Once breakfast time at the orphanage is over, the older children head outside, leaving only the younger ones behind.
The children who go out work until dinner time to earn money, as the support funds from the government or other organizations are far too insufficient to run the orphanage.
You might wonder how much money these children can bring in, but at the very least, it saves on the cost of lunch.
With that alone, the orphanage barely manages to stay afloat.
“I pray that the children return safely today as well.”
As always, the orphanage director bowed her head in prayer toward the cross.
Once her prayer ended, she took care of the children who were too young to leave the orphanage.
Though “taking care” mostly meant teaching them letters and basic knowledge, while letting them play inside the orphanage for the rest of the time.
As she watched the children running around in the yard, she thought about the ones who had gone outside.
They were sent out to run errands and earn some money, but in reality, less than half of them actually did so.
Most of them often strayed down a bad path—joining gangs, becoming scavengers, or boy mercenaries…
In their spirited adolescence, it seemed holding a gun appeared so cool to them that many chose that life.
Besides just looking cool, it was also because they could make more money than running errands.
Even in this current group alone, there were quite a few kids who had joined gangs.
“What’s with this tattoo all of a sudden?”
“That, Sister… it’s just for show.”
Still, most of the children, having some sense of guilt, often hide their tattoos or made excuses, not wanting to worry the sisters.
However, their attempts were meaningless.
The orphanage director had been running this place for years.
She knew exactly which gang had what kind of tattoo and where they were placed.
Even so, she pretended not to notice and turned a blind eye.
She loved the children and was well aware of how dangerous the gang life was.
She also knew the sorrow of attending the funeral of a child who had graduated from the orphanage.
‘Yet, there was nothing she could do.’
The only reason the orphanage could remain a neutral, safe zone in the slums was that many of the kids from here had joined various gangs.
Among them, some had even become high-ranking members, enforcing a no-gun policy near the orphanage.
In other words, for the orphanage, the gangs were a necessary evil.
‘Thinking about it, the children have grown up really well, even in a place like this…’
But even in the mud, flowers bloom.
There were children who, despite their surroundings, grew up as normal and well-behaved as their peers.
Amon and Sonia.
These two kids did not lose their goodness in this environment.
There’s a saying, “One bad fish spoils the whole pond.”
But on the contrary, a lotus flower blooming in muddy water could purify it.
The dirtier the water, the more the presence of the lotus shines.
And there were two such lotus flowers.
Thanks to them, this batch of children had far fewer who strayed down the wrong path compared to previous ones.
A few years ago, the children who joined gangs would encourage others to follow, and the younger ones, seeing this, would end up joining as well, creating a vicious cycle.
But at least in this group, there was no overt promotion of gang life.
The director was deeply grateful to Amon and Sonia, the two “lotus flowers.”
It was as if God had sent them, and because of them, she could now dream of a better future.
At the same time, she felt sorrow.
Their talents were like precious gems, too radiant to be hidden by mere mud.
If only they had met good parents, they could have showcased their talents in a much broader world.
‘Am I just holding them back?’ she wondered.
The list of their talents seemed endless—beauty that rivaled that of child actors, exceptional athletic ability, and a brilliant mind.
But what truly set them apart was their divine power.
Divine power was a rare and special force, found in about one in tens of thousands of people.
While most people were born with some degree of magical power, divine power was different.
Magic could be easily substituted or replicated by other means, but the miracles wrought by divine power could not be replaced by any other resource.
For this reason, those with divine power were highly sought after by corporations, governments, and religious institutions alike.
The director first realized Amon and Sonia’s divine power when they were nine years old.
It started with a simple fight between the children.
In the midst of trying to break up the fight, Even if someone were to test her, By the way… do you happen to know how to sense divine power, Director?
No, not at all.
She pretended to be ignorant of divine power.
Despite numerous leading questions, she didn’t give any reaction.
As a result, the organizations could not obtain any information beyond the fact that there was a divine power holder at this orphanage.
In this precarious standoff, the organizations couldn’t cut off their support, and the orphanage gradually became prosperous.
Up to this point, it was a good thing for everyone.
However, as the orphanage flourished, the director’s heart felt constricted.
