The Place Where the Winds Blow or Philosophy of Death: Enchanted Worlds

By Maxwell Kofman and Valery Kofman

In the pages of the sequel The Place Where the Winds Blow or Philosophy of Death of the trilogy Enchanted Worlds, our readers will meet again with previously acquainted characters. They have all grown, and the challenges they face this time have changed as well, along with the circumstances and the geography of their next adventure.

Everything in this life takes its toll. Sometimes the cost of our mistakes is a lot weightier than money, as one cannot put a price tag on the health and life of people close to us, and neither can it be measured by any material asset. Our characters had learned this rule of life the hard way and fully experienced its wisdom in their adventures.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Mar 7, 2017
• ISBN: 9781524674915

Maxwell Kofman

Maxwell Kofman, the younger author of this book, is a tenth-grade student at Los Altos High School in California. It was a seventh-grade school essay, for which he got a perfect grade, that was the seed idea for this book. As the story and characters grew in his head and begged to be let out, he used the free time he got between school and other hobby classes to write this novel. In the last three years, the plot for a trilogy is ready. Currently, Maxwell is on the threshold of his college education, looking for a school that fits his interests. New ideas for the next trilogy have also taken roots. Inspired by his son's book concepts, Valery Kofman joined in this venture, helping Maxwell overcome his writer's block and getting his imagination into the book form. Valery Kofman is an engineer with wide experience in life in several continents, and his never-say-die attitude has infected his son.

Book preview

THE PLACE WHERE THE WINDS BLOW

OR

PHILOSOPHY OF DEATH

Enchanted Worlds

Book Two

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MAXWELL AND VALERY KOFMAN

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AuthorHouse™

1663 Liberty Drive

Bloomington, IN 47403

www.authorhouse.com

Phone: [phone]

This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, names, incidents, organizations, and dialogue in this novel are either the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

© 2017 Maxwell and Valery Kofman. All rights reserved.

Interior Image Credit: Elena Kotova

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse 03/08/2017

ISBN: 978-1-5246-7492-2 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-5246-7490-8 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-5246-7491-5 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2017903430

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models,

and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Table of Contents

Foreword

Prologue

PART ONE: TIME OF UNFULFILLED HOPES

Chapter 1. The tributaries of the stream

Chapter 2. The awakening

Chapter 3. At home

Chapter 4. Logical discourses

Chapter 5. The technical progress and revolution

Chapter 6. The cost of mistake

Chapter 7. Materialism and idealism

Chapter 8. Happy birthday, bitch

PART TWO: HELLO AFRICA

Chapter 1. City of wind

Chapter 2. Grand Marche Bazaar

Chapter 3. The benefits of applied mathematics

Chapter 4. Pomegranate flower

Chapter 5. Boubacarr

Chapter 6. Depository of human sins

Chapter 7. Venetian chevrons

PART THREE: THE LONG WAY HOME

Chapter 1. Escape

Chapter 2. Goodbye the city of wind

Chapter 3. Wrath of Amir

Chapter 4. Sandy highway

Chapter 5. Postulate of practical reason

Chapter 6. Sahara

Chapter 7. Gulnar

Chapter 8. Death as a new mode of existence

Epilogue

Glossary

In the pages of the sequel Place Where the Winds Blow or Philosophy of Death of the trilogy Enchanted Worlds our readers will meet again with previously acquainted characters. They have all grown, and the challenges that they face this time have changed as well, along with the circumstances and the geography of their next adventure.

Everything in this life has its toll. Sometimes, the cost of our mistakes is a lot weightier than money, as one cannot put a price tag on the health and life of people close to us, neither can it be measured by any material asset. Our characters had learned this rule of life the hard way and fully experienced its wisdom in their adventures.

Liah, the last book of the trilogy Enchanted Worlds ties together the fate of the characters from previous novels in unexpected and surprising ways, and unites the two worlds, which normally would have no chance of meeting. But their fate decrees otherwise, throwing an invisible bridge between them. And only echoes of the past prevent our characters from fully enjoying the upcoming holiday.

Everything in this world develops in a spiral, and the end of the trilogy is not the end of history. It is rather the beginning of the new adventures in the lives of our personages.

Foreword

Our fate is predetermined from the moment we are born. We cannot change what we inherit on a genetic basis. Some people lead a consistently dull life with no extreme ups and downs; from birth through one’s childhood, education, marriage, the same boring adult period, and retirement—everything is predictable and planned. But the life of others is different—chaotic, spontaneous and erratic, and every day is full of surprises, both pleasant and then not so much. It does not matter what that person does or where he goes, ahead of him there will always be surprises and wonders as destined by his fate.

