Hero's Return 4 Sora's Childhood

Charging through the village on the wolf the two parents were very familiar with the townsfolk, as they sped through they constantly were greeted and welcomed back by the people of the village, eventually they reached their home, their estate was a pretty exquisite one, but only by the standards of the village, their house was 2 floors tall and had about 5 rooms in it, 3 downstairs and 2 upstairs. The 3 rooms downstairs were the kitchen, living room and a separate room made for the wolf, the 2 rooms upstairs were a bedroom big enough for two people and another bedroom that was about half the size for one person, this was the room that was going to be allocated to Sora. Rayns opened the door and felt extremely comfortable, this was his home, after all, Selica felt similarly whilst Reiner immediately went into his own room in the downstairs area and began to sleep. This was a long trip and they had only taken a short break at the house on the way back, so he was extremely tired. Now that Reiner was sleeping Rayns and Selica went to the room that they had allocated to their newborn.

They had preemptively prepared for the birth of the child so they had set up a cot and many soft pillows around the room so that their baby would have a comfortable living s.p.a.ce. They placed him in the cot and let him sleep, this journey had been exhausting for him too, to have just been born and then going on a journey of over 1000 miles - he quickly went to sleep too. After everyone around them began to sleep Rayns and Selica both also felt the immediate fatigue from a 10000-mile journey. They went to their room and lay in bed together. "Hey Rayns, what do you think our son will grow up to be like?" Selica asked, seemingly concerned "We're near the top of the village in terms of wealth because of our lifestyles as above-average mages and merchants. We are able to quickly make a lot of money, but... I don't want to spoil him, if he were to grow arrogant then I feel as if he wouldn't be able to fully live his life. Let's not spoil him, make him humble like you, I only learned to be humble because of you. If you never came into my life I would probably be an arrogant little- I would probably not be better off" Selica laughed at the compliment her husband just gave her and pulled him into her embrace "I agree with what you're saying, for now, though we just have to rest. We'll do what you do and we'll see where it goes" Rayns looked down at his wife and kissed her on the forehead "Thanks Selica" They both went to sleep.

Meanwhile, above their house suspended in midair were five invisible figures

N: "You do realize how creepy we look right..."

I: "No! We're not creepy! We're simply taking care of our leader! Like he told us to back then!"

D: "Iona I feel like you're using the mission as an excuse to trick yourself into thinking that stalking this family's every move isn't creepy."

S: "Guys... C'mon... It's for the mission but we should probably find a better way to keep tabs on him besides stalking him..."

X: "Um... Seth! Any way you can bring your floating castle here?"

S: "You serious Miss Xion? Yeah, I can but unless you want to cause a ma.s.s panic I really don't think I should bring a floating island here..."

X: "Why do you still refer to me as 'Miss Xion'? Unlike everyone here your basically the same age as me, you don't have to call me 'Miss' you know..."

S: "Because I feel like you're stronger than me..."

X: "Only by a couple of levels..."

S: "Those couple of levels' will get me killed in a fight..."

X: "Ugh... Just call me Xion, I can understand the others but not you... It just feels weird..."

S: "Well if you permit it I guess... Xion..."

X: "..."

S: "It feels weird doesn't it... me and you..."

X: "Doesn't matter, you'll get used to it, stop calling me 'Miss', makes me feel like an old lady"

S: "Fine"

...

D: "Guys this still doesn't fix the stalking problem..."

...

D: "Okay how about this then... we can register to move into the town as a family of three and two, Me and Miss Xion will move in together as a husband and a wife whilst Seth, Iona and Natu will move in as a father of a daughter and a son."

Everyone was fine with this plan, normally, no matter how weird a plan was, it was the best they could do as whenever Dezrin planned something, he would take into account everything and find the best possible way. Also, none of them really cared about acting like a family because they were that close anyway, they knew that as soon as they could basically act the same towards each other regardless of where they were outside, plus as soon as Sora went into a school they would drop the familial act. The only thing Dezrin was scared of was Xion teasing him and getting too 'into' the role. They unanimously agreed on the plans and moved in, for the most part, it went smoothly, they changed their clothes to ones that weren't as exquisite as what they usually wore and registered with the village to move in. The only problem was that the man named Dezrin seemed to be extremely embarra.s.sed around his wife whenever she made physical contact with him, just like his fears had predicted, Xion teased him and began brushing up on him everywhere he went. Seth was laughing the entire time whilst Natu and Iona were already used to Xion's playful nature so they just allowed it to happen, eventually, they couldn't help but laugh too at the way the normally calm and composed Dezrin was acting.

