Hitsugi no Maou

Confederation of Ruin. A composite state consisting of eight precincts (kanku) that used to be separate countries.

Born in its easternmost, Cold Village in the Fifth Precinct, Straw was imposed labor for the state from the moment it was laid down in the world.

That is not a limited story to Stolo, and 90% of the babies born in the Ruin Federation receive the same treatment. A Labor Surveillance Officer, who is bound to be present at the birth of the people, nudges the newborn baby into small national clothes and takes him to a special newborn camp in each precinct.

Babies spend three years there and are raised until walking and thinking is possible. In the meantime, it pays back the favor of engaging in the lightest labor prescribed by federal law and having the state allow it to be born in the world.

Baby labor. It is the breeding of a parasite named "Gitica", which inhabits the Louis Union.

Gitica puts a hole in the mammalian's skin and lays eggs in it. The eggs hatch at about half a month, then eat the host's meat a little bit, and grow.

Gitica has just two to three years to become an adult and get out of the human body. The newborns of the Ruin Federation are finally returned to their homes, signaling that the guitica laid on their arms and feet will nest.

Gitica is a miserable parasite, but its feathers are traded as a type of gem with seven beautiful colors of light. The cost of a baby's stay in the camp, so to speak, is paid for by Gitica's feathers.

Although it is the duty of the people to go to the baby's camp, parents are exempted from receiving money equivalent to Gitica's feathers. But the general Louis Confederate people are not allowed to have money per se. Only the children of state officials and government officials, or of a very small number of people who have been granted possession of money by ultra-legislative exceptional measures, can grow up in an empty body of parasitic holes.

There is also a hole about the size of a bean crust on both feet of the straw. The right calf, the left heel (heel) … holes emptied in Gitica will not be blocked for the rest of your life.

You have to live with the proof that you grew up eaten by a parasite.

But the people embraced the system of a nation that would do such cruel things to themselves and their children.

It was a gift (occasionally) of national identity, a unique value that a country called the Union of Ruins had indeed created for hundreds of years.

The people of the Confederation of Ruin believe that only those who perform labor will be eligible to live. I believe that labor is the only (yuichi) act that benefits the nation, and that there is only one loose end to the existence of man in the country.

Babies or old people, but healthy or sick, only those who work are allowed to live. Labor is the raw condition and does not deserve to live in those who can no longer perform labor.

It is only then that gratitude and hatred should not be directed at the government that has prepared the means to benefit the state (eh) in its infancy, which would otherwise not be able to do any labor.

The implantation of parasites is a remedy for the weak who are unable to demonstrate their workforce. That's what many of the people thought and spoke of as common sense.

... A boy who grew up in such an environment, Straw, was able to feel uncomfortable with the way the world is (ah) even vague with his young (little) head because he met one man.

He who turns his back on the values that the rest of the people are supposed to be.

A madman, a criminal and a person who has not been slandered, yet continues to stand in the land of the Louis Union.

On the outskirts of the village, a man who lived exactly like a beast in an old anagma nest, said his name was' the third Lecht '.

It was not a native of the village, but a central precinct of the Federation… it was with a man of former officials, who had flown out of exile from the centralized capital of administrative functions.

The third, Lecht, had renounced all labour obligations in the Union of Ruin, which made labour an absolute condition for survival.

He watched the sky and the river for a day when the sun was shining, he was engraving a sentence on the ground that he couldn't understand, and he sang loud, loud, loud songs.

Naturally, the villagers despised him and reported to officials that he lived on his own in the ancient nest of Anagma, the property of the country, and that he had captured and eaten bats and dragonflies (dust) and tendered rainwater for his mouth.

The third Lecht was each time taken to the camp and paid the fine by being implanted with parasitic guitica eggs, but when released he began to live in the same place again, repeating the same act (like this).

From the top of his head to his toes, seeing him spill in holes vacated by parasites, the villagers also began to hold (hold) feelings of fear more strongly than contempt (shiatsu), and actively stopped reporting.

Sooner or later, the officials who ran out of tokens will try him for a more serious crime. That's what I thought, distancing myself from the third Lecht.

But Straw wasn't the only one who did. Because the place where some guy lives was one of the 'workplaces' that Straw had to go around all year and every day.

Straw, who finished his shift in a neonatal camp in the summer of his third birthday, was immediately placed in another job. It was a State-designated labor that Straw would continue to do for the rest of his life, patrolling all parts of the village.

In order for Straw to carry out the labor imposed on him (and so forth), he had to approach the third Lecht. And when Straw goes by the ancient nest of Anagma with his work tools, the third Lecht finally comes out of the nest hole and lets him sit down on the ground, as if Straw had been visiting him.

