房客(糙汉)何璐程曜坤

He remembered his mother, her long straight black hair, the warmth of her voice...

He also remembered their home in the slums, a windy ruin that wasn\'t fitting for a stray mutt and much less for a tiny family of two.

He also remembered the freezing-cold morning when his mother died from horrible fever in the middle of the winter... and that he was left all alone in the cruel world.

...that was when the little child began to think that all the things he seemed to remember – the other world, the game, him talking with a god and agreeing to be sent into this hellhole – it must have been all a dream...

And the little boy cried in despair - furious at himself for remembering the name of someone he dreamt to be while forgetting the one his own mother gave him – as he was just a four years old boy dying from cold and hunger.

And yet, he did not die.

When he had already lost all hope and was ready to succumb to the horrible faith, he was taken in by two men who gathered many orphans from the slums.

Unfortunately, those weren\'t good people.

Those two were giving food only to the kids who stole something and brought it to them.

The boy didn\'t want to steal and so he was often beaten up by the men, kept constantly on the verge of starvation.

He was extremely skinny and small dirty rags that were once the clothes his mother sewn for him, hung on him like on a very tiny, pitiful scarecrow.

His skin was so pale that he could be easily mistaken for a ghost, his hair was black and his eyes were like two black marbles that did not reflect any light.

If only he wasn\'t so neglected, he would be a beautiful child...

Every day was the same for him and the only difference in seasons that he could notice was when the mud on the road was sometimes covered with white frost in the morning.

He didn\'t know when his birthday, and similarly he didn\'t learn about the calendar by the time his mother passed away, so he couldn\'t know that it has been he had already spent over two years tormented by the pair of thugs, serving as an example for the other children.

|...God has duped me...|

The nameless child was thinking to himself while slowly chewing on a dirty molded chunk of bread he found dropped in the back of the bakery.

He tried really hard to remember the name that his mother gave him – he remembered it being a pretty one, at least that what she told him, but the only thing he could remember, were the details of the dream.

|...I only hope that if Miriette exists, she is safe...|

He sniffled forcing himself not to throw up the precious food – although no one else in their sane mind would call the molded bread he had as food.

The boy wasn\'t sure whether he would want the dream to be true or not – but he really wished for the safety of the black-haired girl he could remember so clearly – much more clearly than anything else, including his name.

Though it wasn\'t so weird for him to forget it since he was only referred to as \'the useless shit\' by the people who keep him for a long time already.

|There\'s no way this is the world of Kampf um die Liebe! That thing in the dream surely wasn\'t the god but the devil!|

He crushed the molded bread he was eating and waved his hand as if he wanted to throw the mushy pieces away...

...but he didn\'t, he just opened his hand and with tears in his eyes, he greedily ate what has become of the bread...

It tasted awful but he had to eat something.

Kids who brought good stuff to Edung and Boren, the two men who forced them to steal, were getting good food, but since the nameless boy firmly refused to do the same he was left to search through the garbage.

*creak*

"...!"

Suddenly the backdoor of the bakery opened and a fat wife of the baker walked out and glared at the boy.

Scared that he would be shouted at or even beaten up, he stood up and started backing away cautiously.

"...I-I\'m sorry for hiding here..."

He whimpered in a scared voice. If this was either one of the people that kept him he would already be at least mercilessly kicked.

"I-I was just looking for something to eat..."

The boy felt the need to explain what he was doing there - even though he wasn\'t doing anything particularly wrong.

"You\'re one of the Edung and Boren\'s kids, aren\'t you?"

The obese woman frowned and reached for something inside.

|Is she getting the broom...!?|

The scrawny boy became terrified - he certainly didn\'t want to get beaten with a broom! His body was already black and blue from the \'lessons\' that he received, and he clearly remembered that broomstick feels particularly painful as he got hit by it already when a butcher chased him away from his shopfront.

"..."

But even as fearful as he was, there was something in that woman\'s word that he couldn\'t tolerate.

"I\'m not one of them!"

He managed to force out a shout - although it was a very weak shout, he was hungry so he couldn\'t help it.

"Stealing i-is bad! I won\'t steal no matter what!"

If either Edung, Boren, or even one of the kids working for them heard him, he would be ruthlessly beaten up and thrown out of the house to spend the night outside in the mud.

"Eh?"

As if to confirm the little boy\'s greatest fear the woman pulled out a broom, a sturdy one, one that looked like getting hit by it would be very painful...!

"...!"

He subconsciously shuddered but did not back down, glaring at the plump woman for mixing him up with the people who tormented him - focused on that to such extent that he completely missed the plump woman flinching and letting out a soft gasp of surprise.