They made sure that they lived as close to each other as possible and allocated one person to personally watch over and protect the family every 3 months, living life like this, 4 years quickly pa.s.sed. By now the young Sora could walk and had a basic understanding of the human language, as for the way he was raised, it was exactly like his parents had discussed, they had given him a lot of love and familial care but they never spoiled him. Through this he began to grow humble and through the stories about the 'Legendary 100' above all powers in this world, he grew a subconscious desire to become one of them, and now it was time for him to decide something very important, every time a young child of the village reached the age of 4, they would be put into training to begin hunting - it wasn't really dangerous, all it was was the child being taken into a tiny field with training dummies and they would pick a wooden weapon from a wall, whether it be a spear or a sword all the way to gauntlet's. This trial wasn't special training but it would decide what weapon the child would focus on. In some special cases, some people even chose more than one weapon, some of the legendary 100 effectively used many types of weapons at the same time to fight. All 5 of the team had concealed themselves and were standing within the field, they were here to see if their leader would choose the same weapon as the past, or if he would completely change the way he fought by choosing a different weapon. In his past, he used a pair of gauntlet's and fought in extremely close combat, he literally punched his way out of any situation he was trapped in, this one track mindset had led him very far but had also got him killed. He knew he had no chance of winning in his past but he still charged into his death with a smile on his face to postpone the end of the world and allow himself to be reincarnated. There was one more reason why they were here though, in their leader's previous life he had a special ability. An ability completely unique to him, he had named this ability one of two t.i.tles, 'Darkness in Light' or 'Light in Darkness', the reasoning behind these two t.i.tles is that either would work. This ability gave him the ability to manifest a chosen weapon within his hands that emanated an extremely pure aura of both light and darkness, because of this he was able to fully execute both the power of light and the power of darkness in quick succession through his manifested weapons. In the past he utilised both powers in his gauntlets by directing the light into his fist for punching power and using the darkness behind the knuckle's almost like a jet, releasing a burst of any type of magic energy would result in propulsion/recoil. Through this, his punches were like jet-propelled steel fists. .h.i.tting people. They wanted to see if one, he would pick gauntlet's again and two, if he could use his special ability again if at all. Sora had to do this trial by himself as they didn't want parents to influence them into picking something they thought would be good for their children, when going through with the trial children were alone. This did not mean he came alone, his parents were currently waiting outside, naturally, they couldn't sense or see the five teammates watching their leader.

S: "Think he's gonna go for punches again?"

X: "I wouldn't mind but that would be kind of boring, I wanna see how he applies his special ability to something new"

N: "Yeah, I'm guessing that since his aura is the same the chances of picking gauntlets again is pretty high though."

D: "Whilst it wasn't really my style back then, I have to agree with Natu, he's so similar to how he was back then, the chance of him picking gauntlets is pretty high"

I: "I don't mind what he does, he'll still probably be as cool as he was back then"

As the young 4 year old walked around the wall with the mult.i.tude of weapons on them, he gravitated towards a pair of gauntlets and picked them up, after putting them on he began to punch the air, seemingly familiar with them. This caused a few of the team to sigh as they truly did wish for something different, after punching the air for a couple of minutes, the young Sora looked at them and after about a minute of staring, he removed the gauntlets and placed them back on the wall to keep looking. Now all five of the team were staring at Sora with a hint of expectation in their eyes, none of them could guess what their leader was going to choose, denying the gauntlets meant that he was going to pick something new! They all watched and waited for his next decision.

After walking around for about 5 minutes, he gravitated towards a wooden sword that had the shape of a katana, he picked it up and began swinging it growing more and more comfortable with it, but to Sora, something still felt off, he couldn't shake a feeling of longing for the gauntlet's that he previously used, something about them just made him naturally gravitate towards them. Because of this he eventually decided one thing. Sora walked up to the gauntlet's with the swords still in his hands and he put them on, now he had the gauntlets one whilst wielding the sword. The team that was currently concealed looked at this and were on board, it was something that was simultaneously similar and new at the same time. Naturally, none of them had any doubts. With his new combination of a one-handed sword and two gauntlet's he began to test it out on the dummies, he currently wasn't very intelligent so all he really did was swing the sword at the dummy. The most interesting he did was he would drop the sword then kick it towards the dummy, transitioning to his fists. The team found this movement to be hilarious, watching a 4-year-old beat up a dummy was already funny to them but to see them kick a sword towards the dummy then wail on it, they could barely hold their laughter in. This reminded them of their leader over 400 years ago 'Azu' - they would try any move they thought to be possible and see if it was functional, leading to many failed attempts that would often make the team laugh.

