Episode 79. Cake (8)

I couldn’t reveal Karin’s identity, so I couldn’t fully tell Jack the warmth of the saintess that Sepia felt… .

A sincere attitude naturally comes out through actions even if he does not say it out of his mouth.

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Jack was able to tell that Karin was different from the hypocritical priests he had met so far, just by looking at the trick he showed to attract attention and looking at the person who deceived him with concern.

‘If you hate everyone, you won’t even recognize the people who try to help you.’

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Jack hadn’t lived an easy life enough to blindly believe in unpaid favors, but he wasn’t blind enough to distinguish between pretense and sincerity.

As he pondered Sepia’s advice several times, his dark eyes slowly began to light up.

“… That girl from earlier, what is her name?”

“It’s Karin.”

“Karin… .”

Karin’s transparent appearance resembled her younger sister, and the guilt that came belatedly was quite heavy.

‘Even if you’re hungry, you said you wouldn’t touch other people’s things… . Why did I do that? Bill will come to his senses when he gets ripped off.’

A younger brother who is ostracized not only by merchants but also by other beggars for being mute.

The moment I saw Karin, who was living a completely different life from my sister, I must have been temporarily blinded by the emotions I had been suppressing.

‘It’s not Karin’s fault that her sister can’t enter the cathedral.’

Realizing that he was trying to take out the anger he felt at the nearby church toward Karin, Jack bowed his head in apology to Sepia, who made him realize this.

“Sorry, wizard. Please tell Karin that I am really sorry.”

“yes. He will understand everything too. Next time we meet, show us a few tricks for the price of fruit. I really liked it.”

“… Yeah.”

“Hey, wait.”

Sepia grabbed Jack with the bag of fruit in both hands.

“Are you going already? eat and go Don’t take it.”

“I, that… .”

“Was it Bill? That friend will be arrested sooner or later. The Lang tribe followed. Eat here with him. Carry it around the market floor and take it away from the other gangsters.”

“I want to share it with my sister. I think he will be the hungriest right now.”

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Jack’s sister, who has forgotten how to speak after a head injury, is probably sitting by the river by now waiting for him to bring her food.

After hearing his circumstances, Sephia shared the burden and said,

“I will go with you. If this is taken away, your sister won’t be able to eat either.”

“… thank you.”

“No, but why is Ina so late? You fool, have you lost your way?”

Not long after the Rang people grumbled about why it took so long to catch a child, Ina appeared with a sullen face.

“What is it, Ina? Why did you come alone?”

“I missed it… .”

“… Just take off your ears and tail, let’s be human. What kind of wolf are you?”

“That is unfair! I have something called the pride of the Rang people!”

“Too much! Where is the Rang who can’t catch a kid!? What else are you holding in your hand?”

“that… .”

It is said that when Ina chased after Bill and grabbed the empty left sleeve, she threw off her top and mingled with the crowd, just like a lizard cutting its tail.

This was a survival skill Bill acquired as he was chased daily by beggars seeking his hard-earned meal.

“They disappeared in an instant, leaving only their clothes behind!? I’ve never seen anything like that!”

“Even if it’s fast, you’re a human, right?”

“Ki-ing… . I have nothing to say… .”

Sepia took the jacket from Ina and handed it to Jack.

“You give me back these clothes later. Ina, stop straightening your ears. I have somewhere to go.”

“… where?”

“I’ll explain as I go. We don’t even have time to go out-“

“for a moment! Shh.”

Ina, who had covered Sepia’s mouth and pricked her ears, suddenly began to smell the surroundings.

“A boy without a left arm, it looks like he’s coming this way again. Can you smell him?”

“What?”

“There it is!”

As swiftly as lightning, Ina poked her head out the window and pointed at Bill, who was running towards the general store.

“Look over there! he’s right wait, but… .”

* * *

‘Damn it! What now?’

The first thing that came to Bill’s mind after he managed to escape the wolf woman was that he had a unique appearance among beggars and was easy to track.

It is said that all kinds of cripples are gathered under the Skia Bridge, but Bill is the only one-armed boy.

‘Even if I abandon Jack now and run away, if the women earlier report that the beggar without a left arm is an accomplice… . Both of us are doomed!’

If a rumor spreads that two members of the troupe are targeting a poor dumb theologian, the situation escalates to the point where breakfast rations are cut off at the church, to the point where one has to pray and pray for the case to end.

The troupe, whose reputation has already gone to the bottom, may have to shut down after being hit by merchants who believe in the goddess.

If, by any chance, the Holy Knights start investigating the case… . At that time, you really have to be prepared to give up your life.

‘How can there be no way to quietly move on?’

The first place Bill was going to go was the theater.

I thought that if I was prepared to be destroyed by Tony and reported the situation to the leader, he would be able to finish this job well even if he gave the theology student and her party a large sum of money.

but.

‘What’s wrong with proud noble ladies taking bribes… . Then, the only thing to lose is your life. Shall we take all the members and threaten to kill you and me? neither is this How can we beat the wizards?’

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Just as people who are cornered have faith. If neither of these things work, you have no choice but to cling to uncertain things.

In the end, Bill chose the last resort.

“Ah, noble cleric. And great wizards! Bill without arms has come to beg for mercy.”

Even after losing his left arm, Bill has lived his life without asking for sympathy or mercy from people.

This was not because of his pride, but because he had arms, but most people looked at him as just a dirty beggar.

Or rather, because he had no arms, he was looked upon more coldly than the other beggars.

Bill, a one-armed man, was to others more unpleasant and dirtier than the average beggar.

