CHAPTER XXVIII. -The coming Race

In Chapter XXVIII of “The Coming Race,” the narrator and Taee engage in a profound conversation about life, death, and the societal values of the Vril-ya. Positioned on the broad road leading from the city to a now-closed chasm, the entryway to the narrator’s ascent into this subterranean world, they confront the startling revelation of the narrator’s impending death—an order decreed by Taee’s father under the impulse of maintaining the community’s welfare.

Taee, revealing a blend of childlike innocence and unsettling resoluteness, shares that the Vril-ya harbors no fear of death, viewing it as inconsequential to the enlightened and perpetual existence they claim to embody. This perspective deeply contrasts with the narrator’s innate fear of death, emblematic of his terrestrial, human condition, wherein love, duty, or honor are the only forces strong enough to override the dread of mortality.

The narrative reaches a climax when Taee discloses that, influenced by his sister’s folly and in accordance with his duties, he is to employ his vril staff—a symbol of both creation and destruction—to end the narrator’s life swiftly and painlessly. This revelation is met with distress and disbelief by the narrator, who pleads for an alternative, suggesting his return through the chasm he originally descended from. However, Taee reveals the impossibility of this escape; by Aph-Lin’s command, the chasm has been sealed with solid rock to prevent any influence from the outside world permeating their society.

Stricken with the realization of his inescapable fate, the narrator experiences a moment of spiritual awakening, praying to a divine presence he acknowledges in the face of his despair. This scene captures the profound disparity in existential beliefs between the two races and stirs a level of empathy within Taee, who, moved by the narrator’s fear of death—a concept so alien to his own culture—proposes to attempt persuading his father to spare the narrator’s life.

This chapter poignantly explores themes of life, death, and the ethics of a society that perceives itself as superior, through the lens of a crushing dialogue between an innocent executioner and a man grappling with the imminent end of his existence. The encounter not only highlights the clash of cultures and values but also illustrates a touching moment of understanding and potential compassion bridging the vast divide between the Vril-ya and humanity.