I charged toward Liora as I held my wooden training sword high in the air. The plan was simple. When I reached Liora, all I needed to do was swing my sword downward with all of my strength and send it crashing down on her shoulder blade. That would make her drop her sword, then I would have free rein to do whatever I wanted.

  As I charged toward her, closing the gap between us, a grin uncontrollably came to my face as I thought about the pain I could cause her while she was defenseless. At the moment, I couldn't take my revenge on Mira or Caelen.

  They obviously had way more experience than me. Mira had shown the gap between us before, and while I hadn't seen Caelen explicitly show his power, the fact that he had created a healing spell on his own had shown me that his experience was probably great. So instead of getting my revenge on them, I’d just have to settle for taking my frustration out on their daughter once she was defenseless.

  Should I take out her eyes? No, maybe I could thrust the tip of the sword at her throat. Whatever, there will be plenty of time to think about this after I disarm her.

  When I was finally in range of Liora, I jumped up to gain some height before swinging my sword downward exactly where I had planned. “Take this!”

  Liora simply hopped backward, avoiding my attack completely with a grin on her face. The same eager grin she wore on her face since the match started. I could tell that she was loving this.

  “Heh, heh, that was way too obvious,” Liora chuckled as she got back into a battle stance.

  “Shut up, I’m gonna knock you out!” I said in anger as I readied myself. My attack had missed her completely, and now I probably looked like an idiot.

  I glanced to the side and looked at Mira. She was off to the side and out of our way to examine the match. Her face was hard to read as she stood watching us with her typical stern expression and her arms crossed. Though even with her unchanging look, I could tell that she thought I was an idiot. That pissed me off even more.

  I turned my attention back to Liora, who stood in front of me. I needed to attack again. But the last time I had tried, it missed completely. She said something about my attack being obvious, but was it really? I didn't even know that moves could be telegraphed or that it was even a bad thing.

  Actually, come to think of it…

  Thinking back, I did remember Mira explaining something like that while watching me do my sword swinging drills earlier in the week. Though I barely remembered, as I wasn't really listening to her all that much.

  What did she say again…?

  I racked my brain trying to remember, but didn't have much time to, as Liora charged toward me while I was lost in thought. She was fast. So fast, in fact, that I thought she was using mana augmentation for a second, until I remembered she didn't know how.

  Shit!

  Liora rushed towards me and sent a horizontal slash toward my head. It was fast, and I knew that I wouldn't be able to react to it in time. My body was just too slow.

  Unless

  I released mana from my core. Instantly, I felt the familiar sensation of strength flood my body. Though with no time to relish in that feeling, I quickly ducked under Liora’s attack.

  I didn't care that we weren't allowed to augment ourselves. I wasn't about to get hit in the head with that thing. A hit like that would’ve taken me out for sure. Besides, Liora already had the advantage of being older than me. I was just evening the playing field.

  I looked up at Liora from my crouched position in the grassy field. She was still in motion from her issued strike, and her facial expression of puzzlement was enough to make a smile form on my face. The girl couldn't believe her attack had missed.

  Taking advantage of her still being in motion from that attack, I decided to send a counterattack. I looked for where would be a good striking point from my crouched position and quickly settled on her kneecaps. My plan was to swing at her knees as hard as I could and take her out right then and there.

  With that settled, I pulled my arm back to wind up my attack before swinging a quick horizontal strike toward her legs. My attack was so swift that I knew she wouldn't have enough time to bring her sword down to block it.

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  And I was right, she didn't block it. Instead, she hopped over the swing entirely, but not just the swing—she hopped over me as well. The girl had jumped over me completely. Because of that, my back was now completely exposed to her. She took full advantage of my vulnerable position and wasted no time in swinging her sword down onto my shoulder.

  I dropped my sword, unable to hold it because of the pain in my shoulder, and collapsed onto my back. I yelled out in pain as I writhed on the ground. Liora looked down at me with that annoying grin of hers and pointed the tip of her sword at my head.

  “I win.”

  ***

  “That was pathetic, Reyly.”

