infodatos Chapter 22 Creditors
Chapter 22 Creditors
As the clock struck ten, a carriage stopped in the square in front of Lorraine Castle, breaking the stillness of the night. Fafnir, Martha, and Allen alighted from the carriage.
"Thump—thump"
There was a knock on the old wooden door to the basement of Lorraine Castle.
"Oh! My dear little Fafnir, I didn't expect you to come back so late. You must be exhausted. Please come in!"
"Elisa, quickly light the candles."
As the candlelight illuminated the scene, the most familiar face appeared before Fafnir.
"Good evening, Dad, Mom!"
Fafnir stepped forward and hugged Clint and Elisa.
"On holiday? Why are you back? Little Fafnir, we received your letter last week. How are you doing at grammar school?" Clint said.
Today is the Sunday of my fourth week of work; I only get this one day off a month.
I had a wonderful time at grammar school. Dad, Mom, I had little chores, and I was able to learn a lot of knowledge, even magic.
Oh, and I brought you some food.
Fafnir opened the lunchbox in his cloth bag, which contained several meat patties: "Meat from the school cafeteria, these are fried meat patties."
I get to eat meat every day, for free.
"My little Fafnir..." Elisa said softly, "Thank you."
"Haha, I knew it! Our little Fafnir loves us the most. Thank you, haha!" Clint was delighted.
The aroma of pan-fried pork chops filled the small room, their oily sheen gleaming slightly in the candlelight.
"By the way, Fafnir, what is magic?" Clint asked with interest.
"Elisa and I don't understand any of this. Is it like the fire and light that those priests use?"
"Hmm," Fafnir nodded, "I can conjure small fireballs, but it's not convenient here."
Moreover, he had already practiced twice at school today, and he didn't have enough spiritual energy to cast the fireball spell.
"Amazing!" Clint exclaimed excitedly, "Our little Fafnir is fantastic!"
"Thank you, Father. I only know a very basic level. I can also use magic to see bloodlines, just like those priests who can immediately recognize that I am a ratman."
"Oh, little Fafnir, what does this mean? How do you figure it out? What's the underlying principle?" Elisa asked.
"Through the simple technique of spiritual vision, it's possible to see things that are normally invisible. Everyone has spirituality, but the color varies depending on one's bloodline."
Fafner felt he hadn't described things clearly.
Clint listened intently: "So you saw it on us?"
"Mom and Dad, I haven't tried it yet," Fafnir said.
He closed his eyes slightly, and his brow felt a little warm.
Fafnir's spiritual awareness has been enhanced, and he no longer needs to silently recite the "Commandments of the Church of the God of Death" to strengthen his connection with the spirit world; he can directly enter a meditative state.
When he opened his eyes again, Clint's body was covered in a dim, almost nonexistent gray glow, but his body shone with a pure white light, just like Elisa.
“It’s white,” Fafnir said. “A very pure white, representing the pure-blooded human lineage.”
……
The bell rang; it was eleven o'clock.
"Alright, alright, go to sleep early, goodnight, my dear little Fafnir."
……
Fafnir lay between his parents, his eyelids slowly closing.
Clint's snoring had already begun, and Elisa's breathing was even and soft.
The ratman's night vision had somehow improved, and he could clearly see the texture of the wood on the ceiling.
……
Where is this?
He was on a road, not a wide, gravel-paved road like the one in Lorraine Manor, but a narrow, compacted dirt road with drab, low houses on either side.
Fafnir looked down at himself—his hands were transparent. He could see the mud beneath his feet, he could see his own feet, but they were someone else's feet, a size larger than his own, wearing a pair of worn-out shoes with exposed toes.
This is not his body.
He tried to move forward, but his body wouldn't obey him. He just stood there, like a spectator nailed to the spot.
Two children walked towards the end of the dirt road.
The girl had her flaxen hair tied into two braids and was holding some tree branches in her arms.
The boy had messy brown hair, held some branches in one hand, and tightly gripped the girl's clothes with the other.
Martha and Allen.
But not the Martha and Allen that Fafnir knows now. This Martha is much thinner, with sunken cheeks and arms as thin as firewood as she holds the branch. Allen is the same; his eyes appear unusually large, with dark circles under them.
They walked past Fafnir.
