-------Six years later

“Mum mum, guess what day it is?”

An overly excited Ryuu exclaimed as he bounded down the stairs. Chin length, dark brown hair framed his cute face and his silver eyes gleamed with expectation as he looked towards his mother who sat at the dinner table.

“Hmm, I can’t seem to recall anything special about today. Can you Erwin?” replied Liane , Ryuu’s mother as she turned to face him.

Erwin scratched his head.

“No, I can’t think of anything either.”

Watching their child start to pout made them both burst out laughing.

“Off course we wouldn’t forget your birthday honey” Liane laughed.

Cheering up again Ryuu sat at the table, opposite his mother and dug into his breakfast which was a piece of wheat bread with cheese and a cup of warm milk. 

"Ryuu, your father's going hunting with his adventurer team today for a special dinner so we're going out to buy some vegetables and other ingredients. We also need to get you some stuff for school since you're starting in a months time. Oh and you get to chose something small for your birthday present remember? Shall we go straight after breakfast?"

Ryuu nodded beaming, clearly ecstatic.

“Yay, I’ve been so excited to get a present for ages.” 

He gobbled up the rest of his breakfast and went upstairs to get ready.

Ryuu’s house was a moderate size, not too big but not small either. Ryuu had his own room upstairs with a small bed, a cupboard and a desk by the window. Next to it was his parent's room and then the study where his dad sometimes worked when he was not out adventuring with his team the Adamantine Wolves. Downstairs, was the living room and the kitchen which had an open fire stove and many different storage units for various ingredients and kitchenware. The small area between the kitchen and living room contained the dining table with the stairs behind it. The bathroom and small backyard were located past the stairs.

Ryuu and his family lived in the South Sector of Zouron the capital city of the Kingdom of Nidia. Zouron is divided up into North and South by a ten meter stone wall. The North Sector is where the nobles, aristocrats, wealthy merchants, mages and most of the adventurers lived. The south is filled with the common folk, small-scale merchants and the poor.

At the heart of the city stood the glorious castle, the tallest building by far with magnificent pale white towers embellished with golden details that glistened in the sunlight. It was surrounded by a ten meter wall equally well decorated and connected to the wall separating the two sectors.

The closer one got to the castle, the wealthier the residents. The high class nobles and mages could be found at the center of the northern sector closest to the castle while merchants and adventures on the outskirts. The same could be said for the south with a few adventurers and small time merchants toward the middle, beggars could often be found in the outlying districts where the streets were run down and houses uncared for.

For protection against monsters the whole city, even the poor, were surrounded by a fifteen-meter wall with guards stationed at various intervals, although the majority were present on the North Sector wall.

Ryuu’s house was toward the middle of the South Sector in the biggest district where most of the population lived and close to where the markets and vendors were located. His father decided to live here instead of in the North Sector even though he had high wages as a semi-famous adventurer because he took it upon himself to help the less well off and donated large sums of money to the hospitals, schools, and projects that helped rebuild the slums. Being closer to the poor districts also meant he could often go there to see how things were and help out.

A few minutes later Ryuu and Liane left for the market.

“Hello Ryuu. Lovely weather today isn’t it Liane? Where are you headed?” asked their neighbor a chubby, kindly looking old lady called Ane.

“Just to the market. It’s Ryuu’s birthday today.”

“Oh, little Ryuu growing up so quickly. How old are you now?”

“ Seven” a proud Ryuu replied with a toothy smile “I’m going to school soon”

“Oh that’s wonderful, my husband Marcus is already out selling his famous meat skewers, tell him I said a skewer is on the house for Ryuu's birthday."

“Thank you very much Ane” Liane replied.

The two of them made their way to the main road and soon joined the hustle and bustle of the Monday morning market.

They walked past most of the meat and vegetable vendors only stopping to pick up some of Marcus’ skewers. As Ane had suggested, they were indeed delicious. They stopped at the clothes shop first, purchasing some smart clothes before buying a school bag and a few writing supplies. The total cost came to four gold pieces and eight silver pieces.

The human currency system was fairly easy to understand; ten silver pieces made one gold piece and a hundred gold pieces is one gold bar.

On their way back to the food vendors, Ryuu saw a small magic items shop tucked away in between two larger buildings. He had only ever been in there once with his father but didn’t have a chance to browse properly. There could be something interesting in there that he could ask his mother for as she had promised him a birthday gift. 

"Mum can we look in there quickly" Ryuu asked, tugging on his mother's sleeve.

"Sure, why not". 

