Esther stood outside "The Gilded Lantern." The legendary lantern cast a warm, golden halo in the damp night air. She watched that light like she was observing a distant galaxy, nervously clutching the faded fabric of her worn dress. Eight years of savings hidden in the sewn-shut pocket inside her skirt felt heavy and solid like a stone - the physical weight of eight years of hunger, eight years of scrubbing floors.

She took a deep breath, the air thick with the alley's mildew and distant docks' fish. She forced her shoulders back, a clumsy imitation of the posture she'd secretly observed from university ladies. Do I look ridiculous? The thought flashed through her mind as she walked toward the door.

The moment she pushed it open, she felt the stares - looks of distaste so profound they felt like a physical force, as if she were a logical fallacy that had no place in their ordered universe. She swallowed hard and smelled herself - only the clean, sharp scent of industrial soap. Their disgust has no factual basis, she told herself. The error is not with me. She ignored the whispers, her eyes locking onto an empty table, each step forward like performing a difficult calculation.

Led to a corner table, she immediately hid her hands - her rough, red, hated hands - underneath the table. Then the bowl of noodles was served. It wasn't just food. It was proof at the end of a long equation, the conclusion to eight years of exhausted nights and countless scrubs in cold water. She had earned this. She told herself this with quiet certainty as she picked up the chopsticks, her movements a little clumsy but firm.

It was hot. It tasted of meat. It was real. She ate slowly, savoring every sip of broth, every strand of noodle, trying to create a small, warm universe populated only by her and this bowl.

That universe lasted less than five minutes before tall shadows fell over her like a dark cloud.

"Hey, little thing," the man in the lead began, voice dripping with contempt. "Where'd a girl like you get the money for food this good?"

"It's my own money," she said, her voice quiet but enunciation clear.

The man laughed. "Your own money? What money does a cleaner like you have? Tell me, which professor's pocket did you pick?"

That sentence punctured her final sphere of peace. She snapped her head up, staring directly at him with eyes made brighter by anger. "I did not steal."

Her defiance seemed to entertain him. His smile widened. "No?" He reached out, rough fingers seizing her chin, forcing it higher. "A tough one, are you."

CRACK. The slap was sharp and loud. Esther's head knocked to the side, a high-pitched ringing in her ear. The table lurched, half her treasured soup spilling out to stain her only decent dress. Laughter erupted around her as no one intervened.

"Let's go!" another man said, grabbing her arm and hauling her violently from the chair. "You're coming with us. The big boss wants to personally judge a little thief like you!"

She was dragged through streets filled with leering eyes and finally thrown hard onto the floor of a dimly lit room that smelled of tobacco and power. Pushing herself up, she slowly lifted her head to look at the figure sitting behind a massive desk, their face obscured by shadow - the one they called the judge, whose logic would decide her fate.