The debt

"Only 120 tenra?" Madam Kona said as she disappointedly looked at the money once she was done counting.

My eyebrows raised in confusion as I wondered what the problem was. This is the amount I've always given her at the end of every month.

"…At this rate who knows how many decades it will take before you pay off the debt," she said.

"Seven years madam, it will take me seven more years," I reminded her of the deal we had made. Why was she acting as if she didn't know.

The total debt I had to pay was 15 000 Tenra (300 000usd). So far, I had paid back just over 4 thousand Tenra in the last three years since I started working at the Teman's manor. It was the agreement we had that I would pay off the debt in ten years. There were still seven more years to go.

"… receiving 120 tenra isn't going to be enough going forward," she said.

There was a moment of silence as I processed what she was telling me. At first I thought she couldn't possibly be serious, however, her silence told me she was very much serious.

"Madam Kona…" I started in confusion. "I don't understand, we agreed that this arrangement would be how I would work to pay off my mother's debt and you accepted it. So why is it a problem now?"

She scoffed, "You see I came to the realization that this arrangement is no longer sustainable. Three years ago, I was open to the idea you proposed but now things are different…."

How are things different now? What is she talking about? I asked myself. Overnight she just decided that this arrangement was not sustainable for her? When I was paying this all along for the last 3 years?

 "Despite all your working you still haven't made even a quarter of what you owe me in the last three years. I'm tired of waiting. 120 tenra is too small an amount. Seven more years is too long a time to wait. I want my money now. Within the next three years to be exact."

"Three years?" I said in disbelief.

"You should be giving me at least 500 Tenra a month," she said.

My mouth opened wide in disbelief. "That's impossible there's no way I can make that amount," I told her. There is no job where a commoner could make more than 200 Tenra and that was a lot of money already.

 "Then clearly you're out of options," she told me unsympathetically.

My eyes widened in horror. What did she mean by that?

Madam Kona sighed as she looked at me. "You just turned 21 last month, didn't you?" she then asked me.

My eyes suspiciously stared at her. "…Yes," I replied slowly, wondering why she was bringing it up.

"Now Mera, I've told you, many times before that you could make life so much easier for your mother if you just became a courtesan. You could very quickly make the amount she owes me as well as buy her out of this brothel if you became a courtesan."

My eyes narrowed as I pieced together what she was telling me. She wanted me to become a courtesan.

 "I know your mother has been begging that you don't become a courtesan all this time and I've been kind enough to allow you to play around these last three years, but it's high time I got serious. I want my money now," she said.

"Don't give me that look," she said in disgust. "Remember you should be grateful for everything I've allowed considering all the trouble she has caused!"

 She then smashed her fist on the table.

"Not only does your mother still owe us for trying to run away with one of the customers' 21 years ago, but she has to pay us back for the trouble she caused having to raise you as she worked. And now that she's sick and useless, she's taking up space in the brothel with the housing we offer you. You should be grateful for everything I've done for the two of you because I should be charging far more than what you currently owe!" she yelled at me.

I flinched at her cold words about my mother. I wanted to yell but I couldn't talk back to her though.

She was saying that I should be grateful as if the 15000 Tenra I owed her was a small amount. In fact, I wasn't even sure how Madam Kona calculated some of these expenses that my mother apparently owed her. My mother, who had once been a courtesan for more than 2 decades now, still hadn't paid off all this debt from when I was born.

 Which was strange considering how much brothels charged customers for their courtesans and had been her most popular courtesan for a long time. So, for those two decades she apparently still hadn't managed to pay off the debt? I looked at the buff menacing looking bodyguard beside the madam. It's not like I had any power to question her, however.

"You've turned 21 which is the perfect age to be a courtesan as you've fully bloomed into your womanhood," she said to me licking her lips and her eyes sparkling as if she was looking at a bag of money. "Even if you try to conceal your body in the kind clothes you wear, I know you have quite the body. You're an Amaru like your mother after all."

I blinked hard at what she said and looked down at my clothes. But I couldn't be a courtesan, not after the promise I had made to 'her'.

"Since you decided to take on your mother's debt yourself, I'm holding you responsible," she explained.

"I'm giving you until the end of the year to decide. I'm tired of receiving small amounts like this. It's either you find a way increase the amount you owe me to at least 500 tenra or you become a courtesan. If you don't come up with a solution by then, there's no telling what will happen to your mother," she went on in a threatening tone. "Am I understood?"

I didn't respond, just looked at her in disbelief. How can she suddenly change her mind like this and make impossible demands?