Chapter 713 - Rather Too Late, Marks Struggles while Growing Up (1/2)

Day 152 - 7:59 PM - Rooftop, Farmhouse, Coconut Plantation, Labingan, Municipality of Cawayan, Province of Masbate

”But that's not the case, right?”

Mei asked, hearing the grave thought that Mark had as a child.

”Of course, it's not true.” Mark shrugged. ”If I'm not their child, I wouldn't have been a Blood Demon and never had weird powers. I might have died since the outbreak started. Well, probably not. I still have Freed at that time, I guess.”

Mei glared at Mark. She was not comfortable with Mark talking about his death jokingly. Smiling bitterly, he could only sit up and pat her head.

”I realized when I grew older.” Mark continued. ”When that thought popped up in my mind, it is pretty much a bad sign.”

***

Children were feeble and innocent creatures. Their minds were simple. It was not because they were incapable of thinking of slightly complex things. It was just they lacked the experience and knowledge.

These experiences and knowledge would be supplemented by their surroundings. And the first source that children had would be their parents or guardian.

Thus, the first people for the child to trust the most would be the people that raised them.

For Mark to start thinking that he was adopted...

It meant that he began to lose that trust.

Mark began to question things more. At times, he would complain and ask why he had to do everything while his siblings did not. At first, it was because he was the eldest and had the responsibility to take care of his young siblings. But when his younger siblings had grown up enough, these questions mostly fell to deaf ears.

The worst thing that happened was when he received the answer.

”Because your siblings did not want to do it.”

They answered with a complicated expression.

Mark could not accept that answer. In his mind, he wanted to ask why his parents did not forcefully push the responsibility to his siblings, pretty much like how they pushed these things to him.

The first time, his parents told him that he needed to learn about these things. It was because when they were his age, they already had it harder. And then, it suddenly became all his duty.

Why did his siblings not receive the same treatment?

However, Mark was already afraid of his parents could not muster the courage to ask such disrespectful questions.

Slowly, Mark found staying at home less and less enjoyable.

Unlike at home, he barely had anything hard to do outside.

Unlike at home, he would not get scolded unless he did something bad.

Unlike at home, he could play with other children.

Mark began to try to spend as much time as possible outside the house, specifically, at school. Studying might be boring. At least, it was something that kept him away from home.

But then, spending more time outside, Mark realized something. He began to learn more about things that he would not learn at home.

And...

Compared to other children, he actually had it a whole lot worse.

In terms of daily school allowance, he actually had a lot less than other children. Well, he did not question this part too much. He knew that compared to other families, his was not that well off.

However, that topic became a huge issue to Mark in the future.

Unlike private schools where school tests were paid beforehand, photocopied texts and test papers on public schools were paid on the spot. Scheduled and announced tests were fine. Mark could ask for money from his parents before the schedule.

But for surprise tests and other study materials, Mark's allowance was never enough. He learned how to endure hunger and how to earn debts this way in school.

Mark mentioned this issue to his parents several times. However, he never had a raise until he grew tired of asking. It continued until college, where it went to the point that Mark would only eat twice a day because his allowance was not enough for daily expenses school. After all, studying at college needed a whole lot of money.

Because of this, Mark learned to leech off from his richer classmates, even just to get a stick of fishballs for lunch during days when the subjects needed more stamina to attend. Physics and Trigonometry on the same day for the whole day were the worst.

It all happened with another occurring issue.

At the same age, his siblings had several times larger school allowance than him.

When Mark was in the fourth year of his college course, Michael was already in the first year.

Michaels daily allowance was way higher than he had, even if they were attending the same school and he was older.

Mark could only swallow that in as he already asked the reason for this, years before.

The answer he got was that because the prices of things now and then were higher. Of course, it was nothing but an empty excuse. The prices of things in and outside school barely changed in the years. The only time the prices actually rose was when he already graduated college.

Mark, who already lost trust in his parents, did not bother asking anymore. It was not like anything would change, anyway.

As Mark seemed to stop caring about home and spent a lot of time outside with all sorts of school-related excuses, it was not surprising that at one point, he got caught. His father was a tricycle driver, after all. There would be a time that they would accidentally see each other on the road.

Mark received another level of scolding at that time. He felt it funny when his mother started with the topic of not caring about his family and spending time with his friends. She proceeded to tell him that they were bad influences and stuff. That he needed to stay away from them in the future.

Unfortunately, Mark had no choice but to reduce the time he spent with them. He valued his friends, but it would be bad if his raging mother just went and confronted them unreasonably.

However, it had a bad effect.