Chapter 1 : The End Of Childhood – 1

My Mother Was a Prostitute.

The city where I was born and raised, Stormgate, was infamous within the Empire for its high crime rate.

In a city of crime, prostitution was a common profession, and the children born accidentally between prostitutes and their clients were often thrown straight to the bottom of society.

I was no exception.

As the child of a prostitute, my mother never even looked at me.

From the time I could barely walk—around five years old—I was cast out onto the streets and had to survive day by day by begging.

“Hey, just a coin, please…”

“What? Money? You little brat, you crazy or something? Get lost unless you wanna die.”

It was a life that could only be described as hell.

I was kicked by passersby, fought other homeless boys over fallen coins or scraps of food on the ground.

I had my nose broken, my legs fractured.

Honestly, breaking a leg was almost a blessing.

A limp could make begging a bit easier.

While I was living each day in such a desperate struggle, my mother, for reasons I still don’t understand, suddenly brought me a new child and introduced her.

“She’s your sister. You’re her older brother now, so take care of her.”

With that irresponsible comment, she left the girl behind and disappeared.

The girl looked to be about two years younger than me.

Silver hair and pale red eyes—she was unusually beautiful for someone born into the back alleys.

The moment I saw her calm, innocent gaze and her small, tightly shut lips, I felt something stir in me.

“What’s your name?”

“…Lily.”

“I see. Lily. Nice to meet you. My name’s Aiden. Call me ‘oppa’ (older brother).”

“Oppa?”

Lily smiled faintly, as if she liked the sound of it.

I smiled back.

“Yeah. Oppa.”

That’s how Lily became my little sister.

She was the first salvation that ever came to me.

After that, we begged together.

But I never let Lily do the actual begging.

She was still too young, and I just couldn’t accept the idea of her sitting helplessly on the streets.

“Oppa.”

“What?”

“I want to eat that.”

One day, she looked longingly at a buttered wheat bun on a vendor’s stall.

It was expensive—something we couldn’t afford even after a whole day of begging.

But theft was common in Stormgate, and I was decent with my hands.

I stole the bread and brought it to her.

Lily took a bite, then, after glancing at me, split it in half.

“Oppa, eat.”

“Thanks.”

Lily always gave me the bigger half.

I thought our relationship wasn’t so bad.

But as time passed, I grew stronger, and Lily turned into a striking young girl.

So much so that, during our begging, even shady guys started approaching her.

She was far too beautiful for these dirty alleys.

Our mother must’ve smelled money from Lily’s appearance.

“You, make sure you keep this girl safe.”

She sternly warned me.

“No matter what happens, don’t let her face get hurt. Her big brother said he’d pay a lot of money for her later.”

It seemed my mother planned to turn her daughter into a prostitute.

Pretty prostitutes are in high demand—especially if they’re young and virgins.

I was old enough to know what the job entailed: spreading your legs for strangers with a smile.

And Lily understood it, too.

Ever since she heard what our mother said, she grew visibly anxious and cried into the rough newspapers and blankets every night.

“I don’t want to be sold off…”

“…I won’t let that happen.”

But all I could offer were empty words.

To kids like us, our mother’s word was law.

It was an order we couldn’t defy.

Defying her meant losing the only roof over our heads—and in this city, that was no different from a death sentence.

Just when our days were overflowing with fear and worry, we got unexpected news.

“She’s dead.”

“Who?”

“Your mom.”

The brothel keeper said it with a blunt expression.

From what we heard, she’d tried to steal a customer’s wallet and was beaten to death.

We didn’t know why she did it.

Maybe it was selfish greed. Maybe—just maybe—she wanted to buy us one last decent meal.

Not that the second option was likely.

Still, it was a fitting death for her, I guess.

That’s how I think of it now.

“So you and your sister will have to work off the debt your mother left behind.”

The brothel keeper said this with a satisfied smirk as he stared at Lily.

The aging, washed-up prostitute was gone, but her daughter was beautiful—and a virgin.

