Lunch and the isolation room went quickly, and Tom met up with the others at the main obstacle course. They were attempting the fourth one, and it was rated for aged seven and up. Tom didn’t use his ring, but kept his performance below that of his friends.

Bir had used hardly any fate, so Pa snuck through to win, and promptly showed his muscle. His flexing was completely uninspiring. Bir was laughing hard in response in any case – then, abruptly, her laughter cut out and she clutched his hand. Tom followed her gaze to see what had spooked her.

Three teenaged boys had entered the room.

Pa noticed their sudden sombreness and traced their gaze to the new entries. A frown crossed his face and he subtly stepped between the two of them and the new entries, like a bodyguard.

It took Tom a moment to dredge up the relevant memory of who they were. Bir’s uncharacteristic fear suddenly made sense when he did so. He could remember running to dinner, going around a corner and having his feet land on a patch of sleek ice. Little Ta had instantly lost his balance because of the loss of traction and helplessly crashed into the door frame. These three had been the ones watching and laughing. They were clearly responsible for the ice.

“Move it, cry-baby,” Arnali snarled at him. Even without his prior life memories and the mental strength that went with being an adult, Little Ta was tough. But there was a difference between tough and stupid, and he had recognised the kids and the real threat of violence they represented.

Despite how badly his leg hurt, he had had struggled to his feet and then hobbled away. They had let him go and then waited for the next victim. At the gymnasium, Little Ta had gone straight up to the nearest volunteer and asked about them. She was a matronly woman, with dark skin and sympathetic eyes, and she had frowned when she heard about the ice and the boy’s age.

“Stay clear of them, sweety. Arnali and Declan I like. They’re generally reasonable and competent, but recently they’ve aligned themselves to Boreas, and he’s bad news. They would flee at the first opportunity and rush to find an adult kind of terrible. Listen to me carefully, sweetie pie. You stay clear of them.”

“But why?”

“Why, sweetie? It’s complicated. I don’t know what’s wrong with Boreas. He’s been a problem since he got here. The other two? They’re with him because they’re greedy, or weak-willed, or something like that. Boreas is the only child of Maurice. She’s a high-levelled adventurer, not terrifying enough to be famous, but she’s super rich and she dotes on her only son. She showers him with gifts. Rumour has it that he received a tier five ice skill. Crazy to have given that to a kid, but she did, and that means he’s going to be powerful once he becomes an adult. The other two presumably follow him, hoping to get a reward from her. Listen, sweetie, just stay away from him. Okay, do you understand? If they enter a room you’re in, you leave straight away.”

Tom pulled himself out of his memories and studied the newcomers with significantly more caution. They were here now, and the three of them were laughing, joking, and thankfully ignoring them. “Arnali, do you really think you can beat me?” Boreas said, punching his friend on the shoulder with a malicious level of force.

Arnali didn’t even flinch and shot him a sunny grin:

“Beat you, nope. I’m going to absolutely crush you.”

Tom couldn’t see it, but then skills were the great equaliser and meant you couldn’t rate anything by how one looked. Physically speaking, Boreas had the superior physique. He was taller and thicker than the other boy, and it was all muscle. And, if the rumours of Maurice’s investment were accurate, he had almost certainly also drunk numerous elixirs to increase his physical attributes. Given Tom’s knowledge of the Vitality Fount title, that was bad for Boreas in the long run, but titles were not commonly talked about, and even if Maurice knew, she might not care.

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If Tom ever had a child of his own, he wouldn’t want him or her to go through what it took to get that particular title. If Emily, his little sister, wanted to do it he would do everything he could to convince her otherwise. Not everything was about blind strength, and, this close to the end of the competition, unless you had been reincarnated, your childhood should at least in part be dedicated to building the foundation for the rest of your life. That included not subjecting yourself to permanent mental scarring.

Pa tugged his hand hard. Tom looked up, startled, and Pa’s head jerked furiously toward the exit.

Slowly, the three of them crept to safety. Thankfully, the three newcomers couldn’t care less about them, but that didn’t stop Tom from watching them the whole time.

They took off at once. They were racing on the most difficult course, one set up to allow a contest. Each had their own dedicated lane.

Tom was stunned by their speed. Boreas had leapt at least a metre and a half into the air from a standing jump. Arnali was not as flashy, but Tom could see skills at play. While he clearly didn’t have the same attribute advantage of Boreas, his weight seemed to be significantly less than the other boys’. He leapt almost as high, but the rubber matting hardly bent when he did, which was very different from its reaction to the other two boys.

A stray backhand from Boreas caught Arnali on the shoulder. It was deliberate, and while it lacked the force of the friendly punch of earlier, that didn’t matter. Simultaneously, the ground under Arnali’s feet was turned to ice and he was sent sliding out of control. Between that, and his reduced mass, even that light blow was enough to send him crashing to the floor.

Arnali sprinted back to the start and moved through the course even faster. His reduced mass allowing him to do athletic feats the other two couldn’t get close to replicating.

Declan, on the other hand, struggled and was clearly outclassed by his friends. His persistence and body control would have made a gymnast from Earth proud, but without any magical assistance it looked pedestrian. He scaled the dangling four metre rope twice as slow as the others. He still seemed to almost fly up it, though, as slow was only relative.

It was when Declan reached the combat dummies that Tom’s opinion on his relative position changed.

The obstacle had three taunt ropes, a metre and a half between them, and a series of combat dummies that were designed to attack and drive you to leaping from rope to rope in order to get past them. Declan didn’t bother engaging with the obstruction like he was supposed to. Instead, he cast force spells as he ran across the tightrope. Shields materialised and prevented the mechanical opponents from striking him.

Bir tugged on his arm insistently, and Tom realised that he had stopped at the door. Boreas had been knocked off by the combat dummies. Declan was in the lead.

His friend was right: he didn’t want to be here when they finished the course. Together, the children ran to make sure they weren’t around if there was any fall out. They didn’t discuss anything, but instead went straight to the gymnasium and played bubbles until dinner.

The following day specialised training was an axe class taught by a large, bulky man who looked like a wood chipper that would be at home in the country fair competitions. The kind of man that could hack through a metre-thick stump in a ridiculously short period.

Pa enjoyed the lesson, but Tom, who had no intention of specialising in the axe did not.

The next day they were taught archery by a woman who moved like how he imagined an Elf would, but lacked the ears. Maybe, in rebellion to her looks, she also possessed a foul mouth that was only acceptable because everything she said went over the heads of four-year-olds.

The entire process, the procession of experts, was an eye opener. The orphanage only contained five hundred students, but it seemed to have over a hundred volunteers floating through. All of them were there willingly, and all had the knowledge and experience to teach children a valuable skill. What was more impressive was that it was not a one-off thing. If you liked an activity, you could sign up to daily courses for the next ten years, and the way it was taught was deliberate. Tom had no doubt that it would result in you obtaining multiple skills by the end of the course.

The abilities of that teenager proficient in martial arts demonstrated just how effective such training could be.

The following day, after getting through reading, their class was split into four chunks. Tom, Pa, Bir and six others were directed toward an isolation room in the twelve-year-olds’ wing. In a happy gaggle, they entered the room to find out what they were learning this time.

Tom froze. He was not the only one. Both of his friends were likewise caught like a deer in headlights.

Their instructor was younger than usual, a brunette girl with a white streak in her hair. “Hi, everyone. I’m Corrine, and today’s not going to be pleasant.”

There was a ding as the isolation room shut.