Fafnir tried to call out to them, but his mouth opened and no sound came out.
The next moment, Fafnir was standing in a room.
A wooden plank bed took up most of the space, and the bedding on the bed was so thin that you could see the straw underneath.
Martha sat on the edge of the bed, head down, seemingly sewing something with a needle and thread.
Allen huddled in the corner, waiting for something.
The screen shattered.
This time, Fafnir stood at the entrance of a mine.
The mine shaft looked like a dark hole carved out of the mountain, with rubble and rusty tools piled up at the entrance.
A man emerged from the mine. He was short, slightly hunched, and his face was covered in coal dust, obscuring his features.
His walking posture was not right; his left leg dragged.
The man stood at the cave entrance for a while, then spat on the ground; the spit was black.
Fafnir followed him involuntarily.
The man walked for a long time, passing through a bare forest, crossing a dry ditch, and finally entering the drab, low houses.
……
The room was dark, with only an oil lamp burning, its flame flickering in the wind that seeped in through the crack in the door.
The woman sat on the edge of the bed, a tattered garment spread on her lap, mending it with her head down. Her hair was grayish, her face sallow, her knuckles large, and her fingernails embedded with indelible gray-black stains.
"You're back?" The woman didn't look up.
The man grunted in response and sat down on a chair with a missing leg. The chair wobbled for a moment before settling into place.
"The foreman said today that the workload next week might be reduced," the man's voice was muffled, as if squeezed from deep in his throat. "A section of the mine tunnel collapsed and needs repairs. Until it's fixed, we can only work half a day."
The woman paused in her needlework: "How much can I earn in half a day?"
"half."
"That's not enough!" The woman's voice rose sharply, then fell back down as she glanced at the bed.
Fafnir followed her gaze.
The two children huddled together on a narrow bed, the blanket so thin that their bodies were visible through it.
The woman didn't say anything more, and continued sewing, stitch by stitch, to close the hole.
The screen jumped slightly.
There was more noise in the room; the man's voice was so loud that it made the flame of the oil lamp tremble.
"I can't support you both!" he roared into the house, his face flushed red, the veins on his forehead throbbing. "Both of you need to eat, both of you need to wear clothes. With the few copper coins I earn a month, I can't even afford oil for a mining lamp!"
There was no sound from inside the room.
"Speak up!" the man roared again.
Martha held Allen's hand, and Allen kept his head down, shrinking behind Martha, with only half of his messy head showing.
……
The dream never stopped.
After the man roared, the room remained silent for a long time. The flame of the oil lamp flickered a few times before finally going out, and only heavy breathing could be heard in the darkness.
Fafnir stood in the corner, out of sight of anyone.
"Dad," Martha's voice came from the darkness, "I'll gather more firewood. Allen can help too."
no respond.
After a while, the man's voice rang out again, this time much lower, as if he were talking to himself: "How much money can you make from gathering firewood... You're still young, how much money can you make from gathering firewood..."
The scene changed again.
This time it was a large stone house, but it had no windows.
Damp sheets and clothes hung on the wall, and the air was filled with a damp smell of soap and mildew.
Fafnir saw a woman squatting on the ground with a large wooden tub in front of her, filled with swollen clothes.
Her hands, white from being soaked in water, and her knuckles red and swollen, were vigorously rubbing a dark-colored robe.
That was Martha and Ellen's mother. Fafnir had seen her once before—from afar—in the laundry room at Lorraine Manor.
"Hurry up, hurry up," someone urged.
She didn't look up, and her hands moved a little faster, splashing soapy water onto her apron, which was already soaked through, making it impossible to tell where the water had just splashed.
Fafner saw her hands—the area between her thumb and forefinger had several cuts, some of which had scabbed over, while others still revealed pink, tender flesh.
She rubbed it for a while, then took the robe out of the water to look at it, before putting it back into the basin to continue rubbing.
Someone pushed the door open and came in.
"Martha, the kitchen needs your help."
"I understand." Her voice was hoarse, as if she hadn't had water in a long time.
She stood up, straightened her back briefly, but couldn't stand up completely. She leaned against the wall and slowly stood up straight, wiped her hands on her apron a couple of times, and then went out.
Fafnir followed behind her.