To him, it was a perfect deal.

No losses.

But there was one thing the bastard overlooked: I’d grown into a sturdy teenager, with enough guts to smash a wooden club into the back of his skull.

Crack!

The club hit his head, blood splattered, and he collapsed, convulsing and wetting himself.

I grabbed Lily’s hand as she stood there, frozen in shock.

“O-Oppa, what do we do now…?”

“We run. There should be money left in the house—whatever Mom had stashed away. We take that and go to a different district. And we live together.”

I emphasized the last part—live together.

Lily’s pale pink eyes widened, then filled with light.

“Okay!”

That’s how we began our second life.

It wasn’t anything grand.

Sure, we stole what little money our mother had saved and ran away, but we were still just a boy and a girl, and this city was brutal to children.

Of course the local toughs in our new district didn’t welcome us.

“So, you want us to share turf?”

“Yeah. We won’t step a foot into the city center.”

The gang leader here wasn’t someone interested in negotiating.

“And why should I? Why would we give up our turf to some punks who just showed up? What do you think this is, a charity?”

His crew laughed mockingly.

I bowed my head.

“Please. We just need to survive. I swear I’ll pay it back later.”

“Well… maybe we could spare a little room.”

His words gave me a sliver of hope—but then he looked past me, leering at Lily like he was licking her with his eyes.

“If you let me sleep with your sister just once…”

Thwack!

He never got to finish that sentence.

Because I punched that bastard square in the face.

“Hey! His nose! His nose is bleeding!”

“You little bitch!”

We fought until dawn that day, and in the end, I won—earning a crooked nose as a scar and the right to control a single alley.

Of course, “control” was just a fancy way of saying we were allowed to beg there.

But at least we didn’t have to rely on begging alone anymore.

“Oppa! I found it!”

“Oh, Lily! Good job.”

I patted Lily’s head and took the coin pouch she brought.

Like me, she had a natural talent for pickpocketing—it must’ve run in our blood.

The new district we’d moved to was wealthier than our old one, and the pockets of those people became our prey.

Of course, if we got caught, we were beaten within an inch of our lives.

That’s how my already crooked nose got even worse, and our sleeping place remained a sewer with just enough scrap metal to keep the rain out.

But still… we lived with a strange sort of happiness.

“Oppa, look at this. It’s a necklace!”

Lily pulled a small pearl necklace from a stolen wallet.

It probably wasn’t real, of course.

“Hmm… think we could sell it for something?”

“…I kinda want to wear it.”

“Wear it?”

Lily blushed and gave a small nod.

After thinking for a moment, I nodded too.

“Okay. You can have it, Lily.”

“Really?!”

“Really. You stole it, after all. And it’s fake anyway.”

“Oppa, you’re the best!”

Seeing her light up like that, I silently promised myself that one day, I’d buy her a real pearl necklace.

It was a vague hope, really.

Deep down, I already understood: no matter how much we aged, we’d probably live poor and hidden in this place forever.

Lily must have thought the same.

“Oppa… do you think we’ll still be living here when we grow up?”

“Probably.”

“…”

“You don’t like that?”

“No. I do.”

“Yeah? Then I do too.”

She smiled.

The conditions we lived in were far from comfortable—borderline inhumane, even—but we didn’t know what a “better life” really was.

We had no reference point, so maybe that’s why we could feel happy like this.

We enjoyed each other’s company. We worked well together, and we understood each other.

“When we grow up, Oppa, you have to live with me forever.”

“Forever?”

“Yup. Forever. Until the moment we die.”

That’s what Lily said.

It sounded almost like she was proposing marriage.

But of course, I wasn’t heartless enough to tell her siblings couldn’t marry.

I decided to go along with her dream for now.

“Together forever. Even after we die.”

“Hehe.”

Lily leaned into my chest, and I stroked her hair.

But everything changed when I turned fifteen, and Lily was twelve.

“She’s a witch! Burn the witch!”

Lily, bloodied and barely alive, was tied to the stake.