Ruthorn went on explaining, “The way to survive and not fall victim to the latter type is by surrendering to everything without any conditions. Surrender without judging who is right or wrong, surrender without considering if it is fair or unfair, surrender to any advantages or disadvantages you might have. Surrender from the first moment you interact with those people.”

“But if I act in this way, won’t I lose the opportunity to wake them up from their state of deep sleep?” I challenged him.

“If you follow my suggestions, this might exactly be the right way to wake them up because they are not used to the method of surrendering as an expression of love. In fact, they may have never experienced a love as great as yours before in their life. When they receive it for the first time, they will probably be bewildered. But when they know how much it impacts them, they might think about it, and in the end, the experience of the pure love you have shown them could become the bridge between themselves and love. And if they are lucky, they will wake up.”

“But if you don’t treat them with pure love, you will not only lose the chance to help them, but you can also become a victim yourself,” Ruthorn added, almost as an afterthought.

“Then how do I know if the way I treat them is done correctly?”

“Well, that’s easy,” replied Ruthorn. “Every time when you say or do something to someone, always try to be aware in your heart whether it is love and goodwill that drives you to say or do that, or if it’s rather the desire to win. Whenever your desire to win is stronger than love, you should think twice about what you intend to say or do.”

“What exactly do you mean when you say ‘the desire to win’?” I asked him.

“The desire to win is the desire of wanting to express your identity, your ego. You may get confused sometimes and be tempted to use love as an excuse to win, and by that you would make a double mistake. Putting the desire to win before love means that you are trying to make another person yield to you. This could be your subconscious desire to see him lose, to have him believe you, to listen to you, to accept what you are telling him, thereby getting him to adapt to a situation, or to change. If the act of surrendering isn’t caused by true love that you have for that person, it means that you only want to gain power over someone and have him surrender to you.”

“If you believe in your ideas but you can’t make another person understand them, it’s not that person’s fault. And as soon as you start arguing, it often leads to conflict or discrimination. The one who makes this differentiation is you, since you are the one discriminating people into believers or non-believers. By doing that, you treat the non-believers as outsiders to your group. And when you’ve reached that point, you have already cut those people off from you, and that would be a terrible mistake,” Ruthorn pointed out.

“You have to understand that this situation is only temporary, and it basically means that you – and the people you interact with – still need more time. You don’t have any right to judge them.”

“I have to warn you that you should be very careful because this is a very delicate matter that goes far beyond any basic desire to win. By suggesting that ‘you have to believe me’ or ‘my belief is better than yours’, you already force your belief upon others. At that point, you wouldn’t be using love as your guide. You would end up winning in a primitive way, or in the way that you’re used to winning. In other words, this is the way to gain power through external factors, namely, making things seem bigger than they are, owning more than others, making it look better than it is, making it more beautiful than it is, or even trying to make you more admirable. All of these are only external factors, and they don’t convey true power. The only true power is love.”

“By using love to guide you in everything you do, the result you get at the end will be an absolute victory. Your actions won’t be driven by the desire to win any more. And if you don’t use love to guide your actions, you won’t be representing God anymore, so please understand this matter clearly and take it very seriously,” Ruthorn said, emphasising his words.

“I think I basically understand what you are saying, but I may not understand it in its full depth yet,” I admitted.

“Don’t worry, you already have the quality that most don’t have, which is the connection with God. He will tell you everything you need to know, word by word and minute by minute.”

“Will God be with me all the time?” I asked.

“Yes, He will be with you and with everyone else who listens to His voice and acts in His will,” he confirmed.

“Anyone who can do this has a soul similar to the soul of the plants and animals, who, as you remarked earlier, have an advantage over you humans. But in fact, you’re not at a disadvantage at all, you actually have more advantages than they do as you have more ownership. You own a body that is capable of doing whatever you want it to do. You have a brain, and you can think. But animals and plants, however, can’t do anything beyond what they have been assigned to do,” Ruthorn explained.

“Well, I don’t want to rush you, but you have to go back to your world today. We only have two or three hours left for the preparation. Is there anything else you want to ask?”