In a situation where beggars were already crowded under the shadow of Skia Bridge, the defect of being one-armed was not a reason to easily seek sympathy from others.

Thinking that he would rather be ridiculed by taking advantage of this situation, Bill joined a theater company.

His theory was that rather than starve to death on the street while waiting for an angel, he should at least eat something like an ugly clown… .

Now, he could only hope that the gray-haired girl would pity himself on his face.

“We must have gone out of our minds for a second to try to touch the things of someone under the care of the Goddess! I have come to repent, priest. Please forgive me just once.”

Standing in front of the theological student girl who just came out of the general store, Bill deliberately groaned incessantly at the rabbit hairpin magician girls beside her.

‘The priests are all the same.’

All the priests he met reacted sensitively to the gaze of the people around him.

When I was alone, if I took off my top and begged, the person who would not even look at me, let alone hostility, would throw a few coins with a kind smile if I had eyes to see.

It would be the same for that theologian girl approaching over the wizards who were dazed as they were trying to figure out the situation.

‘It’s going as expected.’

Bill smiled only inwardly and moved on to the next strategy.

“Sophie, why are you hiding behind? I apologize to you as well.”

“… .”

“Sorry, he couldn’t talk… . This is Jack’s sister, the guy who was captured earlier. Are you too skinny?”

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Jack, unlike Bill, was proud and lacking in smirks, so it was obvious that he would bludgeon the wizard who had captured him without knowing the subject.

If it was like usual, I might have bowed my temper just thinking of Sophie, but I wonder if my frustration as I watched my younger sister keep drying up finally exploded… . The previous eyes were completely dead.

To save Jack, who was delirious, Bill brought Sophie, who had been dipping her toe into the river alone, and put her head down together.

“This happened after two weeks of subsisting on half a piece of bread a day. The child can’t speak, so I can’t go anywhere to beg. Even at the cathedral or theater company, they don’t accept it as useless. Jack worked hard to feed himself, but he couldn’t overcome hunger and made a mistake… .”

“… .”

“Even though I can’t go to the church, I’m still talking about it in the theater, but Sophie… . wait, huh?”

Bill finally stopped talking when he noticed Jack approaching from the general store entrance.

‘What?’

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Jack stood between the brown-haired wizard and the wolf woman, holding in his hand the bag of fruit they had been trying to steal.

The atmosphere didn’t look threatening for being caught, so that’s when Bill was confused.

“uh… .”

Karin, who had approached her before she knew it, knelt down on the dirt floor and began examining Sophie’s condition.

Bill stood still, watching her.

Sophie was barefoot because she had washed her shoes in the river a few days before, but Bill had hurriedly dragged them and her feet were a mess.

Sophie, who was frowning at the sand getting in between the scratches on her feet, clung to her in delight when Karin’s touch healed her wounds.

“Uh, sorry, sorry. The clergyman must be dirty… .”

Bill tried to pull Sophie away, but Karin shook her head as she hugged her.

Sophie only got away from her after seeing Jack approaching with the fruit.

Karin approached and handed over a note to Bill, who was staring blankly at Jack peeling oranges for his sister.

‘Saint Stica’ is open to the outcasts as well.’

“My arms look like this… .”

‘I hope you don’t humble yourself too much.’

The angel of the road that Bill met for the first time stroked his stubby left arm and prayed.

‘I hope that the day will come when your wounds will not be laughed at, but become hope for those in similar situations.’

* * *

Lethe has often dreamed of the rye fields lately.

It was a dream of being thrown in the middle of an endless field of rye.

The rye field, which seemed to overflow as if it were contained in a shaking cup, was sometimes the dazzling jade color of the green springtime, and other times it was the soft golden color of the clear autumn.

There were times in the middle of the night when I felt like I would go deaf to the song of tens of thousands of frogs and night bugs following the command of a shooting star.

There were times when it was broad daylight when the white clouds rolled in the sky like the foam left by the waves and were carried away by the wind.

What Lethe does in her dreams is always the same.

It is to protect the rabbits who play freely in the sea of rye from falling into the ditch in the field or being bitten by foxes.

If you wait for the sunset or sunrise with cute bunnies for a while… . I was awake from a dream.

“What time is it… ? Eh, it’s already eleven o’clock. It was a big deal.”

Shocked by the clock, Lette hurriedly made the blanket.

It was because Jun and her friends were coming to make a cake today.

Agoge 4 Building 3-28, where rumors spread that a demon lives there, and even the housekeepers turn away.

Lethe, who lives alone with Jun here, has recently been living with the pleasure of hearing from her about the Bunny Club.

Her rabbit hairpin was only for Jun, who is often bullied by Agoge’s bullies… . Her friends were also having a hard time, so I gave her a lot of help to share it with her.

I was happy to see first-year girls wearing them one by one in their hair and adventuring all over the school together.

‘If you’re going to cook, you’ll need a little more space, right?’

Lethe pushed all six beds into the corner.

“one! two!”

‘… ?’

Curiosity was aroused by the unknown sound coming from outside the window, so I opened the window to ventilate.

“Kyaaa It took!”

“Chief, please make it bigger…” !”

Princess Frill, Guardian Knight, and Carly’s friends, Zeon and Harin, were jumping rope in a group with a rope tied to a tree.

“… What?”

Lethe, who was enjoying the spectacle that could not be seen anywhere, smiled when she saw Jun and Karin whimpering in the distance and climbing over the wall.

“It will arrive soon. Then me too… . I have to turn around and come back.”

A time when Lethe wouldn’t normally be awake. At noon.

Today was the day that ghosts roam Kiruna from broad daylight.