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Alexander's training grounds, ~two months later

"Oh my, you really are jumpy, aren't you?"

"After months of torture, I am recovered and stronger than ever! I am bursting with energy!"

Scarlett stood before Alexander as the little bundle of energy jumped around, about to try his new body for the first time in a serious manner, 'You should be happy, as this was quite the investment.'

The last months were anything but easygoing. Ipe, her daughter, and her son-in-law fell after every session dead-tired into their bed and slept, only to wake up and do the same thing again. Many projects and administrative duties came to a halt since most energy and time was put into Alexander.

Her grandson, on the other hand, was a tenacious little beast. After undergoing the body-strengthening procedure, Anastasia visited him and started his lesson. Such a mindset alone won her respect.

However, besides creating a monster, the others who worked on him also improved. She remembered how Ipe told her there was no better training than what he had done for the last month. Her daughter didn't mention anything, but even she became increasingly better at controlling her energy, which was already her forté.

Scarlett also invested quite a lot of time into him by trying to find ever so more potent potions to give the little monster increasingly more robust resistance against them. After a week, the potions she needed were only available at the black markets and would cost quite a coin, but nothing was too much for her dear grandson.

Besides trying to procure potions that could quickly kill Tier 2 warriors, she also gained quite a lot as she documented Alexander's changes to her method. They weren't that different: He was hyper-focused on specific parts with every session, while hers was an overall body treatment. She liked his more as it was much more systematic, and the strengthening became more substantial.

However, it also needed much more time since every body part needed to be augmented independently to the highest degree. There were even points where he wanted them to concentrate only on specific organs for the whole day. Besides that, one would also need someone with exceptional energy control, like her daughter, but such people were rather rare.

Whatever the case was, a seven-year-old monster stood in front of her. A new weapon in her lineage that had everything she could wish for. From overwhelming talent to the iron will of her daughter. It was perfect, except for one thing: Combat sense.

Without any sense for combat, he would become, at best, great, far below her expectations. For her, combat sense was something natural with which one was born. It was how one acted on the battlefield: Would he panic if something unexpected happened, or was he someone cold-blooded, trying to ascertain his next steps while being on the verge of death?

She needed to test him and see for herself how well his instincts were, 'Well, let's see.'

She came forward, the lower part of her dress and high heels covered in a thin, almost transparent film of energy so they wouldn't become dirty, and said, while smiling, "I would say you attack first..." She looked to the sidelines, seeing her daughter, Kairoso, Ipe, and Lili staying there and observing, "...don't disappoint the audience, Alex."

Alexander stood still and opened his arms, smiling joyfully, "Don't worry, I am pretty good, I would say..." without wasting any more time, he began to cast.

Scarlett immediately felt the annoying mage's spell on her, which would automatically let their spells aim at her, 'Hm, I never saw him cast spells. Let's see what you can do.'

All she saw from him were a couple of fireballs, which were, what she later learned, called contraptions and things alchemists used. There were also cases when she saw a play he did for Patricia and Janina, but that was all. She was curious to find out what kind of attack spells he learned.

In front of him appeared multiple earth bullets that spun ever so quickly around, which made Scarlett raise an eyebrow, 'Well, he is seven, so I didn't expect much in the first place when it came to magic.'

Magicians were strong, but only so with time. However, younger ones would never even come close to a battlefield. They would only study day in and day out in some dusty library till they had a reasonable repertoire of spells that they could use efficiently.

Yet, she cared little about the concerns of magicians, only how to quickly kill them, so she only knew a little about how they became powerful. However, she often heard that the older a mage became, the more powerful he would be, while warriors reached their apex earlier and, with age, became weaker.

It was partly true since she knew of some knight fossils that could crush her to dust, but usually, the saying had some truth to it. However, she prepared herself to have some boring sparring match since her grandson was a mage, from whom she couldn't expect much.

After another moment, she heard a loud bang, and the earth bullets flew at her with tremendous speed. This surprised her, but without using her energy, she deflected them easily by using her hand.

She looked confused at her hand, 'It hurts...' Hurting her was almost impossible as one of her three body modification talents was highly focused on extensive body strengthening.

However, there was something else she felt and couldn't believe something like this was possible: She felt a demonic aura inside the earth bullet, and analyzing Alexander more closely, she suddenly also could feel the same from the targeting spell and Alexander as he probably moved his mana around him.

There was only one explanation for this: Her daughter's miasma from her energy deposited inside his mana veins, and now his spells have the stench of a true guard dog, 'Fascinating.'

She decided to remember it for later as she was testing her grandson for now. However, before praising him for the great spell, she needed to keep observing him, hoping he didn't use all of his mana on one attack, which would be disappointing.