“Am I stifling those children’s wings?”
If you want to deceive the enemy, first deceive your own allies.
For the sake of the secret, she merely mumbled that the parties involved had a special power compared to others, while thoroughly concealing that they possessed divine power.
She had no intention of monopolizing them in the slightest.
It was simply to protect them.
It was a choice made because she loved those children more than anyone else.
But no matter how much it was for the sake of those children, she always lived in guilt, feeling as though she was suppressing their talents.
To relieve her guilt today, she rested her arm on her prosthetic limb, lowered her head, and closed her eyes.
“Lord, please let those children return safely today as well.”
There’s no finger that doesn’t hurt.
But as a human, there are particularly painful fingers.
Thus, the director offered a slightly more special prayer for the painful finger.
Even knowing that other children might feel left out.
On the way back after running errands for Johnson, the goat-human, it was just another ordinary day.
If she managed to avoid the gunshots echoing from somewhere while moving the goods, the delivery would be complete.
Ding-dong!
An alarm arrived on Amon and Sonia’s phones.
It was a notification that $75 had been deposited into their accounts.
$75 for 8 hours of work.
The minimum wage for delivery workers was practically a joke.
However, they didn’t complain.
Sonia and Amon were pure humans who hadn’t received gene enhancement procedures, nano machines, or magical engravings.
Comparing their labor to that of professional delivery workers was an act devoid of conscience.
Moreover, the two didn’t urgently need money.
In fact, $75 was quite a good income at the orphanage.
When this amount was combined with the monthly living expenses, they could dream of a bit of luxury in their savings.
Therefore, they headed home satisfied with today’s wages.
In their everyday lives, the sounds of gunfire could be heard from afar, and police cars rushed somewhere in a hurry.
Amidst that routine, Amon and Sonia crossed the traffic light, shaking a bag of fries for their younger siblings back and forth.
While Amon was looking left and right, careful of the possible appearance of reckless bikers who wouldn’t care about traffic signals, Sonia spoke to him.
“Amon. Are you going to pay tithing too?”
“Yeah. Of course.”
With a blessed appearance and a blessed talent, Amon didn’t want to become an ungrateful being who didn’t show gratitude for this.
Sonia nodded upon hearing Amon’s answer.
“Then can I pay together?”
“Of course. What’s stopping you?”
“But those kids make fun of why we pay that stuff, calling us fools.”
“Oh, those kids?”
Amon recalled the ‘those kids’ Sonia mentioned.
They were what you’d typically call a bad crowd.
You know, the kind that loves fists over words, delinquency over good deeds, and insults over kind words.
They were the type that would bully innocent kids while blaming their own twisted nature on how the world is.
Amon didn’t have a particularly good relationship with them.
They had tried to start trouble with Amon while sorting out their pecking order, and they ended up getting beaten as a group.
Since then, they hadn’t directly bothered Amon, but they changed their strategy to isolate him as much as possible.
Thanks to Amon’s shining personality, that strategy didn’t work very well.
Their teasing of Sonia was also part of that plan.
They called the act of tithing foolish to tarnish Amon’s image as a fool.
But Amon remained unfazed.
Instead, he persuaded Sonia about how great tithing was.
“Tithing is like a ritual for me to remember my gratitude.”
“Gratitude?”
“Yeah.
Gratitude for being blessed like this, gratitude for safely spending the day, gratitude for meeting a good person like you.
It’s to maintain this kind of heart.”
At the end of the explanation, I didn’t forget that tithing is not mandatory and that one should do it according to their heart’s desire.
Sonia was quickly convinced by Amon’s gentle explanation.
“Then I guess I should also do tithing to remember to be grateful for meeting Amon?”
“If you truly wish to.”
By now, Sonia had long forgotten the existence of ‘those kids’ in her mind.
The two naturally shifted their conversation to gratitude in everyday life.
Gratitude for being able to grow up in an orphanage despite being an orphan.
Gratitude for the headmaster who devoted himself to them.
Gratitude for adults like Johnson, who unnecessarily created errands for these kids and gave them pocket money.
Looking back, they could find gratitude even in a world like this.
“And I’m thankful that I can eat a lot of meat because of you!”
