Chapter 02

In a certain night in an unknown town in the kingdom of Fiore.

A woman's painful scream echoed to a room.

"Aaaaggghhh!!!" Screamed of the woman who was in pain.

"Push! Push it! Take a deep breath and push! The baby is close". An aged voice of a woman informed the screaming woman.

"Aaaaaaagggghhhhh!!!" The woman screamed yet again as she was experiencing pain she never felt before. She wanted to faint, but she persevered and continued despite the pain.

"The baby is here! Push more! It's close!" Comforted the old lady.

"UGGGHHH!" The woman screamed one last time with all she got, and finally, she gave birth.

"Waaaah, waaah, waaah" cries of a baby was heard after the woman's one last painful scream.

"It's a boy!" The old lady exclaimed in joy while the baby was still crying.

The old lady then proceeded to clamp the baby's umbilical cord and did her thing.

After that, she then carefully took the baby up to her arms and putted it in a basin to wash the blood off its body using a warm water.

The mother of the infant was weak and pale due to the blood loss, but she still warmly smiled when she heard the cries of her own baby.

The atmosphere was warm, as though to welcome the new life that came into this world. But the warm atmosphere was suddenly disturbed when the old lady noticed something as she exclaimed in surprise.

"W-w-what is this?!" She can't help but asked out loud as she saw something unbelievable on the baby's back.

"W..w..what's...w..wrong?..with my baby...bachan?" Asked the woman, still weak.

(A/N: O bāchan= Grandma, this didn't mean that they are relatives.)

"Something is on your baby's back!" The old woman loudly informed as she examined her findings.

The baby has a blond hair and healthy complexion, it is a normal and healthy baby in her opinion, but what confuses her was the unbelievable "mark" on the baby's back!

To be exact, there was a red mark on the baby's back. And it was not just any mark, the mark shows the image of a head of a lion with it's mouth wide open, and a mane that looks like it's on fire, with a slit scar on it's right eye.

The image was too accurate and clear, which confuses the old lady.

'How did this became attached to the baby's back?' Is the question that was currently revolving around the old lady's mind.

The old lady was astonished in the mark on the baby's back as she decided to inspect it properly for a while. A couple of seconds later, she finally came into a realization as she then assured the anxious mother at the side. "It is a birth mark, don't worry".

"What a unique birth mark!" The old lady can't help but comment while covering the baby's body with a clean white cloth.

After finishing on covering the baby with the cloth, the old lady then gave the still crying baby to its anxious mother's arms.

"Waaah! Waaah!" Cried the baby.

"A...birth...mark...". The mother of the baby mumbled weakly as she gently and carefully traced her fingers in the baby's back. Smiling warmly, she then whispered to her newborn son.

"My...baby..boy" she warmly smiled and shed tears of happiness on her eyes as she finally saw her baby who was on her womb for 9 months.

When the baby heard her voice, it stopped crying, as though he recognized the voice and knew that it belongs to his own mother.

Seeing this, the mother smiled and praised. "Good...boy".

Hearing his mother's praise, the baby then let out a giggle.

Seeing the mother and son pair, the old lady smiled as she then asked. "What will you name to this little boy?"

The woman hearing the question, looked at her son and warmly smiled. "Escanor.... Escanor would be your name... as you are... the knight... who protected me from sadness and loneliness... even... before... you were... born". The woman said weakly, as her eyes then suddenly shut without warning.

(A/N: Escanor means "Knight Slain", though the woman named him like that as the baby protected her from sadness and loneliness even before he was born.)

[[x765, Escanor was born.]]

The old woman, seeing this, was alarmed. She forgot that the woman lost so much blood!

She was consumed by her confusion about the mark and the happiness the mother showed to her son that she forgot to tend to her immediately.

The old woman then hurriedly took the baby from its mother's arms and putted him to a wooden cradle.

After that the old lady then went and hurriedly tended to the mother.

Feeling that he was not in his mother's arms, the baby cried out loud as it called for its mother.

The old lady keep calling the mother while using her own knowledge and experience as a midwife to try and save the mother.

The warm atmosphere in the room when the baby was born was now all gone and was replaced with a sullen and depressed one.

The old lady was now all panicked, coupled with the loud cries that the baby produces at the back, which was obviously not helping at all as it was instead distracting her from doing her job.

She spent several minutes to try and save the mother as the old lady kept on calling the mother's name. But... It was still no good, the mother of the baby... didn't woke up, nor responded.

Seeing this, the old woman stood up and shakily stepped back. She was consumed by guilt, as she thought that it was partially her fault that the mother died.

Seeing the still crying baby, the old woman closed her eyes in thought. Opening her eyes, the old lady then took the baby into her arms as she swayed the baby slightly from side to side to make it sleep.

The woman looked at the baby and mother pair with sympathy and sighed.

*Sigh*

"The father was killed by a wild beast... and the mother died because of blood loss... How unfortunate... don't worry boy... I could at least take you to the orphanage that would take care of you, as this old woman only has little time left on this world and would not be able to take care of you and your needs".

The old woman said with sadness seing the baby still crying on her arms.

...

After a while, the baby finally stopped crying and fell asleep into the old lady's arms, seemingly tired. The old lady then putted the baby back to the cradle as she then went out to call for help on taking the body of the dead mother from the house.

That night, the neighbors of the said woman all made a proper burial for her, while the baby was safely sent and admitted to an orphanage where he would be taken care of and his needs would be sustained.

After those events, Escanor lived in the orphanage and was taken care of properly, although the nuns and headmaster of the orphanage that took care of the orphans find his unique birth mark strange, but they still accepted him and took great care of him like they would, to the other kids.