This is the main plot of this book, which was as hard to write as it was for all the characters in this almost-true story to overcome their destined challenges.

What about the name of this book? Why is it so dark and gloomy? Where did all this pessimism come from? What happened to our optimistic, resourceful characters who were always resilient in the most difficult situations, as we knew them from the earlier book? You may well ask.

It is simple. They grew up, matured, and faced situations where they had to take responsibility for their own actions, like we all do, and pay for the consequences of our doing.

So, what is this book about, the inquisitive reader may wonder. Yet another ethnic minority tale? Cannibals, ancient rites, and rituals?

Actually no, not at all. There are so many more complex problems in our society, in various parts of the world, and it would be wrong to concentrate on only one of them. The world shudders from senseless wars, ruthless piracy, and incurable diseases while humans suffer from hunger and overeating …

Wait a minute, what does the overeating have to do with world issues? You would probably be curious.

How can you compare it with the other problems of mankind? Take hunger, for example. This really is the scourge of our time. In one part of the world, we without any hesitation, buy expensive luxury items while in other regions, the same amount of money could have saved a hundred people from starvation. Why don’t we talk about that? Wouldn’t that be a better subject of discussion?

Of course, that is true. But we are not going to eradicate the vices of humanity and solve the world’s problems, which our society has been trying to fight unsuccessfully for so many years. This is beyond our ability. And even more so, we do not want to discuss well-known global issues. However, there is evil and cruelty in little, hidden parts of the world, unknown to us, of local importance, so to say. In fact, we don’t even know whether it is an evil thing at all. And this is what we want to talk about, and let our reader be the judge.

But, as usual, this book is not about that either. We just wanted to impartially tell you the true story of the friends, maybe exaggerating and embellishing it just a little. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. As said in the Old Testament¹: To everything there is a season: … A time to kill and a time to heal … A time to weep and a time to laugh … A time to throw stones and a time to gather …

Prologue

The death of a human being is always sad and horrible regardless of the deceased one. But the demise of a good person, someone you know, somebody who was close to you, is a hundredfold worse.

They stood at her grave with bowed heads. Heavy tropical rain poured hard from the sky, but no one seemed to notice it; they were already soaked to the skin, and it didn’t make sense anymore to rush under cover. Everyone was engrossed in their own thoughts thinking about something completely abstract, detaching themselves from reality.

The tombstone was a large plain rock that they had found nearby, without engraved dates of birth and death, without names or the photograph of the deceased resting in peace under it. Just a nameless stone in the burial ground on the outskirts of the village, like many others scattered elsewhere. A few bouquets of wilted wildflowers were laid at the base as a last tribute from those who knew, loved, and remembered her. In a few years the place would be overgrown with weeds and there will be no trace of the grave left. Perhaps a random wayfarer would sit down on the stone to rest a little, not knowing that the remains of a person were underneath it; a good person who could have lived for many more years, but whose fate decided otherwise.

Everybody stood in silence with no sign of crying. Tears are useless and feigned; they cannot always express the fullness of the loss that has befallen us. A mournful silence is sometimes more eloquent than a flow of tears. It is not what is on the outside that matters, rather what is inside a person’s heart that reflects their true emotions. There was a deep sadness and despair, in the hearts of all those present, an irrevocable sense of hopelessness.

He approached her, and took her hand.

Let’s go home, we cannot bring her back. Life goes on and we shall try to live on as well.

Why? What for? she asked.

I do not know. Probably just to live.

The question caught him off guard. She was right. Why? What are we living for?

We shall live to remember her, said another, standing nearby. As long as we breathe—we remember; we will live with the memory of her and our loved ones. But as soon as we die, the memory of them will vanish with us. Therefore, we shall live as long as possible, in spite of our enemies.

He turned around and walked away, and everybody followed him. And she went too, slumped and weighed down by her loss.

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PART ONE

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In the name of God, Most Gracious, Most Merciful!

Thee do we worship, and Thine aid we seek.

The Philosophy of Illumination, Shihäb al-Din al-Suhrawardi

Part One: Time of Unfulfilled Hopes

Chapter 1. The tributaries of the stream

Rain poured from the sky.

So what? What’s wrong with that, one might say. That is just a natural phenomenon that we are all used to, just like the sight of the setting sun or the moon and stars in the sheet of the night sky.

