vaneramos | Seekers of the puzzle tree

I wrote this for free_write, but liked it so much that I'm cross-posting it here.

A monkey sat beneath the puzzle tree. Because he stayed there with his chin in his hands and an intense look on his face, everyone in the wilderness thought he was wise.

Sometimes people in faraway cities, who heard about the monkey, would set out on a journey to find the puzzle tree. They had to cross dangerous swamps, where there were many crocodiles, and some of the travellers were drowned and eaten. If the crocodiles didn't get them, the mosquitoes would, so some fell ill and died of malaria, or if they survived they would turn back and invariably be eaten by crocodiles before they reached home.

After the swamp there were high mountains, which only the most skillful climbers could scale. At the bottom of one sheer cliff there accumulated a pile of bones of the seekers who had fallen to their deaths. If they reached the tops of the mountains, many more would freeze in the heights, or get blown off the mountains by the winds. Some of them were never found.

After the mountains there lay a wide desert, and the travellers must walk for many days to cross it. But there were no paths and no landmarks, only parched earth and occasionally dunes. Those who died of dehydration were slowly eaten by the sands.

At the far side of the desert was a high green hill with a river running past. There grew many trees with fruits upon which the monkey would feed, then climb the hill and sit beneath the puzzle tree with his legs crossed, staring across the desert sands. Occasionally one out of a hundred travellers would survive the desert, and come crawling up to the foot of the puzzle tree where the monkey sat. Then they would ask their questions.

"What is the meaning of life?"

"Is there a god?"

"Why must the poor suffer?"

"What should I cook for dinner tonight?"

Then the monkey would gaze thoughtfully into the sky. After a few minutes he would reach into the branches of the tree and pull down a puzzle, which he would give to the questioner. Usually the travellers were already so starved and tired that they would perish there on the hill before ever figuring out the puzzle. So the green slope became covered with their bones and flesh. Vultures always circled the hill, and the hyenas milled about, nipping at the crawling bodies of those who had not yet died.

One in a thousand travellers would survive the journey. They would stay by the hill long enough to regain their strength, feeding on the food fruits and drinking the pure water of the stream. Then they would take their puzzles, turn around and travel back.

If they were so unlucky as to survive the return journey, they would go about their lives as they had before. No one could ever figure out the puzzles, but they became quite valuable on the black market.