The room was brightly lit and filled with thick books. Some were on shelves, and some were scattered on the floor. There were so many books in one room that it could make one head hurt just by looking at them.
Except for page flipping every few minutes, nothing could be heard in the room. Surrounded by a mountain of books, a young girl around ten sat in the middle of the room. She read the book earnestly, and when she finished reading the page. She would flip it and start reading the next one. While reading, If she found something interesting on the page, she would write in the writing book on her side. Haze had been following this cycle every day for the whole last month.
"Haze, you must remember to rest between studying; how many times have I told you" A gentle voice sounded from the back, and a beautiful woman walked inside the room. Milan walked to Haze's side and sat beside Haze. Haze and Milan's mentor-teacher relationship had grown closer in the last two to three weeks.
Milan looked at the mountain of books scattered on the floor and sighed. "If you don't take rest while forming memory imprint, it will make your mind unstable, and you will get corrupted by Concept when you try to advance to Sequence 1," Milan explained seriously while patting her head.
"I was trying to finish these books early," Haze spoke dimly and pointed her finger at ten or so books.
"Why are you in so much hurry to advance? It does not feel very good after you advance. After advancing, you have to constantly worry about corruption, madness from concept, mind instability because of too much knowledge, and many other dangers that come with it."
"Take your time; you have your brother to care for you. What would he do and feel if you suddenly went mad" Milan's serious voice again sounded in Haze's ear.
'This young lady is too young and too serious,' Milan thought as she looked at Haze, whose head was down in little shame.
"Here, I brought you the pathways to choose from in the 'Creative Group' of 'Mystic Path.' There are three pathways which will suit you best."
"Prism, Artist, and Storyteller show them to your brother and family to discuss which one will be best for you" Milan handed Haze a sealed folder.
"Let's stop here today," Milan Said, and Her hand moved to cup Haze's cheeks.
"Ah! Teacher, your hands are cold" Haze's body shivered in the cold, but it only caused Milan to squeeze her cheeks tightly 'Hahaha' Milan laughed evilly in her heart.
Haze may be more intelligent than a normal kid, but in the end, she is still a ten-year-old kid who needs a reminder to be a kid and enjoy life when you still have time. Finally, after a minute, Milan took her hand off Haze's face. Haze instantly cupped her face to return her cheeks to normal temperature.
"Let's go. I will take you to eat something," Milan said and waited for Haze to pack up.
----
The next day, in the evening, when Milan came to work. Eon and Second handed her the shop to handle, and they took off to open the wishing stall. Eon and Second's plan was simple: first, grant wishes, spread their name, and later watch the show.
The stall was in the same place as yesterday. Second cleaned the stall with a spell, making it look like a new one. Like yesterday Eon sat on the chair and started to read a book to pass the time. Their action caught the attention of the same food stall owner from yesterday, and he observed them from the corner of his eye.
He could also read the sign on top of the stall, 'Changing Fate & Granting Wishes.'
'What boasting words,' the food stall owner thought but did not say anything loud it was always better to maintain a good relationship with neighbors than be on bad terms.
By now few passersby also had caught the attention of the new stall, but naturally, they chose to ignore it. No one wanted to get scammed willingly.
Eon read his book, and Second stood silently at the back.
"Uncle, do you grant wishes" suddenly, a little boy who looked eight years old appeared at the stall and spoke in a childish tone. The boy looked malnourished; he had tattered clothes on his body and could barely reach the table height.
"What do you want to wish for, little boy" Eon raised his eyes to observe the kid and spoke gently.
"Can... Can you really grant a wish?" the boy spoke, stuttering.
"If you believe, then of course."
"But I... I don't have money for a wish," the kid spoke hesitantly.
"We don't take money here. You can pay with anything valuable you have," Eon explained calmly, he did not expect that he would have to start giving people loans, and his second customer was going to be a small child.
"Well then, I wish for a home and food, it's cold at night on the street, and I only get to eat one time," the boy explained, even causing the nearby stall owner, who was paying attention to the stall to feel sad in his heart.
Homelessness and poverty was widespread problem in the advanced world. With the progress in technology, the work lessened, and the new available work required people to be highly educated. The second problem was if people wanted to choose the path of studying magic, sometimes they would not have enough resources and talent to start. All these changes caused a good amount of the population in Floating World to remain poor.
