Lein was woken up by the noise.
From upstairs came the sound of something breaking, followed by a woman’s sharp cursing, her pitch so high it nearly pierced the ceiling.
A man’s hoarse voice mixed in, the two tangled and tore at each other, causing a chaotic ruckus.
The floor’s soundproofing was terribly poor, and fragments of the argument drifted down intermittently—gambling debts, useless waste, can’t go on living like this—all the usual phrases in Ash Lane, accompanied by slamming doors and children’s crying, making up the daily life of Ash Lane.
Lein opened his eyes and stared at the ceiling for a while.
The room was gray and dim, impossible to tell what time it was.
His head felt heavy and groggy, as if someone had poured half a bottle of cheap ale into him and then hammered him on the temple.
The bizarre experiences from this morning swirled chaotically in his mind, making it impossible to distinguish real memories from lingering dreams.
Lein tried to move his fingers, and they bent as expected, so he was truly awake.
He let out a sigh of relief and sat up from the hard bed board.
Every muscle in his body ached terribly, each joint protesting.
Being controlled by an unknown force this morning, running across most of Ash Lane, climbing walls and picking locks—his entire body had reached its limit.
The argument upstairs continued, but the rhythm had changed from mutual yelling to one-sided roaring.
The man’s voice overpowered the woman’s, interspersed with the sharp sound of something breaking.
Lein rubbed his head, pushed off the thin cotton blanket, and stepped onto the cold wooden floor.
The chill rose through the soles of his feet, making him shiver.
His coat was draped over the edge of the bed, wrinkled and stained with gray-white flour marks.
Lein stared at those flour marks for two seconds.
‘It’s real, not a dream.’
He sighed, rummaged through the cabinet for a relatively clean shirt to change into, then beat the flour off his coat until the marks were barely visible.
The bag he had stolen back while under control was still piled in the corner, wrapped in a coarse sack.
He crouched down to untie it and counted the contents; everything was there, exactly as he remembered.
Lein picked out the silver coins separately and counted them: there were thirty-seven in total.
‘That’s quite a lot, already equal to a craftsman’s one to two weeks of wages.’
These coins could go a long way in Ash Lane, but unless necessary, Lein didn’t plan to use them for now.
As for the rest, he rewrapped them and stuffed them deep into the cabinet, covering them with a few old clothes.
These items were probably stolen or extorted by the Sharp Hook Gang from others; if he could find the owners, he would return them, and if not, he would try to sell them off for money.
After doing all this, Lein sat on the edge of the bed for a while, looking at the gray sky outside.
He judged it must be around five in the evening, night always came a little faster in Ash Lane.
Speaking of which, he had to go to Mr. Si Long’s night school today.
Thinking of that old man’s face, Lein couldn’t help but frown.
According to the Child Labor and Education Act (Child Labor Law) enacted by the Kingdom Parliament in New Calendar Year 143, child laborers were required to receive at least fourteen hours of education per week, but in practice, it was loosely enforced, and some despicable people even used it to line their pockets.
Felix Si Long was exactly that kind of old bastard.
He rented an abandoned warehouse in Ash Lane and opened a night school specifically for the lower class; classes were held three days a week, about five hours each session, and the fees were exorbitant, charged weekly at two silver coins per week.
Logically speaking, his greedy and shameless face shouldn’t get any benefits in a place like Ash Lane, but Mr. Si Long was a shrewd and also a shameless man.
He called himself a professor, claiming to have received higher education at the Kingdom University; regardless of the truth, Mr. Si Long indeed had a silver tongue.
He easily convinced working-class families of the necessity of education and the various benefits of his night school.
Many people fell for it, and when they later calmed down and wanted to back out, Mr. Si Long immediately changed his face.
He sternly threatened those who wanted refunds, even bringing up the Child Labor Law, warning that if they didn’t pay up, he would report them to the Ministry of Education.
This scared them badly, and the matter was dropped; as for whether there really was a Ministry of Education in the Kingdom Government, how could these Ash Lane people know?
Lein had also believed his nonsense and foolishly attended classes there for two months; only after being told by others did he learn about this.
Later, Lein didn’t leave; he continued paying, because at Si Long’s, as long as you paid, you could read any book.
Books were very precious items; a lower-class worker might not be able to afford a single book with content even after a month of hard labor, yet Si Long had half a room stacked with them, covering all topics and genres.
For a period, Lein went there almost every day to read; since he had paid, Mr. Si Long could only let him read with a sour face.
Later, when Lein got older, he started working as a teaching assistant for Mr. Si Long, teaching the children to read and write.
It was called a teaching assistant, but he received no salary—another example of Si Long’s stinginess and shamelessness.
The benefit was that Lein no longer had to pay to read, and if he had any questions, he could directly ask Mr. Si Long; as long as the old man was in a decent mood, he would usually get an answer.
But come to think of it, Lein rubbed his brow; that old man really did know a lot.
‘Could everything he said be true?’
Lein gave up thinking about it; it was still early, and before going to the night school, he thought maybe he could stop by the orphanage.
After quickly making something to eat for dinner, Lein grabbed his coat, put it on, and pushed open the door to leave.
The evening in Ash Lane was somewhat desolate; coal ash dyed the sky a leaden gray, and there were fewer people on the streets than during the day.
Lein walked south along the main road of Ash Lane, passed the Broken Horn Tavern he often frequented, went two more intersections, and turned into a slightly wider alley.
The road here was paved with fairly flat stone slabs, and the houses on both sides were a bit better than the shacks deep in Ash Lane; at least the walls didn’t have large cracks, and the windows had intact glass.
At the end of the alley stood a gray three-story building that looked quite old; the paint on the exterior walls had faded heavily, revealing large patches of the original brick underneath.
On the second and third floors, several windows were boarded up, and the remaining panes of glass were as dirty as if covered in a layer of gauze.
A crooked wooden sign hung on the door, its writing already too faded to read, but Lein could recognize it with his eyes closed—St. Claire Orphanage.