During the late 20th century, half a decade away from it's end.

In the region far from the major cities where sewage, diseases and garbage were a common site.

In this dirty slum a boy was digging into the garbage can searching for something.

His hands vigorously moved as he kept going through the garbage, it seemed like he would have swimmed through it if he had too.

But it didn't come to that.

The boy stopped his moments before he crawled his head out of the garbage dump.

The boy was very hideous in his appearance, his face and black hair dirty and covered in waste like banana peel and such, he was wearing a tattered inner wear which also was covered in filth. And his body looked starved with his bones visible under his skin.

And in this filthy boy's hand was a box.

" Found it, hehe." He laughed with glee as he looked at his hand.

It was a chocolate box.

It was a fairly large box and belonged to expensive side of the chocolate business. But it was no use to this boy as it was empty.

But the boy smiled happily as he looked at not seeming to care. Ofcourse it may be that this boy never tasted chocolate or seen it before.

" I am going to open it ~" He sang to himself as he opened it.

And obviously there was no chocolate in it and some leftover ones have already melted. And one could see maggots and cockroaches rushing out of the box at his actions.

" Wow." But seeing this scene the boy exclaimed instead.

He looked at the box with satisfied expression as he dusted of the remaining insects of the box. Then he picked up the the thing he was desperately looking for.

In his hand was a wrapper. It was covered in dirt and was crushed and tore off but it didn't matter to the boy. Because the wrapper was a not a normal one but a gold one in color. This type of chocolate had become famous in the recent years and the boy would find one or two around and keep it safe.

"But what a jackpot it is to find not one or two but ten!...the lady seems to look at my side." The boy said excitedly the phrases he heard from some of the people who pass by the place.

"...oi, ugly idiot.." At that moment a shout was heard by the boy from a distance.

The boy's smile froze as his brows furrowed. He hurriedly picked up all the wrappers and put into his trouser pocket, that wasn't torn.

Then he turned around and ran.

Whoosh. For a petite and weak looking boy, he ran like wind as he jumped over the garbage across his path.

His eyes glimmered with light as he ran.

After a while the boy dissappeared, a group of 5 tall men appeared at the garbage dump.

"...oi, idiot are you here?" One of the men shouted as he scanned the surroundings with his eyes. If the boy was present he would have recognized the man's voice as the one he heard earlier.

'Hmm.' Seeing that there was no answer , the man turned around. He then walked towards a tall men in better clothes than his. He seemed like the leader of this group of five.

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" He is not here boss. " The man said respectfully.

the boss's brows furrowed. He turned his head left and right before he fell into thought.

Seeing their boss in deep thinking , the other 4 also started to pretend to think before they randomly spoke out.

" maybe he is just lazing around...and you know that among the pickers he is the most working one, maybe that got to his head."

"I bet he is growing through...what they call it..ah a phase. If we give a few spanks to his ass he would return to normal." Another one said .

But other than these two , the 3rd guy had unbelievable thought.

" maybe he escaped?" The 3rd guy said but soon the other lackeys except the boss gave him a look that said

'Don't joke around.'

And the last one said his possibility,

" maybe he was bought by the new gang. You know that in the garbage picking business, the new gang seemed to buy off the good pickers when they are alone, or even kidnap them."

This sounded quite possible to the others and to the boss.

Just like the 4th guy said, this group of five men belonged to a bigger group that collects garbage, make some valuble things to not look like garbage, then sell them in illegal ways.

And to run the business , these man did not even work themselves but made children to become pickers and to run around to pick up the garbage. These children were once beggars roaming the street straving.

And when they told by these men that they would give food and a place to sleep and all they had to go and pick some stuff. They jumped at it.

And soon these nameless beggars became the primary workers of this business.

And among this workers , the nameless boy they were searching for was one that worked the most. The others also seemed to call him "The ugly king of garbage."

Wherever someone saw him, he was digging through the garbage like searching for some priceless treasure.

But they didn't know that this boy was just collecting gold color wrappers.

The boss then finnaly nodded his head before he turned around to face the other four.

" let's search for a little longer, than report to big boss." He ordered and started moving.

The other looked at each other before following after him.

Tap. Tap. Tap.....step.

The boy ran for a quite a few distance before he stopped.

Huff. Huff.

He catched his breath as he stood in front of a makeshift hut. It was poorly made, it was just a space where the garbage was made as the boundary and a big carpet was hanged at the top with a rod to act as roof. It looked like a tent, but the poor boy doesn't know it as there was a broken board on the ground written in it

"_______ hut. " There was a space left for something to be filled later.

Huff.

After his breathing calmed down he walked inside the open 'hut.'

Inside the 'hut' there was a torn bed and pillow for sleeping and large box made of rusted iron.

The boy happily walked towards it. Then he quieted down for a moment to hear if anyone was nearby before he opened it.

In the box were two set of things. One was the large number of gold color wrappers that he collected and the other was a torn book.

The boy took out today's collection of wrappers and put it into the box.

" This should be enough money to get me out of here." He said as he naively smiled.

Little did he knew that they were just gold in color not literal gold.

The boy then took out the book. It was story book that contained many words that he didn't understand. But he had picked up a few words when he heard the adults talk and decided to take a shot a reading it again today.

He opened the book and saw the familiar pictures and words. It was story about king and his curse. The boy understood th gist of it as this, the king one day gave his home to a old man who was a big shot and the big shot above him gave the king a gift for his kindness.

The gift was the favorite part of the boy and he yearned for it every day. A power to turn anything you touch into gold. It was marvellous power in the boy's eyes.

As for the rest of the story that was torn apart or eaten by insects , he didn't know where to find them in this large garbage dump.

Normally he only saw the pictures but today he tried to read the words.

But alas he couldn't read many of it.

'Hmm...M...I..what is this again?' He recognized some letters of a word.

' K..I.. N ...G'

" king!" He shouted finally able to learn a word.

He normally identified the king from his drawing, all grand and all but this was the first time he learned the word for it.

'..hmm..Next is M..I..D...ah A ...and S?' The boy thought not sure if he got it correct.

" ..hmm Midas. " But he said it out anyway.

" king Midas." He said before he smiled widely. He threw the book into box and closed it. And he went to the bed and picked out something sharp from under the pillow. It was a knife , a somewhat clean one that he kept to protect himself.

And he rushed out of the hut with knife in hand.

Outside he went and picked the broken board as he wrote with a knife.

Scribble. Scribble.

After he finished he went inside placing the broken board at the entrance.

In the broken boards a new word filled the empty space.

"Midas hut."