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Translated By Arcane Translations
Translator: Shio
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After a month of kissing up to the guards and the manager, I was showered with affection and granted various privileges.
Before, I was just scolded less, but now, incredibly,
“Seok-Hyun, there’s a lot of work today, so just come and give some massage.”
“Yes, understood!”
I was even allowed to skip work.
‘Now my nails won’t peel off.’
Furthermore, I had become so close with the guards that they called me by name.
Nowadays, I just played around with the guards instead of working during labor time.
The sharp gazes of the other orphans naturally followed, but I ignored them.
‘You have to survive first, don’t you?’
Were they hoping for their situation to change while doing the same forced labor every single day?
Change only happened when you start it yourself.
The kids seemed to judge the situation only in front of them, likely because they were all too young.
While my body was the same as theirs, my mind was that of an adult, so I understood.
‘Honestly, it does seem annoying.’
There was a reason the guards only caught young orphans, making them mine mana stones.
It was because it was a job that favored smaller statures.
The mana stones that grew in a cleared dungeon were very small and hard to find.
Some had to be dug out of the ground, and most grew in fine cracks.
So they used children to mine more efficiently.
‘Because they’re orphans, the labor cost is cheap, and even if they die, there’s no trouble…No need to take care of workers’ comp.’
If you threw away your humanity and morality, there was no honey business better than the anthill.
Whenever they were bored, they could whip and order the children around, generating money in the process.
There was no reason for them not to do it
“Whew, it seems like my efforts have finally paid off, as Manager’s shoulder muscles are loosening little by little.”
“Right? Haha, this guy really knows how to speak.”
“That…the thing I asked you before…”
“Ah, that? Of course, go look around comfortably. Or should we go together after this?”
“If you let me, I’ll be deeply grateful!”
As expected, this guy was the easiest to manipulate.
‘First stage clear.’
The manager was a very simple person with a strong desire to be acknowledged.
There was some backstory about him being violent to the orphans because he was always belittled.
Skipping the trivial details, this was what I had been aiming for by diligently kissing the manager’s ass.
“Okay, then let’s go to the guards’ room after this! You said you respect us so much that you want to clean, so I have to let you!”
“I will clean until it shines!”
“Yeah, haha! I really like this guy.”
“Thank you!”
It was entering the guards’ room.
The terrain of the anthill couldn’t be memorized even if you tried.
Moreover, the anthill terrain changed every time you started a new game, so existing knowledge was useless.
So I absolutely had to steal the map of the anthill in the guards’ room.
‘It would have been best to do it when my body was intact.’
I looked at my hands while massaging the manager’s shoulders; they were completely different from a month ago.
The days of massaging the guards’ shoulders or washing their feet after mining had only recently ended.
My hands, with peeled nails from mining and constant servitude, looked no different from a monster’s.
‘Give us at least one tool to mine mana stones and the efficiency will rise much more.’
The only tool the guards gave the children was a basket to hold the mana stones.
It meant they had to figure out how to meet their quota with just their bodies; not a single kid was unscathed.
“Hmm. Is it because you’ve been massaging my shoulders all this time? My body feels really fine today. Let’s stop here.”
“Ah, is that okay?”
“Yeah, if you overdo it with your hands like that, I won’t be able to use you for long.”
You chose now to worry about that? Fucking bastard.
I was so grateful I could cry.
“Thank you for your concern!”
But what could I do?
Without power, I had to humble myself for the time being.
“Now, shall we go take a look at the guards’ room?”
“Yes!”
With those words, the manager got up and strode away.
I moved my feet busily to catch up to his speed as much as possible.
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“This is the guards’ living quarters.”
The guards’ room I arrived at under the manager’s guidance wasn’t particularly nice.
But what could you expect from the quarters of men who lived off the mana stones mined by children underground?
Still, the individual leather beds and the fully stocked cabinets did stand out.
‘The map… isn’t visible anywhere for now.’
The anthill map issued to each guard was nowhere to be seen.
If this was the game, a message like this would have popped up.
The point to note was the “Failure leads to death” part.
Regrettably, most of Seok-Hyun’s quests were like that.
No matter how trivial the quest, it could directly lead to death.
This was the reason FD players extremely avoided Seok-Hyun.
‘In a roguelike game, who would like a character that dies easily like a mayfly and has trash performance?’
Seok-Hyun was a character only played by experts who had seen all endings. Why did I have to transmigrate into him of all people?
I wouldn’t have suffered like this if I transmigrated into a character like Jin-soo.
