Oliver Németh zo 6.A svojou poviedkou v angličtine zaujal porotu aj v celoslovenskom kole súťaže Jazykový kvet v kategórii poviedok. So svojím príbehom o fiktívnej krajine Jediman a jej obyvateľoch obsadil v súťaži 3. miesto!
Oliverovi srdečne blahoželáme k obrovskému úspechu a prikladáme jeho pútavú poviedku, ktorá si možno získa aj vás. :)
Jediman, the Land of Imagination by Oliver Németh
Once upon a time, there was an energy that exploded. This is how the space was created. The space started getting bigger and bigger and a few planets appeared. Those planets formed our solar system. Life formed on one of the planets, the planet that became our home. We named it Earth. A lot of people think there is no other life in the universe but no one can say that for sure.
Lots and lots light years away from our home there is my imagination. There is one large galaxy among others, in which there are my own planets. For me, the most interesting one is Jediman, the planet of Jedimans, creatures very similar to people. Just, they live for up to two hundred years, except the members of the royal family who live up to three thousand and eight hundred years. There are a lot of kingdoms, established long, long ago, but all having roots in one mother kingdom, The Dragon and Snake Empire.
However, I am not here to talk about history, I am interested in the present. There is one kingdom especially interesting for me. It is called The Land of Equilibrium, in which evil is trying to beat good, so the balance cannot be found. The evil is spreading everywhere, even in the smallest villages on the far edge of the kingdom. It is coming from all people who do those random acts like stealing someone’s horse, robbing houses, and even rebelling against the kingdom and its ruler. The queen Crasseibra has been ruling for over a thousand years and has been a just, responsible and caring queen. Despite all this she lost her popularity recently. That is why she is giving up her power for her still very popular daughter, the princess Modran. Let’s move right to the coronation ceremony, where the whole story begins.
“Princess, will you obey the laws and will you use your power justly?” the priest asks.
“Yes, I will,” she replies.
“I hereby declare you the ninth queen of Jediman” says the priest giving her the sceptre and the golden apple, and putting the crown on her head.
A celebration follows. Everybody congrats the new queen in joy, but there is one person who has come without an invitation and does not plan to congratulate Modran at all.
When the royal family sees her, they are very nervous. They know her quite well. Aunt Isabel did not come to bring good. The family suspects her of being the source of evil spreading in the country. They are afraid her arrival will bring a curse that would finally destroy the kingdom. Standing by the long table, she is cheerfully chatting with the guests to their surprise. The guests seem to be quite amused by the things she is talking about. The family feels relieved. She is not her to make a mess, they think. But they don’t know she once was a really good actress and she still is.
“Aunt Isabel finally stopped spreading hatred,” Crasseibra whispers to Modran.
“When I was passing by her, I even heard her saying words like “thank you” and “please”, mum! We haven´t witnessed her politeness for centuries! I hope she isn´t up to something. I wish she wasn´t,” replies Modran.
Suddenly, the two women see Isabel moving around. She stops by Magda, Modran´s sister, and whispers her something in the ear. They wonder what she just said and agree on asking Magda about it later.
When the ceremony is over, aunt Isabel heads towards the new queen and very unexpectedly she bows and as she says “Farewell, my dear,” she disappears. All you can see is just a smoke in the place where she was standing just a second ago. Other people in the hall come to her to say goodbye too.
After the celebration, the queen says to her servant to call her mum and sister. She needs to talk to them in private, in her room. When they come, worried Modran asks Magda about their aunt and their conversation. “It´s really strange but I don’t remember any of her words. Perhaps it wasn’t anything important,” Magda says.
The next few days Magda acts in a very unusual way. She does not follow her daily routine. For example, this morning everybody expected her to go for a walk in the gardens at ten o´clock, but she stayed in her room and she asked for cookies. She never ate cookies, not even as a child! She always loved salted food.
