Chapter 63: Rank 11 (3)
Orphanage.
It was a word that had no connection whatsoever with Harang, who had lived a life somewhat akin to a thug.
Of course, it wasn't that he didn't know the meaning itself, but since he had never actually set foot in one, it was an unavoidable fact that he couldn't easily grasp the nuance the word carried.
Therefore.
Harang, who took his first step into the orphanage, couldn't help but look around with a dazed expression.
“Hey! Let’s play in the sand!”
“If you don’t put it out, you lose, rock-paper-scissors!”
“That’s mine!”
“Ah! I need to use it too!”
“……”
‘Why is the atmosphere like this?’
It couldn't be helped.
It was because the atmosphere was so different from what he had expected.
As mentioned earlier, Harang didn't know much about orphanages.
However, he could make an educated guess, as he too had memories of being in a similar place.
It was the ‘village’.
‘A place where numerous children gather to learn something from adults…… Perhaps, the place I was in was also called an orphanage on the outside?’
Of course, it didn't even take a minute to realize that the village and the orphanage were completely different places.
It was too peaceful.
It was too serene.
And in the midst of a very gentle atmosphere, children living in a warm atmosphere filled the orphanage.
That evoked a sense of incongruity in Harang.
For a moment, he felt so dizzy, so mystified by the different emotional tenor of this place, that he didn't hear Hagio's words twice.
“Harang.”
“……”
“Harang.”
“……”
“Harang!”
“Huh? Ah, yeah.”
“……You seem surprised. Well, considering you thought of the orphanage as a place like the village, it's understandable to be surprised. How is it? Completely different, right?”
“……Honestly, it’s surprising.”
Harang nodded dumbly, and Hagio, watching him, let out a chuckle.
He was still an unpredictable fellow.
Watching him look at the children with a dazed expression, it felt as if the ghostly demeanor he had shown in the village was all a lie.
Of course…….
‘What’s even more unpredictable is my own heart right now.’
That was right.
No matter how much he was a guy one could reason with, unlike some ‘key figures’, Harang was still a Godok.
He couldn't quite understand his own actions, his own heart, for bringing such a dangerous existence to the orphanage.
Of course, there was no turning back now.
The deed was done.
The man had already set foot in his most precious place, and if he harbored ill intentions, there was no way to stop him.
He could only hope that the man would continue to quietly explore the orphanage like a curious cat, just as he was now.
Hagio, who had thought this far, nodded slightly and then opened his mouth.
“First…… I have something to discuss with these kids.”
“Hiek!”
“S-sorry!”
“We’ll never do it again!”
“Really! Please believe us!”
“Yes, Teacher has decided not to believe your words anymore. Let’s have a deeper conversation in the room.”
“Uuuuu…….”
“Anyway, so…… could you wait here quietly for a moment?”
“……”
“Harang? What’s wrong?”
“Ah! Aah, sorry…… Alright. I’ll be waiting.”
“I'm not just saying it. Please, quietly, without doing anything…… Yes. I'd appreciate it if you just stood still like now. Without causing any trouble…… Understood?”
“Understood.”
Honestly, he didn't quite understand.
Why Hagio was making such a wary expression, why he was speaking in such a worried tone.
However, Harang, not wanting to trouble his Godok Peer, obediently nodded, and Hagio, looking at him distrustfully, forced himself to turn away.
Behind him, the four thoroughly dispirited children followed.
“Mister.”
“Not a mister! Aren’t I an Oppa (older brother)?”
“Eh? You’re this tall and not a mister?”
“Is that so? Are you Oppa-mister, or Oppa?”
“Ah! Want to play building a toad house with us?”
“No! Something cooler than that! Let’s build a castle, a castle!”
“Aah, a castle is hard! Let’s just build a toad house.”
“No, no no no, this time I’m really going to build it! I’m going to build a castle! The mister can help, right! Mister! No, Big Brother ! You’ll help us, right?”
“Will you really help?”
“Will you really help?”
As soon as Hagio and the children disappeared into the building, four children, who looked to be about six or seven years old, ran up chattering all sorts of things.
“……”
Harang was flustered.
What kind of beings were the children in his memory?
They were Godoks.
No, they were just the dropouts of the village who couldn't even become Godoks, now departed for good.
Apart from them, Harang had never interacted so closely with such young beings.
‘So…… different.’
He recalled the past.
Children who swung swords daily to avoid death, trained their bodies, and were busy killing each other.
In the midst of that, emotions and expressions, voices, hope, freedom, all gradually wore away…….
However.
The beings before his eyes were completely different.
Despite having lost their parents just like him.
Despite being confined within a narrow fence under the supervision of adults just like him, there was no shadow on their expressions.
There was no fear.
Their chattering voices, like the chirping of birds at dawn, were incredibly refreshing.
Only then did it hit him more clearly.
The orphanage was a place incomparably more beautiful than the village.
“What’s this? This mister……”
“He’s not talking.”
“Why? Why?”
“Were we too noisy?”
“……Hmm.”
“Oh? He spoke!”
“He spoke, he spoke!”
“Wow! Big Brother! Will you play with us?”
“Are we going to make a sandcastle?”
“……Mmm.”
Harang kept groaning.
His mind was still complicated.
Hagio's request also weighed on his mind, and his worries about the connections he had left in Marzen continued to hold him back.