...

Five years passed in a blink of an eye, Escanor was now, obviously, five years old.

He was living happily and made a lot of friends in the orphanage. He was like any other kid, youthful and full of energy.

It was now the year x770, it was a great and "sunny" day that shone onto the town. It was supposed to be a good day to the people living on the orphanage, when suddenly....

*BOOM!*

*CRACK!*

*FWIP!*

*BOOM!*

*SWISH!*

One of the room on the orphanage was destroyed and the noise startled the people inside. And as if it was not startling enough, the room's temperature suddenly went up and broke out in flames!

The people on the orphanage went panicked seeing the huge and burning heat of the flames, the headmaster of the orphanage instructed the nuns and caretakers to evacuate the children into safety.

The people who was instructed by the Headmaster then hurriedly went out to evacuate the children.

When all the children were taken out, the headmaster instructed someone to check if all the children was there and safe. The caretaker then counted the children and noticed one kid was missing.

The caretaker reported it to the headmaster and the headmaster looked at the now burning orphanage with an uncomfortable feeling in his eyes.

The headmaster was still confuse on where the missing kid is, he wished that it was not inside as he treated all the children in the orphanage as his own, but alas, one of the children raised its hand and hurridely informed.

"It's Escanor! Escanor is missing! We are roomates and the fire also came from our room!" The headmaster, hearing the confirmation of a kid still inside, mmediately took action.

He hurriedly went inside to the orphanage himself to find the kid despite of the caretakers and the nuns protest.

The flames were so hot that he feels like he would burn, but he used his water magic and cast it onto himself as his magic wasn't strong enough to be able to put this strong flames out.

After casting the magic, he feels better as he then wasted no time and went to the said room.

When he was close to the room he heard screams that resembled of a boy.

"AAAAHHHHHH". Hearing this, the headmaster wasted no time and gritted his teeth in pain because of the heat.

When he went inside, he expected the worst and to see a kid with at least burns of different degrees in its body. But what he saw, shocked him.

It was not a kid he saw, it was a boy who look like in his early teens and has blond hair with toned and strong muscles on its body, but not bulky.

The boy has handsome and sharp features with blue eyes. He stood 5 ft. flat in height and was topless and currently screaming, not noticing the headmaster close to him. The headmaster was about to ask on where is the kid here, when he noticed the mark on the back of the boy.

It was a red mark of a lion head with it's mouth wide open with a mane that look's like it's burning and has a slit scar on the right eye. He could not be more familiar on the unique mark on the back of the boy.

Realizing who this was, the headmaster asked stutteringly. "E-E-Escanor! I-I-Is that you?!"

Hearing this, the boy who was Escanor stopped screaming and slowly looked behind.

Escanor saw a worned out and a coughing headmaster due to smoke and he was happy when he saw him, Escanor then was about to ask the headmaster's help, when he suddenly saw the headmaster collapsed.

Seeing this, Escanor wanted to go beside the headmaster, but accidentaly used too much force that he made a dent and cracked the floor when he took a step.

Seeing what he did, Escanor went pale and looked at his hands, he can't control himself and he was about to lose control any moment. He then hurriedly crouched down and took the headmaster to his shoulder carefully, and kicked the wall of the room.

*Boom*

He went out carrying the headmaster and threw him to the bushes.

Escanor has no choice but to do that as he feels himself slowly losing control. He ran as fast as he can out of the orphanage, topless, with only his pants on which looked so tight on him.

He ran so fast that he even made large dents on his way.

Hearing the noise of Escanor's action, made the townspeople to look at his direction, but all they saw was a blurring figure leaving large dents onto the stone ground.

This made the people close from the dents to shout in both surprise and fear. Escanor hearing those fearful screams went despair as he adorned a confused and also a very scared expression on his face.

In no time, he went out of the town and entered somewhere deep in the forest full of wild beasts lurking on it. Escanor who saw that he was out of the town, can't take it anymore and finally lost control.

"AAAAAGGHHHHH!!!" He yelled in rage as he started punching and destroying anything he saw. This made a huge wild bear to growl threateningly at him and was about to attack him, when escanor suddenly went close to it and punched its body, making a huge whole on the bear's chest.

The other wild beasts seeing these, all escaped and didn't dare to get close to him.

Escanor after killing the bear didn't stopped as he went and destroyed anything close on his attacking range. This went for as long as the sun was nowhere to be seen anymore.

...

Escanor, who now looked like a 5 years old kid, looked around with a pale complexion. He stared at his hands as he shed tears and crouched down to the ground.

He held his head and cried. Around him, you can see all size of dents and small craters, destroyed trees and burned trees, crushed rocks, and small hills that were missing some chunks on it.

Escanor was now so scared, he was supposed to change clothes in his room earlier, when he suddenly felt hot, he feels his body growing which freaked him out.

He feels so hot and felt like it wanted to go out of his body so he focused and let it stay inside him, what he didn't expect was when he punched the nearby wall due to him not bearing the heat, he accidentally destroyed it.

This caused him to lost his focus and feels the hot feeling went out of his body and burned his room and then the orphanage.

Escanor was now crouching while crying, topless with only his ripped and stretched pants on.

You can't blame him! He was just a five year old kid and was enjoying his life like the other kids on the orphanage.

What he didn't expect was this, happening to him. When he remembered the burning orphanage which served as his home and to the other children, or the fearful shouts and screams of the townspeople, he can't help but fell deep in despair as he held his head and cried like there was no tomorrow. He felt so scared.

He cried there alone in the night, deep in the forest, where his sorroundings was utterly destroyed.

After crying for so long, he grew tired and finally fell to the ground, asleep.