“This thing weighs a ton!”

  Sweat ran down from her forehead and across her body as she clenched her teeth and groaned, caused by the fact that she was now carrying the shopping bag she had bought earlier.

  Thalia truly never expected there would come a time when she would struggle just to carry groceries that were not even that much. Yet it forced her to hold the bag with both hands in front of her, staggering as she walking while trying to bance the excessive weight for her small body.

  Not wanting to push a body that had already been weak from the start, Thalia finally stopped near a bench pced in front of a shop building that had already closed.

  The bench looked neglected and worn. It was easy to believe it would colpse immediately if a grown man sat on it. But this was Thalia being talked about. With a body as light as paper, the bench probably would not mind.

  “I’ve no energy left…”

  Under the sunset that seemed to keep her company, Thalia sat down, leaning her back against the seat.

  Seeing the shopping bag beside the bench, Thalia reached for one of the brown paper bundles. To regain some energy, a simple sandwich of meat and vegetables was chosen.

  The city newspaper bought earlier was also taken out. While she is chewing the bread, the pages were opened to see if anything interesting might keep her mind occupied for a while. After all, that was the purpose of newspapers. Whether the story was bullshit or not did not really matter as long as it was a good story.

  There was no need to read far, because the headline alone was already eye-catching:

  Mayoral Election Approaches, Candidates Begin Campaign Preparations!

  Her focus on the newspaper made her ignore the pedestrians passing in front of her.

  “Goddamn, what a mustache…”

  Thalia muttered at one of the photos shown in the paper, which dispyed a middle-aged man with an incredibly thick mustache. If she said a squirrel could build a nest on top of his mouth, plenty of people would probably believe it.

  According to the article, the thick-mustached man was named John Boulstone, one of the two leading candidates who would be running in the upcoming mayoral election of New Raven.

  Thalia narrowed her eyes as she read further into the article. Beneath the photo of John Boulstone smiling stiffly, the text mentioned that he was known for his proposals on handling immigrants fairly. He wanted to embrace immigrant communities and help them prosper in their new world. Boulstone promised “Order and Economic Reform” for immigrant districts such as Dronxe.

  “Reform,” the word lingered in Thalia’s mind for a moment, though not in a good way. “That’s just polite nguage for wanting our votes. It never changes.”

  Thalia could already guess how this game worked. Carrying out reforms required considerable funding, and a figure like Boulstone would never be able to win without financial backers, along with people who could secure protection and guarantee votes for him.

  The article was still fairly long, so she had to flip to the next page if she wanted to keep reading. But that was interrupted when she heard hurried footsteps coming from the same road that led to the immigrant market.

  “C’mon! Don’t let yourself get caught!”

  “Don’t leave me behind, damn it!”

  “Hahaha! I can’t help you if you get caught, so hurry up!”

  The shouts that caught her ear came from two boys who appeared to be running from something, one of them clutching a small pouch in his hand.

  Because of the commotion, Thalia lost her focus. Her gaze followed the two boys as they picked up their pace. When they ran past her, their eyes briefly met, and that was when Thalia noticed they shared the same features.

  Twins?

  Eventually the two presumed brothers reached an alley at the end of the street on the right. They slipped into it and disappeared as if swallowed by the darkness inside the alley.

  Shaking her head, Thalia decided she could care less and went back to reading her newspaper. But that pn was cut short when the paper was suddenly pulled out of her hands, as if someone had grabbed it by force.

  “What the fuck?”

  Thalia cursed in reflex, confuse painted on her face. Standing before her now were two men in dark blue uniforms with their distinctive helmets, their faces openly showing irritation as they stared straight at her, casually tapping their batons against their palms.

  She could already identify them just from the uniforms they wore. They were officers of the New Raven police. More precisely, another pair of badge-wearing dogs.

  The one who dominated the scene was the officer with a thick mustache above his mouth. While it still could not compare to John Boulstone’s, the man looked to be in his fifties, making it obvious he was a senior officer.