But it is hard to get used to this kind of rain for someone not accustomed to tropical weather. It can only be compared to a busted pipe in the shower if the region could be scaled down to the size of a bathroom. Modern plumbing, like the weather, is unpredictable. Everything would have been working perfectly well, but suddenly the shower pipe bursts or the faucet gasket leaks (there are so many vulnerable places in the piping) and a powerful water-jet strikes from the damaged site. Then a heavenly plumber comes in and replaces the pipe, twirls and tightens a few nuts, and puts Teflon tape on the thread. The leaks disappear, and the rain stops. Not for long though. The fixed ’pipe’ lasts a day or two perhaps, maybe a month. But soon the heavy, leaden clouds return, covering the azure sky, and water pours down once again.

Rain was coming down hard. An old bus with faded advertising on the side was slowly making its way along the village street. Windshield wipers could not keep up with the amount of water falling from the sky and the driver’s eyes ached from the constant strain of blinking and trying to view the road through the glass. At least the street was familiar to him; he knew every detail, down to its smallest cracks, and it helped him move forward and not get stuck in a deep pothole filled with water.

Roads in these areas have always been a disaster. Due to the frequent and prolonged rains they deteriorate quickly. The asphalt crumbles, and powerful streams of water wash its remnants away into the sea. Local authorities repair the roads from time to time but the new coating doesn’t last long either, and by the next rainy season the pavement is covered with deep potholes yet again. Then someone decided not to waste money on costly repairs and simply patch the deepest ruts with gravel at the end of the rainy season.

The bus approached a familiar house. The driver slowed down, pulling as close to the gate as possible, and rushed inside. In the few yards he had to run in the rain, he was soaked to the bone. An elderly woman with a face indented with deep wrinkles came to meet him at the door.

I’m glad you could make it, Hubert. I thought you would not show up in such bad weather.

Hello, Igissy. I promised you I would come, so here I am. But I am not going back today for sure, and will stay overnight, if you don’t mind, the driver replied.

I would not let you go back home anyway, she chuckled. You have to come here tomorrow morning anyway, why should you drive back and forth in such bad weather? Take off all your wet clothes. I’ll wash and dry it by tomorrow. She gave him a bathrobe to change into. Hurry, dinner is getting cold.

Hubert changed quickly and sat at the table in anticipation of a hot meal. Igissy flatly refused to talk about business before dinner. They had known each other for many years, and Hubert knew it was useless to argue with her. However, he wasn’t going to argue and ate his meal.

Wow, you even cooked chicken today, he grinned. What is the occasion? Don’t tell me you slaughtered one just for me.

You wish! Igissy quipped. I thought Emma would come today, and I wanted to feed her a little while she is here. But in this weather she will not come; the rain has lashed for a few days in a row, and the forest is impassable now.

Igissy put on the table a bottle of wine she kept for special occasions.

Drink a little, it will warm you up, she said. You are not going to drive today anyway.

Having finished dinner, they moved into the small living room. Rain was still pouring down and heavy drops were drumming on the window. Occasional bright lightning flashed in the darkness, and a few seconds later thunder rumbled from the sky, but the house was dry and cozy inside. They sat at the table and discussed business. Igissy brought a notebook and a couple of sharpened pencils and Hubert took notes, commenting on each line aloud. They spoke vigorously, unlike grown-ups conducting an important business meeting. Igissy interrupted him, angrily forcing him to expunge or rewrite certain notes, and he argued back, defending his thoughts. But at the end of the heated discussion, they concurred nevertheless. Hubert summed up all the entries, wrote the final number at the bottom of the page, put a dollar sign in front of it, and circled the sum.

This is how much we would need, he concluded, leaning back contentedly in his chair. We cannot do it for any less.

The required amount of money turned out to be quite large, but the task they had on hand was not easy. Igissy brought from the other room a pillowcase packed with money and poured it on the table. Banknotes lay scattered on the tabletop, covering it in a thick layer.

About ten years ago the first cruise ship had entered the harbor of this village, and entranced by the exotic beauty of this coastal land, tourists had poured in, improving the economy of the region and the wellbeing of its residents. Once a week people from all over the world swept away from the market stalls outlandish trinkets and ornamentals of the local craftsmen in unlimited quantities, fascinated by the unknown civilization and culture of this Terra Incognita. Igissy was also among these souvenir sellers, constantly bringing home a pile of cash in small bills.

