Gray sat down on the simple wooden bench. He was short, even for his age, so his legs dangled in the air. He waited patiently as Old Li went into a side room and returned with a loaf of dark bread and a bowl of water.
Gray tore at the bread when it was placed in front of him. He ripped the coarse wheat loaf apart and stuffed a big chunk into his mouth. It was dry and tasteless, hard to chew or swallow. He could only soak it in water until it was soft enough to go down. Each mouthful was a struggle but he was too hungry to care.
He got about halfway through the loaf when Old Li sat down across from him. He looked up to see that the old man was nursing a cup of hot tea. The wrinkled hands that clutched the clay cup had an orange-red glow about them. This glow was transferred to the cup and then to the tea, causing the liquid to heat up and steam.
Intrigued by the sight, Gray couldn't help but ask, "Can you teach me how to do that?"
"What?"
"The cup, how you heat the cup with your hands." Gray said.
Old Li's ability was a product of something called cultivation. Gray knew almost nothing about it, only that it varied from person to person. Some could heat things up or cool them down. Others could make a heavy object lighter or make their skin hard as tough as leather.
These abilities were interesting but not as strong as his eyes. He could tell because they weren't innate and needed years of learning and training. His just seemed to exist, as if it was a part of him. Still, they seemed useful and he was curious.
Old Li looked at him strangely for a moment before giving a derisive laugh, "Come back to me when your ten years older."
"Huh?"
"And bring ten silver!"
"Stingy…" Gray grumbled and returned to his bread.
One silver coin was worth a hundred copper coins. Gray had never even held a single silver, let alone ten.
"Boy! Nobody in the world will teach you how to cultivate for free." Old Li said, "In ten years, maybe you will have saved up ten silver. And that's only for the first few lessons. If you want me to teach you everything I know, it will be one gold…"
Gray almost choked on a mouthful of bread. One gold coin. It was a hundred silver coins and ten thousand copper coins!
"I don't know why you don't just join one of the mining gangs or even the hunting and foraging companies. That way you won't have to starve constantly. And if you're able to become a formal member, they will naturally teach you their cultivation methods for free." Old Li said.
This was true to some extent. These gangs and companies did take in orphaned children but it wasn't an easy life. There was no free meal in the world. A child was an extra mouth to feed so they had to earn their keep.
Orphaned children in mining gangs were treated especially harshly. They were forced to do the most undesirable and dangerous tasks. They were beaten and abused and nobody cared if one suddenly disappeared or died. They were nothing more than slaves until adulthood.
Gray was not content to live such a life and had set off on his own. Armed with special abilities that no one else had, he was the only orphan to ever do so in this valley. As for cultivation, he could only wait and figure it out once he earned more money.
"Why are you so stubborn?" Old Li prodded.
"They're assholes. I'm not going to deal with them." Gray answered resolutely.
"They're not all like that… I know some that have orphans around the same age as you." Old Li argued, "You can help each other, maybe make a friend along the way."
"Those kids are assholes too."
Old Li snorted and shook his head. He dropped the subject and Gray ate the remaining bread in silence.
Afterward, they traded for the things Gray wanted. The money he had just earned was spent but he came out of it with a shiny iron pickaxe and a heavy sack filled to the brim with bread. The food was enough to last him two weeks at least and the new pickaxe would be good for a while.
By the time Gray left, there were no lights at all around the village, everyone had gone to sleep. The candle in Old Li's shop also went out soon after. He didn't bother asking for a place to stay for the night because he knew that the stingy shopkeeper would charge him money for it.
Gray didn't feel tired or sleepy. His stomach was full and he was filled with eagerness. There was much more high-quality iron ore in the tunnel he dug. It meant he wouldn't have to go hungry for a long time. He just had to protect it from others. This was why he wanted to set off in the dead of night, so there was no chance of being followed.
He stepped out of the boundaries of Blue Lake Village. The nearby crystalline lake would normally be glittering from the reflections of stars and moonlight but tonight there was nothing. It was cloudy and there was nothing in the sky except inky darkness.
Gray looked up and paused his steps. He was reminded of a memory, his earliest memory.
It was a night like tonight, less than two years ago. He had opened his eyes to find himself lying on the ground, in the middle of a forest, staring up at the night sky. It was pitch black; there were no stars, no moon, only the endless void.
He tried sometimes to remember but there were no other memories, no parents, no relatives. Nobody in the village knew him or where he came from. The villagers attributed it to memory loss from a traumatic event or head injury and he accepted it.
The village elders, including Old Li, gave him spare bits of food so he didn't starve. After the first few weeks, that support dwindled as they pressured him to join a gang or a company so that he would not be a useless burden. But he refused to be a slave so he could only fend for himself. It was Old Li who lent him a rusty old pickaxe and, in a way, saved his life.
Gray held a tiny bit of gratitude towards the shopkeeper, only a tiny bit because the stingy old man's help was worth just a few copper coins…
"These people…" He muttered to himself. "I have to rely on myself!"
He shook his head. He didn't often think about his misfortunes because it was pointless to do so. It didn't fill his stomach or earn him coins. He focused back on the task at hand, mining ore. It was the most important thing, the only thing, that could ensure his survival.