There Is No Lie In This World Chapter 17: The Daycare Visit

The room was warmly lit, soft lights on the ceiling blending with sunlight that shone through very faintly colored stained glass depicting so sort of a fairy tale I could not recognize. It seed to tell a story of an ancient hero.

There was a clean and playful scent in the air, heartwarming sounds of children’s laughter and giggles floated and filled the space.

The daycare center was located in a separate wing of the Roen Tower, reserved for employees with young children. There were many places in Roen Tower I hadn’t set foot in and I wasn’t sure if I wanted to explore them all, but this one was sowhere I didn’t mind visiting.

I was nervous before the visit. I liked children. I liked watching them play. I liked their sound. Interacting them was a different story though.

"What if they cry?" I had asked earlier in the morning, half-joking, half-terrified.

Luc had only tilted her head slightly. "Then they will have sothing in common with you."

Now, standing in the center of a playroom with foam mats and plush toys scattered across the floor like artifacts of joy, I felt even more nervous than I had been at the Ceremony Hall.

At first, a tiny girl with pigtails ran up to and handed a block painted to look like a slice of waterlon. "This is for you," she declared, then turned and ran away, giggling. Then a boy no older than five ca around and stood in front of , very close. He looked up at , his eyes studying my face carefully. I t his eyes and tried to smile, but it only ca out awkwardly. He didn’t say anything and just kept the eye contact, and then suddenly broke into smile and ran back to his friends.

A group of children approached after that. Two boys and two girls. One of them suddenly shouted, "Catch !" The children then scattered, each of them running in a different direction. I wanted to play together but I didn’t know who to run after, until three more children joined and started to circle , all of them asking to catch them too.

’I suppose I could catch one of them at least," I finally built up the courage and started to run toward a girl that was closest to . I almost caught her - multiple tis. But these kids were like cats. They would just stand and wait for to get closer, only to spring away to an unexpected direction and start running again.

It was fun. I hadn’t really played with other kids like this when I was their age. I spent most of my ti sitting in the sandbox. I was always concerned about soone coming and destroying what I was building, to the extent that very often, I didn’t want to build sothing too nice because I knew I would be devastated if it was stomped into oblivion on the naughty whim of another child, who’d laugh, turn, and run off. It had happened more than once, leading to only build things that I can rebuild again easily.

As I stopped chasing the little kids around for a mont to catch my breath, I noticed a girl seated at a corner, hunched over her desk.

Sothing about her pulled in. After promising the other children that I will get back to them and we will play again, I walked across the play room.

The little girl was drawing on a sketchbook. She was drawing so sort of a fish. It had a very cute face.

"What are you drawing?"

"A seal," she answered without looking at .

"Huh, I thought it was a fish," I instantly regretted.

"That’s what everyone thinks," she said, unbothered.

"Do you like sea animals?"

"Very much."

"That’s great. They are really special, aren’t they?"

Then the girl stopped drawing, looked up from her sketchbook, and asked, blinking.

"Did you know that sharks have over thirty thousand teeth in their lifeti? ?"

"Oh, wow. I didn’t know that."

"And they have been around even before the dinosaurs."

"I didn’t know that either."

"This is a picture I drew."

She then flipped a few pages, and showed a creature that looked like a seal but with just a lot of teeth.

"That’s really impressive!"

"They are really cute, right?"

"Yes, and with a lot of teeth."

"Yes."

"And who is this? Isn’t it dangerous to be so close to the shark?" I pointed at a woman and a girl standing next to the fearso creature.

"That’s and my Mommy. And it’s OK because this is an aquarium and there is a glass between us."

"Oh, is that so? I didn’t see the glass."

The girl looked at with the face that said ’Are you stupid?’

"It’s glass. Of course you can’t see it," she taught .

"I’m sorry."

"You are funny."

After that, the girl flipped through her sketchbook so more and showed even more sea creatures she’d drawn. I tried to guess what they were each ti, and every ti I was wrong.

"You really like sea animals, don’t you?"

"Yeah."

"What is your na?"

"Bada."

"Oh, Bada-, aning the sea?"

"Yeah."

"What a pretty na! It suits you well, too."

"Mommy said she nad Bada because I was conceived during a cruise trip."

I had to suppress my laughter.

"I really want to go to aquarium," the girl continued. Surprisingly conversational now.

"I’m sure you’d love it."

"Sigh... but I’ve never been to aquarium. Not even once."

"Oh? Why not?"

"Because Mommy is always so busy."

"I can take you there then."

I shocked myself by saying this. It just ca out of my mouth without any deliberation.

"Really?!" Bada instantly jumped up from her seat, her hands in front of her chest in prayer pose, her eyes exploding with excitent.

Not knowing what to do, I turned to find Luc, and as she always does, she was standing right behind - did she hear the whole conversation?

Both the girl and I looked up at Luc like two children asking for permission. Luc looked down at us with a very, very faint hint of a frown. .

"Please...?" we asked Luc for her approval.

But then, suddenly we were sward by all the other children from the daycare. Sohow, soone overheard us, and now they were all jumping up and down in excitent, cheering and chanting ’Aquarium!’

"Um... Luc...?"

She closed her eyes and placed her palm on her forehead. I don’t think I’d seen Luc so agitated before.

"I don’t think this is a good idea, Miss Roen."

That deflated everyone, earning a collective sigh.

"Please, Luc. Look at these children. They really want to go. Surely we could arrange that?"

After rubbing her temples for a few seconds and seemingly grinding her teeth, she finally spoke.

"Fine. Take Cain and Abe with you."

The children erupted in joy, jumping up and down, flailing their arms in the air.

"You are not coming?" I asked her.

"Fishes don’t like ."

That was possibly the weirdest thing I heard from her yet.