To her surprise, Alexander dashed toward her with tremendous speed for someone his age, which made her frown, 'Bad choice. Just attack from afar...' Him approaching her without using more possibilities was stupid, '...Hm, let it be a lesson for him.'

He punched forward, which she avoided easily, followed by a spin-kick, which she blocked with her arms while smiling, "Oh, what no..." Her words stuck in her throat when suddenly two fireballs flew in her face from the side, exploding around her head.

She felt how he jumped back and was about to cast another spell for up-close. She clicked her tongue, creating a shockwave that blew away the fire and smoke around her, only to hear a bang and see how a much stronger earth bullet hit her forehead, making her head jerk slightly backward.

She smiled, 'Pain.' She suddenly felt how a little blood flew down toward her lips, licking it and looking at her grandson with a smirk, not out of spite but hoping he could show her much more.

However, Alexander was surprised, only to be followed by him screaming in frustration, "This is bullshit! I headshot you, and you have only a scratch!"

She heard her daughter's voice from the side, "Don't worry, Alex. Your injuring her is already a great feat."

Yes, it was a remarkable feat. Even though she didn't use any energy, other trainees couldn't hurt her this easily. But now, her grandson did. She congratulated him, becoming a little ecstatic, "This is beyond great! Now, defend!"

Alexander sounded surprised, "Wha..." Before he could end the sentence, she appeared before him, 'Now let me see what you can do.'

She pushed toward him with her hand. Not too fast so he couldn't see, but fast enough to test him. He immediately conjured one shield after the other: water, air, earth, and fire. All were easily destroyed, but this wasn't the point of her attack; it was to see his reaction.

After she went through five shields, he leaned back and jumped away from her, 'Good!'

She jumped after him but suddenly felt something under her moving, and she already knew what he was doing, 'Oh, good choice!'

Using all the space around one was always easier said than done. Many newer soldiers had problems getting their heads around the concept of an up and down on a battlefield, as they only attacked directly, ignoring the space above or under them. Yet, her seven-year-old grandson was already at this point, where he used all the space around him, which made her happy.

In the next moment, a spike made out of earth appeared before her, almost hitting her head. She flicked against it, destroying it, only to feel how her senses warned her, 'Oh? Back to attacking? Nice choice!'

She congratulated him on quickly returning to an offensive position since many also had problems with this after they started defending. They would either stay defensive or force their way into the offensive, which was also a bad idea since they risked a counterattack. The best course of action was what Alexander did: Avoid, distract, and attack.

Multiple ice spears flew at her, which she easily deflected by snapping her finger, creating an airwave. Yet, when they were destroyed, smoke came out, 'A feint? Yes!'

Creating a feint sounded easy enough, but it was actually hard to think multiple steps ahead while fighting. Something like this needed a lot of experience. Yet, her grandson's counterattack was also, at the same time, a feint, which made her incredibly proud, already seeing that he, again, overwhelmed her expectations with an exceptional battle sense.

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The smoke surrounded her, which would make everyone blind, but she could see perfectly fine through what her grandson was doing. With a clap of her hands, she blew it away, "Oh m..."

Bang!

She heard another bang, and another earth bullet hit her head, which she allowed to do, 'I can't block everything. Otherwise, he gets too frustrated.' She needed to calm down a bit and allow some attacks to get through. From experience, she knew that younger warriors got more quickly frustrated when all their attacks were destroyed. Giving them small wins here and there for intelligent actions would reward them by letting them through, while bad ones would be punished by her counterattacking.

However, before she could continue, she saw how multiple fireballs flew in her direction and how he conjured more earth bullets, 'Let's change the pace a little bit.' It was time to test how he would react when someone tried to disrupt the flow in stressful situations.

She flashed away and appeared behind him. She saw how he smiled while the ground under her became muddy, 'Oho! He thinks multiple steps ahead.'

However, she quickly jumped to the side, not wanting to use any skills against her cute grandson. Yet, as she jumped, she saw how another ten bullets flew at her, 'Cute, but you can't use the same trick all over again, and overdoing it is not good.' As she thought it, she also reprimanded herself for it. He didn't have a large repertoire of spells he could use, 'I should get him some spells, hm.'

Yet, as she was about to smack them away, she missed, and they flew to the sides. They circled the training area at grandiose speeds, and only now did she notice that the targeting spell was all around her, cast onto columns, walls, and the ceiling, 'Oh? What a genius idea!'

It was obvious what he did. He targeted the targets one after the other, making them fly around her, only to target her again when she couldn't defend herself.

They flew around and came at great angles at her, 'Nice, but I really like this dress.'

