Red Light District of Withya, where the lights shone brightly and it looked as clean as any other tourist attraction. A place prepared for priests, where they secretly visit young and beautiful women.
However, there was a completely different landscape in the back alley. Insects were buzzing on the dirty streets, and the women peering out of the windows had wrinkles on their faces. The prostitutes, whose demand decreased due to their age, lived here in the back alleys and sold their bodies.
The main customers now were the merchants, no longer the priests, and because of that, the streets were dirty and gloomy like ordinary prostitute towns. Melibea was the thinnest prostitute in the alley.
Unlike other prostitutes who die from illness or ailment within ten years, she had been selling her body here in Withya for thirty years. So there were few men she hadn't met and few men who didn't know her. But the man she met today was the most impressive person in her life.
"Melibea, there's a guest."
"I told you I wouldn't accept anyone today."
"That's..."
Melibea, sitting with crossed legs and smoking a cigar, nervously looked back. The tall man had already entered her living room.
"Where..."
Melibea, trying to shout, "Where are you?" soon fell silent. Before her, there were darkly sunken golden eyes under hair illuminated by the moon.
The sharp gaze and the shine of his lips were characteristic of the noble priests she had seen before, and his face was dazzlingly beautiful. And she knew that face. When she was young, it was the face of a person she had been jealous of.
"Claudia?"
Melibea shook her head because it was absurd despite what he said. He looked terribly like Claudia, but he was a man and had a different hair color. Besides, the dead cannot come back to life. A silver-haired young man resembling Claudia.
When she thought about it for a moment, the memory of a child's face appeared blurry in her mind. He resembled his mother and seemed unfortunate. He was Claudia's son.
"Are you Doha?"
"I came to hear the story of my mother."
Doha spat out his business with an expressionless face. His cold eyes fixed on Melibea, but she, who focused only on the vivid images of the past, laughed fearlessly.
"Hahaha! I used to be so arrogant as to ask for a piece of bread. Why would I...?"
"Tell me, when, how, why. Who killed her."
Doha interrupted Melibea and left a wad of money on the table. It was an amount she had never had before. She checked the money and quickly took it into her hands, so that no one else would see it. Fortunately, her colleague had stepped away for a moment. She laughed like a madwoman at the idea of being able to keep the money for herself.
"Doha, you crawled and cried because you didn't want to leave. Did you succeed?"
"Don't say useless things. Answer me. If you don't want to lose the money."
"Sure, sure. Of course, Claudia is..."
Doha clenched his fist at the relaxed voice. Like preparing for an unexpected blow, he clenched his teeth tightly. However, that alone was not enough to bear the truth.
"She died less than a month after they took you away. It was because of you."
"... What?"
Melibea's finger pointed at Doha. To him, her finger was like a sharp knife.