I was just way too unlucky.
“Wow… it’s so cool.”
I responded to the manager and walked inside, feigning amazement.
My heart fluttered at seeing a bed for the first time in a while, but I resisted the urge to touch it.
He probably wouldn’t like me touching the bed with my monstrously swollen hands.
In fact, the manager kept staring intently at my hands.
‘Are you curious where these hands will touch?’
Hands with peeled, swollen, and festering skin.
Originally, I wasn’t going to touch the bed either, but I was so spiteful I couldn’t stand it.
I slightly raised my eyes to check the manager’s location and ran straight to the bed and put my hands on it.t
“Wow, it’s so soft.”
“…! Uh…yeah, but let’s take your hands off for now.”
“Gasp…I’m sorry.”
Actually, other than looking grotesque, my hands were very clean.
But no matter how clean a cockroach was, it’d be annoying if it touched your things.
It was a similar principle.
“I don’t mind, but try not to touch the other guards’ beds.”
“Then should I not clean the beds?”
“That would be better…Hmm, before cleaning, should we wash your body first?”
The manager’s face twisted in disgust as he belatedly noticed my appearance due to the dim light of the anthill.
Unwashed, matted hair, dirt-covered skin, and rag-like clothes.
Without light, he probably enjoyed the massage, but seeing my appearance in the bright quarters must have changed how he felt.
‘I’m the very skull water of Wonhyo.’¹
Anyway, as a result, I got to take a shower, so it was worth it.
I didn’t expect this at all, since I was honestly just testing my luck out of spite.
“The shower room is there, so wash up…wrap your hands in bandages and clean. I’ll go first.”
“Yes!”
“Ah right, I’ll tell them, but the guards will come soon. Speak well.”
“Understood!”
The manager informed me of a few more precautions and left the quarters.
Then without hesitation, I followed the manager’s words and went straight into the shower room to turn on the water.
‘Washing after a month, broth is coming out of my body.’
Needless to say, there was no such thing as a shower room where the children gathered.
If they died, they could just get another orphan to fill the spot, so the maximum welfare they got was food.
There was a reason there was no separate break time in the schedule I mentioned before.
“Ahh… it’s nice…”
As expected of the guards’ quarters, warm water came out.
They were living in a place like this by themselves.
“Eek…”
The warm water felt good when it first flowed from my head to my chest, but when it touched my hands, a crazy pain rushed in.
Hot water entered through the burst blisters, but I had to endure it.
I had to wash off the dirt here with water as much as possible and rummage through the guards’ quarters to disinfect my hands.
‘Argh…’
I bit my lower lip hard, deliberately bursting the festering parts and tearing off the loose skin.
No matter how close I got with the guards, they only saw me as a useful consumable.
They wouldn’t treat me any better than that.
‘If it flows according to the game, there’s plenty of leeway.’
If it followed the quest, as long as I didn’t get caught stealing, I could do anything.
There were no lunatics here who would beat someone to death for taking a shower after the guard told them to.
No, there was, but he was on shift right now, so the chance of meeting him was close to 0%.
“Whew, refreshing.”
I washed my hair five times and my body about three times, and finally, a human-like appearance emerged.
I thoroughly washed my dirty clothes and dried them with the guards’ magic dryer, so they felt very refreshing.
“Now, shall I start cleaning?”
But before that, I searched the quarters, found a first-aid kit, disinfected my hands, and wrapped them in bandages.
After that, I took some extra bandages, and if they said anything later, I could just use cleaning as an excuse.
‘Let’s do this now.’
It was time to start the real map search.
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[Shio here~!
Can we just sit here and pray in silence for this dumbass mc? Who goes and says, “Oh it’s a 0% chance to meet the guy who’d literally beat me to death right now.” Especially after emphasizing how unlucky he was beforehand!?
Red flag alert!
Notes:
1: “I’m the very skull water of Wonhyo.”
Wonhyo refers to a renowned Korean Buddhist monk and scholar known for his deep insights and teachings. And “skull water” is linked to practices and symbols associated with enlightenment in some Buddhist contexts.
Because of that, I’m assuming that Seok-Hyun is using this as a form of sarcastic self-deprecation.
Possibly implying that the difference between the manager’s mental image of Seok-Hyun (a cleanly, subservient slave who actively sought to please him) and the reality of the situation (that the subservient slave was actually a dirty, unhygienic, rag-wearing bum) acted as a form of enlightenment for the manager (which is why his face twisted in disgust).]
Thanks for the chapter 😁