Constantine believed.
"How should I overcome my weakness?"
"Early to bed, early to rise, nutritionally adequate, and exercise properly."
"You mean 'can't overcome'?"
"I'm just suggesting as much as possible."
"So, it can't be overcome."
After hesitating for a moment, Constantine asked again, "Do you think there is a necessity to overcome this?"
"This is a vague question. I have to take into account all your experiences in the first half of your life. I can start talking now, but perhaps you can predict some key points through questions."
Constantine anticipated that each answer would have this effect, but he was also frightened by this possibility.
Without a doubt, if he let Shiller start talking himself, he wouldn't get any more such proverbs anymore. It would be a psychoanalytical discussion on a psychological level. But if that was the case, why didn't he find a professor who was better at speaking?
Constantine had to admit, even with reluctance, that he preferred this kind of answer. Even without any evidence, or any principles that he could put into words, it seemed like blind guessing based purely on intuition. But in that moment, he saw his heart's blood on the frosty sword.
Constantine swallowed.
"What was my childhood like?"
"The root cause of your expectation for the sunset."
This answer was beyond Constantine's expectations. All the doctors at the mental hospitals where he had lived constantly spoke about the neglect and abuse he received from his father. His terrible birth family was the root of all the tragedies he had encountered.
"Why do you say that?" He couldn't help but ask.
"Because that was the only time in your life when you could sit on the lawn in front of your house and watch the sunset leisurely."
The answer was shockingly simple, but it was like a fishhook jabbing accurately at a piece of memory in Constantine's mind - he was bathed in an orange sea, watching the sun's light shining on the grass into a color that he could not describe to this day.
"What else?" Constantine wanted more.
"You don't actually like sunsets, you're just curious. Why did the creator make its color so similar to blood, your father's blood."
Constantine's fingers stiffened.
The pieces of memory were completed. On the grass, the blood seeped through the crevices of the mud. He didn't even need to turn his head to know that the blood had soaked the doormat, and inside was an arm.
"It would be good if they really were the same," Constantine muttered to himself softly, "They're not that similar."
"But I saved my father," he said again.
"Are you trying to say I'm wrong, or do you want to change this into another question?"
"If you're wrong, does that mean we're finished?"
"No, the contract just doesn't take effect, you can continue to ask, and I'll still answer truthfully."
It's like adding more fuel to a gambler's greedy fire, but Constantine decided to remain honest because he was still recovering from the shock.
"Why did I save my father?"
"His death would be the first rain in your life."
For a moment, Constantine felt suffocated.
Many doctors evaluated him, saying he was a naturally weird and crazy one, just like those juvenile murderers. If they weren't nasty enough, they wouldn't act, and if they did act, it proved that they were nasty enough.
When he was hypnotized to talk about his past, the doctors usually concluded that John was worried about his murder being discovered, afraid he'd be sent to the welfare institution if he lost his only relative, thinking he should let his father make his will before he killed him.
This was what people usually speculated, because the whole logic was like this. John Constantine didn't just kill his father in desperation.
He became involved in magic, learned about arrays, spent a lot of time gathering materials and practicing on animals, gathered all the elements and carefully arranged the Array— if he had any regrets at any moment during this time, his father wouldn't have died. Isn't this enough to prove he's a cold-hearted madman?
Constantine himself was often puzzled by this.
"Have I been bewitched?" he asked.
"No."
Shiller's firm answer filled Constantine with fear.
"You long for a world without your father, but his death also brings you pain," Shiller said slowly.
"Your whole life has been about this—sacrificing a promising future to alleviate your current suffering, so the rain will never stop."
Constantine fell into another long silence, while Shiller continued to drink his wine, one glass after the next.
"Is that what you think I am?" asked Constantine.
"Too ordinary," Shiller replied. Constantine, somewhat incredulously, asked again. Shiller elaborated.
"What I mean is, this kind of self-contradiction is too common. The vast majority of the human race spend their lives doing just that, whether it's not studying hard before exams or risking being sanctioned for crimes, essentially it's all the same."
"Then how am I different?"
"Your tolerance for pain is much stronger than that of others, prohibitively strong," said Shiller. "Chronic weakness and stress are not enough to crush your spirit, let alone erode your dreams of a better future—you can fully endure it."
"So, should I endure until the arrival of a better future? Have I chosen the wrong path?"
"You wouldn't be able to endure."
"Why?" Constantine was even more confused by this self-contradictory statement.
Shiller said that his tolerance for pain was very strong, so shouldn't the right approach be to endure and then look forward to a better tomorrow?
Yet Shiller simply glanced at the scene on the table, with its remnants of food and severed limbs, all appearing so decayed and eerie.
"You feel joy," Shiller said, looking at the corpses on the table. "You're glad these people finally got what they deserved, that they finally went where they belong—met their end brutally here."
"Not only do you find this satisfying, but you're ecstatic. And it's not because of the years of suppression they inflicted on you—it's because you're the only one left in the magical realm."
"You feel the same about your father. You didn't save him because you loved him, but because everyone he loved, sought, and eagerly awaited birth from, was already dead, killed by your hand—he only has you left."
"So, you choose to wander in the rain, making yourself their biggest tragedy in life until they despairingly realize that you're all they deserve."
"Your existence is indeed a kind of natural survival of the fittest. Intelligent people would choose death over having you in their life, because you use your rain to slowly drown all the fools."
"To take revenge for the injustice that fate has bestowed upon me?"
Shiller shook his head.
"To satisfy your arrogance that's no different from these mages. The sunset is beautiful, but if it doesn't react to your admiration in a special way, you let the rain keep falling," Shiller said, looking into Constantine's eyes.
"They are greedy for power, while you are greedy for the artistic appreciation from the ones you've chosen. For this, you're willing to live in a form that encourages art—a pure tragedy."
"This isn't a performance, you invest everything in it, using your incredible tolerance for pain as your advantage, quietly enjoying the artistic qualities that some perceive from your tragic life. This satisfies you every time you think about it."
"What about you?" Constantine also stood up, placing his hands on the table and leaning forward, "Would you regard all this as art?"
"Too many."
"What?"
"There are too many Constantines."
Constantine widened his eyes.
Shiller lightly swirled his wine glass and said, "The unique artistic quality of a tragedy is this: In a society, similar darkness guides different souls towards different endings. This reflects the subtle differences in everyone's sufferings, it is delicately beautiful."
"But if the darkness guides many people in the same direction, training them to become identical, art loses its uniqueness, becoming a bland and tasteless residue."
Shiller giving a slight shake of his head said, "So I'm lifting you up, bringing an end to your tragedy, because you're too close to me. And I hate being swamped. I'd rather buy a ticket to someplace far and watch."