A Scoundrel's Guide to Running an Orphanage

You. So, you're finally awake? You almost gave me a heart attack, not gonna lie. I saved you when you almost drowned but I wasn't sure if you could survive. Are you sure you're not a ghost? I've seen ghosts before, but in the unlikely situation when I'm not expecting their presence then I'd be scared.

You don't look like one, though.

They're spectral like the movies portrayed them.

Although I doubt you've seen a movie in the duration of your life. You were born in a forsaken timeline, then you're still trying to survive from the economic recession. How unlucky of you, constantly being embroiled in the low conditions of life.

I can see it in your body and well, you should know the elderly have their fair share of visions and whatnot.

This man and I, we lived our early days in the beginning of the "magical cyberpunk" stage. It was cool and all, but it was short. Damn too short, you might want to travel back in time and slap them authors who were optimistic for the 22nd century. Who would have thought we're experiencing another global recession after only three years of peace and prosperity?

Second season of the Middle Ages─now airing towards an indefinite point in time.

We're living through harsh lives, the future is uncertain and I can barely stand it anymore.

You see, I used to eat miso soup and grilled salmon for breakfast.

I haven't eaten salmon in forever.

I have hopes of miso being manufactured, but well, we're too far away from Japan.

Unfair, I know─but struggle is the only way.

What are you doing in a remote place like Romania?

You must have come all the way from New York.

Your fashion tells everything, and if that's not enough, you remind me of a prominent clan.

It's painstaking how they're everywhere so I can't pinpoint who…No, no, no, don't bother telling me who they are yet. I love playing the detective game and I think uncovering who exactly are your parents is a good exercise for the brain.

I have always loved that city no matter what time: I lived in SoHo, but sometimes moved bases to either Hell's Kitchen or 23rd Street.

Oh, I must have grinned.

You don't have to make that face.

I'm afraid you'll have to hear an elderly woman's story until you've recovered as well.

Sit down, have a hot chocolate.

I brewed because I craved, don't mistake it for hospitality.

Since they're synthetic and all, I'd feel bad if you'd worship kindness you can't expect these days.

Sigh.

It has been years since someone visited home.

Since it has been stigmatized as the witch's abode, no one has dared to set foot.

I'm more than thrilled by your presence.

It's the era of magic so what makes me and the house special, you ask?

I only have one word for you.

Machine.

As you can see in front of you and I'm sitting besides it, the secret was never hidden.

You've been curious for a while and I have to admit, I pretended like it wasn't here in the first place.

Of course, who wouldn't be curious?

Technology has been scarce for your generation.

Metals you see in the streets are rusted, nothing with artificial intelligence nor any kind of programming at all.

Why are there floating characters?

Are they what they call numbers?

They look like the ones in the sky, don't they?

"Gasp!" One resident let their intrusive thoughts be exclaimed out loud.

"She's carrying the heavens in one curious implement," said another resident.

"What exact kind of sorcery is she using?" Curiosity killed them all.

"I want to know!" All howled in unison.

Wands and pitchforks raised, the devils created themselves.

"Yeah, let's kill her."

Funny story, all the kids here are like you.

I only have a corpse entrapped in a machine, and I've been deemed terrible.

They mistook it for a torturing device, and I'd be keeping them inside once I was bored with my plaything.

There's no threat to survival though, because I'm the strongest in the domain.

I'd be challenged, they'll come home injured.

Nights after nights of them raising torches and pitchforks, they didn't stand any chance at all.

Declared I was too strong for their time, and was left alone.

It wasn't resolved, though.

They sometimes come back, hike their asses deep in the forest, as a partying crowd creating ruckus and playing music. I've been treated as the medal they want to clutch, and because I didn't understand their language─it became a tradition. Happens twice a year, during the summer and the winter, like it's the goddamn comiket.

Kill them all?

No, it's the only source of happiness in here and I hold it so dearly, I'd protect them at all cost. With the population dwindling these days, you'll have to save who you can regardless of its nature. Geez! You're too bloodthirsty of a lad, good grief, let's just begin the main story.

"Corpse," though, he's not dead yet.

He has long foregone life to navigate a different life, and I doubt he'd be willing to return to the surface. Nothing to expect in real life if you're technically a corpse. I invented the healing vat for him to recuperate, but what can be expected from a replication?

This is the human side's answer for mage hospitals back in the day. Cutting edge technology as they said it was, and cured the late King Takarajima in the span of an absolute twenty days. He was severely injured─and take note, he missed an arm but regrew his limb back.

How it works?

Simple.

What you need─an untainted source of mana.

Lucky, I happen to purely be a mage. I channel spirits naturally unlike you, a hybrid, who is unliked by the forces of nature. You press your hand like this, pray to the dormant spirits, and the mana tank is replenished.

Would you like to try?

No, you don't have to take your gloves off.

Touch, close your eyes, and think you can supply your mana…Nothing happened, yes, because your lines are disarranged. Nothing too fancy though, I'm not keen to discrimination as I've always loved people no matter how they're constructed.

Color the historical scheme curious─because the design was from a human. No less, the one who advocated peace between worlds although it never happened. I can never return to the world where I came from, and even if I can return now, I doubt I'd be welcomed.

And that's fine, in and of itself.

I must say though, it's the breakthrough your kind needed but never experienced.

Bubbles rise to the coordinated momentum of beeping noise, it tells the person in the tank is alive.

He's breathing, and I don't know why you wouldn't think it's a good interface.

Of course, that's only for emergencies─when you're far away.

Projected on the thick glass barrier is his life monitor. Expected time he'd open his eyes: three thousand days, thirteen hours, and less than fifteen minutes. That's about eight years, and I don't know if I'd take another eight years alive for us to see the light.

Keeping him alive might be unnecessary at this point in time, the world is reaching its expiration.

Why am I keeping him alive, you wonder?

Oh, good question!

You're hooked.

You see, Mister Miller is the one to blame.

I despise him for throwing the mission onto a mere mortal when he's the one who won't die.

Granted, he's not the man in the tank.

I'd break it into you firsthand that he's responsible for him.

He's responsible for us scoundrels─the father of that forsaken orphanage.

And boy, I can see you in him.