Typer’s room: Hello guys. Today’s third chapter!

So, a small time-skip and some interesting information, the first about the martial arts part of the story, I guess. I personally want to see your reaction to the character introduced next chapter, though.

We also get to see a bit how Lia deals with her new body and a bit of her slightly more mischievous side. I could go on with the depressing side of the mother leaving, but as those who follows my other works knows, that isn’t my style, so here we go.

As I said before, this is VASTLY a work in progress, and wasn’t made to be posted initially, so there might be some inconsistencies. If so, please do tell me, as I want to make it an enjoyable read ^^

May your reading be enjoyable.

----

The morning after mother ran away, father was a wreck. He didn’t even leave home to go work on his smithy and simply kept walking around the house with hollow eyes. He would often take the message mother left him and read it over and over again. And every time he did it, he would go back to the kitchen, sit on the table and cry.

Luckily for us, mother’s friend, the one I met when she took me to the city for the first time came to visit, and after hearing the story from father, she started to come over to help us by cooking and cleaning.

But, father started drinking. He would often leave home at late afternoon, leaving me with mother’s friend and only come back to get me late into the night, his breath stinking of beer. For a moment I feared that he would start beating me up whenever he drank, but contrary to my expectation he would simply hug me and cry even more.

This lasted for almost half a year.

During this time I made my best to help father around, sticking close to him and avoiding mentioning mother whenever I talked to him. On the few times he would go to the simple smithy in our house, usually because one of his workers needed something made by him, I would follow him and sit in the corner of the room, watching him as he hammered away.

The heat was a bit unbearable, but thankfully the little I learned about my energy allowed me to somehow protect myself.

You see, after seeing mother using her energy that time, I started trying to copy what she did. Not to much avail, though, as I was still missing something. But I learned to somehow control my energy enough to move it closer to my skin, and this somehow relieved me from the heat of the forge.

It was weird, maybe it was reinforcing my resistance?

I didn’t know, and probably wouldn’t find out anytime soon. And from the little I actually knew, was that I was doing it wrong. I had to force my energy to move, different from mother, whose energy seemed to obey her with scary ease.

Anyway, since I kept quiet most of the times, father didn’t notice me until the third time, and this was mostly because I stumbled on some metal rods while going to my usual place. Widening his eyes in shock, he quickly ran to my side and helped me up.

“Lia! What are you doing here?” he asked me worried, checking to see if I had any scratches.

“I came to watch you.” I said while putting myself up and patting the dust off my dress…

Dress…

Daughter…

“What… What are you saying?” He asked me angrily. “What if you get hurt? Or ill? It’s too hot in here for a kid like you!” He told me while trying to push me out. But I slipped away from his grasp and ran my way to the corner of the room.

“But I like seeing father working!” I said while frowning and sitting in the corner. “Father looks cool when he’s smithing.” I put on my best puppy eyes, which made him flinch surprised for a moment. Well, as much as I dislike being a girl, at least my adorableness is amplified by ten fold compared to being a boy, and this helps when coercing adults.

“But… This isn’t a place for kids...” He said while trying to get me out of the smithy.

“Why?” I asked with a fake innocence.

“Because… It’s too hot. You could get ill if you stay here for too long.” He said me.

“But when I stayed here earlier it didn’t happen anything?” I tilted my head and putting my finger in my mouth.

“That’s… Well...” He said before finally frowning slightly. “Wait, you came here before?” He asked me, and I smiled while nodding.

“Yup! Daddy looked really cool!” I jumped cheerfully to make my point, and he smiled wrily. “When I grow up, I want to be a cool smithy like daddy!”

Well, that’s actually the truth. At first I simply watched in curiosity as he worked, but the more I saw him working, the more impressive he looked. It also helped that he would take his mind out of mother whenever he was working, so if I could somehow make him focus more on his work, maybe he would recover a bit faster from the shock of losing mother.

About mother, I still have no idea why she ran away that night, and even when I put everything into sensing energy I was unable to find her in the vicinity. Still, I carried the pendant she left me whenever I could, as, according to father, she told me to never take it out. So I did.

Well, at least it looked like my cheering somehow left him in a better mood, as he smiled smugly and scratched his head awkwardly.

“Hmm… If you say so...” he said while filling himself with pride. “Then, you can stay here for some time.” He nodded before frowning. “But if you start to feel bad, you have to leave immediately, okay?” He said seriously.

I nodded and sat down on my usual corner, watching him as he hammered away.

From the looks of it, my plan started to work, since he started to focus more and more into working. Not that he left me aside, mind you. He would spend most of his free time playing with me and taking me to the city so that I could see new things.