The kitchen was brighter than the laundry room, the fire in the stove casting an orange-red glow throughout the room. Several women were chopping vegetables, stirring soup, and feeding bread dough into the oven.
"Take these up to the third floor." Someone handed her a tray with a beautifully presented meal served in silverware.
She took the tray and went out.
The stairs were long, and she walked slowly. When she reached the corner on the second floor, she stopped to catch her breath, leaned the tray against the handrail, and wiped the sweat from her forehead with the back of her hand.
Fafner saw her face—pale even more so than in the laundry room, her lips bloodless, and dark circles under her eyes.
He carried the tray upstairs.
The third-floor corridor was long, with carpets on the floor and oil paintings on the walls. Her old cloth shoes made no sound as she stepped on the carpet.
She stopped in front of a door and knocked.
"Come in."
The room was large, and an elven lady sat by the window, wearing an exquisitely made silk dress, reading a book.
"Madam, your lunch." She placed the tray on the table, stepped back, and bowed her head.
The elf lady glanced at her, then at the tray, said nothing, and continued reading her book.
She stood at the door for a while, and seeing that there were no further instructions, she turned and left.
The door closed behind me.
She leaned against the corridor wall, closed her eyes for a moment, and then went downstairs.
Back in the kitchen, just as I put the tray down, someone urged me again: "We're short-handed for the basement wine cellar. Go and bring up a few barrels of wine."
"I just—"
"Go quickly."
The image shattered completely in that instant.
Fafnir opened his eyes.
The wood grain on the ceiling was still there, and Clint's snoring was still there.
He lay there for a while, pulled the blanket under his chin, and stared at the scar on the ceiling for a long time. He felt a dull ache in his chest, as if something was blocking it.
When Martha said, "We don't have a surname," her expression was calm, as if she were talking about something she was already used to.
When Allen said, "It's only right to help each other," his tone was very calm.
They used their points to buy him fried meat, they visited him in the hospital, and they helped him mop the floor.
They never talk about themselves.
Fafnir closed his eyes.
Fafnir was thinking about Martha and Allen—
Their parents share the same name as them.
My father was a miner, both in the Narns Empire and in the Elven Holy Kingdom. When the mine collapsed, his wages were halved, and he couldn't support his two children.
My mother worked in the laundry room from morning till night, her hands were soaked and raw, her back was so sore she couldn't straighten up, and she was still being urged to move wine barrels.
They were selected by lottery.
The Nunns Empire lost the war seven years ago.
Civilians from defeated nations either signed contracts to become laborers or stayed behind—but what for? Fafner didn't know, but he figured it probably wouldn't be much better than being a laborer.
So they came.
A family of four traveled from the Whitewing Province of the Narns Empire to the Elven Holy Kingdom of Lorraine. From one mine to another, from one laundry room to another.
Fafnir rolled over.
He remembered a book he had flipped through in the library before, about the war between the Narns Empire and the Holy Kingdom of the Elves.
The book is written with restraint, offering only objective accounts: the advance of the battle lines, the casualty figures, and the terms of the treaty. Every page is clean and tidy, and every number is accurate to the single digit.
……
In accounting, there is a concept called "creditor".
A creditor is someone who lends money to others; what they lend is not just cash, but also trust. When a debtor promises to repay in the future, the creditor acquires a claim on that debt.
Fafnir thought that he owed Martha and Allen not only for the few days they helped mop the floor, not only for the days they went to the cafeteria to get food for him, and not only for that fried meat.
He entered a meditative state, staring at the panel, trying to silently recite words like "debt" in his mind, using his spirituality to guide it, just as he had tried to actively summon the ledger before.
The panel is not responding.
Fafnir was not willing to give up and tried again.
Still no response.
He took a deep breath and changed his approach—instead of trying to activate any new functions, he recalled the images from his dream: his thin figure on the dirt road, his father's words in the house, his cracked hands in the laundry room, and the back of his hand in the kitchen as he put down a tray only to be urged to move more wine...
……
Debtor: Martha, Allen
"Status of claim: Not yet effective".
He wanted to be their creditor, not to lend them money or teach them to read.
He wanted to lend them a possibility—the possibility of surviving, the possibility of taking a step forward, in a world where everyone decides how to treat them based on their bloodline.