In reality, the magic items shop in the South Sector could be considered nothing more than a joke store as most of the powerful and valuable items were sold in the North. This store was filled mostly with junk. 

As Ryuu entered the store he saw a number of weapons ranging from small daggers to long swords, some with small writing carved into the blades. All of the weapons had dents or clash marks over some of the writing so they probably didn’t have their magical effects anymore. There were also small vials of liquid, trinkets, armor pieces, ores and all manner of items that Ryuu had never seen before littered all over the place. However, everything was covered with a thick layer of dust. It was like stepping into an abandoned antiques store.

Scanning the items, Ryuu noticed a particular stone, the size of two thumbnails, that was not buried by dust. Taking a closer look the stone turned out to be a pendant of sorts. It was round and dark in color almost black and had a tiny carving of a bird like creature in the center. Picking it up, the pendant flashed a sudden bright blue before returning to its previous state. Ryuu looked as his mother who seemed oblivious to what just happened. His interest peaked, this pendant must be special he thought. Ryuu decided that this would be his birthday gift.

Ryuu handed the pendant over to him mum and she agreed to ask for its price. The shop owner could barely be seen behind a desk covered and surrounded by yet more clutter.

"Four gold pieces and that’s final" the shop keeper argued.

For a child's toy, four gold pieces was way over what Liane was willing to pay. She decided to argue her case one more time before she was interrupted by the ding of the bell that was fixed to the door. Two strange looking men walked in. There was barely enough room for the five of then in the crowded, small shop.

"One gold piece" the shopkeeper suddenly exclaimed. 

Liane was surprised by the unexpected price reduction but she supposed one gold piece was a reasonable price.

"Fine, I'll take it. Thanks for understanding"

The shopkeeper seemed to barely register her words as he held the pendant tightly in his hand, wrapped it in a piece of paper under his desk before hastily handing it over to Liane. Was his hand shaking? Thinking nothing of it, Liane took Ryuu's hand and squeezed past the two men opening the door with a ding. Ryuu skipped happily out of the shop.

"Thanks mum, this is the best birthday ever! Can I wear the pendant now?"

"Sure honey, I don't see why not, take good care of it though." 

Ryuu put the pendant over his head grinning from ear to ear.

A few minutes later Ryuu and his mother reached the food market. His mother went off to buy the various ingredients for supper while Ryuu stared at a particularly funny looking batch of potatoes. Ryuu didn't even realize when two figures walked up behind him and grabbed his pendant in a swift motion before running off into the crowd.

"Hey that's mine" Ryuu shouted, furious his brand new gift had been stolen. Ryuu recognized the thieves as the strange men from the magic shop.

He ran after the thieves, little legs carrying him surprisingly fast as he dashed between the crowd, slowly catching up to the thieves who had a much harder time navigating through the townspeople.

As the crowd started to thin out, the thieves took a turn into a side alley that was shaded and devoid of people.

"Hey, the little squirt's still following us. What do you say we teach him a lesson about the real world?" said the skinner thief with a shaved head and wide eyes who wore a piece of leather armor that looked to be surprisingly high quality.

The other thief who wore loose fitting brown clothes just shrugged in response. He looked well built even under the loose clothing and was about five inches taller than the skinny thief. Both had a scimitar strapped to their belts. 

They stopped running and turned towards Ryuu. The taller thief spoke.

"Hey kid just turn around and go back to your mummy, don't do this to yourself, it's not gonna end well."

"I'll go back once you give me back my the pendant"

"See I told you he wasn't just gonna go, come on, let me go teach him a lesson" the skinny thief said with a sadistic smirk that spread to his eyes giving him a crazed look. 

"Fine but don’t be too hard on him"

"Sure, whatever"

The skinny thief smirked and walked slowly toward the boy. Then suddenly he lunged forward, aiming an uppercut at the boy's face but before the punch connected, the boy simply stepped out of the way. The thief knew his punches were fast so how had this little boy dogged it when grown men couldn't? 

He had intended to knock the boy down in that one move and then maybe kick him around a bit more until he was satisfied.

Seeming to imitate the thief, the boy lunged, punching him hard on the chin at a speed the thief couldn't even react to, let alone dodge. The thief was knocked back several meters, his world spun and he almost fell over from the sheer force of the little fist. 

There was a look of unbelief in the thief's eyes with quickly turned to hate. He no longer saw a child, instead he saw someone he wanted to utterly tear apart. The boy must be mocking him, copying his move as if to say, ha, I can do better.