She stepped a little bit to the side, avoiding all of them, using her speed and flexibility. After evading them, she was about to stop the fight, but she felt her grandson dashing toward her with what looked like a spear, which was purely made out of metal.

She only raised an eyebrow but didn't underestimate him or his creativity anymore. She was rather curious about what he was about to do. Before the tip of the spear reached her, she caught it between two fingers, feeling that it was weirdly soft, "Nice try."

He smiled back, "Bad choice."

He jumped backward, letting go of the spear, making Scarlett raise an eyebrow, anticipating what trickery her grandson had up his sleeve, 'Oho, is this spear somehow different?'

The spear was suddenly cut into many pieces and surrounded by water, which abruptly heated up. Scarlett knew what was coming, as she had already seen such things multiple times on the battlefield.

Boom!

It exploded before her, hurting her and ruining her dress. She felt elated, almost to a fanatical degree, 'I can't believe Alex can actually use explosions without having any black powder!'

Explosions weren't illegal, but what one used to create them was in some cases. Black powder was such a thing and usually regulated by the Crown, but there were a lot of other ways to create similar effects, but those were usually much more expensive and harder to make. Thus, they were somewhat permitted.

After the dust settled and the smoke vanished, she joyfully looked at her grandson, "This is exquisite!" She opened her arms, becoming more vicious as she wanted to see more, "Now, was it all?"

He opened his mouth and looked at her dumbfounded, only to become angry, "This is bullshit! It's like throwing an egg against a fucking mountain!"

This made her laugh, "Haha! Of course! I've fought for more than 120 years, and my whole body is more robust than you can imagine..." She licked her thumb and went over the little scratch on her forehead, "...my dear, what you did was only damaging my skin..." She suddenly thought, "...however, if you can really hurt me, I will give you a present! Anything you want!"

It was perfect. Alexander was everything she wanted, and she would already want to take him away from her daughter and train him by herself, but she wouldn't do it for obvious reasons. Yet, the more he surprised her, the more she became fond of him, even wishing to adopt him and get him into the north to her Estate.

There was also another thought that she suppressed heavily, and it was that she was getting aroused by talented warriors like her husband. She was loyal and would never cheat, but she imagined if she were a hundred years younger and Alexander twenty to thirty years older, she would court him, even forcing him if he didn't want to, 'Ah, I need to calm down and quickly get back to Roland.'

She was brought back out of her thoughts by Alexander agreeing to her deal, which surprised her, "Deal!"

He brought his hands together, and a wave of strong energy, mana, which she sensed instinctively, was created, creating a wind, blowing towards her, 'Oh? How interesting, what is he...'

She stopped the thought when an annoying and high-pitched sound suddenly distracted her. It became louder by the moment, and when looking to the side, Lili, her daughter, and her son-in-law started to use a small amount of their energy to block it out. Yet, Ipe was fine, looking confused at them.

She looked back at Alexander, who had something around his ears, which surrounded him like an air barrier, 'Nice trick, but it is only useful in combination with other things.'

She was rather impressed that he used sound for an attack like some of the dwarves did in the north. Still, it usually was only effective if it was an attack that was momentarily and came in undefined patterns one couldn't predict.

The sound became increasingly louder and started to annoy her, but she also felt the pain from it, 'Cute, but it's not enough.'

She clapped a little stronger once, and an enormous shockwave went through the training place, interrupting her grandson, who looked at her astounded, "Are you kidding me?! This was almost 140db!"

She chuckled, "I don't know what it means, but it was cute. It would be best to use it as a momentary attack, thrice as loud. Then it would be a great choice."

Alexander frowned at first but sighed after glaring at her in annoyance, "Fine, I have another trump card..." He started to stretch, "...however, I am not sure how well it works, and I need Ipe to be ready."

Scarlett raised an eyebrow and looked to the side, especially her daughter, who should decide. Otherwise, a fight would start again. Marisia contemplated it shortly but nodded, looking at Ipe, "I am counting on you."

He bowed slightly toward her and then toward Alexander, "Don't worry, Mr. Alexander, I will immediately heal you should something unexpected happen."

He nodded and gestured to him a thank you. He turned toward Scarlett and positioned himself in a martial arts stance, "Okay, this is something I learned a long time ago..." He smiled excitedly, "...but now I guess I can use it."

Scarlett raised an eyebrow and could feel how his body slowly heated up; his eyes became blueish, his heartbeat became faster, and his muscles bulged slightly, 'Interesting skill...'

She saw something like this very often. Those [Mystic Skills] usually involved martial artists pushing themselves into something they called a berserker status. Their physical abilities would be heightened to great degrees, and they would lose their reasoning. After some time, it would end, and they would become useless.

