Otaku Witch

To give credit where it's due, Denisha did resemble a nun more than Dorothy, even now when the Homebody Witch had the maternal advantage of being the Moon Goddess Incarnation. Asking her to mingle with a bunch of rowdy kids each day was too much for her patience, but Miss Shepherdess wouldn't feel the same way.

The Divine King's mini-classroom was now open not only to The Witches, but Denisha also often came to the Mechanical Church to teach these children some basic literacy, instructing them in reading and writing.

These kids were the offspring of the workers in the factories, and naturally, they wouldn't have had the means to access education; most of them had to start hustling for a living at an early age.

The poorer the area, the more people tended to have children; after all, there's no denying that in those places, more people meant more Strength—it wasn't an empty phrase. Having one more person signified an additional labor force for the family.

Although taking care of children required attention, it was often the older kids who looked after the younger ones without much trouble. As for the cost of raising kids, in those days, it was simply about providing a meal to keep them from starving—beyond that, there were hardly any costs.

Just a few years of care, and once a child reached their teenage years, they could find a simple job and fend for themselves, even contributing a little extra to the family's income.

With many children, there was always the chance that one or two would turn out to be successful, and this too was a way for these impoverished families to think about changing their Fate.

However, now the mechanical factories offered high compensation to the workers, and the income of two working parents was enough to sustain a whole family. Hence, there was no need for the children to worry about earning a living too early,

and at this time, the Mechanical Monks of the Mechanical Church stated that idle children at home need not worry. They could be sent to the church, where teachers would instruct them in knowledge and skills. After completing their studies, these children could immediately become Senior Technicians and the like.

With such promotion, parents naturally had no objections. After all, it was free of charge, and the Church even provided lunch for the children—why would they have any concerns?

Moreover, having worked in the factory and enjoyed such high benefits for a while, people had already developed a deep-seated respect for the Mechanical Monks, seeing them as truly good souls, believing their words to be correct.

And a few more astute workers with a longer-term view saw even more. Over the month they had been working at the factory, they had come to understand the greatness of the Power of Machinery even more.

A task that would have required hundreds of blacksmiths one or two months to complete can now be done by a few people in a few hours with the help of the Power of Machinery.

It's not just in blacksmithing either. The power of machinery can be applied to various industries, like the new weaving machines added to the factory for female workers. With a well-designed program and the input of raw materials, once the machine is started, it can produce various high-quality textiles all day and night without pause, an efficiency that manual weaving could never keep up with, even to the point of exhaustion.

In short, these workers had a vague premonition that the world was about to change drastically, that the Power of Machinery would sweep across the world and bring new transformations to it.

In this wave of transformation, by seizing even the slightest advantage, the lives of these lower-class citizens could undergo revolutionary changes—it was indeed a once-in-a-millennium opportunity.

Additionally, the workers discovered that most of the jobs they could participate in were simple and required little skill. The core technology of the factory was far beyond their current level to engage with. To undertake those core tasks and earn higher salaries, they would have to learn more technology and quickly become Senior Technicians.

But they also understood that at their age, their learning efficiency couldn't match that of children.

Thus, the opportunity promised by the Mechanical Monks, where children could become Senior Technicians immediately after graduation, was extremely rare.

Those visionary parents sent their children to the Church without delay and lamented not having more kids at home, even working overtime to produce more children.

After all, once there was a clear path of upward mobility, having one more child meant an additional opportunity for class transformation.

Of course, children couldn't understand the parents' high hopes for them—wishing sons to become dragons and daughters to become phoenixes. Most kids naturally resisted school and felt that they were losing the hard-won freedom, which made them miserable.

Children of this age didn't yet understand the importance of knowledge or what it meant to change one's Fate through education. Their minds were filled only with the desire for happy playtimes, especially since they were used to running wild before, making nearly every one a handful.

In any case, sometimes Dorothy looked at this wild bunch of little ones and could only feel her blood pressure rising. Accustomed to the Witches' offspring who were knowledgeable at birth, she found it hard to adjust to the foolishness of these human children.

However, Denisha was quite patient and had effective methods. In a short time, she managed to get these rowdy kids in order, at least to the point where no one dared to slack off during her lessons.

But...

"It's Sister Dorothy."

"Good day, Sister Dorothy."

"Sister, sister, look at the words I've written."