The thief drew his sword and readied himself to attack. He felt confident that he could win again the stupid, unarmed boy.

Holding the sword out in front of himself, the thief advanced toward the boy, closing the distance between them.

Seeing that the boy had done nothing to guard his vitals, the thief thrust out his sword aiming at the heart.

But again the boy just sidestepped the attack.

The thief quickly recovered his stance and attempted a slash from the right.

The boy stepped backward, the tip of the sword missing his chest by an inch.

Again and again, the boy dodged the thief's attacks that came from every angle imaginable.

In a fit of rage, the thief activated his martial art [Raise Speed] which, as the name suggests, increases the user's movement speed to their body's limit. The thief could only stay in this mode for about five minutes and after the battle, his body would crash. But right now he didn't care about all that, his one goal was to kill the infuriating boy.

He raised the sword to a horizontal position by the right side of his body, took two powerful steps forward then seemed to disappear for a fraction of a second before reappearing behind the boy. He brought the sword out, slicing right to left at a blinding speed.

The sword connected with the boy's neck. The feeling of relief swept over the thief and he grinned smugly. 

"HIIIEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE" the thief screamed dropping his sword with a clang.

The sword that was swung with the speed and force to cleave a tree clean in half only made a small cut about the length of a pinkie on the boy's neck.

What kind of monster was he?

The thief looked past the boy to his partner, panic clearly visible in his eyes, while the boy picked up his sword.

"HELP ME!!!" He screamed. "What do I do?!"

The taller thief, Lukus, had seen everything unfold from a short distance away and was surprised the boy could dodge Vail's attacks. Lukus hated to admit it but Vail was pretty good with the sword, rivaling the skill of some of the lower ranked adventurers especially with his [Raise Speed] martial art.

From the start, he had decided not to intervene unless Vail was having real trouble, which was unlikely against such a young child, as he didn't like being involved with Vail's sadistic urges.

But then the boy did the impossible, he was a monster. How could he not be dead after a direct strike to the neck? 

Lukus stared, gaping, his whole body began to shake involuntarily with fear. After being in that state for a few seconds, he finally snapped out of it and judged that he also would definitely not be able to kill the boy. He yelled at Vail to make a run for it since the boy must tire eventually and give up the chase for the pendant. 

His master has specifically asked them to retrieve it for reasons unknown to Lukus and that was probably why the shop owner sold it in haste after seeing them. Lucky the boy put the necklace on right outside the shop in plain view.

Before Vail could respond, Lukus saw the boy pick up Vail's sword and move just as Vail had done. The boy disappeared from his position and reappeared in front of Vail. 

Lukus stared, eyes wide in horror, aghast as Vail's body fell lifeless to the ground with a thud he barely registered. 

Vail's head rolled to as stop a meter away and a crimson pool of blood started to form. 

The fear Lukus felt quadrupled and embedded itself deep in his soul. 

Vail was beheaded in an instant. 

The speed of the strike was just as fast, if not faster than Vail's. There's no way that such a young boy can have enough time to learn and master the [Raise Speed] martial art so there's no way the thing standing there was a child.

Unwilling to risk his life against the monster that took the form of a child, Lukus threw the pendant and ran for his life.

Ryuu was stunned by what he had done. He had never fought anyone before so he had tried his best to dodge and copy the thief's movements because he hadn't the faintest clue what to do himself. But when the thief struck his neck, his body just moved on its own, striking back in retaliation. However, Ryuu didn't expect to kill the thief as he didn't kill Ryuu with the same attack. 

Being just barely seven, Ryuu didn't entirely understand what had just happened.

He felt a tingling sensation where the sword had met his neck. He reached over to feel the area with his hand but only felt smooth skin. There was nothing there.

Shrugging, he picked up the pendant from the floor and headed back toward the main road, satisfied he had gotten back what was his.

Stepping out of the alley, Ryuu saw his mother a short distance away with a desperate look on her face and shouting his name.

"Mum I'm here!" Ryuu shouted back. 

His mother turned and ran towards Ryuu, embracing his in a hug.

"Thank the gods you're safe Ryuu." His mother said relieved. "Don't ever go off by yourself again you understand? There are dangerous people on these streets, you could have been hurt"

Ryuu nodded in response.

"Ok mummy, I'm sorry"

"Fine, as long as you understand. Now what do you say we go home and cook up a feast for a certain somebody's birthday?" Liane smiled.

The mother and son headed back home in high spirits, hand in hand.

From within the alleyway, a dark figure peered at them as they passed by.