A few years later, father finally recovered enough to look almost the same as before mother left. However, so that he wouldn't leave me alone in the house when he had to work, he usually took me with him.

During one of our leaves, we ended up meeting one guy similar to that one I met when mother went to visit father. Seeing father and everyone else bow to the man, I quickly followed suit. It wasn’t the same one as I saw the other day, though. This one looked older, and the badge in his chest had three stars instead of one.

Besides, his energy was much greater than the man I met the other day, making me wonder whether energy had something to do with the badge in the end. However, as before, he was still nothing compared to mother.

Once the man passed through and everyone else raised themselves, I turned to father and made the question that had been bugging me for some time now.

“Daddy, why do everyone bow to that man?” I asked as he raised me to carry me in his shoulder.

“Because he’s a spiritualist, deary.” He told me, but all I did was tilt my head to the sides confused.

“What’s an spiritualist?” I asked curious while holding onto his head for balance.

“Spiritualist are people who can channel their inner energy throughout their bodies.” He said in an explaining tone. “And when they train enough, they can become a lot stronger than us simple civilians. To the point that they become almost super-human.”

“Hee… Really?” I asked surprised. Isn’t that what mother was doing?

“Yep. But it’s really, really rare to find someone who can do that.” He said with a sigh. “That, and they must train really, really hard to actually become good.”

“Heeh. Then they train really hard just to get strong?” I asked curious, as this didn’t seem to match the image I had of mother. That is, if this energy thing had something to do with spiritualists, of course.

“No. You can also get some other benefits like political power and so on...” He blinked once he noticed his words. “Not that you would understand what that means, I guess...” He said while scratching his head awkwardly.

But, feeling my curiosity piqued, I decided to press further on that.

“Why would they earn that?” I asked curious. “Is that some kind of super attack or something?” I said while doing some punches into the air.

“Where did you take that idea?” Father asked with a surprised tone. “Sometimes you look a lot more like a son than a daughter, you know that?”

“Tee hee...” I said in my best cheerful tone as I felt my chest stinging…

“And no. Political power isn’t like that. It’s a more subjective power than a simple attack.” He said briefly. “It’s not something you get just by training.”

“Then why would they get that type of power by becoming stronger?” Now that’s the question I wanted to reach.

“Geez, you sure like to make complicated questions, huh?” Father said with a sigh. “It’s because once you become a spiritualist, you can be affiliated to a clan. And these clans have huge political power.”

“Then the clans have super powerful attacks?” I said in a childish tone, mostly to keep the image of a innocent child.

“In a way… Yes...”

“That sounds so cool!” I said while moving around cheerfully. “But I still think that being a blacksmith sounds cooler!” I finished with a nod.

“I’m glad you think that, sweetie.” Father said with a loud and proud laugh.

Well, that’s not very far from the truth, actually. I mean, political power usually means that I have many responsibilities, like taking care of what I say, representing the clan and so on. But I guess there are it’s upsides too, like connections.

Still, right now I’m a lot more interested in learning smithing from father than entering a clan or something of the like.

“Say. Does daddy sells weapons for these people too?” I asked curious, a small spark of excitement igniting within my chest. What if father somehow made a legendary weapon that one of these spiritualists use?

“No, no...” He denied with a laugh. “Spiritualists are too strong to need a weapon. Besides weapons being pretty much useless against them.”

“Heh? Daddy’s weapon don’t affect them?” I asked in shock.

“Not only father’s, but every other blacksmith. That’s how strong they are!”

Wait! What is this! So you mean that the strongest people in this world doesn’t care about weapons? That they are useless to them? This is wrong, you know! I mean, there should be legendary swords and so on! That’s the norm for this kind of world, right?

Within my heart I decided to right this wrong. When I get older and learn how to work on the smithy.

Which probably won’t happen any time too soon. According to father, I should wait a bit before I start working on blacksmithing, at least until I get strong enough to manage the hammer for some time.

This meant that I wasn’t allowed to even touch a blacksmithing hammer until I reached my fifth year.

That meant that I still would have to wait a full year before I could start learning from him.

“Oh! It’s the princess!” “Heya there little princess!” “Aww, She’s cute as ever!” “Marry my son! We will take good care of you!”

As soon as we reached father’s smithy, I was bombarded with these praises by the worker. They were all good men who took care of father’s smithy while he was in the slump, making sure that they kept making enough money to pay the taxes. Feeling thankful to them, I started to help around in the smithy whenever I could by bringing them water and picking some miscellaneous things for them. This somehow made me an idol amongst the guys, so this reception was the usual.

“WHAT THE HELL MING-LU! I’M NOT GIVING MY DAUGHTER TO YOUR SON!” My father said while kicking the man’s stomach.

