The Voice of Death

Years ago, there was a man who was very poor. 

The poor man prayed long and hard to become rich. 

Finally, his prayers were granted and he became very rich. 

But now the man did not want to die. So he decided to go in search of a country where people did not die. 

He roamed from one place to another in search of such a country. Whenever he came to any new place the first thing that he would ask the people of the new country was whether anyone had died in the place.

Naturally every single person that the man had met, told the man that people in their city had died and would continue to do so.

Then the man packed his bags and moved on to another city.

Finally, the man came to a city and he asked the same question here. 

The man whom the question had been asked was a little surprised. "No, people do not die here. But we all hear a voice, and after that, we just follow the voice and vanish from here, never to return."

"Do the people who hear the voice see the person who has called them?" Frankly, the man was astonished at the stupidity of the people who followed the person that had called them though they knew that they cannot be back from where they are going.

The man who answered the question was himself unsure about who could see the caller, but he was sure that those who were called would definitely be able to see the person who was calling them.

But the man was sure that this was the city that he had to Settle down in. He collected all his property, and along with his wife, went to Settle in the country where people did not die, but were called by a certain person and then never came back. He warned his family not to follow anybody who called them no matter who it was.  

The next few years were very happy for the man and his family. 

When they were all sitting in their house, his wife suddenly turned towards the wall. 

"I'm coming, I'm coming." She told an invisible person. 

She looked around the room for her jacket. 

However, her husband caught her and shook his head.  "Stay here, otherwise you will die."

The wife looked impatient. "Can't you hear how he is calling me? I will just see what he wants and come back at once."

The husband tried his best to stop the wife from following the voice. He even closed the doors and windows of the house. 

However, the wife resisted and left her husband's grasp and rushed on screaming that she was coming.  

The husband finally saw that he could no longer stop his wife and went back to his house. 

He realized that he had warned his wife, but she had not followed his advice.

After this, a few years passed again and nothing else happened in the man's house.

One day the man went to a shop. 

He heard the voice.

Then the man fearfully shook his head. "I won't come!"

The shopkeeper and all the others stared at the man in amazement. 

However, this man looked at the door and shook his head. "I will not come. Go away from here."  

However when he heard the voice again, he angrily picked up a knife from the shopkeeper's hand and ran after the voice crying, "I will show him what it is to continuously annoy people!" 

With that he ran at full speed after the person who had called him. 

The poor shopkeeper did not want to lose his knife and also ran behind the man who was screaming and running out of his shop.  

At that time, when they passed the city, the man brandishing the knife in the air fell into a deep chasm and he did not come out again.

The shopkeeper took his knife and told everybody what had happened.

Everyone believed that the people who had gone away and not returned had fallen into that deep chasm.

Then after all this was over they all went to see the chasm. They were shocked because there was nothing but broad plain land and the chasm was no longer visible.

Since that day, the people of that city also died like the human beings in the rest of the earth.

Adapted from Romanian folktales