The first few months, she scrupulously counted the money and sorted it, one president to another, denomination to denomination, and recorded the amount earned in a special notebook. The lump of money increased quickly as banknotes from all over the world flowed in. Some bills were from unknown obscure countries and Igissy set them aside for later identification. All the while, she promised herself that tomorrow she would go to the bank, to count them and exchange these unknown bills for local kinas, but new priorities always came up each morning, and the money count was delayed again and again. Before she knew it, a week sped by and another pile of bills filled the big shoe box, which she had found in a pile of garbage on the shore and had adapted for money deposits. The box had filled up quickly, and soon the storage of the money become an issue. But Igissy solved this problem by simply pouring all her savings into a large pillowcase. And now, a decade later, this improvised piggybank became a tightly packed bag with a pile of banknotes from many countries around the world. Igissy had lost track of the money a long time ago and had a vague idea of the total amount.

We won’t complete the money-count until the morning, Hubert said, looking horridly at the colorful heap of bills.

Nonsense, we will finish it in no time, Igissy replied optimistically.

Who said that it is easy and pleasant to count money? It is, in fact, quite difficult, and there is nothing pleasant about it either. The banknotes were from all over the world, different in size and denomination. There were pounds, pesos, yens, rubles, francs, shillings, rupees, drachmas, not to mention banal dollars with euros and local kinas. Some of them were large in size that probably hardly fit in one’s wallet to the smallest one, barely exceeding the size of a matchbox. Some bills were easy to identify, while the ligature on other bills was written in bizarre characters and one could only guess which country they belonged to.

Why did you accept all this money? Hubert asked in surprise looking at the colorful pile.

I took only local kina, dollars, or other known bills, the woman replied. But Emma was taking everything when she was little. Many tourists gave her money out of pity for the child, without even buying anything. She couldn’t just tell them ‘sorry, I accept only dollars.’

I guess you’re right, Hubert sighed. Well, let’s try to sort and count all this treasure.

After a few hours, a dozen wads of money were laid at the table neatly tied, with the paper indicating the country of origin and the total sum. Pedantic Igissy recorded all unidentified banknotes on a separate page in the notebook, with the description and denomination of each bill. Hubert stretched wearily. His eyes ached from all the monetary chaos and dim lighting. He was about to go to sleep, but Igissy put on the table a big, heavy glass jar filled with coins. Hubert jumped up from the table in fright.

You also want to count that?!

Of course I do, she calmly replied.

You’re crazy, he muttered, getting back to the table. I think you fed me with the chicken on purpose, knowing how much work we have to do counting your treasure.

Oddly enough, they coped with the coins much faster, picking out only the most significant ones. All the smaller change they poured back into the bottle for better time. Soon the rolls of coins were added to the stack of bills.

I am going to sleep. Hubert rose from his chair resolutely. And don’t tell me you have another bag of coins hidden in your backyard. It is past midnight now and I have to work tomorrow. And you do too, by the way, if you had forgotten.

The next day after work, Hubert packed the wads of cash in a bag, and left the town with her entire life savings, promising to exchange all the money for local kina.

Igissy had known Hubert for a long time. She knew him to be an honest person whom she could trust. But she also knew that even the sincerest man cannot always resist temptation, having such a large amount of cash in his hands. She had been saving all her life for her granddaughter Emma, hoping that this money would give her an opportunity to leave the tribe and move into civilization, starting a new life. Losing the money, Igissy’s life would have lost all meaning, and the little worm of doubt that lives in the soul of every one of us was occasionally making skeptical remarks, bringing about discord in her soul.

Igissy persistently drove unpleasant thoughts away as she didn’t believe that Hubert would rob her, but days were passing one after another, and there still was no word from him.

The skeptical worm was declaring itself louder every day, and Igissy’s counterarguments were becoming shorter and quieter. And one day the worm, fed by her doubts, grew, became stronger and turned into a large snake, filling all the space in the soul of the old woman, forcing away all her other feelings and thoughts. The worm-snake was no longer whispering but shouting in a deep bass voice:

You are an old fool. Your head is full of gray hair but life didn’t teach you anything. How could you trust a complete stranger with all your life savings? He is not your son or brother. He is not even your neighbor. Yet you willingly handed all your money over to him. You deserve to be fooled, since you learned nothing in your worthless life!