This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.

Yep, the usual.

“Anyway, what do we have for today?” Father asked while setting me down near the door. One of his workers nodded while taking a small piece of paper and giving it to father. He frowned slightly at that before turning to me. “Lia. Go to your grandma’s today.”

“Important stuff?” I asked him with a slight tinge of sadness.

“Yeah. One of the clan’s is requesting for some armors for their soldiers. We might get occupied for some time.” He sighed.

“But grandma is away...” I said with a frown.

“Well... ” Father frowned too before sighing. “Then go play around until she comes back. She should be back later today, right? Anyway, just don’t go too far. And don’t get into trouble…” He said with a sigh. “Lou-ran is still mad for what you did to his son, you know?”

“Tee hee...” I said while smiling awkwardly.

Basically, there was this big bully going around hitting other kids. I simply went and used him as a testing target for one of the toys I made with grandma.

Grandma was that old woman I saw back when I first woke up. From time to time I have to spend the day in her house because father have an important work, so during these times she started teaching me woodworking. It was something she learned from my departed grandfather, and taught to mother when she married my father.

“Biggest mistake of my life. She stole half of my customers...” She would often say.

Leaving father to do his work, I went my way to the so familiar streets around the smithy. I could go and play with the other kids like I did some times, but this time I just wasn’t in the mood, so taking my trusted toy, I decided to explore around a bit more. For now, I already had an idea of everything that was in an area of around one hundred meters from the smithy, so I decided to expand my knowledge a bit further.

I started walking north, greeting some vendors and pedestrian that I knew from my other walks. Some of them even gave me a treat or two, like these strange sweets you put in a stick. This is one of the advantages of being a girl, I guess…

Girl…

Okay, let’s stop with that. I mean, yes, it is a bit disturbing the fact that i’ve been reborn as a girl, but besides some of the really obvious differences, like the lack of something, once I got used to it, it was far from a bad experience. It’s also not that different from being a boy if you think about it.

Well, at least for now, I guess. Can’t be sure until I hit puberty, I guess…

Then i’ll start to have that time of the month…

And I’m getting depressed again. Slapping my cheeks to recover my focus, I turned back to the street, noticing that I had gotten to the very edge of known territory, ahead being uncharted lands.

Bringing up my mental map of the area, I made my way through the streets looking for anything that caught my interest. At first it was just like the usual, the same streets and the same stone houses as everywhere else. But after a few more meters of walking, the street led into a large avenue where lots of people walked around.

Well, lots for this world at least. Compared to my memories of my old world, this was pretty much a calm weekend on the mall, I guess.

Looking around curious, I noticed that I was gathering some curious gazes, but I didn’t really feel all that bothered by it, as it somehow ended up being the usual for me.

Crossing the street, not really in the mood to walk amongst a large crowd right now, I reached a side street that led into what seemed to be the upper rank part of the town.

The streets here were paved, different from the beaten path used everywhere else, the houses were also bigger, having a small garden in front and being twice the size of the small ones I usually found near the smithy.

Well, they are still smaller than the village elder’s houses near the very center of the city. That one was downright massive. Still, they were big enough to catch my attention as I walked around seeing them with sparkling eyes.

During my walks, I also noticed a small amount of guards that frequently patrolled through the neighborhood. One of them saw me and immediately came to check on me.

“Hey there, little missy. Are you lost?” He asked while crouching down. He looked a man around the twenty something. Fairly young, wearing a simple leather armor and carrying a short lance that could be used on the tighter streets.

“No sir. I’m just looking around.” I replied him.

“Are you really?” He asked me slightly doubtful, and I nodded.

“Father works in a smithy, down that street. I know where to find him.” I pointed towards the workshop, and the man stared at the direction for some time before widening his eyes.

“Wait. You are Ran’s daughter?” He asked me with a shocked face, and I nodded happily.

“Yup. That’s father names.” I told him, which made him scratch his head awkwardly. “Do you know him?”

“By name only.” He said with a sigh. “But he made me my spear, so I owe him a bit.“

“Heeh.” I said while taking a look at his spear. Indeed, the shape was a bit familiar, but I didn’t have memory of that one in particular. Maybe it’s from before I started going to his workshop?

“Anyway, little lady. I will have to take you to your father.” He said while extending his hand to me. “You are a bit too far for someone of your age.”

“But I can take care of myself!” I said proudly.

“Ooh?” He asked while raising an eyebrow. “You don’t look that strong to me...”

“Muu! I beat a boy two years older than me once!” I said him reminding of what happened a few weeks ago. “And I have this!” I said while taking the toy I made with grandma some time ago.

