Chapter 42

Andrew, who suppressed his excitement until the mercenaries were out of sight, turned to Joshua as soon as they were gone with a wide grin on his face.

“Hey! We can make money! We make 1 shilling a day from tomorrow!”

“Well done, hyung! Hyung is the best!”

“What are you talking about? You’re the one who came up with the idea!”

That continued for a while, as they yelled compliments at each other, relishing in their success.

“Rockefeller hyung will be happy too! It’s not even dangerous work!”

“Of course he’ll be happy! If it’s 1 shilling then our entire family can eat until our stomach bursts everyday!”

***

That evening, while they were having dinner, Rockefeller was surprised with the sudden news from his brothers.

“What? You’ll be running errands?”

As though he was unable to contain his excitement, Joshua kept wiggling in his seat as he talked,

“Yeah! From now on, we’ll be delivering the mercenaries their ingredients. The mercenary ajusshi said to come to camp starting tomorrow!”

“Really?”

Rockefeller considered it for a moment.

Although there was quite a distance from the camp to the village, it’s wasn’t so large a distance that the two boys would get lost. It was about a two-hour roundtrip by foot. And it was safer than one would think since there were camps for hunters and woodcutters nearby that they could run to for help if anything did happen.

“Then that’s good. Earning one shilling a day by running errands isn’t bad at all,”

“Right? You think so too, don’t you, Rockefeller hyung?”

“Of course, well done. But since it’s near the forest, you should go straight to the hunters camp or the woodcutters camp if anything does happen. Hyung is okay with what you want to do, but you know I hate dangerous work.”

“Of course!”

Joshua answered and Andrew spoke up confidently,

“Rockefeller hyung, don’t worry, that’s the place where I always go to play with friends. Uncle Tompson and Uncle Bill are always there as well, it’s completely safe. Don’t worry, nothing will happen.”

“Alright, but even so, you never know what might happen so always consider you safety first no matter what you’re doing,”

“Got it!”

Turning his attention away from the two brothers who had found a little job for themselves, Rockefeller looked to the remaining two of his siblings,

“What about you Leo? How was your day? Did anything happen?”

“It did.”

“It did?”

Leo, who rarely spoke and spent his days quietly had a different answer than usual. It piqued Rockefeller’s interest,

“What happened?”

“Well…. I went to the church with Lucia. The priest who gave me the shilling from last time said to visit, so I did.”

“So you visited the church,”

“Yeah. And they gave us bread. It’s the daily bread for young worshipers. The ajusshi said that if we want to eat bread again, we should go every weekend,”

At the news that Leo had take Lucia and visited the church, Andrew pulled a disgruntled face,

“Why go to the church? That place is so boring,”

“Right, the church is boring, you should have come with us instead, it was really good today,” Joshua agreed.

“Just because….”

As Leo’s voice began to lose strength, Rockefeller decided to encourage him a little,

“It’s alright, you did well. Going to the church isn’t a bad thing. From now, if you get bored, you can go as often as you want,”

“Really?”

Looking into Leo’s sparkling eyes, Rockefeller felt a little burdened.

Leo was normally quiet, he didn’t speak out much and nothing seemed to interest him, he didn’t have strong opinions so he didn’t fight like Joshua and Andrew did either.

This Leo was different from the one Rockefeller usually saw. The only time he had been engaged was when he had talked about the ajusshi from the church who had given him the shilling.

‘He must have really liked the church if he looks that excited to go.’

“Leo, you can go to the church as you like. There’s not a single person here who will stop you going to the church.”

At that, Joshua mumbled under his breath, as though he was just talking to himself,

“If Leo goes to the church then it’ll be hard for me and Andrew-hung to take the ingredients….”

“The priest ajusshi said to visit on weekends. I can help hyungs during the other days,”

Rockefeller spoke up,

“No. Leo is always the one looking after Lucia so he doesn’t have to go out and work. It’s okay for you to stay back,”

At those words, Joshua and Andrew couldn’t protest.

Like Rockefeller said, Leo was the only one who usually stayed at home to make sure Lucia was looked after.

“Right, since Leo looks after Lucia, that’s fine,”

Looking convinced, Andrew also raised his voice to agree with Rockefeller and despite looking a little disappointed that they had lost Leo’s help with the errands, Joshua too, eventually agreed,

“I get it. Looking after Lucia is work too, so Leo should take good care of her,”