Chapter 4: The Flyer’s Plea

“Kuchanti!”

Again, the boy poked the basket. Yeosu put down her trowel with a thud and looked up at the boy. She tried to make her eyes look strong, but the area under her eyes was already stained with tears.

Pfft, the boy snorted, then snatched Yeosu’s basket.

“G-give it back!”

“Can you even catch it?”

The boy stood on his tiptoes and looked down at Yeosu with disdain, as she tried to grab the basket in his hand.
It didn’t reach.
Even after struggling for a long time, the result was the same.

The observing children, bored, yawned overtly.
Meanwhile, beads of sweat hung from Yeosu’s forehead.

Hmph, the boy exhaled through his nose, took a stone from the basket, and casually dropped it on the ground.
As if bestowing a favor.

“Is that enough? You’re a dwarf, after all.”

Yeosu looked down at the pebble at her feet.

Something welled up, along with tears, to her throat.

Being short didn’t mean she could fill her stomach with just one stone.
Moreover, there was her mother in the shelter, who had been filling her stomach with only water for several days besides her.

She was desperate for food.

“Hey, let’s go to the exchange. We need to go quickly so the adults don’t take it.”

The boy turned around with a satisfied smile.
What happened next unfolded in an instant.
Pitter-patter! Swift footsteps approached the boy.

When he turned his head, wondering what it was, Yeosu had already grabbed him around the waist.

While the surprised children merely blinked, Yeosu tightened her grip and clung to the boy’s back.

“M-my, my s-stones!”

Pressed by her fierce momentum, the boy, flustered, pushed Yeosu’s forehead.
But she wouldn’t budge.

“Th-this, you b*tch! Someone get her off me!”

A few children hesitantly approached but quickly retreated after receiving Yeosu’s fierce gaze.

In the end, the boy struggled alone, but it wasn’t as easy as he had thought.

He should have known from the moment she could collect as many stones as the adults did.
Her grip was too strong for her small body.

After a short struggle, the basket in the boy’s hand fell to the dirt ground.
Yet, Yeosu, still excited, couldn’t let go of the boy.

Finally, the children, who could no longer just watch, grabbed Yeosu’s arms and legs to pull her off.
Yeosu finally stumbled and fell to the ground.

The boy brushed off his crumpled clothes and cursed.

“Hey! You tiny f*cker!”

The enraged boy lunged at Yeosu.
Thwack! Thwack! Fists, incomparably harder than Yeosu’s hands, struck her face.

“Fight!”

“Fight!”

The watching children excitedly egged on the fight.
The boy, emboldened, grabbed Yeosu’s hair tightly.

“Ugh!”

“You wormy Kuchanti b*tch.”

The boy laughed out loud, watching Yeosu’s face twist in agony.
The children’s cheers grew louder.
Now it was time to show something.

“I’ll make sure you never mess with me again.”

Grinning, the boy pulled out a small piece of glass from his pocket.
It was refuse he had found near the incinerator earlier.

The children’s cheers intensified.
Then the boy swung his arm.
The piece of glass, reflecting the sunset, sparkled in the air.

Yeosu briefly thought it looked like a star as it flew towards her face.
It was a preposterous thought.
Finally, just as her eyes squeezed shut.

Thwack!

“Ugh?”

The boy’s hand, holding the glass shard, stopped right in front of Yeosu’s nose.
His grinning expression instantly hardened.

The boy couldn’t comprehend the situation even as he saw his arm trembling in the air.
The surroundings were dazzling in the sunset.

He squinted his eyes and only then could he finally identify what was in front of him.
A woman was holding his arm.

“Uh… Mom?”

At Yeosu’s faint voice from behind him, the boy finally realized the identity of the woman holding his arm.

Cheche, known in the shelter as a mute.
She was a woman who always wrapped her body tightly even in midsummer, because her skin was so unsightly, drawing strange glances from the incinerator residents.

“Let go of me, you crazy woman!”

Fear filled the boy’s eyes as he yelled.
This was because Cheche’s eyes shone like those of a wild beast.
Cheche, without a word, snatched the glass shard from his hand and threw it far away.

“Oh, no…!”

Afraid of losing his hard-won weapon, the boy immediately shook off Cheche’s hand and ran into the wilderness.
Only then did Yeosu, her collar released, gasp for breath.