  Beside him stood someone who looked like a baby in uniform, wearing a cocky expression. From his build and demeanor, he seemed freshly out of the academy, just setting foot on the streets with the kind of eagerness that wanted recognition for the badge hanging on his chest, as if it were a medal earned in battle.

  “Well, well, well… what we got here? This is the mest hiding I’ve ever seen,” the senior officer said while twirling the tip of his mustache.

  "Haha, this is stupid," said the young officer.

  What now… I can't even read my newspaper in peace.

  “What is it, officer?” she asked, even though she could already guess that their presence meant trouble.

  “What d’you mean what, boy?” the mustached officer replied arrogantly. “Hey, rookie! Put him against the wall and cuff him!”

  “Yes, sir!”

  “What the hell—”

  Not understanding what was actually going on, the young officer immediately grabbed Thalia by the shoulder and forced her to turn around. Without any hesitation, she was shoved against the wall, unable to offer much resistance.

  “What the hell is this!?” Thalia shouted, struggling to keep her hands from being cuffed, though it didn’t make much difference.

  As the incident unfolded, clearly an abuse of authority, the pedestrians passing by simply lowered their heads and tried their best to look away so they would not get involved. For people of the lower csses, getting tangled in anything involving the w was something they desperately tried to avoid.

  “Still pretending don’t know anything, huh?” the officer snorted. “Lowly little thief. Your people are always giving us more work to do. I had to listen to the market vendors compining everyday because of you. Hey rookie, frisk this piece of shit!”

  Considering the timing lined up perfectly with the two boys who had run past earlier, Thalia quickly realized that this had something to do with them and that they may have been mistaken her for the real culprits.

  Hearing the order, like a dog obeying its master, the young officer began searching her while she was still pinned between the wall and his hands. In a hurry, he reached into anything that could possibly be used to hide something. Of course, the remaining money from her shopping was eventually found.

  “Look at this,” the young man said, handing five Quills to the other officer.

  The mustached officer took it, examined it carefully, and said, “Oh, look what we found here. A little thief, huh?”

  “That? That’s my fuckin’ money. Get yourself some gsses before you mistake it for toilet paper and start using it to wipe your ass.”

  With a smirk forming at the corner of her lips, Thalia caught the twitch of the officer’s eyebrow at the edge of her vision.

  “Hey, turn that little bastard to face me.”

  Without asking any unnecessary questions, the young officer forcibly turned her around again. From there, Thalia could clearly see the mustached officer once more, and his face could no longer hold back the anger written all over it.

  Good grief, what a short-tempered man, Thalia thought, amused that he was getting so angry over nothing more than a kid’s taunt.

  “What’s with that dead-looking stare?” the mustached officer asked, pressing his finger hard into Thalia’s cheek. “Anyway, it seems you still don’t understand your own situation.”

  Not long after making that statement, the mustached officer clenched his fist and drove it straight into Thalia as hard as he could.

  The blow made her entire body tense from the surge of pain it produced. She instinctively started coughing, her stomach twisting as if she were about to vomit, though in the end there was nothing inside to throw up.

  “You boys from the market think you’re clever,” he said quietly. “Running around stealing from honest merchants.”

  “I didn’t steal shit,” Thalia rasped, still catching her breath.

  “Wrong answer.”

  Another blow smmed into her stomach. The impact was brutal, forcing the air in her lungs to rush out in a violent gasp. Her body instinctively tried to slump downward, but the young officer’s grip on her shoulders stopped it completely.

  If this had been the old her, maybe she could have endured something like this. But now, that was clearly out of the question.

  Through a hazy blur, Thalia could see pedestrians nearby slowing their steps. Some even stopped for a moment to watch as the two shameless badge-wearing dogs abused an innocent kid in the name of interrogation.

  The officer noticed the small audience beginning to gather.

  “Move along!” he barked.

  Of course, the small crowd quickly obeyed the sharp order. In the end, they were completely useless, left the little girl at the mercy of police brutality.