Bir was wiggling violently with both hands covering her mouth to stop her laughter from attracting attention. Pa caught his eyes and the two of them pulled her away from the hide wall, so the vibrations of her thrashing didn’t become visible from the other side.
“That was me. I caused it to break. Did you see snotty’s face!”
“And the not dad’s face,” Pa agreed wisely. “So angry.” Causally, the slightly larger boy grabbed some sweets and popped them in his mouth. They crunched loudly as he chewed.
Tom wasn’t interested in the sweet candy. He kind of wanted to go and get one of those sausages instead. Then he noticed the two of them were looking at him.
It was the same strange look as earlier.
A sinking feeling struck him, and he instantly stepped sideways into the pseudo-system room. His body, now separate from him, started reacting in the appropriate fashion, and the concerned looks vanished.
With both hands together, he smacked his own cheeks in frustration.
Another misstep.
Being here, in the system room, was a waste of time. He could be practicing being younger, but he had absolutely no idea about how to react to what he had just witnessed. The absurdity of it – he just couldn’t envisage how a four-year-old was even supposed to respond. Probably the way Bir did. But the adult him didn’t know how to mimic that sort of behaviour.
“Why is this so hard?” he screamed, confident that no one would hear or answer him.
It was ridiculous.
That prank.
A four-year-old using fate for a practical joke. She most likely wasn’t even reincarnated - his memories told him she had done this a couple of times before. But her control, the volume of her fate pool – both of those had been impressive. She had to possess at least forty points; possibly more. How could she have so much?
Another entry was dutifully added to his to-do list. Out of the corner of his eyes, on the wall, he noticed it updating in real time. Tom strove to put it out of his mind.
On the screen, the three of them had retreated deeper into the hide fort in an effort to avoid the notice of the not parents.
Tom wondered what to do. Then he focused.
He had to accomplish better acting. He had to learn to mimic behaving like a little kid. Mentally grumbling to himself, he left his system room. The trio were playing heroes versus monsters. He gambled that he could ponder the future while participating on autopilot, and stopped paying active attention to the game.
His overall aim couldn’t be clearer. It was to get stronger and make a difference, and that promise when he accepted reincarnation meant he could. That was locked in. A wellspring of hope and motivation, and the broad steps required to do so were also evident. The only issue was his frightening lack of knowledge. Unfortunately, he had died before any children had been born, so he really didn’t know the rules he was going to be subjected to for the next eleven years. After that, once the experience shop unlocked, it would be a different story, but until that point, he was blind.
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The blind spots of the situation bothered him.
What was going on with the assassins targeting him and the other reincarnated ones?
His brain itched in response to that thought, as though there was a memory that he was supposed to have that could answer it. He focused, but the feeling faded. More reason, he thought with a dismissive laugh, to work out why were there holes in his memories.
Then his mind turned to the state of humanity. How was it going? How big was the city? And did it matter?
There was no specific knowledge that could directly help. However, he was pretty sure this was the only orphanage around here, which gave an indication of the town’s population. If this was the only one, it meant that the town was only generating thirty babies every year. That was not a lot when you thought about it. A hundred people could create that many if they were breeding constantly. But was that a choice that individuals who made it to the competition would make? He doubted it. There was, Tom realised after a moment of consideration, no easy way to estimate the number of adults from the children.
While a population estimate could have been useful, it didn’t matter. In the conversation he had eavesdropped on, Pete had thought they could catch the dragon’s ranking points, and that was what was important. Only a million humans had entered the competition, and probably a third had died within the first six months. Whether the remainder was ten thousand or half a million, as far as he could guess, didn’t matter much.
All that Tom cared about was getting to a high enough place to save the billions who were still coming.
In hindsight, given the threat of the assassins, he figured the most important question for him currently was this: how much freedom to train his body and abilities did he have? He remembered those solitary places that they got sent to. Little Ta didn’t know, but he was hopeful that would be an option. With the assassins hunting him, alone-time in a warded room was going to be vital.
Then there was the issue of the physical impact of his training. Once he got serious about it, he would develop calluses and start to move differently as muscles built up. Mentally, he could feel the to-do list upgrading. He would need to watch the older kids. Provided a segment of them took physical development seriously, Tom would be able to do the same. He guessed he would just have to make sure he was not the best of his cohort and in doing so, avoid painting a target on his back.
There were so many questions jumping around in his head that it almost hurt, and he only had a vague idea of how to deal with them. It was trite to say time will help, but that was what he was telling himself now. Most of them would be answered with time.
Frustrated, he grabbed one of the boiled lollies and popped it into his mouth while examining his two companions. They definitely wouldn’t be able to help answer any of the random questions pounding in his brain. Before either of them noticed his distracted state, he moved the ugly monster dolls he was using:
“Pow, pow.”
He flung one of them in the air to signify a direct strike of Cam’s devastating magic and let the others flee. Those piled up behind Bir, using her as cover.
The adult in him frowned at the game. It was not realistic. There was no way these monsters would hide. If this were real, they would have been driven insane by the presence of a sapient. They would have abandoned all sense of self preservation and charged Cam’s position.
He pushed the irritated thought aside and focused on the sweet flavour flooding his mouth. It felt so good. Appreciatively, he savoured the taste of the sugary treat. The experience almost made him cry. It had been over forty years since he last had one, back on earth, when things were still normal. The taste brought back too many bittersweet memories, memories of what they had and what they had lost. Then, he did not have to worry about monsters and competitions; on the other hand, neither did he have magic.
And magic, he reminded himself, made up for a lot of the world’s injustices.
Providing they could place high enough in the competition, his treacherous mind reminded him to ruin the moment. If they couldn’t get at least third, not even magic would be able to compensate for the sufferings of the billions of humans.
Next to him Pa was waving Cam around:
“Pow, pow, splash.”
Tom turned the monsters over to show that they were dead.
Bir giggled:
“Splash like I made the potion. And mean Snotty cried. She cried lots.” She added happily.
The adult Tom wanted to tell her off for taking pleasure in another’s suffering, but the child within him agreed wholeheartedly. Tom hated what that implied, but he knew what he had to say:
“We got her good.”