“And what’s that?” He asked curious, so I extended my hands to him, showing the object. “I don’t think i’ve seen anything like it before.”

Stuffing my chest out proudly, I quickly took the toy and prepared to show him its fearsome power.

Okay, not fearsome, but it’s at the very least something that could hurt if used wrongly.

During my time in grandma’s carpentry, I somehow convinced her to do this for me. Using a shape similar to the crossbows I usually saw in fantasy games, but instead of shooting an arrow, I made a small leather pouch that held a small rock. It was small enough for me to carry around, and didn’t need all that much strength to reload, so I usually carried it around for fun.

Well, it did help me a couple of times, when a dog tried to attack me, and against the bully from last week. And kids from my age seem to be unable to pull the string with enough strength to load it, but there’s no need to add that, right?

Still, seeing is better than speaking, so I aimed at what looked like a small breaking rock and shot the small stone I had loaded towards it. It wasn’t enough to break the brick, but it did chip the stone a little bit.

“That’s… Impressively dangerous.” He said with a nod.

“It’s my idea!” I said proudly while taking the credit from the true creators back from my old world.

“Is it really?” He asked me while I pulled the string to leave it loaded in case I needed.

“Yup! And if we make it bigger, we might even put an arrow instead of stones!” At these words, the guard paled, probably thinking of what such weapon would mean. “See! I can take care of myself!” He nodded slightly, but still didn’t seem all that convinced. “If you still don’t like it, why don’t you show me around?”

These words caught him by surprise, and he stopped to think for a moment before sighing.

“I guess I could do that...” he said in defeat, so I simply smiled and started walking ahead.

He had to jog a bit to catch up with me, and even then, as I walked around, now with a guide of my own I felt even less need to walk around carefully. In the end, it was me dragging the guard around than he trying to show me.

Well, mostly what I did was see the big houses. There were a few kids walking around, but they didn’t bother too much with me…

Okay, some of them did. There was this big boy around my age who kept saying that he was the owner of the street and that I would have to work for him because I was from the lower streets. I gave him a quick slap then grabbed him by the neck and threw him, which left him quiet on the ground.

I didn’t say this very clearly, but I seem to be really strong for my age.

Besides him no one else bothered me, though, so after around ten minutes of walking and leaving the guard to explain what happened to the boy, I decided that it was about time to go and explore another place.

Like this, I dragged the guard around halfway through the new district in a single day, and two other bullies-wannabe fell prey to my mighty slap of truth. And the guard had to explain what happened to two angry ladies who wouldn’t believe that such a cute girl would do something like hitting their sons.

And the one time one of the boys tried to get up and tell his mother, I shot a pebble at his stomach, stopping him.

When the mother asked what had happened to him, I said that it should be that his tummy that was hurting. This made the mother nod worried and finish the discussion there and then. The guard turned to me with an angry look, but I simply smiled at him and he gave up in scolding me.

As I said, being a girl isn’t all that bad.

After a few more minutes of mischief… I mean, of walking around, I decided that it was enough for the day and that I should see if grandma is already back.

Being followed by the guard who began praying to the heavens that I would calm down, we made our way back to father’s blacksmith. Still, we took on a different path from the one we used to get there, so I at least saw a few new houses on the way back.

However, the moment we were about to reach the avenue, I felt something.

Stopping on my tracks suddenly, I turned towards the house to my right, seeing nothing but a tall hedge, backed up by metal fencing and an occasional brick pillar. I stood still for a moment just to be sure that my feeling wasn’t an illusion, and sure enough, soon it was there again.

“Lia? What happened?” The guard asked me, confused with how suddenly I changed the way I act.

“Who lives there?” I asked him while pointing towards the house.

“That’s the Lon-ying family house.” he said, already used to my questions about the house’s inhabitants. “They are a lower level of nobility, earned when one of their ancestors became a spiritualist in the past.”

“Heeh. So it’s a family of spiritualists?” I asked surprised, but the guard shook his head.

“Nope. After their ancestors, they never had another spiritualist...” He started before stopping and shaking his head. “Scratch that, I heard that their daughter is actually a really promising one.”

That did it for me. Turning towards the hedge with my curiosity picked, I rolled up my nonexistent sleeves and approached the pillar. The guard blinked surprised at what I was doing, but by the time he finally understood, it was far too late.

I quickly escalated the pillar using nothing but my own hands and body, not that it was too high though, at most a bit taller than an adult. By the time the guard jumped to get me, I jumped to the other side of the fence.

“Tell daddy I will be late for dinner!” I told the guard before setting my attention back to the garden, where something had piqued my interest.