After about an hour of testing different weapons and combinations, Sora eventually chose the gauntlet - katana combo that he initially had. He enjoyed this combination much more than any of the other ones he had tested out. He was asked by the spectator if he had chosen what he wanted and he responded accordingly. After he was told he had listed Sora's name with the words 'Sword' and 'Gauntlet' next to them, after this Sora was permitted to leave. His parent's had not asked him about what weapons he had picked as they didn't use weapons so they knew that neither of them could tutor him, his parents were mages that used their minds and internal energy to control the natural energy around them, they didn't use physical weapons. Sora would have gone down this path but after being told about the 100 Legends and the option to go into physical hunting that would not only train him to use weapons but provide food for his village, it isn't that the 100 Legends don't contain mages, there are actually over 40 mages in the 100 Legends but the stories of the other Legends who used physical weapons were much cooler to him than the ones who were just controlling natural energy, even some mages in the 100 Legends used physical weapons, this is because these weapons were tempered and nourished by the aura of their owners, allowing their owners to utilise their weapons to amplify their own power, whether pure magic or aura. This was the case for the 5 teammates that were currently watching over Sora, they could all utilise both magic and physical weapons, but they had control of something else, something all 100 Legends could use but some had a stronger control over it than others. Aura, aura was extremely special, aura was not the same as magic power as magic power was (on a technical level) much easier to control, 'magic power' is just one's ability to control the natural essence around them, natural essence was abundant in this world and if one was able to grow sensitive to its presence they could manipulate it to do thing's they wanted it to do, like controlling the flow of water or in extreme cases, compressing and increasing the speed of air to create wind blades. Aura was not natural though, it wasn't an outside force that one could learn to manipulate. Aura was an internal energy that allowed one to do many things with their body - If someone could sense their own aura they could allow their bodies to move quickly, or even allow the aura in their own bodies to move outside their body and anywhere the aura was they could see with their own eyes. That is how the 100 Legends are able to sense their surroundings so easily.

This path was the one that Sora wanted to travel, a physical warrior who manipulated the aura in his body and the weapons in his hands to break through any obstacle that got in his way. This was the dream that he had held. Grow powerful enough to adventure around the boundless world and help anyone on the way, like a hero! This dream was his innocent desire and because of how he was raised, he wasn't going to give up on this dream. Until the day he became a hero on the level of a Legend, he would not stop.

In a dark room, the surrounding area so different that it seemed like a completely different dimension, there was a two-horned figure that had been missing a horn, the damage caused to the area where the figures second horn had been looked completely random, the bone was shattered. This made it seem like someone had snapped off this horn. As the figure moved their hand up to touch the area where the horn was snapped the expression on their face changed from neutral to complete rage "That kid, one I ignored for so long because he and his little group were merely wandering adventurers, lost in a world they didn't recognise. To think he would be the one to willingly sacrifice himself to extend the peace of his own world, he shattered my horn and weakened me to this pitiful state where I can only focus on healing... Such a being was born into that world once, and now he has reincarnated... I would recognise that aura from anywhere..." Whilst the figure was currently in another world parallel to the one Sora and his teammates were in, such a powerful auric burst of energy travelled much farther than one's plane, it easily transcended the barrier splitting these dimensions and had allowed many people in the other realms to notice that a figure who would grow to be an extremely powerful individual was born. Many people would not care about these though as it would most likely take many years for the individual to reach that level, granted they would be much more powerful than most people - to the 100 Legends, it was just another high ranking Legend being born, none of the Legends would go out of their way to battle each other let alone try to kill each other. Most of them lived luxurious lives, some were evil and some were good, all wanted to grow stronger. So naturally they wouldn't foolishly try to provoke other Legends, no matter how arrogant or evil one was. Everyone knew that these two waves of energy signalled a possible rank 1 Legend but no one could be bothered to check. Because of this none of the Legends besides the 5 teammates had checked up on the point where the bursts came from, no one knew that it was Sora, this was the same for the figure that was lying in wait.

"I need to send one of my general's to track the aura of that wave to where it currently is and report back to me, I need to kill him now before he can grow to someone who can fight me again, he knew he would lose against me and still fought, leading to this pitiful state, I'm not going through this again... Dalvan!!!" Suddenly a snake materialised in the room, this was similar to a projection that could send information back to the sender. "Investigate the aura within the second burst of energy we felt 4 years ago and track it to where it is now, if you can kill him, do so, if by some reason you cannot, return and inform me immediately" The serpent stared at the figure in front of it and with a flicker, disappeared. "Hero... I will destroy you... For ruining my plans back then, for reducing me to this pitiful state and for having your allies constantly stop my forces even after you died... If I cannot get my army to kill you... 800 years is all I need to fully heal... By then... You will die..."