I! Cleaner!

"With the dust from the Hover Crystals in my body."

After showing Leon and his companion her arm covered in blood spots, under the female reporter's horrified gaze, the robber girl quietly explained:

"I was born in the Hover Crystal mining area. Even before I was born, my whole body was covered in this dust. These things are part of my body.

Grandma says Hover Crystals have an attractant nature; once activated, these tiny dust particles will naturally gather towards larger Hover Crystal masses. Every year, people in the mining area get too close to active Hover Crystals and have the dust in their bodies sucked out, tearing their throats and lungs apart.

And those Hover Crystals in the Crolock Kingdom are constantly in a low-intensity activated state. The closer I get to there, the more my body hurts. So if I try a few more times, I'm sure I can find the Crolock Palace's location."

To rely on such a method...

After hearing the robber girl's method for finding the Crolock Palace, even though Leon had somewhat prepared himself mentally, he couldn't help but fall into silence.

The robber girl hadn't purposely talked about the life she and her robber brother had before escaping from Cheshire, but from these occasional words, it wasn't hard to imagine what kind of life they had been living.

"I have a few more questions to confirm."

After a moment of silence, Leon spoke again:

"There are over eight hundred districts in the Crolock Kingdom. Each district is embedded with Hover Crystals. How can you be sure that the ones attracting you are the Hover Crystals beneath the Crolock Palace?"

"Rely on the mining area's numbering."

The robber girl replied calmly:

"Because once activated, Hover Crystals have an attractant nature. So to avoid mutual interference, the Hover Crystals below those districts are mined in different ways. The explosives' ratio, mining equipment, and cleansing materials all differ.

So in theory, the Hover Crystals mined from each area are different. My family is from Mining Area 1. Grandma heard the supervisor from the mine say that the Hover Crystals from Area 1 are specifically for the royal family's district."

I see...

After listening to the robber girl, Leon nodded slightly, while the female reporter, having recovered from her shock, suddenly stepped forward and grabbed the frighteningly slender arm, speaking somewhat incoherently:

"How can this be?! These Hover Crystals are actually so...do you...do you feel pain?"

"Not really."

Hearing the female reporter's question, the robber girl shook her head and said:

"I'm young; my body can still grow a bit. As long as I eat more, I can bear the effects brought by these dust particles. Probably when my bones stop growing and my internal organ size stops increasing, then they'll start wearing down my body."

"Wearing down?"

"Rotting away."

The robber girl pointed to the blood spots on her arm and replied steadily:

"Uncle Mazby told Grandma that when my body matures and the rate of cell replacement decreases, if it's not enough to replace these parts before rejection occurs, these blood spots will grow from the size of grains of rice to the size of beans.

Then the skin will also fail to maintain due to rejection from below, resulting in large areas of ulceration. After about a year, when these ulcers grow to pigeon egg size, my internal organs will also start having problems, and I'd probably die within half a year."

"..."

So, from the time her body stops growing taller to being tortured to death by these dust particles, there's only a year and a half?

Looking at the girl in front of her, who appeared unusually calm as though she wasn't talking about herself, the female reporter couldn't help but clench her hands tightly.

"Then you...how old are you this year?"

"Fourteen."

Fourteen...

Upon hearing the robber girl's answer, the female reporter couldn't help but bite her lip and then involuntarily averted her gaze, not knowing how to look at her anymore.

Even if nutrition could keep up, a person's rapid growth phase usually stops around seventeen or eighteen, and girls stop sooner than boys, some even as early as fifteen or sixteen.

If this child is similar, then her life is already on a countdown, and possibly in less than a year, she'll start being tortured, eventually dying covered in ulcers.

So, although she looks underage, she has practically entered a countdown and, like many aged elders, is about to reach the end of her life...

"Then you...you all..."

The female reporter, shocked by the harsh reality, couldn't continue after saying "then you" twice, silently covering her mouth, while Leon beside her chimed in:

"Now that you've left the mining area, can't the dust in your body be removed with medicine or some other method as time goes by?"

"Uncle Mazby tried; it's useless."

The robber girl shook her head:

"The activation method of Hover Crystals involves connecting to some form of energy, and Uncle Mazby says that humans have energy within their bodies that can be directly absorbed by the Hover Crystal dust.

Children like me, whose blood and organs have dust, are actually considered lucky. If the dust were in the brain or nerves, controlling the body would be impossible, and we'd die right after being born."

"Who is this Uncle Mazby you mentioned?"

"Uncle Mazby was a scholar from the Crolock Kingdom."

When mentioning the Crolock Kingdom, the robber girl's gaze slightly cooled, but then it turned somewhat complicated:

"He originally came to treat the overseers' diseases, but after seeing our conditions, he seemed to cause a stir, and then stayed in Cheshire, treating many miners for free. My brother and I managed to escape because of his help."

"And where is he now?"

"I don't know. Maybe he's dead."

The robber girl said with a somewhat somber expression:

"His health wasn't good either, and he was brushed by the Hovering dust too. His lungs were worse than Grandma's. When my brother and I escaped, he was already coughing up blood every day."

"..."

Upon hearing this, Leon couldn't help but close his eyes slightly, falling silent once again, while the female reporter, having composed herself, with slightly reddened eyes, said:

"Then if you all...if you don't go down the mine, what would the overseers from the Crolock Kingdom do to you? Would they take direct action?"

"No, the overseers from the Crolock Kingdom only care about whether the mine can operate normally and forbid anyone from leaving casually, and nothing else."

The robber girl replied through gritted teeth:

"But although they don't take direct action, in Cheshire and other big mining areas, plants can't grow, there are almost no animals, and everything, including food, has to be exchanged for the Hover Crystals mined!"

So if you don't want to starve to death, the only option is to go into the mine and excavate Hover Crystals?

Understanding Cheshire's 'operational' model, the female reporter bit her own lip so hard it left deep white marks, while Leon sighed inwardly, took out a silver knife, and cut the ropes bound around the robber siblings.

"I accept your offer."