As soon as I returned to the orphanage, I holed myself up in the storeroom and began to plan. First, the cards I held. I am an orphan.
My capital... compared to my goal, it's practically zero. I'm ten years old, I can't even get a manual labor job. ... Right, I don't have any cards to play.
I suppose begging is the best method available.
Hmm...
I can manage the beginning part, but... The front of the textbook was just a review of what we'd learned so far, so as long as I got my hands on it, I didn't think I'd have a problem keeping up with the lessons. The problem is what comes after.
I have two weeks at most. I need to get the textbook and join the class within that time to avoid falling behind. And I need at least 599 silver for that...
It's impossible through normal means. But even with abnormal methods, I don't see much hope. But still, what's with these nobles?
Of course, I know they have a lot of money. But paying 599 silver for a single book? From what I've seen, it doesn't even seem to be treated as that important.
And what's more, they have to keep buying them as they move up through the grades. ... I think I understand why they prohibit anyone but nobles from entering the library. No matter how much magic is the exclusive domain of the nobility, does this even make sense?
As I was lost in thought, I felt the flow of currents again and narrowed my eyes. 'It must be Linmel.' I don't have time to play with her now.
If she catches me, I'm guaranteed to lose at least two hours, so I crawled into a nearby pile of straw. I can even measure time now. I counted exactly five seconds in my head, and the storeroom door slammed open.
Why does she always kick it open? Linmel appeared, her eyes sparkling as she shouted, then tilted her head.
"Jern!! I found a golden beetle... huh?"
"What are you doing in the storeroom? There's no one here."
"Huh? That's strange... I smelled him..."
"What in the world are you talking about...?"
After a confused Linmel left the storeroom with the other children, I crawled out of the straw and brushed myself off. Even after they closed the door and left, I could sense the group of children heading into the woods. To think I can feel them not just coming, but going as well...
"How strange."
The more I use it, the more I feel like a bat. Strictly speaking, becoming a mage and using magic is the stranger thing, but at least this common magic that everyone uses is not impossible to understand. Of course, I still don't know what that metaphysical phrase 'overlay your heart-realm onto reality' means.
But I can roughly grasp it if I just accept that a place to store something called mana has formed somewhere in my body, and I use the power stored there to pull things from my mind and make them exist in reality. I can keep up with the classes that way.
But I have no idea how these magics related to the Deep Sea work. Since they don't use any mana, it literally feels like I've grown new limbs. 'What should I call it.'
At the very least, creating currents and sensing them were completely different abilities, so I felt the need to name them. I don't need to give it a fancy name. Perhaps I'll just call it Tide Sense.
I learned a few things while playing with my Tide Sense ability. First, it's completely unusable in a crowded market. The vibrations are already so faint that they're hard to sense, and when they all mix together, it's impossible to tell what's coming and going.
However, if I'm in a quiet place and focus on something nearby. If I watch and feel just one single thing, its accuracy rises to an unbelievable level. Can I make use of this?
I put a wooden die used for board games into a cracked brass bowl and shook it hard. Let's see if I can guess it.
"Six."
I looked at the number. It was a one. I scratched my head and this time, rolled it slowly.
I can feel the die bouncing inside the brass bowl. It hits the side of the bowl, the top, then bounces off the side again...
"Three."
I opened the bowl.
A three.
I got it right this time.
"This is useless."
But I clicked my tongue. There's no point in taking this ability to a real game, I mean, to a gambling den. There would be too many people around for Tide Sense to work properly, and the dice would be rolled much faster than this.
I could probably tell right away if they were cheating, but would that matter?
"Wait a minute..."
What if I changed the game? For example, roulette. I dug a few holes in the ground with my foot and threw the die.
And just as it falls, I pull. -Clatter... No matter how many times I threw the die, it landed in a different hole than the one I'd aimed for with my hand. It was the place the currents had aimed for.
At this point, it became worth serious consideration. I rested my chin on my hand and reviewed the various possibilities. Of course, no matter how many times I thought about it, it was obviously not something a sane person would do.
First of all, in this young body, I can't even enter a gambling den. And I know how hard it is to win money at a gambling den. I've never done it myself, but I know more than a few guys who were ruined by it.
If you start winning a little, the house will definitely pull some tricks. They say even a mutt has the upper hand in its own yard; I have no confidence I could win if a gambler cheats in their own den. Even if I somehow managed to win money, I'm skeptical I could get away with it without trouble.
Do I have the strength to protect it? Not at all. If they use force, there's nothing I can do.
Overall, it's an abnormal method that I should not choose, no matter how I look at it.
"Well, who cares."
But among the abnormal methods, it was the most normal one. After about an hour of deliberation, I was able to devise solutions for most of the problems. Shall I go and get some money stained with despair.
Without hesitation, I left the storeroom.
"Really, isn't there any way, just this once?"
"I'm sorry, sir. Any more than this is difficult."
The bank employee looked at Albus, the Director of the orphanage, with pity and slid a document forward.
"As I've mentioned, you already have a loan of this size, so anything additional... However, it would be possible if you use the building as collateral."
"I cannot do that."
Albus shook his head firmly. He could never put the orphanage up as collateral. That would be selling the children's future just to survive the present.
He had no intention of compromising, nor should he. The employee sighed as if he had expected as much and collected the documents.
"From a personal standpoint, I wish I could help you, but it's unfortunate."
"... No, it's alright. Thank you for your time."
It wasn't alright, but he said his goodbyes and left the bank. As he trudged out with a dejected expression, he suddenly looked up at the clear sky and thought. 'I guess it was impossible after all...'
Thanks to the princess's welfare policies, it was a good thing that there was more breathing room. Thanks to her, the number of neglected children decreased. Albus sincerely felt he could kiss her very toes.
