Overly Protective Parents

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Shade and Nepheline were currently watching the girls while they fought against the black leopard through the eyes of spirits. Shade could not help but let out a sigh of relief after he saw the two girls kill the creature rather quickly.

"It seems the girls did it alone."

"Sylphy is incredible. She has matured a lot for a young girl at 1 year of age…"

"Indeed. I can already see her be a good friend of Aquarina…"

"They've only met for a few days, but they're already like sisters… I'm so happy for our daughter."

"Indeed. I suppose it wasn't necessary for my crow to do anything. Oh well. Then again, Aquarina and Sylph are both protected through enchantments and barriers, it's just they can't just see them."

"Yeah. If that panther had gotten any closer to them, it would have ended up hitting a magical barrier rather than getting to eat! Hahaha!"

"Moving that aside, I'm quite impressed that Sylph encouraged Aquarina. Also, she seems to be able to use not only Nature magic but also Fire magic."

"Speaking of which, our girl has barely awakened her Water-attribute magic. It seems those two have been training their girl since she was born or something… maybe they should give her a break."

"Hmm… maybe we should also help Aquarina practice more. Even at this day and age, the world is a dangerous place."

"I suppose you're right…"

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After we came back from the wilderness carrying the two hares and the panther, we received the glares of most of the tribal members that we came across. They looked at us with surprise and awe as we carried the massive corpse of this leopard.

"Young girls, you defeated that creature?"

"Incredible…"

"Aren't they like…one year old?"

"Those are the daughters of the heroes!"

"Ah! Even at one year old, they're strong enough to hunt…"

"Is that Aquarina?"

"Wow!"

Hearing their words of surprise, we decided to ignore them as we slowly made our way back. Normally, one would think that two one-year-old girls would never be able to carry a massive panther. However, one must remember that we both ate dragon and were bathed in its blood. Thanks to it, our strength had grown to incredibly high levels. Although it's nothing outstanding at the age of one, I think it's good that we're capable of carrying these corpses without many difficulties.

As we made our way back to the tent, we met our parents once more. I bet mother had already seen us hunt through her familiar, and so did Shade and Nepheline, who were inside the tent.

"Sylphy!? You hunted that?!" my father asked, pretending to be surprised.

"I-Incredible! My daughter is so talented!" mother said in addition. Of course, just like father, she was also terrible at pretending.

"You don't have to pretend you're surprised. We know you were following us through your familiar…" I could not help but say in response, letting out a sigh. If it were any person, they would feel embarrassed.

The two looked at each other's eyes after hearing my words.

"Erm, no! What are you even talking about?" father said in response.

"Y-Yeah! We would never try to… spy on our daughter," mother added, only to stutter near the end.

"Fine…" I decided to just let it be. I know they did that to protect me and because they cared about me. Plus, I'm not particularly annoyed by it. I do know the world is dangerous, so I appreciate that they continued to look after us with so much care.

"I know you do it because you care about me, so don't worry. In any case, it was fun to hunt monsters on our own… hopefully… you can let us do it again!" I could not help but suggest.

The two looked at each other once more.

"We'll think about it." father told me.

"You're still too young to hunt every day, though…" mother could not help but say.

"But we had our fun, right, Aquarina?" I asked, looking at Aquarina.

"It was a bit scary, and my heart was beating fast… but yeah, it was fun," Aquarina replied, nodding in agreement with me.

"For Aquarina's case, that's up for her parents to decide," father said.

"Now let's head inside. Should we butcher your prey? I can make some nice stew and grilled meat with them," mother asked.

"Yaay! Alright!" Naturally, I agreed to it.

"Meat!" Aquarina exclaimed with glee as she began to drool. For some reason, Amazons had a great obsession with eating meat. I don't know if it's genetic or not, but Aquarina, at her young age, was already in love with it. The feast of dragon meat the other day was mostly eaten by her.

As we entered the tent, we were greeted by Shade and Nepheline, who praised our hunt as well.

"Incredible work, you two," Shade told us.

"Aquarina, did you defeat that big cat?" Nepheline asked.

"I did! But Sylphy helped as well. She used her grass to wrap around the monster's limbs," Aquarina replied while nodding.

"Ooh, she can do that already?" Nepheline asked once more.

"I can, but back then, I would get too tired. It's all thanks to my spirit that I can get that far," I said, only to mutter inwardly, 'Well, there's also my endless mana, but I shouldn't talk about it.' After that, I showed them Naturia, with both of them showing great surprise at the fist-sized, green-colored seed as it floated around cutely.

"Eh?! I didn't see that before! Since when!?" Nepheline asked.

"Hehehe! Sylphy got her own Spirit after raising her Eden Apple tree. The apple tree mutated into a Magical Tree and created a spirit that made a contract with her," mother explained to her.

"T-That's… insane. So, she did it thanks to her Nature magic… but even then, it must be because she's half-elf too, isn't she?" Nepheline asked once more.

"Must be. She must have inherited Faylen's talent with spirits and nature. Her lineage is of the royal elves, after all. Even as a half-elf, her elven blood is strong enough that she's almost a pure elf even with human blood," Shade said in response.

"Fufufu. I don't want to say that Elves are superior, but we are!" my mother said all of a sudden. For some apparent reason, she made it seem like Elves were superior to humans. Of course, I didn't like that, but there wasn't much I could do about it.

"Oi! Don't get too cocky. The Amazon bloodline is also great! Aquarina is still growing up, but she'll punch mountains when she reaches her adulthood!" Nepheline said in response to mother's boastful words.

"You're exaggerating it. Not even you could do that when we first met," Shade could not help but say.

"D-Don't sell me out like that! Am I not your wife?!" Nepheline replied to her husband's words with a pout.

"You are. And because you're my wife, I know you the best," said Shade, nodding in response to her words.

In any case, the two were honestly a fun couple.

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