Are You an Apostle?

The three of them split the pork chop evenly.

Mel Carlo stuffed the pork chop into his mouth. It should have been a grilled pork chop, but it seemed to be covered in a great deal of sauce and broth.

The flavors of various spices were mixed together. It tasted fairly good, though slightly strange. But with their stomachs empty, having meat to eat was already good enough.

"Are you full? If not, I'll take you somewhere, but you can't tell anyone else." Chubby stood before Mel Carlo, smiling brightly.

"Now?" Mel Carlo hesitated slightly, but for this Chubby to have eaten himself so fat, he definitely had his own secrets.

"Yeah, now. Normally, it isn't easy for us to get out at night." Chubby walked barefoot toward the distant street.

The city's dining establishments were not concentrated in one area. Wherever people lived, there were generally restaurants.

Though he did not know what was going on, he really was not full. It would be nice if he could eat a little more, and using stolen money to buy food was too risky.

Exchanging silver coins for copper coins once or twice might be fine, but doing it too often would make it easy to get noticed.

In the end, they stopped in front of a restaurant. It was not particularly upscale, and Chubby led them toward the alley behind it.

"It's here. Keep it down."

Chubby stepped forward and reached into the slop bucket, feeling around inside. Beside it stood a huge bin filled with kitchen waste.

Mel Carlo felt his throat tighten, and he wanted to throw up everything he had just eaten.

He somewhat wanted to beat up Chubby, but the other boy meant well. Beggar children like them would eat not only other people's leftovers, but even rotten vegetable leaves picked up from the ground.

Akai and Lily did not feel nauseated at all. They merely thought there was more food to eat, and hurriedly joined in the search.

"Is there food here every day?" Mel Carlo asked from the side.

"Yeah, every day. But before dawn, someone takes all this away, so we usually can't get any. Now that we don't have to go back before dark, we can eat a lot."

Mel Carlo still felt uncomfortable. He had only transmigrated here three days ago, and now he was already going to eat slop? Was there any transmigrator more miserable than him?

Still, it was not inedible after washing it. They might have to rely on this to survive for a while.

Mel Carlo also began searching through the kitchen waste. There was always some unfinished food to be found. Though it had gone cold, it still tasted better than black bread.

The four little ones did not dare return. Instead, they found a hidden spot and prepared to sleep for the night.

The next day, the scarred man woke the four of them.

"Master Anke, what is it?"

"You're Mel Carlo, right? Come here. There's something I want to ask you." Anke stared at Mel Carlo, one hand constantly resting on the short sword at his waist, extremely wary.

That expression made Mel Carlo nervous as well. If this guy had truly seen him stealing and had chosen to hide everything, then he was probably here to kill him now.

Only the dead could keep everything secret.

His thoughts raced, but Mel Carlo still followed him. He would deal with whatever came. If Anke really intended to get rid of him, he could use the wallet to defuse the danger.

He could say that he had already made a deal with a merchant. If he could not leave the city safely, the merchant would bring the wallet and the information that Anke had ordered him to steal it to the Duke's Mansion.

There could be no mistakes in the coming conversation, or he would be in danger. Mel Carlo slowly took a deep breath.

However, the scarred man before him seemed even more nervous than he was.

"Have you ever seen a god?"

"What?" Mel Carlo froze. The question had come out of nowhere. What god?

"Have you ever heard a god's command?"

"Why are you asking that? Is there something about me that you find strange?" Mel Carlo was puzzled, but he still felt there was a serious problem with those words. This was a fantasy world much like a game, so perhaps there were similarities. Gods were usually the big bosses of later versions, after all.

The question was, was he that kind of thing? He had a system, albeit a half-finished one, and he did not even know why he had appeared in another world. He had simply gotten lucky.

For a moment, Mel Carlo thought of many things.

"One last question. But promise you won't kill me afterward, okay?"

"Mm." Mel Carlo nodded.

"Are you an apostle?"

"I'm not quite sure what you mean. Apostle? What is that?" Mel Carlo neither gave a clear answer nor directly denied it.

He truly had never heard of apostles, at least not in the game. But in other games he had played in his previous life, or in some films and television shows he had watched, there had been descriptions of apostles. Generally speaking, they were powerful beings chosen by gods.

"Thank you." Anke was not satisfied with Mel Carlo's answer. Instead, it only deepened his suspicions.

Though apostles existed only in legendary tales, he had truly seen one. When he was young, a dying child had become an apostle, and immense power had instantly destroyed an entire village. The mark on his face was not a scar, but a wound the other party had sliced open with a finger.

That terrifying strength remained vivid in his memory. Before becoming an apostle, that child had merely been an ordinary orphan, bullied terribly in the village. Yet he had suddenly erupted, killing everyone except Anke. Later, the child disappeared.

There was one thing he could be sure of: that child who had become an apostle had definitely not died. He was hiding somewhere in the world.

He had sensed that same feeling when he found Mel Carlo: that sudden change. At first, he might have thought Mel Carlo had lost his memory or been possessed by a demon.

But now, it seemed this child was even more terrifying than he had imagined. In such a short time, the gang leader had already been sentenced to death. He was certain that the child before him had stolen the Duke's daughter's wallet, but he would not reveal it, nor could he.

"Master Anke, do you suspect that I'm an apostle? Can you tell me what exactly an apostle is?"

"An apostle is an agent chosen by a god to act in the human world. Blessed by a god, they possess terrifying power."

Seeing how serious he was, Mel Carlo asked, "Have you seen one with your own eyes?"

"I saw one when I was young. The scar on my face was left then. In an instant, an entire village vanished before my eyes. The other person merely swiped lightly with a finger, and this scar was left on my face."

"He didn't kill you?"

"I know you may not believe me. No one has believed me all these years, but everything I experienced was real. That child was my friend before he became an apostle, which was why he did not kill me." Anke became somewhat emotional. This was also why he feared Mel Carlo. That sudden sense of calm, even the fear he displayed, all seemed like an act.

Others might have been fooled by Mel Carlo's appearance, but he would not be.

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