  Mira looked down at me as Liora, and I sat in the grass. Caelen stood next to her and looked down at us as well. He had come outside to heal me after my humiliating loss. Liora was looking chipper, as she relished in the glory of her win. I couldn’t believe that I lost to her in such a humiliating way.

  Liora hadn’t broken through my skin with her attack, so I wasn’t bleeding, but it still felt like something in my shoulder was damaged, even after Caelen’s healing spell. It made me want to go to Doctor Elasha to get another one of her healing potions. That thing had worked wonders on my hand.

  What Mira said was true, I did look pathetic out there, but it still pissed me off. It wasn’t even my fault. Of course a three-year-old wouldn’t be able to beat an eight-year-old. What the hell did she expect?

  “Not only did you cheat, but got beaten even with your body being augmented,” Mira scolded.

  Yeah, yeah I get it, I lo— wait what?

  So I guess she knew I cheated. Well I had to if I wanted to stand a chance against Liora. And could it even be classified as cheating? I did it because I had to. She had to understand.

  “I’m very disappointed in you. It seems like you haven’t even been putting any effort into any of your training. You half-ass the sword drills. You’re half asleep during my lectures, and you have an attitude that screams that you don’t care about anything. If you paid attention, maybe you would’ve stood a chance. You couldn’t even remember the advice I gave you just yesterday about telegraphing your moves. Your sword swings are still too wide. Of course not a single one of them would hit.”

  Mira blabbered on and on but did she not see my point of view? The reason why I half-assed this crap was because it was useless. It was getting me more and more angry listening to her scolding and harder and harder not to lash out.

  I decided to take a breath. From practicing meditation, I learned that stopping and taking a breath calmed my mind a bit without having to go into full meditation mode. It helped me think a bit clearer.

  With my mind calm, I took a second to think about what she said. I didn’t agree that what I did was cheating. I needed to do it to even the playing field. But as much as I hated to admit it, she might’ve been right about my not paying attention being my downfall. If I had paid attention, maybe I would’ve remembered not to telegraph my moves by winding up my attacks so much and so early.

  “Do you have anything to say for yourself? Don’t think that I’m gonna let this continue. In fact, after such a pathetic display, I’m going to push you even harder,” Mira spouted.

  “I’ll…try harder from now on.”

  Mira stared blankly at me for a moment with her arms crossed. It looked as though she was trying to process what I had just said. Though I couldn’t tell why it took her a moment, it was actually starting to worry me. I was afraid she might flick my forehead or something.

  “Well…alright. Now I need to go to work,” Mira said, seemingly satisfied with my response.

  She then turned her attention to Caelen, who had been watching in silent confusion the whole time, trying to process everything. I guess since he was busy with his plants and not watching the spar, he didn’t know exactly what was going on.

  “Take care of the kids while I’m gone, hon. Make sure they bathe and eat and don’t get into any trouble while I’m gone.”

  Caelen snapped out of his confusion and went straight into his insufferably and annoyingly stupid “husband mode,” standing up straight and giving her all his attention. “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Good, I’ll see you all later,” Mira said before heading off and leaving the property.

  She hadn’t even bothered to change or anything. Though I guess it was pretty late in the morning, and she had to get going.

  Caelen relaxed his posture and let out a relieved sigh, probably at the fact that he could relax now that Mira’s presence was gone. He then turned his attention to us. “Alright, you two, go take a bath, then how about we go shopping?”

  That got my attention. In my old life, I loved buying things. Mostly bong pieces for my collection and such, but still. I was known to blow a hundred grand at the mall in just a couple of hours. I was a shopping connoisseur, and since my reincarnation, I had never even been to a store, so I was eager to get back in the game. I just needed to get this bath out of the way. Honestly, I would’ve preferred to skip it altogether.

  “Alright dad. Let’s go, Reyly,” Liora said as she picked me up and headed back towards the house.

  “Oh, and Lia,” Caelen called out from behind. He was holding one of the wooden swords, so he was probably staying behind to put them away.

  “Hm?”

  “Good job today,” Caelen said simply.

  The same big insufferable grin spread across Liora’s face, and I scowled at the sight. She was so proud of that win.

  “Thanks!”