Ram then looked at Hanu, who was sitting beside him, and said
"Hanu, what you saw is not the truth; sometimes what is in front of the eyes is not always the truth."
"What do you mean?"
"Please let me and Prakhar do the speaking and you listen, and once we are done, you can then ask questions; this is the fastest way to discuss. Please don't mind." Ram said this and then looked towards Prakhar, who was sitting on the other side of the table.
"What did you see, and what do you want to say?"
"I saw a lot of things, but what I find intriguing is that the villagers were too few compared to when I visited them last time."
"Hmm and?"
"I have been to the wooden village numerous times, but I have never met this management elder before." Prakhar said and continued
"What makes me most curious is about what he gave you."
Ram heard all this and smiled, then he looked towards Hanu and said,
"Do you want to add something before I answer him?"
"I agree with Prakhar's both points of less villagers being there and never seeing the management elder before, but those are simple things. Less villagers could be because they are already facing some crises, so they are not working and focusing on their families, which could be understandable. As for the management elder, it could be because the wooden village is facing some crises and they have appointed an elder to manage the village."
Ram heard it, nodded, and asked
"What about the third point of the elder giving me something?"
"This is the most useless point; you indulged in trade for your selfish reasons, and whatever the elder gave you is yours. Why would I be interested?"
Prakhar heard this and looked at Hanu, who was again losing his emotion to anger, as if he were looking at a simple-minded person.
Ram didn't say anything for a few seconds, then said
"I think I need to clear more than just your points, Prakhar, or else I'll be blamed for a very long time."
Prakhar nodded and didn't say anything.
Ram then turned towards Hanu and said,
"Under the situation where everyone knows that the wooden village is in crisis, yet they do not allow anyone to enter their village, why do you think it is?"
"Why?" Hanu asked with confusion.
"It is because either they think that the situation is manageable by them or the origin of the crisis situation has something to do with them, and once it is disclosed, it could be very shameful or induce anger in everyone."
"But…" Hanu started to answer but was stopped by Ram's hand gesture.
"There could also be other situations, but as far as I can tell, there are neither of those. Entering the wooden village and meeting someone inside the village to understand the situation was very important."
"When we were stopped at the tree gate, it could have been many reasons, and pin-pointing the answer was not feasible, so I had to enter the village and see for myself. My offering to sell Wood Law products was basically enticing them to grow their own power and fight and win against the crises. So I was sure they would take the bait, and they did."
"This was the only option for us to use other than forceful intrusion, which I am sure no one would prefer, to enter the village."
Ram then turned and looked towards Prakhar and said:
"Inside the village, I used my mental perception to scan the surroundings and the houses and villagers."
Prakhar, after hearing this, got shocked. As far as he knew, using the mental perception below level 4, it was only up to some distance, and the way to the 'open house' had fewer houses and fewer people nearby. He had seen Ram fight Pret, and from his understanding of observing Ram, he felt at most he was at level 2 advanced or level 3 beginner. "Was he hiding his strength, or did he cultivate some additional method to enhance mental perception?" he thought in his mind.
Ram, while observing Prakhar, understood what he was thinking, but he ignored it and continued.
"And what I observed from the perception was that most of the houses were empty or had very few members in them." I felt it could be that it was normal for there to be few people, as I had never visited the wooden village before, so I focused on their expressions and actions, and I saw that all of them had sadness and loneliness displayed on them."
"Sadness and happiness are part of emotions, and I am sure no average human could be happy all the time, so sadness is also expected, but tell me one thing: if given a choice, would all sane beings prefer to be happy or sad all the time?"
"Happy," Hanu replied.
Ram turned towards him and smiled. "It is an obvious question, and even a kid can answer it. No prize for it."
Prakhar chuckled. while Hanu became a little embarrassed.
Ram then faced Prakhar and continued
"Since a person would prefer to be happy all the time, yet he or she could not control the emotions, some time going towards sadness is also fine, but all the villagers that I saw with perception had sadness and loneliness present all the time we were in the village."
"Do you know what it means?" Ram asked
There was silence for a few seconds before he continued.
"It means whatever the crisis, it is affecting mostly all the families of Wooden Village."
"So it answers the first point of villagers being less because of the crises, which are affecting not just some sections but also all the sections or categories of the wooden village, and this crises has something to do with them as the origin, and it is definitely not manageable by them."
"Wait, I understand that there are a few people in every family of the wooden village who are sad and lonely, but how can you say that it is affecting all the sections of families in the village? It could only be the crises for the poor or a few unlucky ones, and why can you say that it has origins in the same village and is not manageable?" Prakhar interjected, and surprisingly, Hanu nodded and agreed with him, and then they both looked at Ram.
Ram smiled and said,
"It seems like you guys are paying full attention to me. It's good. "The answer to this is actually linked to your second point about the new management elder and what he gave me."
"Keep this question in your mind while I answer the second and third points, and I am sure everything will be cleared then."