In the early morning, Ev stood beneath an old tree in their garden, overlooking their town of Erelund, and was bathed in the rays of the magnificent sun. Erven stared at the tree’s gnarled limbs with a rather more tactful focus. He observed and absorbed how a squirrel would climb and navigate this construct, so easily and without the use of mana as well. It must have an unruly amount of physical strength.

Ev’s little fingers flexed as he prepared to mount the tree in front of him. He leapt onto this fortress accepting the challenge, the squirrel so easily accomplished. His calculations were perfect but his body could simply not execute these perfect plans he brewed up.

Thud.

“Dada!!” Ev yelled out of the underbrush which welcomed his unceremonious descent.

A few paces away, Harold dropped the wooden bucket he was carrying, “Ev!” He called out.

Ev’s father darted towards Ev, brushing aside twigs and leaves unburying his son, entirely incapacitated, and lifted him out, with much less than a few leaves on his head.

I somehow forgot to consider my physical limitations in the calculations, silly mistake.

“Harold!” Lyria called out, “You were meant to be watching Ev, Harold!” Her gentle voice echoed from the kitchen.

“I was watching him just a second ago, he was on the ground I promise,” Harold simply chuckled nervously, understanding it was only his own fault although Lyria’s look was one somewhere between angry, relieved, and one that simply had given up all hope with Harold.

“Your supervising is making him re-enact the fall of the Sunmire basin” Lyria scolded Harold.

“He said dada again, that’s worth something right?” Harold grimaced.

“Not when it’s in distress!”

Ev, who was now free from the bush, sat on the grass and dusted himself off evaluating himself and his lacklustre performance, ignoring the light argument his parents were having.

I was too weak.

My balance was off, my jumps sloppy, and my speed— my speed was simply pitiful.

I need data, I need to get strong, not for war, but for myself.

The same afternoon, Ev had transfigured his garden into a stage for his grand performance. He marked specific distances between trees, and paced from one end to other and back, until he was confident of his stride length. He would mark his jump length with stones in the soil were he landed, trying to beat his previous record each time. He had created a homemade mini sundial using the way the sun’s light fell through his fence and markings on the ground. Ev repeated multiple dashes between two points he had marked and compared them using his sun-dial.

Away from Ev’s little battleground training corner, Lyria went to check on the farm when she noticed numerous radish missing and a leek. The radish were standing like squat, round soldiers awaiting judgement from their general, Erven, in what Ev’s parents called his little “playfield”.

Then Erven’s parents witnessed something that, to them, felt truly magical. They saw Ev standing upright a half-metre before his rows of “soldiers” lined up. Ev visibly inhaled, his eyes locked on forwards then he did it. Ev pounced forward -leek in hand- swinging at the radish bonking them and even somehow slicing one in half. With a dramatic grunt, Ev sliced at the final radish sending it flying an entire metre -which was quite impressive for his young age of 11 months. Then, he spun it before placing it in his waistband as if it was a sword in its sheath.

Harold blinked. “Is. Is he… fencing?”

“With a leek nonetheless?” Lyria asked, equally as gob-smacked.

“He’s barely even seen a sword in his life, just the ones in the market on sale and that the guards use”

“…Should we stop him?”

“He’s far too cute for that,” Lyria replied, biting into her lip gently.

One radish still standing

Ev dashed at it driving his sword straight into it, snapping it in half. As if an auto-immune response, Ev looked at his sword absolutely horrified, paralysed before releasing a loud whine for the first time in this life.

“Looks like we didn’t have to stop him,” Harold chuckled to his wife. “I’ll go grab him another leek, more sturdy this time.”

“Good idea, we’ll let him have this one I think.” Lyria smiled.

Ev’s parents enjoyed the scene that lasted the rest of that evening, Ev standing beneath the Erelund sky, sweating, training, and improving – leek in hand, radishes getting knocked over and a fire burning in his chest that no toddler or child could ever hope to top.