However, he could no longer remain lost in thought.
He couldn't just stand still.
Watching the children who were, at some point, climbing his body like a tree, Harang spoke in a somewhat creaky voice.
“……Alright, let’s build it. A sandcastle.”
“Oh! Great! Great great great!”
“I’ll go get water in the bucket! I’ll get it! Me! Me!”
“Big Brother, but have you ever made one before? A sandcastle?”
“What if you’re worse at it than us?”
The children giggled, chattered, and made a fuss at a single word.
Children who, unlike the children of the village, held toys instead of swords, and were busy playing, covered not in blood but in sand.
And amidst them, a former Godok, Harang, building a sandcastle with surprising skill.
Hagio discovered this an hour later, after his consultation with the children had ended.
“……”
Despite Harang having broken his promise, he showed no sign of dissatisfaction.
No, rather, with a clear and gentle smile he had never shown in the village, he watched the scene for a much longer time and thought.
He still didn't know the reason, but…….
‘Bringing him here might not have been the wrong choice after all.’
Thus, Hagio simply watched the scene quietly until all the children playing in the sand were exhausted and fell into a nap.
* * *
“I see. You don’t know anything either.”
“It’s probably the same for everyone. I don't know what kind of people did such a thing, but……”
After playing excitedly with the children, the two entered the orphanage building as guided.
The first thing they talked about was ‘the time of escape’.
It couldn't be helped.
They had thought they would spend their entire lives trapped in the village, enduring hellish days, but a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity had fallen from the sky.
At least in Hagio's case, he had come to his senses early and knew the general situation, but Harang didn't even know that general development.
He simply found himself with a destroyed carriage when he regained consciousness, and the corpses of what appeared to be village administrators and attackers covering the entire plain.
“No matter how much I think about it, I can’t understand. Even if you guys escaped in a chaotic situation, why did they leave me behind?”
“That is certainly strange.”
“Exactly. If the village had won, they naturally should have retrieved me while I was asleep, and even if the other side had won, just leaving me behind is strange. The only possibility is mutual destruction……”
“That possibility is also slim.”
“……”
“……”
The two Godoks silently recalled the events of that day for a while.
Of course, nothing changed by doing so.
No matter how much they replayed and pondered it, the events of that day were full of incomprehensible things.
Eventually, they agreed not to talk about it anymore.
Thus, the second topic that came up was how each of them had lived for the past seven months.
This situation was better than before.
To be honest, it was much more interesting for Harang.
It couldn't be helped, it was an orphanage of all places.
The fact that his Peer, who had learned nothing but killing techniques for 15 years, was teaching children, not disciplining them in the village way but genuinely caring for and nurturing them, came as a fresh shock to Harang.
Hagio also agreed with this.
“It’s understandable to be surprised.”
“Right? I wasn't surprised for no reason. Since when exactly? Right after escaping the village?”
“No. It’s only been three months since I came here.”
“Then what did you do for the other four months?”
“Assassination.”
“……”
“……”
“……”
“Unexpected. Why are you looking at me like that? Is it so strange that we, who were trained as assassins, made a living through assassination?”
“That’s not it, but.”
It was a bit perplexing.
Perhaps if he had heard the story in chronological order, he would have found it rather natural, but hearing it after seeing him live as an orphanage teacher made it feel somewhat illogical.
Of course, what bloomed even more intensely than that thought was curiosity and wonder.
Fortunately, there was no need to press him.
Hagio, who had been silent for a moment, began to speak with deep eyes, as if recalling old times.
“I…… hated everyone in the outside world. To be precise, I was so envious I thought I’d go mad. Enough to feel no guilt even if I killed them at ease.”
After barely escaping the village amidst the attack of ruffians, Hagio had truly witnessed many forms of life.
A young lady selling fish in the market.
A middle-aged man running an inn while having a drink.
A young man earning money by drawing pictures on the street, and a farmer spending his days farming.
To some, their lives might have seemed insignificant, but to Hagio, all their lives shone brighter than the stars in the night sky.
It couldn't be helped.
Abducted at a young age, his mind was crammed only with killing techniques.
Already a full-fledged assassin, for him, whose very ‘possibility’ of becoming something else had been completely castrated, those who decided their own lives by their own will could only be objects of envy.
“So I killed. Out of envy.”
“……”
“Of course, that wasn’t the biggest reason. I had to do something to make a living, and the only thing I knew how to do was kill people. Of course, as I said earlier, I felt no guilt. After all, they were guys who had lived much better lives than me……”
That was right.
Hagio genuinely thought so.
He believed that there was no one in the world unhappier than himself, who had grown up in the curse of the village and would live his whole life only killing others, except for other Godoks.
That's why he was at ease.
Those who had lived happier lives than him.
Those who had been guaranteed the infinite possibilities that had not been given to him.
The numerous assassination targets who were enjoying something he yearned for but could not reach…….
While dealing with them with a heart full of jealousy, living a life not much different from the one in the village.
A request arrived.
It delivered a shock, as if striking Hagio's, stained with excuses and evasion.
“……The assassination target was a one-year-old child.”
Five years old, an age even younger than when he himself was abducted by the village.
At the appearance of a pitiful being who had not yet been given any opportunity, Hagio’s pupils shook greatly.