MLBO 04

‘How did he know……?’

Was it that obvious on my face?

Or was the excuse I made up in a hurry too clumsy?

Either way, it felt like he had seen right through my lie.

I lightly twisted my wrist free from Emilian’s grasp.

“It’s just a small scrape.”

“Still, make sure you put medicine on it.”

After a brief silence, Emilian added,

“You don’t want it to scar.”

“Ah, I will……”

For some reason, his worried words made her feel strange.

He was probably saying that because he thought she got hurt because of him.

I busily moved my hands, cleaning up the empty dishes.

As I pushed the cart, the dishes clattered against each other.

“Well then, I should get going.”

Leaning against the bed, Emilian simply nodded instead of answering.

His listless appearance kept bothering her. But now that he had finished eating, she no longer had any excuse to stay there.

Before leaving the room, she glanced back at Emilian.

There was something she had almost forgotten to tell him.

“There might be an experiment tomorrow.”

The researchers never spared the test subject children just because they were sick. Unless the situation was truly serious, they would never exempt them from an experiment.

After a moment of silence, Emilian replied,

“……I see.”

Just hearing the word “experiment” was enough to make the other children tremble in fear and burst into tears. But Emilian only answered in a calm voice.

As if he had already prepared himself for whatever awaited him.

That composed attitude only made her worry more.

‘His fever really needs to go down soon.’

The experiments were brutal even when someone was perfectly healthy. If he was sick on top of that, enduring them would be even harder.

As she left Emilian’s room, she shook her head slightly.

‘……I told myself not to get involved.’

No matter how she tried to justify it, she was still planning to escape alone and leave that boy behind.

So what was she trying to accomplish by showing this half-hearted sympathy……?

Giving unnecessary affection would only poison both him and herself.

The faces of children who had died, unable to endure the cruel experiments, flashed through her mind.

‘After all, I…….’

Couldn’t save anyone.

And never would.

That was why it was better to stop this shallow sympathy here.

She steeled her weakening resolve.

Then she forcefully erased Emilian’s face from her thoughts.

The errand children at the laboratory began their day before dawn.

Because of that, most of the children ate dinner and went to bed early.

One by one, the children finished eating and returned to their quarters.

Instead of heading toward the dormitory, she turned down another hallway.

Even though dinner time had long passed, a researcher merely glanced at her wandering around before looking away again.

Compared to the experimental subjects, the errand children were allowed a certain degree of freedom of movement.

Of course, it wasn’t for the children’s sake.

It was simply because it made the researchers’ lives more convenient.

She gathered several supplies from the storage room and quickened her pace.

Climbing the stairs lit by dim lights, she soon stopped in front of a room with a plaque that read:

<No. 175>

It was Emilian’s room.

‘Let’s just check if his fever’s gone down and leave…….’

Going in for just a moment should be fine.

Careful not to wake him, she slowly opened the door.

The lamp’s glow flickered softly across Emilian’s sleeping face.

He didn’t move at all, seemingly in a deep sleep.

She cautiously reached out and checked his temperature.

He was burning up.

‘His fever still hasn’t gone down.’

His hair was drenched with sweat and hopelessly disheveled.

A faint groan slipped from between his cracked lips.

“Ugh……”

Seeing him suffering from the fever made her earlier resolve feel meaningless.

‘I only planned to check on him and leave…… but how can I just walk away like this?’

She let out a quiet sigh.

Then she dipped a towel into the bucket of water and wrung it out.

They were things she had grabbed from the storage room just in case.

Carefully, she placed the damp towel on Emilian’s forehead.

The moment the cold cloth touched him, his long eyelashes trembled faintly.

Emilian shifted slightly, but that was all.

‘Whew, at least he didn’t wake up.’

The towel quickly became lukewarm from his burning temperature.

By the time she had replaced it several times, a great deal of time had already passed.

‘Oh no, I should go now.’

Perhaps all the effort of changing the towel until her wrists ached had paid off, because Emilian’s fever had gone down a little.

Looking at his face, which appeared calmer than before, eased her worries somewhat.

‘……I definitely told myself to keep my distance.’

Just this once.

The experiments would already be harsh enough, and if he was sick too, she wouldn’t be able to stop worrying.

‘Starting tomorrow, I really won’t care anymore.’

As she returned to her room, she repeated that promise to herself over and over again.

Even after Anise gave him the fever medicine and left, Emilian continued to suffer from the fever throughout the night.

His entire body burned as though he had been thrown into a pit of fire.

‘It hurts…….’

The only thing he could perceive was pain.

But it was fine.

He was used to pain.

The thugs in the slums never spared children just because they were young.

On days when he failed to earn enough by begging, they beat him until he lost consciousness.

“You should be grateful that I’m feeding and sheltering a useless brat like you.”

That was what they would say as they tossed him bread as hard as stone, pretending they were being generous.

Even when some noble occasionally took pity and donated a large sum of money, none of it ever reached him.

The thugs stole every last coin.

Hunger and cold were part of daily life.

Every winter, the corpses of children who had frozen or starved to death were left strewn carelessly across the streets.

But no one cared about the deaths of those children.

After the long war, orphans and beggars were everywhere.

Even the slum thugs who exploited children for money were indifferent to their deaths.

If one child died, they could simply bring in another child to beg in their place.

The slums always smelled of death.

And this laboratory was no different.

Only the location had changed.

The slums and this place were both the same kind of hell.

That was why, when he learned he would be used as an experimental subject, he hadn’t even felt particularly despairing.

There was only one thing he could do.

Endure.

And keep enduring in this hell whose end would never come.

Just as he always had.

‘Nothing has changed.’

Repeating those words to himself, Emilian opened his eyes.

Sunlight squeezed through the tiny window, dazzling his vision, and he frowned slightly.

Though still half-asleep, he immediately sat up.

Surprisingly, his body felt light, as though the agony from yesterday had been a lie.

Emilian placed a hand against his forehead.

His skin felt cool to the touch.

It seemed his fever had gone down overnight.

Had the medicine that girl gave him really worked?

He didn’t even know her name.

Yet somehow, it felt strange having someone worry about him and care for him so attentively.

Emilian threw off the blanket and stood up.

Something suddenly slipped off and fell to the floor with a soft thud.

It was the damp towel.

At that moment, a vague memory surfaced.

He had forgotten because he couldn’t tell whether it had been a dream or reality……

But last night, in his blurred vision, there had definitely been a girl with light brown hair.

‘That girl…….’

She had brought him medicine for his fever, and while he slept, she had even taken care of him.

He was grateful for her concern.

But……

‘Why is she being kind to me?’

There was no such thing as kindness without a price in this world.

Emilian absentmindedly fiddled with the towel that still retained a faint warmth.

Why was it?

His thoughts were complicated, yet strangely enough, he felt at peace.

That was when he heard footsteps.

Soon after, the sound of a key turning echoed through the room, and the door opened.

“Test Subject No. 175. Come out here.”

The researcher’s cold voice fell over his head.