3 Life but People with Swords are Normal?

Hooray for me. I'm five years old. Which means I start boot camp.

I started training with my father. My body is weak, and my body is not listening to what I'm telling it to do. I mean, this was expected as a side effect of being born again, but even still, it hurts to stumble when the biggest physical exercise I was asked to do was only simple jumping jacks.

But I'm scared of myself. I'm stronger now than I was before I died.

And I haven't even reached grade school yet.

Well, normally, this would start once I reached 10 years of age. But since I've learned to channel mana into my limbs, my dad decided that I was ready, so long as Mom never found out.

Well, the only thing my mana does for me right now gives me a second wind, but my dad thinks that for my age, that's amazing. I don't know, though. Seems like I should be doing greater things...

Compared to before I'm stronger. I managed to land a hit or two on my father. His

Water God Sword Style has its flaws.

By the way, what was he smoking when he named it? And why did Mom let him name it that?

Like whenever he does continuous strikes, His back is exposed and you have two ways to counter it. Outrun him in speed or always strike at the back. When he realized that I figured out his pattern, he suddenly changed his sword style. Like rushing water, it came to me smoothly as it struck It was a beautiful pattern. It deserves its name. The flow of the rushing currents.

He took extra care not to hit me. He always aimed for the breastplate he bought for me from the blacksmith round the street corner. But after a few, futile defensive swipes from me, he knocked out the sword from my hand and rested the stick he found from the backyard on my shoulder.

"No fair!" I yelled.

"In a battle, nobody is fair. Only those who are strong remain."

"But I want to win against you! Lose already!"

He laughed and ruffled my hair.

My dad may sometimes be a doofus but he finally said something sensible. Of course, even though you start life at the same time as others, we have different starting lines. People come along who develop at crazy speeds. People come along who climb above others. And I think that I want to be among those people. So I will train my arms off. One day, I will beat my dad.

After months of heavy training, I seem to manage to catch up to my father. He seems slower…. or am I getting faster?

Well, the training I've received is light, according to his standards. But I don't think normal training involves fighting blindfolded. I've seen anime where kids get trained like mad starting from age 6, maybe 7, but man…

This other world has a broken power level system. Like, since when are preschoolers trained to use magic?

I was able to conjure up mana up to some point but it can only fortify my body. I'm happy because at least my daily dose of smackdown doesn't hurt as much, but even still, it hurts.

Then one day, after a hard training session, sh(redacted) hit the fan.

I was slumped against a tree, pouring water from my flask on my head. My dad walked over to me and handed me a towel. I dried my face and bounced to my feet.

I was about to go stretch for round two, then I heard someone reaching out for me:

"Zophiel, come here."

This was bad. Why? He never calls me by my name.

"D-dad?" I stutter out, nervously checking for my sword in case I needed to make a run for it. Was it because I bailed yesterday? Did I forget to do the dishes? Fold my clothes properly?

"Relax. Training's off for today." He said, patting the ground next to him. I took a seat and sat staring into the clouds.

"Kid…" He said wistfully. "It's about time."

"What?" I froze. Usually, in anime, this is a trigger for someone to come kill my parents, emotionally harden me, and send me on a quest to collect the dragon balls or something.

"Do you know why you and your mother have never left the village?"

"No…?"

His eyes clouded over, and he averted his gaze from me. He fidgeted, curling his fingers into a fist, and releasing them as soon as he made it.

"Long ago…" He said. "Your dad was a real fighter, you know?"

"Huh..."

"A few years before you were born, I fought in the Great War. Your mother would never tell you about this, but we were different then. We, we fought each other. On many different occasions. And-we grew close after the war ended and we were allowed to be together."

Yo, what's this dude getting at?

"And, once the war was over, we had to settle in the outskirts of the kingdom, because it wasn't safe for people like you two there in the inner cities, or the forest. They're still afraid of…"

"Of what?" I asked. I knew what he was inferring, but I was hoping that I was wrong.

"You know, kid, I'm starting to think that I can't train you anymore."

"What?" That took me by surprise.

"This old dog has battle scars." He smiled, flexing his muscles. "But I still have enough fumes to teach you the basics."

"Wait. So I'm not going to train with you anymore?"

"I've been thinking of sending you to a special place. You'll stay with an old... friend and his daughter. I've always wanted to send you to school so that you can learn a lot, make friends…" His voice dropped into a whisper, and I couldn't make out what he said next.

"Dad, I want to stay here!" I yelled. "With you and Mom! I just want to be cool like you!"

"Nah, kid." He ruffled my hair, fastened his sword to his belt, and took off, heading home. "You… someday you'll become… even cooler than me."