But where there is light, there is also shadow. Orphanages established for profit sprang up like mushrooms. They would bring in orphans by any means necessary, sometimes even 'creating' them to fill their quotas.
Temporary buildings that existed only on paper. Children treated worse than beasts. Albus, a promising scribe at the time, burned with a sense of justice and annihilated all those orphanages.
But the children remained. There was no place to accommodate the children who had simply been gathered up. For a time, the capital was overflowing with children without guardians.
Albus didn't know the details. He handled everything from his desk, and the reports he received all stated that everything was proceeding smoothly. One rainy day, while riding a carriage to the Imperial Palace to receive an award for handling the most cases of fraudulent benefits, Albus saw two children in an alley, dead in each other's arms.
Looking at the bodies of the children, who hadn't even lost their baby teeth, he realized. The ones who committed the fraud had surely locked the children behind bars and sprinkled soup not fit for a dog's bowl like feed.
However.
It was he who had taken away even that soup. Albus stepped down from the path to success that everyone envied and used his entire remaining fortune to open an orphanage. Was it for atonement?
He dedicated his entire youth from the age of twenty and did his best until now, at fifty. Even when warned that the subsidies would stop, he used his own money to expand the building and paid as much attention as possible to the meals.
The other teachers warned him several times that it would be difficult to operate if things continued this way. Still, Albus continued to take in residents. 'I was too greedy...'
Was this punishment for that day? If it was punishment, he wished it would fall on him alone. When he returned to the orphanage with weary steps, a few of the children saw Albus and ran over with aggrieved expressions.
"Director!! Yandil stole my candy!"
"What are you talking about, you gave it to me!"
"I told you to just have a taste! What am I supposed to do if you swallow it! No, but really, why did you swallow it...? Then there's no point in eating candy!"
"Anyway, I only had one bite, so, so what!"
"Now, now... everyone, don't fight. And if you share candy with each other, you could get sick. Also, if you swallow it, it could get stuck in your throat and you might not be able to breathe. You don't want that, do you?"
"No..."
"Good, if you make up and promise not to fight, I'll give you each one candy. How about that?"
"We'll make up!!"
He had been worried his emotions would show in front of the children, but thankfully, only a sincere smile emerged. After taking care of them one by one, he returned to the director's office, where Teacher Catly, who was in charge of the orphanage's overall management, asked with a worried expression.
"Director, how did the loan go?"
"About that... well, they said it would be difficult."
"Hah..."
She looked down at the documents and sighed. If one were to point to the cause, the problem was Albus taking in too many children. But Catly couldn't bring herself to say anything.
If Albus hadn't been so soft-hearted, some of the children she knew and loved would surely not be in this world.
"What do we do now? With the money we have left, it'll be hard to last even two months. If we cut down on food costs, maybe three months."
"Hmm. I'll keep looking into it for now. And..."
Albus took off his overcoat and smiled as if it were nothing.
"You know I'm a landowner, don't you? If it really comes to it, it's alright to sell."
"No, Director, that..."
Catly shook her head. The term landowner was half right and half wrong. To be sure, the land Albus owned in the northern plains, though small, produced such high-quality tea that it was worth a considerable price.
It was also the largest source of income that kept the orphanage running. If he sold the land, managed the money, and slowly downsized, they could resolve things without the children suffering. However, that land had been passed down through Albus's family for generations and was also their burial ground.
In fact, his parents were buried in a plot a short distance from the tea fields, so to sell it meant...
"It is only a last resort. And besides, the remaining children must live, mustn't they? If my mother were alive, she would tell me to do the same."
"... You're truly amazing."
"It's nothing. Whew, more than that, I'm worried about Linmel. I wonder what that knight saw in such a small child..."
"Linmel, a small child? She can catch a bear."
"Pardon? What kind of metaphor is that?"
"Oh my, you must not have known since you've been running around because of the loan lately. The other day, that girl Linmel went up the mountain and..." -Knock, knock, knock.
Just as Catly was about to start her explanation, shaking her head, someone knocked on the director's office door.
"Ah, just a moment."
"Hello."
"Oh, Jern? What brings you here?"
Black hair, short stature. Pale skin from rarely seeing the sun. And the boy, who had eyes so deep and dark it was hard to believe he was a child of his age, bowed politely.
"Something has come up that I'd like to discuss with you, Director. Do you perhaps have a moment?"
"Ah, of course. Teacher Catly, could you tell me that story in detail later?"
"Yes. Jern, the Director is tired from being out for a long time, so don't take too long."
"Yes. I'll be quick."
Catly left the director's office, and Jern sat on a nearby sofa.
"Director."
"Yes, Jern. What is it?"
"Could you lend me some money?"
"... Uh, money, you say?"
"Yes."
Albus tilted his head, his eyes meeting Jern's. He knew he was a good boy, but he had no idea what he was thinking. But what was important was that he was a good boy. 'Right, he's been eavesdropping on classes at the academy recently... he must need money for supplies.'
Having come to a reasonable conclusion, Albus opened the safe door and asked.
"How much do you need?"
"599 silver."
"...?"
He froze.
"Uh, that is..."
"Ah, I'm sorry. I'm not asking for the money you have right now."
Jern smiled softly and pushed his finger forward. At that moment, clank- The safe door shut as if pushed by an unseen force. It didn't stop there.
Click, click- The handle moved on its own, locking the safe door. Albus was silently astonished at his growth. 'I, I knew he went to learn, but...'
Even though he didn't know much about magic, he knew that performing it so naturally without commands was difficult. Is this possible just from eavesdropping, without even taking proper classes? Jern met the contemplating Albus's gaze and answered.
"Let's do some business together, Director."
"... Business?"
"Yes."
It was a thought he shouldn't have about one of his children, but, "I'll make you some money." It was like the whisper of a demon.