Hearing that, the Raikage waved a hand and snorted irritably. "I'm not like that old fool, the Tsuchikage."
"Is that Lord Raikage's voice?" Yugito Nii asked weakly. She sat up and rubbed her still-dizzy head. Her vision had yet to clear, so she could only identify him by his voice...
"I was a failure. I hardly noticed whether the sun was shining, because I had no time.
"My parents couldn't support me, and I wasn't well educated. Alone in the city, I searched for a future.
"I found many jobs, but none hired me. Maybe no one liked someone who was bad at talking, disliked socializing, and had never shown enough ability.
"For three whole days, I ate only two loaves of bread. Hunger kept me awake at night. Fortunately, I had paid a month's rent in advance, so I could keep living in that dark basement instead of going outside to endure the abnormally cold winter wind.
"Finally, I found a job. I kept watch at a hospital at night, guarding the morgue.
"The hospital was even colder at night than I had imagined. The wall lamps in the corridors were unlit, and everything was dim. I could only rely on the faint light leaking from the rooms to see where I stepped.
"The smell there was awful. From time to time, corpses would be delivered stuffed inside body bags, and we would help carry them into the morgue.
"It wasn't a good job, but at least I could afford bread. I could also use the idle hours at night to study. After all, no one wanted to come to the morgue unless a body needed to be delivered or taken away for cremation. Of course, I still didn't have enough money to buy books, and I couldn't see