Cheche sharply turned her head and glared at the children who were looking at her with fearful eyes.
The children gasped, looked at each other for a moment, then without a word, began to race towards the shelter.

“Uh… Mom…”

Yeosu reached out her hand, her skin all peeled.
Her whole body ached, and her head was dizzy.
But Cheche only watched and did not take her hand.

For a moment, sorrow overwhelmed her, but she was quick to give up.
Cheche was a strict mother who preferred her to stand up on her own rather than hold her hand.

Yeosu rubbed her swollen cheek and got up by pushing off the ground herself.
After dusting off the dirt from her knees, Cheche gestured with her eyes at the basket on the ground.

‘Pick it up.’

Sniff, Yeosu swallowed her tears and nodded.
She squatted down on her aching legs and began to pick up the stones.

The setting sun warmed her cold hands.
Her hands became dirty with dust, but finally, Yeosu successfully recovered the stones she had collected from the children.

“I… I finished.”

When she brushed off her hands and stood up, Cheche was looking up at the sky.
Yeosu also looked up at the sky.
Then she saw an airship, its speed reduced, cutting through the fluffy clouds.

“Ah.”

Something was falling thud-thud.
Carried by the gentle breeze, they scattered messily around the shelter and its surroundings.

Yeosu picked up the one that fell right at her feet.
Cheche also looked down at the one that fell next to her foot.

The Human Run wants your children!

Do you want to dress your children in clothes that cover their arms and legs? Do you want to feed them food that actually makes them gain weight, instead of filling their stomachs with pebble cookies and ant egg jam? Do you want to put them to sleep in a warm bed instead of on a cold sandy floor?

Then bring your children to the starting screening center below right now. We will help them live a life different from their parents and dream of a happy future.

All young ones under 15 years old are welcome.

General Human Resources Office.

The flyer, with slightly changed words from the one she saw earlier, was stiff like new.
Yeosu glanced at Cheche.

Cheche, who had been quietly looking at the flyer as if reading its contents, soon let out a hollow laugh as if she had seen something absurd.

Then, the flyer crumpled under Cheche’s foot.
Before the surprised Yeosu could ask why, Cheche snatched the flyer from Yeosu’s hand and threw it to the ground.

‘Let’s go back.’

As Cheche walked silently, flyers continued to descend in front of her.
The loud clattering of stones colliding in the basket was drowned out by the massive airship’s engine noise.

Yeosu, following behind, looked at Cheche’s hand.
She hesitated to hold it but soon gave up the thought after seeing her expressionless face.

Instead, Yeosu tugged at Cheche’s clothes.
Cheche’s steps, which had paused briefly, pushed against the ground again and moved forward.

“Think about it again! This will be the first and last time the Human Run recruits unregistered players!”

Inside the shelter they had arrived at, there was an unexpected visitor.
Yeosu, who was applying ointment to her face, glanced at her neighbor, Leroi, who was passionately speaking to her mother.

She was the mother of three children who often visited Cheche’s shelter, and she had started visiting more frequently since her husband, who had gone to dig for stones, fell off a cliff.

In her hand was the flyer that had been scattered all over the incinerator.
It seemed that the exchange manager, who could read, had gone around the shelters and interpreted the contents of the flyer while Yeosu was digging for stones.

“This is a stroke of luck for the children!”

Leroi shook the flyer with a rare passionate expression.
Then she said she planned to take her two children, excluding her eldest who was over 15, to the Human Run screening center the next day.

Cheche listened to her without a word.
Frustrated by this, Leroi raised her voice even more.

“After the race, they’ll give them food, a place to sleep, and even showers with filtered clean water! If they just run well, they’ll live longer than living in the incinerator. No, even if they live a bit shorter, what does it matter? It’ll be much better for their lives to live luxuriously there than to live here for one or two more years!”

Cheche’s eyes narrowed at Leroi’s last words.
Leroi, however, seemed to mistakenly think that Cheche was paying attention to her words and smiled broadly.

Cheche eventually stopped listening, sat down at the table, and began to mend a worn-out sock.
Yeosu sat opposite her, watching her mother’s reaction.
Meanwhile, Leroi’s impassioned speech continued.