I think I have gauged the whereabouts of the treasure, soon I will be relieved from this exhaustive post. Well, I believe there is a necessity to brief about my identity before my leaving.

I’m the priest spoken widely among the people of Town S. I was one of the members of the island exploitation team at early days. I was merely an ordinary people, being a priest was purely the intention of the black crow himself, which I believe it is due to my capability of communicating with him. The crews were pretty uncomfortable with the wuthering voice coming from deep inside the forest at the moment they landed on the shore, just spare the scenario when the black gigantic figure appeared at their vision. The frightening voice that they feared, when it came to my hearing, has become continuous phrases that made sense with meaning. In fact, he has been living solidarily on this island, he can’t disguise his happiness on the rare visitation from the outsiders, therefore he never thought his natural behaviour of running to us will scare off the crews. Later he discovered my special capability, he brought me to cave for a talk during the night when the crews were looking out for the treasure. As time passed, they noticed I have been always absent the treasure hunting, soon my secret rendezvous with the black crow was brought to light. They demanded me to get info from the black crow on the whereabouts of the treasure. Black Crow heard the demand and spoke in a calm tone: ‘This won’t be a big deal, as long as the people reached to this island would not leave, would not disclose any word beyond this island, at the absence of outsiders for eight years, then I shall share you the treasure location.’ Even though we were clueless about the conditions are given by the Black Crow, not even I was told of any reason of those conditions, they were basically agreed to spend their eight years on this island for the sake of the treasure. I believed this has explained why there was no news received at Town S all these years.

But eight years was a long duration for certain people, the long term isolation with outside and multi-tensions caused by the uncertainties will evoke the hidden insecurity deep inside the human heart. Finally one day someone collapsed, that sense of insecurity consumed his reason totally, he became insane. He did not bother the agreement of temporality that supposed to abide, did not bother others attempt to stop him, they were not even up to against him, he then jumped on to a small boat and left away, at the same time keep repeating “A black crow, a gigantic black crow is residing on that island! Shall no stay longer on that island!”, until it was driven into the sand dust. The Black Crow no longer handled with ease when he knew of the news of fugitive movement, with a pair of malicious eyes, he spoke to me, “Your act has incurred breach of agreement, which has enraged someone that you not supposed to, hence each month one person among you shall be sacrificed to worship me until the arrival of the newcomers, and you must be the one who carries this ceremony. From now on you are the priest.” Another clueless condition again. We stood no chance to carry out the negotiation, it was either giving up the treasure or draining this island with blood monthly. In the end, everyone agreed to go for the latter. I began to curious what sort of curse lies within the treasure, causing people making unfathomable decisions.

/

我覺得我知道寶藏的下落了，我很快就可以卸下這讓我身心疲憊的職務，在我離開之前我覺得我有必要交代我的身份來歷。

我是S城人口中的祭司，我是早期的島嶼探險隊成員之一，我只是一名平民，後來當上祭司完全是黑鴉的意願，我相信這與我具有與黑鴉溝通的能力有關。遠在海岸邊著陸的時候，大家都對森林裡面隱隱約約傳來的咆哮聲感到不安，莫說當有一隻黑色的巨獸出現在大家的視線。讓大家心驚膽跳的咆哮聲在我的聽覺裡反而是一連串有意義的字句。事實上，它一直在島上孤獨地生活，難得遇到外來者它實在無法掩飾雀躍萬分的心情，也沒有察覺它撲向我們那最自然不過的行為會嚇到與我隨行的人。到後來黑鴉發現我有特殊的溝通能力，便趁在夜幕低垂大家找尋寶藏的時候的時候約我在洞穴裡聊天。久而久之，大家發現我一直缺席尋寶活動，從而我跟黑鴉每天夜晚會面聊天的行踪從此曝光。大家趁此要求我從黑鴉身上打聽寶藏的下落。黑鴉知悉，一臉鎮定沉穩的說：“這沒有問題，只要目前來到島的人不離開，不向外透露任何消息，而且在八年以內島上沒有外來者，我便告訴你寶藏的下落。” 儘管我們都對黑鴉開的條件感到不解，黑鴉也不跟我透露任何端倪，大家都同意為那份寶藏在島上度過八年，這也解釋了多年來S城沒有接獲任何來自這裡的消息的原因。

可是八年對某些人說實在太漫長了，深藏人內心深處的不安會因為長期與外界隔離以及與不確定性多番拉扯而再次浮現。有一天，有人受不了，那股不安完全吞噬了他的理性，發瘋了。他不理會時間性上必要遵守的承諾，也不理大家的阻擾，大家也多眾不敵寡，他隨後跳上小船上揚長而去，同時不停的重複“島上住著有一隻黑鴉，一隻巨大無比的黑鴉!”，直到那艘小船駛入沙塵裡。黑鴉知道有人潛逃的消息後，不再以以往沉穩的姿態來應對，它以一雙凶狠的眼神對我說，你們違約的行為已經觸怒了你們不該觸怒的人，因此你們必須每個月從你們之間選擇一人供奉我直到有外來者為止，而這儀式必須由你來主持。從此以後你就是祭司。又一個讓人不解的條件，我們也沒有談判的籌碼，要么放棄那寶藏，要么每個月讓這座島流血。最後大家還是選擇後者。我開始懷疑到底這份寶藏附有什麼詛咒讓人作出讓人不解的決定。