Modran doesn’t like that. She knows there is something in the air, so she goes to the library and spends there hours each day reading books about the history of their civilization. She does not leave the library, not even for a drink or a snack. After a few days she feels so exhausted she suddenly falls down and hits the floor. Falling down she tries to catch something to get her balance back and she drops a book. Lying on the floor, not able to move, she starts studying the book that has fallen next to her. The page in the now opened book gets her attention. There is a story about a chancellor of the old republic who had similar symptoms as Magda. His behaviour also changed in a second – he became a tyrant. Under his illustration, Modran notices a phrase from an old Jediman language. It says “Astana miyawa zu,” translated as “From now on you will be a different person and act in order to eliminate my enemy”.
Right after gets the information, Modran faints. Crasseibra is worried about her, so she comes to the library to check her. She finds her lying on the floor without moving. She runs to her and tries to wake up her up, but Modran does not respond. Crasseibra is afraid she is gone. She calls for a doctor and the servants help take her into her bed.
After three days of doctor´s trying, she finally wakes up just to find out terrifying news about what has happened in the kingdom. Her mum tells her while she was in the library and then while she was unconscious, somebody betrayed them. Their secret information was given to Aunt Isabel, who is now heading towards their palace with a huge army. With the information, she knows the only way how to break their magical defence that has been working for thousands of years. They cannot escape their defeat and death now.
Modran is so stunned and desperate, she forgets about what she found in the library. After a few minutes she comes back to herself and tells the story about the chancellor. Mum Crasseibra immediately calls Magda. When she comes, Crasseibra orders Modran to say the magic phrase aloud to break Magda´s curse. Right after she says “Astana miyawa zu,” the curse is over and Magda realises what she´s done. She falls to her knees and begs everyone for forgiveness. Modran says it is not her fault and after some thinking she has an idea.
“There is a way, how you can undo what you´ve done,” she says in a calm voice. Magda looks at her in hope. “Bring a parchment and a pen. You will write a letter to our dear auntie. Write:
Dear auntie,
I am sorry for my handwriting, but I am in a hurry. The whole kingdom is moving eastwards to the secret place known only to the queen. It is called Pass of Hope, which literally is their last hope, where they can hide and survive.
To find the place you must go to the east, go through Sinderet Woods, pass by Utata Lake and go through the Crystal Waterfalls – there are secret paths behind the water. Take the middle path that will lead you to Anor Desert. Follow the zambo birds that are moving to Hysteria Cliffs in this season. When you get there, step in the place. Everybody will be hiding on the other side of the cliffs.
And! Do not worry about the climate change. There might be snowing at this time of the year.
Your sincerely,
Niece Magda”
Magda does not understand why Modran is revealing their only way to escape their fate but she believes she knows what she is doing. She sends the letter and hopes, aunt Isabel will not find out her curse is over.
In fact, Pass of Hope is a place where everybody dies after stepping in. No one can get out alive. The place is the last of all hopes when there is no other way to stop the evil. The kingdom used it just once.
Not knowing about the deceit aunt Isabel changes her direction towards Pass of Hope. As she steps in, the weather suddenly changes. The icy wind starts blowing and every second it gets colder and colder. It starts snowing heavily and there are hailstones failing from the sky, but aunt Isabel is not surprised at all thanks Magda’s warning. She goes further and further until she gets right in the middle of the pass, where, as she thinks, will find people of the kingdom headed by the new queen. Suddenly, the ground beneath them is disappearing and aunt with the army she leads is falling and falling and falling… to the unknown. Then, the ground closes and the weather calms. It’s a lovely sunny day again.
The weeks pass and no one hears of aunt. However, after three weeks, a dead body is found floating in the sea. The local people bring the body to the palace because they recognize whose body it is. It is aunt Isabel.
Although aunt Isabel brought a lot of evil, hatred and pain, the royal family loved her and believed she would change. But all they can do now is to honour the memory of her by making a funeral. They bury her in the royal crypt and after saying the last goodbye, the queen says to the people of Equilibrium: “We are safe and free from evil now. Finally, there is bright future ahead of us.”