' What? Where? Where am I? What is going on? '

Right now, the newborn's mind was a mess. Countless questions were presenting themselves in his mind, under the severity of his unexplained condition. The last thing he could recall before his current condition was a strange feeling. He felt like he was drowning in some kind of sludge, but he also knew that he wasn't actually drowning in anything. That was a strange thing, he felt. It was an unfamiliar environment. He was awake and asleep at the same time while he was in this strange condition.

Now he had woken up, followed by a severe burning sensation all over his body. He wondered if someone had set him on fire for a moment before the sensation was gone. Jack tried opening his eyes after he failed to take control of his limbs. But he couldn't muster up any strength to open his eyes. He kept trying and trying, and after a few minutes, his eyes opened up for but a moment and he glimpsed what looked like two small, chubby hands flailing all over the place. This kept repeating for a while before he fell asleep from exhausting himself.

Time flowed forward, and 3 months passed by. Jack mostly had been asleep. He had realised a lot of things about his current situation. It felt too real for it all to be a dream, and after eliminating several possibilities, it left him with only two plausible situations. Someone was tricking all of his senses into thinking that he was a small defenseless baby or someone had literally turned him into a baby. That's what he wondered about his situation. The thing he couldn't get over was the why. Why, and for what reason, had someone put him in this situation? He kept asking himself. Although he was feeling anxious about this whole thing, he felt something change in himself every time he would wake up after a nap. He didn't know if that was for the better or worse. He did not dwell on that, since he had no means to resist.

Now, he could stay awake longer and had enough strength to keep his eyes open. He could hear birds chirping outside. The sound was coming from his right side, so he figured the window might be located there. He still couldn't fully control his body, so turning that way to confirm whether or not there was a window was not an option for him at the moment. Thud. Thud. Someone was coming. He deduced after hearing footstep sounds coming closer every second. It had been a relatively long time since he came to be in this situation and he had always wanted to meet the one taking care of him. The newborn was feeling a lot of things right now. Fear. Anger. Hatred. Those were the prominent ones. They presented themselves on his fave without a moment of hesitation, but gone the next moment. The situation still did not allow him to resist. Yet again, Jack bottled up all those feelings and waited for the unknown person to enter the room.

Soon, a woman with pale skin, brown hair and black eyes entered the newborn's room. Beth had been strangely excited for the past couple of days. She wanted to interact with her son more than ever, now that he became stable and had more strength. Beth lowered herself to pick up the newborn. As soon as she did that, she could see that her baby had a curious expression on his face, which she had never seen before. She could not help herself from smiling and brought Jack into her arms. Both of them did not move for a while, and the newborn still had the curious expression. The newborn could not understand what was happening and fear grabbed him quickly as no one explained the situation to him. Tears gathered in the baby's eyes. Seeing that, Beth wondered what happened to her son. She knew the sustaining magic that was cast in the room took care of Jack's needs. He did not have to worry about having a wet cloth on him or feeling hungry. Jack's tears finally burst out and seemed that they would never stop.

Beth did not know the reason behind Jack's tears. So she thought of calling someone who might know what was wrong with her son. She was just about to call them, but stopped thinking that it might not be good for her and her son to depend on someone for every little thing. Beth wanted the ability to deal with anything her son threw at her and make sure that Jack would be safe. Everything was new to her, and she wanted to learn from this experience. After thinking it over, she thought that calling someone would be her last resort. It took a while for her to get there. Beth had the habit of being in her own little imaginary world whenever she was thinking about something serious. Jack's fear of the unknown only grew stronger with time.

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The newborn's crying sound got bigger and broke Beth out of her imaginary world back to reality. She resolved herself, and thought of scanning her son for any abnormalities through an active skill she had gained not long after Jack's birth. Beth freed her right hand and held Jack with the other. After arranging her right palm on the newborn's forehead, she spoke out her skill's name.

"[Scan: Life form.]"

The mystical energy took on a new flow and entered Jack's body from Beth. The energy went to every nook and cranny of Jack's body and flowed out of him naturally before assimilating with the energy present in the air. If there was an anomaly, then the energy would send out a specific wavelength before assimilating with the energy present in the air, but in Jack's case it did no such thing, which meant that it could not find any anomalies. Beth could not figure out what was wrong with her son and went into her brainstorming mode again.

Just now, Jack vividly felt something come inside body. Astonishment took over fear. He did not fully understand what had just occurred, but he knew that something happened right after the woman with brown hair spoke something in an unknown language. Then curiosity took over astonishment. Jack or Beth, none of them realized that the newborn had stopped crying. Beth was still in her little imaginary world brainstorming what to do next. Jack could see her looking up towards the bland ceiling.

'What is she thinking about so deeply?' Jack thought.

Jack wanted that woman to explain the current situation. He wanted to get her attention. Jack had little options, so he tried to control his arms and make a gesture to get her attention. Which he failed to do so. He could only flail his arms around senselessly. The action that Jack performed brought Beth back to reality. At the moment, Beth could only think how cute her son was. She also noticed that he had stopped crying and had a curious look on his face. It finally hit her, and she pieced the pieces together to deduce that the skill she used before had caught the attention of the newborn. Now the newborn was looking at her as if asking what had she done just now, and how. She thought maybe Jack was exceptionally sensitive to magical energy, which allowed him to feel the flow of the energy when she used her skill.

"I guess it is to be expected. Mom said she could feel magical energy taking its place in your body, so no wonder you can feel the flow. I wonder how your status looks like, my red pumpkin.", Beth said while smiling warmly at Jack.

Jack could not understand what the woman with brown hair had just spoken. She spoke in an unknown language, but one word caught his attention. That word was 'status' . He had heard of it from somewhere. It felt like he knew exactly what it was, but he could not remember how he knew of it. Something was tugging him away from the side where he held the origin of that word in his mind. It was an unpleasant feeling. Thinking someone was manipulating him to this degree made him furious. A seed of hatred had taken its place because of that thought. Mysteriously or not, he decided not to think too much about it right now when he had no means of resisting or even seek help from someone who might have the means to resist. The next moment, he knew what he had to do. It was something like instinct or a muscle reflex, but not quite the same. He concentrated on the word 'status' inside his mind, and after a while, he glowed with a dark purple aura enveloping his entire body. An image or something similar made its way into his mind, making his eyes almost pop out of their sockets.

Jack saw and thought 'what?' ;

[https://i.imgur.com/QJVjO2e.png]