"Very well then, your wish has been granted, and I'll take 20 years of your lifespan," Eon simply said, looking at the boy. Maybe the boy did not understand what he lost, but every wish has a price. Nothing was free in this world, especially a wish. But Eon did sound like a scammer.
"Hmm... That's it?" the boy asked disappointingly, lowering his head, and his eyes dimmed. He really wanted to see some lights and firecrackers when Eon granted his wish.
The stall owner, who was looking from the side, could not watch Eon give the boy fake lollipops. He suddenly walked outside of his stall and called the boy to his stall.
"Hey, little guy, come over here" the boy turned around and looked in the direction where the sound came from. His eyes landed on a fat middle-aged man, but when he smelled food from the stall. He walked over to the food stall owner happily.
"Here, eat this" the stall owner placed a rice bowl at the side table and told him to eat. On the other side, looking at the food stall owner's action, Second was smiling inwardly,
The day ended without more people coming when it started to get dark. Eon and Second closed the stall and disappeared from the place.
---
Somewhere in Sector 40 'Industrial Zone' existed a big metal factory that spanned in few kilometers. The factory produced metal parts for ships and heavy machinery. Inside the factory, on a machine was working a woman that looked in her late twenties.
She started working here in this factory when she was nineteen-year-old. Later the woman fell in love with her colleague worker at the factory and married, but he died after a year in an accident in the factory. The death of her husband and the pressure of the newborn child caused her and her child to move on to the streets in a few months.
The woman wore a yellow vest and safety earphones on her head to not get her ear ruptured by noise. She stared at the moving machine; every few seconds, her hands would move, and she would replace the metal part position in the machine. She has followed this routine for the last eight years and was extremely familiar with it.
"Mira, the boss is calling you into the office" a man came inside a big lunchroom and spoke to Mira, who was on her break and eating her lunch. The man was none other than her supervisor, but the plant suddenly manager wanted to see her. She felt anxious inside. Mira was just a regular worker at the plant even if she had worked for a few years; it was rare for a plant manager to pay attention to workers working in a big machinery plant who would change every six months.
Mira hurriedly got up; putting her lunch box in her bag, she made her way out of the lunchroom to the manager's room.
Manager's room was quite far; it existed on the other side of the plant, where there were fewer noises. On her feet, it took Mira more than fifteen minutes to reach the office.
"Knock! Knock!" Mira knocked on the glass door.
"Comin," a heavy voice sounded from inside.
"Good afternoon, Sir," Mira greeted as she slowly pushed open the door. The room inside was bright and filled with drawers. After the door closed back, no sound entered the room from outside. Mira felt peaceful for a second.
"You are?" The middle-aged man had a questioning look on her face. He had never met Mira, so he naturally did not recognize her.
"It's Mira, Sir. My supervisor informed me you wanted to see me," Mira spoke hesitantly, still standing near the door.
"Oh, I remember; take a seat. I have something to talk to you about" Mira walked to the chair. She pulled it back and sat on it anxiously. The boss fiddled through some paper on her table, unable to find what he was looking for. He bent down a little and looked through table drawers, and after two minutes, he finally took out a file from one bottom drawer of the table.
"The reason for calling you here is, as you have been working in the plant for the last eight years and have always been a loyal and hardworking worker, the higher-ups are quite happy with your performance." Mira listened carefully.
"Next month, the company is opening a new plant for production and hiring for supervisor. After looking through the last few years production work reports, I found your name and wanted to recommend you take one of the positions," The Boss explained calmly and looked at Mira.
Listening to the manager, Mira felt her body suddenly become cold and numb. 'Are the bad days finally gone' she questioned herself, sitting like a statue on the chair. With so many people working in the factory, it was extremely hard to progress in this kind of work, and sometimes it could take more than ten-fifteen years to get a promotion, but now Mira got it out of nowhere. She felt hard to believe.
"Company will provide you with a house and free education for your child, and your salary will also be increased fourfold of current," The plant manager explained further as he felt Mira was hesitating about something. Listening to more information, Mira woke up from her thoughts.
"I'll accept it, Sir," she hurriedly said as if the manager would take back the offer. The manager handed Mira a paper folder to sign and informed her about the new job responsibilities before sending her out.
Mira walked out of the room; she suddenly started to sob, and tears started to drip from the corner of her eyes, but these tears were tears of happiness, the tears of finally having a roof overhead, tears of finally being able to eat, and the tears of finally being able to transform their life. She silently prayed in her mind to attend church and donate some money to God.