In the next moment, he begins his' lecture 'as he follows with his eyes the figure of a working straw. When he was an official, he coached many of his men. He dealt with children without edge or itch, and he spoke unilaterally of the history of the Luin Confederation, the foundation of the world, as the logic (proverb) of Morinawan.

Straw, who at first blocked his ears saying it was in the way of his work, was also interested, however, in the lesser breadth (haba) of the contents of the third Lecht's talk, depending on his rarity (shiatsu).

I knew much more about the third Lecht than the elder, who was said to be the village's best known.

The words of a man who once worked in a national hub were exciting and full of surprises for Straw, who even spent his day on labor but thus had little chance of gaining knowledge.

Eventually, the third Lecht lecture came to the greatest pleasure of Straw's days.

Among the countless workplaces that had to go around, he went around the Anagma's nest at the end and slowly listened to the voice of knowledge until the sun went down.

Straw wanted to learn more about foreign legends, fairytales, and the landscapes and people's lives in the central precinct that he probably would never see in his lifetime, but the third Lecht tried to teach more academic things. Societies, laws, and state mechanisms. From the notion of good and evil to the understanding of human existence itself.

Complaining that the still young (nasty) straw was too difficult, the third lecht - who was already shorter at the time and called him lecht - said this without tickling his face full of holes.

"People can't be happy if they don't know it's hard. Ignorance is a sin worth dying for, especially in situations where the country is turning to the enemies of the people."

"... the nation is the enemy of the people...?

"Sora, you're already exposing your ignorance. You're not really getting bullshit (shit) about the fuckin 'government sheltering the people. I don't have much to wear or eat, I let them work from newborn babies to dying old people, and I stick the gold I made into bridges, buildings, iron, weapons, mercenaries (hey) instead of food. Such a stupid, stupid government is not the enemy of the people."

Every time Lecht scolded the Ruin federal government with dignity.

Each time, Straw jumps back and forth from Lecht's side, jerks off his work tools diligently, and dresses up as if Lecht was alone. Lecht loses his mood even more (there), poisoning his tongue.

I had heard that Lecht had been stripped of his official status and deported from the Central Precinct because he had been charged in the upper echelons of the federal government with "the crime of having dangerous ideas" and "the crime of being an enterprise (wax) for overthrowing the state".

Straw didn't know what the charge was at the time, but he understood that it was so vague (absurdly) that a man who was an official of the capital was considered to be a sin, unimaginable anyway, to fall into a life below that of a villager on the border (Hen today).

Madman. Criminals. If they even saw me close to a man like that, if they thought I was speaking ill of the government, they wouldn't have figured out what disaster (deliberately) would befall Straw.

For the joy of gaining knowledge, I was aware that I was crossing a dangerous bridge. I also thought it would be wise for a man like Lecht to take advantage of a slice.

But there was nothing left for me, such as joy, if I skipped the conversation with Lecht from Straw's life.

In the morning, he rises out of the dark and throws into his mouth a piece of bread that cannot even be called bad bread made of straw (straw) powder, filling his stomach with all the water and heading to separate offices for his family. And afterwards he shall work even, and shall eat straw after sundown, and sleep. That's all.

The villagers are all exhausted and seldom exchange words. Even the only elders who get a holiday once every ten days don't shut up and open their mouths, except for that holiday.

Only Lecht, who does not labor, throws up his words infinitely and gives him knowledge. Only Lecht works for the emotions of Straw.

Stolo only realized that he admired (did) Lecht more than his parents and brothers. It was always Lecht who gave me what I truly preferred.

When I confessed to that at one point, Lecht nodded and showed that he didn't move one frown (Mayu), even though it was natural.

"I was popular in the Central Precinct. That's what the crowd wanted to go over a thousand times, and they wanted to hear my words and push me into the mansion. You can't fall in love."

"Why did you fall when you were so popular, you"

When Straw interrogated Lecht in a tone that was completely impressed by it, Lecht strained his hollow lips (tickles) with a "buckayaroo," and answered the melancholy.

"I thought it was dangerous because it was popular, and they kicked it off. Who do you think I am? It's the third Lecht. You're not like the twenty-fifth Strawman."

"... you're not sure about that either. Me, why is the twenty-fifth Strawman such a weird name? Everyone else tells me about Fleisch the eightieth, Weizen the third hundred and twentieth... and neither my father nor my mum will tell me 'sooner or later there will be a day to know'. There's something wrong with the human name in this country."

To Straw's words, Lecht erased his expression all the time… opening it for a little while, then "Buckayaroo" again, he went low.

"So if you don't know the hard part, you can't be happy. I still have no idea how unusual this country is, you."

"Huh?"

"Twenty-fifth Strawman. Tell me, it's not a name."

Lecht's red-brown eyes dwelt in a different light.

"'Number'. Neither the twenty-fifth, nor the Stroman, but only with symbols. I'm not referring to your personal personality."