the fissures weren’t the world, the world wasn’t just a pillar, and their knowledge was reliable.

The outside world was vast, matching what was in their minds-their home was indeed a pillar, but it was only part of the world.

What had once been terrifying knowledge became common sense.

Knowledge is like this: a small shift in perspective can lead to ruin.

Only then did the Natural Gas Tribe start calling their birth pillar the “World Pillar.”

This name meant they’d made peace with the fear that once loomed over them.

Because they only contacted the outside world late, the Natural Gas Tribe always seemed non-confrontational.

They didn’t join any faction, didn’t dare to explore, and kept hiding in the World Pillar, observing the Needle Stone Forest.

Until the accident happened…