At Sonia’s words, Amon awkwardly turned his head away.
If that’s the case, wouldn’t about 30 percent of what was in her chest belong to him
he caught himself thinking this way.
Amon agreed with her statement.
As they talked, they had almost arrived at the orphanage.
Sonia ran ahead, laughing about what the dinner menu might be, while Amon tried to follow her.
However, just one corner away from the orphanage, they were blocked by some people.
‘They say even a tiger comes when you talk about it.’
Those kids.
A group of delinquent youths with shabby clothes and sullen expressions.
In short, they were known as ‘iljin.’
Whenever Amon saw them, he often wondered how this bad relationship had started.
It wasn’t particularly complicated.
They had grown up faster than others, thinking it was a talent, and started acting like delinquents until they poked at Amon.
Who was just minding his own business, and ended up getting beaten and holding a grudge.
That was it.
Since then, they had tried to mess with Amon whenever they had the chance.
Most of the time, their attempts ended up meaning nothing, so Amon wasn’t particularly concerned.
He stood there, indifferent, waiting to see what kind of event they had brought this time.
The leader, a kid named Jimmy, tried to provoke Amon but when he saw Amon’s continued indifference, he finally got to the point.
“Hey, do you know what this is?”
He took off his shirt.
A white snake tattoo.
It belonged to the <Children of the Serpent> gang.
They were a relatively sizable gang in this city.
After showing the tattoo, Jimmy waited for Amon’s reaction.
Would he panic and blurt something out?
Or would he put on a brave front despite feeling scared inside?
However, Amon’s response was different from what he imagined.
“Oh, looks like you had a hard time filling up your numbers. Work hard from tomorrow.”
He was uninterested.
Jimmy tried to argue back, but he couldn’t because Amon had mentioned “filling up the numbers.”
The white snake tattoo was a temporary tattoo given to members of the Children of the Serpent before they staged a protest.
The fact that Amon mentioned it meant that he was already aware of their structure.
In reality, Amon understood the meaning of the white snake tattoo well.
‘How has this 50-year tradition continued unchanged?’
There was a sub-quest that required distinguishing between executives, regular members, and those filling up numbers.
It was okay to take down the regular members, but if you recklessly dealt with the fillers, a related quest might pop up, requiring careful control.
In Amon’s case, he preferred to just knock them all out with a bat.
Regardless, Amon wasn’t particularly intimidated by Jimmy’s white snake tattoo.
There was no reason to be.
That tattoo was like henna, which would wash off when wet, so there was no need to be scared.
“Sonia, let’s go.”
Amon walked past the iljin group, holding a bag full of fries in both hands.
The iljin tried to block their way, but, “Hey—? This is for you guys and your little siblings for a late-night snack, is that okay?”
When it came to food, there was no business.
The iljin group had been too busy running around lately to do any work since they were trying to join a gang.
With no money in their pockets and barely managing to fill their lunch, the temptation of fries was too strong for them.
Moreover, they had to show bravado while considering their audience.
If, by chance, those fries fell to the ground and they couldn’t eat them, they would get cursed out by the orphans and nuns in every language in the world.
Just imagining it was enough to fill the iljin group up so they wouldn’t need dinner.
They reluctantly stepped aside for Amon and Sonia.
It wasn’t that they had surrendered to hunger.
Slightly.
Seeing them was quite cute, so Amon gave them a bag, saying to eat a little before dinner.
Due to Amon’s interference, the group fell apart.
Their loyalty to Jimmy was worth less than a bag of fries.
“You have to eat dinner, so make sure you eat moderately. Tidy up well so the kids don’t find out.”
Amon left those words and went with Sonia to the orphanage.
Jimmy’s friends urged him to eat with them as well.
If it were up to him, he would want to kick the bag away, saying he had no pride left, but he held back, thinking he might lose the few friends he had.
Instead, he squeezed what was left of his pride and refused, claiming he wasn’t hungry.
Jimmy turned his gaze back to his friends and looked in the direction Amon had gone.
‘Is that orphan kid giving me the side-eye?’
Blaming the innocent Amon, Jimmy gritted his teeth.
Once again, it was Amon’s victory today.
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