"Alan... Alan... Hurry up and get up..."

A gentle voice echoed in the boy's ears.

"You little lazy bastard, the sun is on your ass..."

Alan, who was twelve years old, turned over and muttered: "Mom, let me sleep a little longer..."

"Oh! I really can't do anything about you. If you love to sleep in so much, no girl will like you in the future."

"Well... I see... Mom, just for a while..." The boy fell asleep again in a daze.

After an unknown amount of time, he felt his mother gently stroking his body, and said in a slightly stern tone: "This time, I must get up!"

Allen had no choice but to bid farewell to the dreamland reluctantly. After opening his eyes, he saw his mother's hands on her hips, with a slightly angry expression.

He got up from the bed, covered his mouth with his right hand, and yawned, "Ah—"

"Got it, got it, I'll get up right now."

He reluctantly began to dress slowly.

The mother sighed and complained: "Really, look at Little Tom next door, he gets up at dawn to help his mother cook, how can he like to sleep late like you... Wait a minute, what's wrong with you?"

Allen suddenly woke up, and hurriedly said: "There is nothing on me...ah, I accidentally fell."

But the mother couldn't help but grabbed the boy's arm and rolled up his underwear, and several bruises appeared on his body.

The mother's face instantly changed into a look of distress, and she asked anxiously: "What's the matter... How did you do it like this?"

The boy said in a nonchalant tone as much as possible: "It's really nothing, Mom, yesterday I accidentally tripped when I was walking downhill and rolled all the way down. These bruises came out at that time."

But the mother could tell if her son was lying, and she stared her son in the eye and asked seriously, "Did you fight someone else again?"

"I didn't..." The boy retorted hastily, but when he met his mother's eyes, his voice instantly became inaudible.

He lowered his head and admitted in a low voice: "I'm sorry...Mom, I will never do it again."

The mother looked at Alan with deep sadness in her eyes, and she didn't continue to ask why her son was fighting, she knew the reason.

Allen is not only warm-hearted and kind, but also has a tolerance that does not match his age, and he will not easily argue with others.

So far, there was only one thing that could irritate this child to the point of doing it—his only relative whom someone made fun of, that is, the mother in front of him.

When the mother was still pregnant with Alan, her husband passed away early, and Alan never saw his father since he was born, and became a posthumous child.

The mother did not choose to remarry, and she worked so hard to bring her son to such an age. As a young widow, no matter how cautious she was, rumors would inevitably spread in the village.

The adults were concerned about the feelings of neighbors, and they only mentioned a few words quietly behind their backs, and they would not say such things in front of Alan's mother.

But children have no scruples when they play together, and they often share the "secrets" they overheard from adults.

Not only when sharing secrets, but when the children occasionally disagreed with each other, they would call each other all kinds of nicknames. When this happened to Allen, nicknames like "wild species" The numbers are pretty good.

These have become the fuse to ignite the youth's anger.

"Didn't you promise me that if you encounter this kind of thing in the future, just ignore it and don't let yourself get hurt again." The mother's eyes became moist, and she begged her son again.

Being weak by nature, she is absolutely unwilling to let Allen solve the problem with her fists. Her son is now her only relative, and anything that may cause her son to be harmed must be avoided.

His mother's tears made Allen feel anxious. He wiped the corners of his mother's eyes with his sleeve and said, "Mom, I promise you, I promise this will be the last time."

"Oh...you always say it's the last time."

"It's that fellow Pine, talking nonsense with rumors that I don't know where I heard it. I was so angry that I fought him. We have reconciled now. Yesterday you saw us drop by together. home's."

The worried look on the mother's face weakened a little. She immediately hugged her son tightly, and said: "If others talk nonsense, you just ignore him, and you are not allowed to do anything again in the future."

"Okay, okay, mom, I promise you."

"I don't know if you listened to it... Forget it, let's wash your face and eat first."

The boy washed up briefly, and came to the dining table to eat the breakfast made by his mother. Although they were all simple food, for some reason, he felt that the breakfast was particularly delicious.

The mother also came to the table, and the mother and son had a conversation. They talked about the source of livelihood of the family-cooking salt.

Mother said with a little concern, "Recently, there have been fewer salt merchants coming to our village."

"The salt merchants from Ardaland next door haven't been here for a long time, and there are not as many salt merchants from Bairding as before."

"All of a sudden, the money earned is much less."

Allen speculated, "I've heard some rumors in the blacksmith shop. It seems that Arda has built a new saltworks that can make a lot of salt at once."

He changed the subject and said: "Mom, don't worry. I will soon become an official apprentice to the blacksmith in the village, and the blacksmith praised me for my job. I will be able to receive a wage then, although the apprentice The salary is not too much, but it is no problem to subsidize the family."

The mother smiled and touched her son's head. The child is always so sensible and understands her hard work very much.

"Forging iron is not easy, you have to learn from the master blacksmith."

…

After breakfast, my mother cleaned up the tableware~lightnovelpub.net~ and came to the table again.

Allen was a little strange. On weekdays, my mother should have started a fire early to prepare for cooking salt. Why is she so free today.

He said: "Mom, if there is nothing else, I will go to the blacksmith shop to help first."

The boy got up and was about to leave, but was grabbed by his mother.

"Alan." His mother called his name softly.

"Besides not to fight, don't forget my other instructions."

Why did he say that suddenly? Allen was a little puzzled, but he agreed.

But I heard my mother continue to ask: "Tell me what I told you on weekdays?"

The boy was a little helpless, and began to list one by one:

"Chew your meals slowly."

"Cover the quilt well when you sleep."

"Don't fight with people."

…

"Uh, and get up early."

After the list was finished, my mother nodded and said: "After I leave, you must remember these instructions of mine."

Allen was shocked: "Leave? Mom, where are you going?"

Then something horrifying and inexplicable happened to him, the mother's body was becoming more and more unreal until it turned into a transparent phantom.

He reached out to grab his mother's hand, but he couldn't.

"Alan, I'm sorry, mom can't go on with you anymore. You must take good care of yourself in the future."

After leaving such a sentence, the phantom of the mother finally disappeared.

Allen stood by the table blankly, tears streaming down uncontrollably.

"Do not-"

…

The boy opened his eyes suddenly, but this time he really woke up from his dream.