– Chapter 1 –

‘Where am I?’

It was dark and humid, just like a basement.

While Raphia looked around with her vision still hazy, cold water suddenly splashed over her head.

“What are you doing dozing off! The rest of us are already working! You think you can just eat without doing anything?”

As she shrugged her shoulders, Raphia realized that she wasn’t wearing any clothes.

‘What kind of situation is this?’

No matter how many times she blinked vacantly, the situation wouldn’t change.

‘How is this possible? Didn’t I die?’

The sensation of a cold, sharp sword stabbing her heart was still vivid.

‘But how . . . am I alive?’

The cognitive dissonance caused by the unbelievable circumstances she found herself in made everything she saw hard to believe.

At that moment, the woman slapped Raphia on the shoulder, at which she yelped.

“Are you going to keep being disobedient?”

When Raphia finally turned to look at her, a freckled middle-aged woman met her eyes furiously.

“Huh . . . ?”

It was a familiar face.

“If you don’t gather your wits about you right this second, I’ll hit you harder!”

Anna, the orphanage’s handywoman who did every odd job. Everybody called her Auntie Anna. Although she worked in a place filled with children, Anna hated them, and in consequence, also loathed her job.

Raphia shook her head from side to side, wondering if this was only a dream.

‘Why is Anna in front of me? What the hell is going on?’

Ever since Raphia left this place and followed ‘that person,’ she never saw the older woman ever again.

‘And it’s strange.’

Hadn’t it been nine years?

Anna was still obviously older than Raphia, but her appearance was exactly as she remembered.

“You’re the only one left who needs to be bathed! Turn around!”

This was something she’d heard before.

A sense of foreboding dawned upon her as déjà vu enveloped her.

Anna forced Raphia to turn around.

“You know how important tomorrow is! If you don’t clean up, I’m the one who’ll get scolded by the Director!”

This line . . . she also heard this before.

Nervously, Raphia’s red eyes quivered like a leaf. With her lips equally trembling in confusion, she asked, “Is . . . today the first time I’m taking a bath?”

“Yeah, that’s right.”

The more a child wouldn’t listen or would rebel against Anna, the dirtier the water she used to wash them.

The only reason Raphia could take a bath for the first time was because the Director saw value in her.

The longer Raphia stayed here, the more she continued hearing familiar phrases she’d already heard before.

“This—this can’t be . . .” she said, with an increasingly trembling voice, desperately denying reality.

“H-how the hell is this possible?”

“What’re you saying? It’s annoying, shut up!”

Anna smacked Raphia’s unclothed back, then began rubbing it with a rough towel.

Raphia lowered her head.

At nineteen years of age, the hands that entered her vision could hardly be called that of an adult’s. No matter how many times she would close her eyes and open them again, they remained a child’s hands.

‘I need to get my head on straight first.’

Considering Anna’s cold reception, Raphia rose carefully, took a deep breath and said, “Just a minute, Auntie Anna.”

Annie glared at her and said, “What? What is it this time? If you keep wasting my time by talking nonsense, you’ll be punished severely.”

If Raphia was really ten years old, she might have cowered, but she didn’t even wince now.

Calmly, Raphia continued without missing a beat, “Please give me the towel. I’ll do it myself.”

“. . . What?”

“Auntie’s busy because you have to wash up the other kids. I can wipe my body, so please hand me the towel.”

The children in this place were all the same, either doing nothing but cry while feeling terrified, or living every single day like they were stepping on glass everywhere. But the Raphia that was here today did not belong to either group.

Anna stared at her with eyes full of distrust. None of the children she’d encountered thus far acted the way she did.

At that moment, a ladder popped out as the door it was attached to burst open.

*****

***Download NovelToon to enjoy a better reading experience!***