Bout

"Shall we go outside and train?" Norman said with a smiling mouth but his eyes doesn't show even small bits of happiness.

"Yes father..." I agreed without any question asked so I don't anger him more than this...

A moment of silence covered our backyard with only the winds making a sound "Haah, You've grown stronger than before, maybe we should do a bout to test your skills" after a second of silence, my father sighed and finally spoke.

"A bout?" I repeated his words like im confused as to why he thought about that. He stopped in silence again while thinking what he's gonna say to me.

"Yeah, since being a six years old and you survived on that forest for the first time you go there, I think you are strong enough for me to start being a little serious"

"All the thing he said about me was right!" Is what I thought, it feels like I'm always being tracked of what I'm doing.

"Maybe, but father! I'm not so strong as you think, I've only fought small slimes on that forest and barely defeated more that ten! And that sphere that showed up is the reason I came back here because I don't know what that thing is! And-!?" before I know it, I have started to rant in front of him, leading it to be more suspicious of me.

"Truly... What a marvelous son I have. Save your talks from your mouth, we're not magicians here but a fighter! Talk with your sword my son"

My father made a stance I haven't seen him use before, he's now holding the wooden sword and pointed the tip of it close to my face. If he's a little closer, he would have cut my face even though what he was using is just a wooden sword.

I already know what that means even though it's only the first time I've seen it, instincts maybe? By fending off that sword on my face using my weapon, it would mean I'm accepting his duel. The rest is on me on how I will do it.

This time, I decided pretty fast. Maybe because it was father or whatever but I accepted it. I slashed father's sword off my face and gave a down upward slash and stepped back to look at him. "As expected huh?" I said in reflex

He is already close to me even though I just gave him a surprise attack second ago. "See how you improved, you even learned this" I don't know wether it's a compliment or not but I got his opinion I guess?

He attacked me with such speed that is hard for me to follow with just my bare eyes, but I can't use magic when doing it with father so I gotta bear with it.

Even though I'm being hit one after another I'm not getting wounded which means he's still going easy on me. I started giving blows too trying to follow up with him but everything's easy to say.

Openings after openings, since he's technically faster than me. Trying to follow up will just give me with more openings. It does more bad than good with just my strength and speed alone.

"I need more speed" I did every means to try and lighten my body without using magic but in the end, nothing works.

"What? Is that all you have son?" I heard my father say this to me looking dissapointed. Maybe I didn't meet his expectations or whatever but I'm sure. "No father, it's just the beginning" Hearing my words, he smiled mischievously and started to fire up

"Surely, I can't move any part of my body tomorrow without hurting"