A week later, yet another ship with tourists came to the port. Igissy was selling souvenirs and waited for the right moment to demand explanations from Hubert, but that moment never came. In the morning Hubert took a group of tourists on an excursion to the jungle, and then Igissy was busy with customers. When the flow of tourists dried up, Hubert went home, without even saying hello to her. It was then she had become enlightened. She wanted to go to town and look for him but soon she realized that it was pointless, as she didn’t even know his address. Madang is a big town, and it is impossible to find someone there searching blindly. Igissy paced the room in her little house, cursing herself for such credulity. Too much was at stake; a lot depended on that money.

It had all started six months ago when she suddenly felt unwell. Throughout her life she had never been ill and hadn’t seen the doctor in years. But now, without any warning, she had fainted and sunk to the floor feeling weak in the legs. Good thing her neighbor came by and helped her to get to bed, advising her to visit a doctor in Madang, but she only waved it away; it was obvious, she was getting old, and with age comes disease and infirmity. Igissy treated herself with herbs as usual, and a week later, when Emma came by, she was already on her feet doing her usual errands at home and in the yard. She didn’t say anything to her granddaughter, but thought that Emma didn’t have any relatives other than her grandmother, and if anything should happen to Igissy, Emma would be all alone in this world. Yaga would force her into marriage, and soon she would become a tired old woman, mother of a few children. By her thirties she would grow completely old, as Igissy had, and her mother Jarra had, and her grandmother had, whom she vaguely remembered.

Igissy could not let that happen. She had worked all her life, saving each hard-earned kina. She did not refuse any hard and dirty job so as to make enough money to enable Emma to move to town and start a new and civilized life. She had hoped to go back to Madang with her, but now she realized that her time had passed and she would never survive yet another move. So Emma would have to do it by herself.

Once she recovered from her illness, Igissy took a notebook and some pencils, sat down, and wrote a letter. She was writing to complete strangers; people who by some irony had come to the island and had lived in her house for several days and generously paid for her hospitality at the end of their stay. Apparently they were good people, quite wealthy, and would be able to help her. Igissy started a new page and wrote:

Dear Mr. Rupert and Mrs. Margaret …

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Ben entered the elevator and pressed the button for the top floor. It seemed like everybody were trying to hide in the coolness of the shopping center on this hot summer day as the parking lot was full, right up to the roof. Ben spent the last few hours walking through the mall, going from one store to another, buying everything necessary for Emma’s arrival from the long list, prepared by his mother. Bags no longer fit in his hands while the list didn’t get any shorter. Margaret, his mother, had planned to buy everything herself, but then something urgent came up at work and she had been coming home late every day. Ben dragged his feet as long as he could, hoping that she would be free from work, but time was running out. He had to put everything aside, and went shopping.

Make sure that the bedding matches with the washbasin towels and they must be the ones with the strips around the edges, so they are easy to straighten, Margaret admonished her son before he went on his shopping spree. Ben tried to reason with her, saying that all her life Emma had lived happily without towels, and it was unlikely that she would care much about the color coordination of her linens. And she certainly wouldn’t give a damn about how straight her towels were. But Margaret demanded that he do it, not only for her but also for himself.

I care about that even less than she does, Ben argued. Besides, we don’t even need to buy new stuff as we already have plenty of everything at home.

However, Margaret insisted, saying that they had taken responsibility for the girl, and must do everything properly. Ben looked at his father hoping to find support from him, but Rupert didn’t want to get into the dispute, avoiding unnecessary confrontation with his wife, and took her side without questions. His duties included providing for the family and supporting all the whims of each member, which he was doing successfully, and he didn’t want to delve into any unnecessary details.

You have a very odd idea about responsibility for the girl, Ben muttered, realizing that he would not get any support from his father.

He sighed, took the list, and went shopping, putting aside everything else. That was very amiss, as their Game occupied all his spare time.

The project, code-named the Game had begun a few years ago with an invention that belonged to his friend, Marcus. He had developed the program that allowed them to breach the security of the most protected computer networks, and penetrate into the sanctum of every company, its data center, regardless of whether it was a toy factory or the central bank of any country. The only difference was the network complexity and the time they had to spend breaching their multi-layered security.

No, they didn’t transfer money from banks into offshore accounts, nor did they engage in industrial espionage, or sell trade secrets to competitors. The sole purpose of breaking into the networks was to find information, anything from the name of the marketing director to the date of birth of a client in the bank.