She didn't like that her grandson used something like this, but it seemed to be an extraordinary skill that had positives with some decreased effects and no negatives.

Without waiting for her, he dashed at her and started with a punch, which she could easily block. However, a slight shockwave was created, and she felt little pain, 'Interesting...'

Alexander started his combination of punches and kicks while breathing erratically. Every consecutive hit became more vigorous, slowly increasing the pace. She didn't do anything but block, wanting to see the power her little treasure was slowly showing, making her smile even more intensely, 'Fabulous! Magnificent!'

He was on a level she couldn't imagine, shattering her expectations repeatedly as he could also simultaneously conjure fireballs and ice spears to attack her while not stopping his onslaught of attacks.

She was about to stop the sparring session, seeing how his nose bled, but around his elbow suddenly was air pressure, making his punch faster and stronger, hitting her stomach, and creating a very unfocused but brutal shockwave, 'This is it... he actually can do it!'

It was unsophisticated, rough, and amateurish. However, looking at the context of a seven-year-old, it was magnificent, as he used spells to increase his strength, 'I can't believe that my daughter gave birth to such a monster!'

Another side-kick came, which she blocked. However, he immediately jumped backward with a Summersault, standing there and looking at her with hate. Not the one she saw from enemies she slaughtered by the thousands but those of rivals who were ready to do everything to overcome her. Such a sight made her almost blush, 'This is it... if you want, take me as your goal; I will gladly be your first stepping stone.'

He stood in place, clenching his teeth, and she could feel how he used more spells on his body, which was heating up to ridiculous degrees. He growled through his clenched teeth, "Get ready..."

He went back into his martial stance, exhaling steam out of his mouth, and bent slightly forward to dash at her. Yet, as he was about to approach her, he suddenly flashed, appearing far to the side of her. He looked confused, "What the..." unexpectedly tripping and misusing a spell, making him do an arc, crashing with his face against the ground, and knocking himself out.

It was somewhat silent till Scarlett broke out in laughter, "Hahaha! I can't believe he learned [Flash]!"

It was a skill that was a must for everyone who wanted to be called a true warrior. To have this skill, one needed to create a quick burst of speed, which was impossible with a weak body. However, her grandson did just that through other skills and spells.

Ipe immediately ran toward him, turning him around and starting to heal him, holding his laughter back, "Mr. Alexander is fine; he just knocked himself out, hehe..." He stopped himself by biting into the inner check, clearing his throat, "...Ahem, I apologize."

Scarlett, though, didn't laugh. She looked at her grandson lying on the ground, barely containing her greed for taking him away, 'I want him.'

Alexander had everything she ever wished for a progeny and more: Overwhelming intelligence, administrative knowledge, a sense for socializing, physical strength, exceptional magic talent, and being risk-friendly, not shying away from trying new things to edge out even a slight win.

Sadly, though, her daughter birthed such a person, not her. Otherwise, she would've directed him to the Outer Circle only to bring back someone akin to the three Great Knights.

Fortunately for her, her grandson had all the ambitions to work on himself even without her help, but she wouldn't let him. She needed him to reach his unlimited potential as best as possible. For this, she would even risk her life, 'I need to think through how to support him better.'

She walked toward her daughter, past Ipe, "Ipe, you will stay here till his legacy, do you understand..." He frowned but nodded nonetheless, "...I understand, Mistress."

"Good..." As she stood before her daughter and Lili, she looked her loyal personal guard in the eyes, making her flinch slightly. Without even saying something, Lili nodded, "I will, of course, stay too and defend him with my life."

Scarlett also nodded toward Lili and looked at her daughter, who stoically stared her down. She now needed to act as amiable as possible while trying to bypass her daughter's protectiveness, "Mari, I couldn't be more proud of Alex and you, who educated him. I will not interfere but send all the artifacts I can procure through you so you can decide if it is necessary to use them since you already did such a splendid job."

Her daughter glared at her but sighed in the end, "Of course, Mother. Thank you for the compliment..." She walked past her toward Alexander, saying, "...by the way, I see the greed in your eyes, and I will not subject him to anything he doesn't want to."

Scarlett tried to control her facial expression but couldn't. It had been such a long time since she thought about her ambitions and ideals. Now, with her grandson and maybe another 50 to 100 years, she could actually reach it, "...don't worry, Mari. I am just happy to have such a talented grandson." She needed to control herself, not to take Alexander for herself with every fiber of her body.

Yet, her daughter's answer was cold, "Of course, whatever you say, Mother."

It was a little icy between them, but it didn't matter. Soon she would take her little grandson and train him after the legacy, making him a true weapon she could hold against the scum of central Mal-Gil.