This took me completely by surprise. “What? Today already? In two or three hours? Why is this so urgent? I had hoped I could spend a few days with my wife before departing …” I protested.

“No,” Ruthorn said firmly, “portal 16 will only open today for a short window before noon. If you miss that, you would have to wait until portal five opens, which is estimated to be in 10 years’ time. That would definitely be too late for your mission.”

“Isn’t there another portal I could use?” I pleaded with him, desperately trying to find a way to stay for a little bit longer.

“There’s one on Mercury which will open in a year from now, but in order to use it we would have to travel from Tuengra to another star in our solar system first and then wait until the portal there opens to get to Mercury. Then we could travel to your world from Mercury. However, the only beings who can use this path must be of semi-energetic form like me. A purely physical form like you wouldn’t be able to do that as the magnetic poles in your body cells would be severely damaged. And also, it will take my spaceship at least twenty-four hours to travel from Mercury to your world,” Ruthorn said.

“A whole day?” I questioned. “Even considering that your ship can travel at a speed rate of 700 kilometers per second?”

“Yes, that’s how long it would take,” Ruthorn nodded.

“Sounds like I don’t have a choice, do I?”

“No, I’m afraid you don’t.”

“There’s another reason why you should go today. Nobody would be able to bring you back to your world later, because all the highly evolved beings will be sent there today for the very last time. Everyone has to leave except me. I have to remain here.”

“That means that Hepf and Piet are going to take me there and I would travel in their spaceships, right?”

“Yes, that’s right.”

Although deep in my heart I yearned to be with Koharu, I couldn’t help but feel excited about the prospect of finally travelling in one of the alien spaceships.

“Alright then, I’ll go with Hepf and Piet,” I agreed.

“Very well,” Ruthorn said, and I could see that he was pleased by my acceptance.

I turned to Hepf and Piet. “Tell me, what do I have to do when I’m on your spaceship?”

“Relax,” Hepf replied, “you don’t have to do anything.”

“Well, I mean if I have to change my clothes and wear something like that,” I said and pointed at the suits they were wearing because I assumed I might be required to wear one as well.

“No, that’s not necessary. You can come as you are because you’re not a pilot. It’s only necessary for us pilots to wear these suits,” Piet replied this time.

“And while we are traveling, are there any guidelines I should follow? I’d like to know what I should do first,” I said as I felt quite eager to do everything right.

“As a passenger, you don’t have to do anything. There are a lot of rules, but only for pilots,” Ruthorn replied with a smile.

“It’s good thing though that you brought this matter up,” he added.

“Hepf and Piet are quite junior pilots, and they would indeed need to do their dry runs until they are proficient enough to be allowed to travel between the stars. But in the current situation, we really need to activate as many people as we can, and they are the only two pilots left in the city. Although their flying skills are not on par with the desired standards yet, we have to let them fly.”

“I don’t want to alarm you, but normally, a pilot of a ship that carries passengers must show his credentials and experience of having flown back and forth for at least 10 times. This means that a pilot must have lived on Gaia for over 2,000 years.”

“But Hepf and Piet have only been on the training program for a short time, and they now know how to land without the assistance of instructors. Incidentally, they haven’t been to your world before.”

“In order to safely fly these spaceships, the pilots need to have a very high level of concentration, especially when focusing on the reactions of the particle accelerator in the magnetic field separator. Therefore, it’s very risky to allow a passenger to fly with newly trained pilots.”

“For this reason, Areeya, I have to set a rule for you. I have to ask you to strictly focus your mind on regulating your breathing all the time. Don’t speak and don’t ask any questions until you get their permission to do so, is that clear?” I could see that Ruthorn was very serious about this, so I nodded in agreement.

“That’s alright with me, I’ll do exactly what you told me.”

Then Ruthorn turned to address Hepf and Piet. “Listen carefully: you have to follow every regulation more strictly than ever before. There can’t be even one tiny mistake.”

“And Hepf, I have decided that Areeya should go with you,” he added.

“With pleasure,” Hepf replied, beaming with pride.