In the small town of Heinsten ruled by the Kingdom of Clisto, a young boy the age of ten was running. Carrying a lot of weirdly shaped metals and wood works he was running away from an older kid who was twice his size. This young lad is Cedric Joules, the son of a blacksmith and a woodcarver. The thing he holds are obviously his parents works and the kids chasing him are bullies.

“Cedric! Come back here!”

The boy who looked to be 13 years old shouted at the running Cedric. On the other hand Cedric paid no heed and simply dashed to his house. Soon he arrived and was able to get inside. Inside was his father and mother sipping tea having an afternoon break.

“Oh Cedric back already? What happened to playing with your friends?”

Cedric’s father Clarence Joules asked his son. After all Cedric a few minutes ago said that he would play with his friends but then he immediately came back. He thought that he was getting bullied again so he looked out the window and saw a group of three boys yelling, “Coward!” in front of their house. Closing the window he came closer to his son and comforted him saying.

“Don’t worry Cedric, when you grow older I’m sure you would become a lot stronger than those kids out there.”

“You keep saying that but that will never happen!”

Cedric knowing that he really will not become strong like his father said ran up to his room and locked himself in.

“You know you should stop telling him that he will get stronger and make him hope, after all you know very well that our son has Letonia”

The person who said this is Cedric’s mother Mine Joules. And Clarence could only look down in anger as he tightened his fist. Letonia is an illness that only one out of a million people get. This is not a virus but an inborn disability.

In this world a person is measured on their strength or magic. As it is like this people are born with two energies inside them, Aura and mana. Aura is the energy that seeps into the bodies muscles and makes them able to use martial arts and the like, this aura is in every person and without it a person is considered dead. Mana on the other hand is the energy of a person's soul, the mana is used to cast spells and use magic without it a person is considered to be without a soul so they are considered dead.

With this Letonia is a disability wherein the person has a soul and can move but he doesn’t have aura nor mana. This type of person is normally pale and skinny he would easily get tired and is prone to sickness disease and easily injured. That’s why Cedric is criticized not only by the other children but also by the adults in the village.

“Just because he has Letonia doesn’t mean that he can’t achieve anything!”

“But you do know that if he wants to achieve something he would have to put in more effort than those around him while putting up with the criticism”

“I know that”

The two fell silent and they went into the living room and continued to sip their tea.

While the couple were thinking of how to help their son get back some confidence, the very person they are worrying about is happily playing with the dolls he created. The metals and woodworks he was carrying are all dolls. But these dolls were not made by his father nor mother but by himself.

For a while now Cedric knew about his situation unlike other kids his age he was more sensible to his surroundings. He heard his parents talk about his illness and he understood why he was treated as such.

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“All of those kids can just do what they want, who needs them when I have you guys with me”

He happily conversed with his dolls though this may look weird to some these dolls actually have some sort of life in them. Cedric knew from a young age that he could see things others couldn’t normally see, these are the spirits of nature. They didn’t have any humanoid form only blobs of light but Cedric for some reason could sense their feelings.

With this Cedric would occasionally asked his mother or father for some materials like iron, copper or wood. He got tools for his 5th birthday that he used to make these dolls. The metals on the other hand was molded with the help of the spirits. These spirits are forces of nature that have high levels of mana and they continuously absorb it from the atmosphere.

Cedric doesn’t understand it now but soon he will find out that his ability to see and befriend these spirits would be the turning point in his life.

“Cedric, if you can hear me could you open the door”

A voice Cedric was very familiar with, it belonged to his mother. Although he has no mana or aura his senses are already inhuman, so much that he was able to hear his parents conversation a while ago. This strength of his he awakened it when he was 10 and at the same day he found out about his illness. Walking to the door he signalled the dolls to stop moving and opened the door slightly showing only half of his little face.

“What is it?”

He gloomily asked his mother in hopes that she would leave him be like usual but what happened next surprised him. His mother Mine would normally go back to the kitchen and make him his favorite foods and then wait for him to go down. And Cedric would also regularly clean his room in a sense his mother rarely entered his room.

“Oh”

Mine was not able to hide the surprise in her voice when she saw the dolls on top of Cedric’s bed. There are more than a dozen of them and they are all made from either wood or iron. Mine was able to understand her son being able to make this after all they did gift him a tool set in his 5th birthday. But the iron was perfectly shappen and this can only be made in his father’s shop using the heat of the coal.

“How did you make these?” she asked Cedric as she picked up one of the metal dolls.

“Of course I used the tool kit mom and dad gave me 5 years ago” he answered and pretended not to see the iron doll his mother was holding.

“But those tools could only make wooden dolls” she pursued further

At this time Cedric knew that if he continued his mother would find out about his secret so he pushed her out of the room. He knew this was not something that he should be doing but he didn’t want his mother to know about this. He talked about this with some people and they all said he was going crazy, he doesn’t want his mother to look at him in that way.

He snatched the doll back and closed the door locking it. Mine who was on the other side was flabbergasted but she understood that whatever her son was doing it was not something she could help him with. When she saw the wooden dolls she was amazed at the details they had, she was also keen enough to see the doll that was modeled after her and Clarence. With the smile of a proud parent she went down stairs and told Clarence the about what she saw.

“That was close”

Cedric sighed inwardly as he looked at the dolls that started moving again. One of the dolls floated towards Cedric, it was modeled as a little boy the same age as Cedric. It’s had no facial features as Cedric wasn’t able to think about anything good for it. Although almost all dolls had no facial features there were two at the very back of his room that did. The spirits didn’t enter these dolls as they knew who it was modeled after.

“Hey hey what are you doing?”

The doll that floated towards Cedric started rubbing itself on his body. It was made of metal but the surface was smooth although a little hard Cedric felt the comfort it wanted to give. His expression turned better and he happily continued talking with the spirits.

“By the way, do you guys know of a way to cure me?”

Cedric understood that these spirits had powers and a large pool of mana so he thought they might be able to help him in some way. But to this the dolls all lowered their heads dejectedly. Cedric understood what they meant but he wasn’t dejected or anything instead a strange light flashed in his eyes and he declared to the spirits, “Well this just proves that nothing is perfect right”.

The dolls then raised their heads and all looked at Cedric. Feeling their gazes Cedric continued.

“My disease can’t be cured by even the powerful spirits of nature right? Then that means that everything has a flaw, with that as the number of flaws increase so does the number of strengths”

The dolls tilted their heads, with this motion Cedric knew that the spirits didn’t understand his meaning.

“Well think of tit this way you guys are powerful spirits right but as powerful as you may be you still couldn’t release that magic as you don’t have physical bodies and need to synchronize with humans like you did with me. Also you are bound by the laws of nature which is why you guys are immortal but can’t speak”

With those words the spirits began to understand it and as glided all around Cedric. The boy knew what these spirits were doing as he’s been with them for a long time now and they only do this when he does something good or says something incredible.

“With that mindset that also means that I have strengths that counteract with my flaws. Even if I have the sickness that prevents me from having mana or aura, I still got to meet you all and even get enhanced senses”

Cedric then lied down on his bed and stared at the ceiling for a while.

“I can’t use martial arts nor can I cast spells but I can make dolls”

With that thought in mind the boy started studying all the books in his room. They are all books on metallurgy and crafting that came from his parents. If he can’t fight with his power then he would create dolls who could fight for him. Of course the spirits wouldn’t be the ones fighting as he doesn’t want to do that so he wants to find a way to make an autonomous doll that doesn’t need a nature spirit to move it.

“Okay now time to study!”