Interlude - Is My Son a Ninja?

Akira Hideyoshi POV

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As I began to prepare for Hoshi second birthday, I felt time passed by too quickly and started reminiscing about the previous year.

Shortly after his first birthday, Hoshi begged me and Youta for multiple sets of his little chef uniform.

We ultimately conceded and got him enough sets for each day of the week.

Hoshi would only wear his uniform and would only change into his pyjama when going to bed.

I might have to resize his old set of uniform or buy an entirely new set soon; he was growing older and getting bigger.

He won't be able to fit into his current uniform soon, and I highly doubt he would give them up.

I allowed Hoshi to wear his little chef uniform daily instead of dressing him up with a bunch of different outfits because he would lament and ignores me.

I wouldn't last a day without my son.

I often need to hug him to recharge my energy.

Whenever we went outdoors, he would always gather attention from random pedestrians.

His pink hair and eyes with his father's handsome face while wearing his little chef uniform made him popular.

We would often get compliments from friends and strangers about how cute our son was.

Everyone assuredly recognized the excellence of my son.

He was the cutest baby in town and his cutest factor has gone through the roof!

Hoshi became fairly well known in our small community as the cute chef baby.

Our days weren't unique, but I still treasure them.

Every day I would wake up and change Hoshi into his uniform and began to make breakfast as he watched and waited for me to finish.

I would then place him into his playpen after breakfast, he would then move toward his chef's play kitchen.

When he first started playing with his little kitchen, he surprised Youta with his proper knife handling and skills.

He obviously learned that from me, he often watches me prepare and cook our family meals.

Youta was spouting rubbish about image training and being abnormal.

I gave him a cold look, and he immediately stopped spouting nonsense.

As time passed by, my and Youta gazes were often in a glued state towards our son without being able to take our gazes off.

Our curiosity kept rising over the limit.

Hoshi would standstill with his back straight while properly hold his toy knife and began to continuedly cut his play-doh over and over and reform it and rinse and repeat.

At first, I thought he looked like an amateur chef mimicking some knife handling techniques he learned from watching me or the television.

I still remember him celebrating after the first day of practice.

What surprised me the most was the rate of improvement; Hoshi slowly became better and better.

One month later, he began switching hands while practicing his knife skills.

Hoshi struggled to use his non-dominant hand, but he continued and persevered.

He looked to be ambidextrous now; He would often use either of hands during daily tasks and cutting practice.

Every so often, he would laugh aloud and raise his hands to celebrate and stare straight as if checking something.

It was an odd situation because every time he celebrated; his skill would improve.

People often considered me a scatterbrained person, but the improvements were obvious.

The quick transition from amateur to professional knife skills was shown in the past few months.

It was amazing and scary at the same time; Recently he looked like a ninja with his cutting speed and accuracy.

"Are we filming a movie? what with that special effect?" my husband resorted.

I slapped him in the back on the head.

I don't believe any spirits possessed Hoshi.

However, it was ridiculous that a one-year-old had such skill and dedication.

With his speed and technique alone, I could justify Hoshi was a ninja.

But his dedication to training every day made it obvious.

"Youta I believe Hoshi is a reincarnated ninja, that would explain his knife skills and dedication to training!" I told my husband my hypothesis.

Youta began laughing.

"I highly doubt he a ninja. Maybe he went back in time and kept his previous skills." sarcastically replied Youta.

As more time passed by, his improvement seemed to slow down.

Hoshi rarely spoke, but he was very articulate whenever he did.

Recently, Hoshi would ask me about cooking and knife techniques.

The slowed improvement must have bothered him, and Hoshi decided to gather more information to improve his ability.

He would watch any cooking show on the television and make notes and practice whatever he has seen.

Hoshi also asked if I needed help cooking, but I refused him because he was too young and it was dangerous.

I can see his frustration with his "slow" progress; I was pretty sure any profession would cough out blood if they saw his improvements.

"Mom, Dad, can you buy me books on knife handling and techniques?" Hoshi asked.

We gave him a queer look and promised him after he begged.

We would often read the books together with Hoshi; It was an enjoyable activity we did together as a family.

It was funny and adorable that Hoshi requested we read them to him as a bedtime story.

I can officially say my knife skills have improved.

I know a lot more about knife grips and techniques because of all the reading we did together.

However, my improvement was nowhere close to my genius son.

He would assimilate the knowledge and put it into practice right away.

He began to increase his speed while cutting patterns and shapes.

I took photos of all his designs, from simple shapes such as stars to intricate lace patterns.

Seeing him seamlessly switch between knives and grips, while performing picture-perfect cuts was humbling.

I am not a chef by trade but I cook every day, to see my one-year-old son surpass me in knife skills made me speechless and proud.

One night I heard some noise and quickly woke Youta, we went toward Hoshi bedroom to check on him.

In the midst of the darkness, I saw my son small figure with his toy knife in his hand.

He had his eyes closed with an expression of focus; He began swinging the knife left, right, up and down.

After flickering on the lights, I notice Hoshi play-doh was cut perfectly, each strip of play-doh was identical and about one-millimetre thick.

"That impossible" whisper Youta.

I was speechless, the ability to cut perfect one-millimetre strips of play-doh in the dark with a toy knife was improbable.

Unless he was a ninja, they are trained in ancient Japanese martial arts and used for espionage and assassinations in the dark.

Hoshi must have smuggled his toy knife and play-doh in his room to practice.

However, this worried me and Youta.

We didn't want him missing sleep and his obsession might cause him to fall ill from overwork.

We took his toys away for two weeks, which will allow him to rest and relax.

Hoshi must have felt guilty for worrying us, he spent most of his time during those two weeks with us.

There was still a question on my mind, I needed to ask him.

"Hoshi, are you a ninja?"

Hoshi gave me a confused look, and Youta started snickering.

I remembered that embarrassing moment and quickly woke up from my daydream decided to finish preparing Hoshi second birthday.