The rules of the Game were simple. A player who found some information on any network in the world that was of interest to him, posted a query about it on his page. The other players had to find the right answer to the question. That’s all. Sometimes they left a harmless file on a server, forming a so-called catch. The second player had to find the catch and copy it onto his directory as confirmation of the successful hacking of that network. These were the rules of their Game. The only thing forbidden to the players was to use their knowledge for personal gain and to intervene in the affairs of the hacked company.

For each correct answer, or discovered catch, the player earned points, but only if he spent less time than allotted in accordance with the complexity of the network. If he spent less time than the player who created the catch, his score was doubled, while the creator of the challenge lost his points. Subsequently, earned points formed into virtual medals and titles. Although the awards were not real, it was nevertheless interesting.

The Game was based purely on passion, a sense of omnipotence and of impunity, which cannot be bought by money. Besides, the players were not interested in making profit. They were all from wealthy families, and could not be tempted by few hundred bucks. But the adrenaline in their blood bubbled like the fountain in the square in front of the Justice Palace.

They had played the Game for a few years now, but the passion for it did not fade out, on the contrary, it grew with each passing day. The number of points earned in the Game was rapidly increasing, filling the players’ personal pages with virtual accolades and titles. A knowledgeable person could tell a lot looking at these awards—one’s points counter spun incessantly, non-stop, giving the player sonorous titles, while another’s page had only a seedy medal in the corner. Therefore, ambitions in the fight for awards and titles also grew.

At first, all the players started slow and didn’t do too well. They had yet to learn to crack complex network security, sort the information located on the servers of the company, and sift through thousands of unnecessary files to find the information they were seeking. Over time, once the Game gained its momentum, the players got sorted according to the individual character traits inherent in each of them. One was calm and slow, but persistent in achieving his goal, while another was fast, but lost interest in the catch just as swiftly, not being able to breach the network in his first attempt. The third had excessive assiduity and sought the catch even at the risk of losing points. All players had been stratified and grouped by their levels of knowledge. Some players went far ahead while others were still lagging behind.

At first Ben had been a leader in the Game. But later he began to lose points, while the other participants quickly advanced, and soon he ended up somewhere in the middle of the group surrounded by other players of his level. Right now another gamer was literally breathing down his neck. He was one of the founders of the Game, his friend and colleague since schooldays—a boy nicknamed Richter. This name derived from his virtuoso typing skills. Richter claimed that he polished his typing through a special technique, achieving impressive results. Once, during a meeting with the Game members, someone exclaimed, looking at his typing: Wow, you’re just like Richter!

Nobody knew who Richter was, but the resounding nickname stuck to him like a burr. Turned out that Richter was a famous Russian pianist, with whom the grandmother of the boy was personally acquainted. Due to Richter’s typing skills, he managed to close in on Ben.

In the Game, not only were good technical skills important, there was also a huge emphasis on strategy. Ben knew that Richter was fast and got his points through speed. He had discovered every catch of Ben’s and his timing was always better, causing Ben to lose points, while Richter doubled his. But Ben also knew that Richter was conceited and fought hard for his score, therefore, he did not like to take on complex catches, risking the chance of losing. This is where Ben came up with a trap for him. He found a small, unpretentious company with a simple network. However, the apparent simplicity was deceptive and, in fact, it turned out to be well secured with sophisticated hardware that cut out all attempts to get beyond the firewall. It was not clear why this company was so well protected. It was just an ordinary metal fabrication shop, but oddly enough, their security was compatible with that of a large bank and Ben spent a lot of time breaching their network.

At first he was puzzled by such a phenomenon. Usually the network security of any financial institution or similar organization is expected to be high, unlike the manufacturing unit of, say, an enamel pottery enterprise. But then he decided not to bother trying to understand this fact. They probably had good sales last year and were now flooded with cash, spending it on all kinds of upgrades. He hacked their network, made a catch, and listed it on his page. Now he was waiting with great interest for Richter to bite the bait. He would, no doubt, fall for it and then stumble on this catch, losing points as a result. And now, at this crucial moment, when the fate of his match with Richter was on the line, he had to postpone everything and go shopping, buying all sorts of rubbishy goods for Emma.

It had been six months since they received the letter from Igissy, Emma’s grandmother, whom they had met during that ill-fated vacation in New Guinea. He had already forgotten the events of that trip five years ago. Ben had grown, graduated high school and gone on to university, achieved a black belt in aikido, and so much more had happened in his life! The events of those days were gradually getting erased from his memory. Only rare letters from Emma reminded him of those adventures. Her letters were not so rare, to be frank, but he replied to them with decreasing frequency.

First, when he came home, he immediately