2 weeks had passed since my first birthday and I was being held by my hands as Alice assisted me in practicing my walking. I have spent the previous few months trying to stand by using my crib’s railings and whatever I can grab as support. When I first got up on my own feet with the support of the wall, Alice screamed in delight and went to get my parents while Emma crawled after me making excited baby noises with a sparkle in her eyes.
Since then, whoever was watching me at the moment would always encourage me to walk by propping me up as I put 1 foot in front of the other. Seeing what I was doing, Emma also wanted to try walking, but for now, her limbs were too weak and too unbalanced to do anything of the sort. It did not stop her from trying tho.
But today was special. I think I figured out the balance of this baby's body and I am ready to take the first step on my own.
It was after breakfast and the family had retired to the tea room to chat about their plans and what they were going to do today.
I wiggled out of Mum’s lap and she gently let me down to the ground feet first. I hold on to Mum’s hand as I take a few assisted steps.
After I felt confident of my balance, I released the grip of Mum’s fingers and started taking a few unsteady steps of my own. This caused quite a commotion from the family that was watching me, but I did not dare look back, least I lose my concentration and balance.
I take slow deliberate steps toward the nearest wall, I stumble a couple of times making my family raise their voice in worry, but I quickly recover and move forward.
When I touched the wall, my family cheered. I turned around to see my mother and the maids shedding tears of joy, while my dad and grandparents had a look of pride on their faces.
Mum then couched and stretched out her hands, “Well done Luke! Now walk back to mommy.”
Not one to disappoint, I carefully made my way back into Mum’s embrace, where she then proceeded to bring me into her cleavage for a suffocating hug.
That night, the family and servants under the confidentiality contract celebrated my first steps. Emma was there with me, she did not know what the ruckus was about but she got the general positive vibes and spent the whole party stuck to me. At this point, the family considered her as my childhood girlfriend.
***
Years pass and I am now 3 years old, and much has happened.
I now have a little sister, her name is Charlotte.
Just like Emma, Charlotte loves her big brother and even gets jealous when Emma holds on to me. But Emma does not care and has also taken to hugging Charlotte, eventually, Charlotte stopped being jealous when me and Emma showed her enough attention.
But I am not the only one who just got a sibling, a few months after Charlotte was born, Anna gave birth to a bouncing baby boy named Otto, who I treat as my baby brother. By this point, our 2 families were very close and decided to socialize the 4 of us kids together regardless of our social status.
My Dad who came from a humble background said it would be a good thing to avoid me and my sister growing up to be like some of the entitled lordling flops they had seen in the capital. While Grandpa agreed, Mum and Grandma had their doubts but went along with it.
Another big thing that changed is my physique. As time went on and my appetite continued to grow unnaturally, my parents got worried. So the job to find out what was going on fell to the closest thing to a healer in my family, Grandpa.
Grandpa went back to his home and raided his own library to research for months before coming back and diagnosing me again. That was how my family found out about the low-intensity aura (That I am still unable to turn off) making my body passively exercise 24/7, and as my body grew bigger, so did my appetite. This cycle of a high-protein diet and constant passive exercise has caused my body to bulk.
Which leads to the 3 year old me, currently having the body of a 6 year old. A rather buff 6 year old. In fact, I am stronger and heavier than anyone my size should be, now the only ones who have no problems carrying me for long periods around are my Dad, Klaus, and Anna.
But all is not that bad, because of my body growing a lot quicker compared to normal children, Dad decided it was time to allow me to do some sword training.
Despite mother’s protesting, Dad got me a child-size wooden sword which I excitedly took and started swinging around.
While in the presence of anyone watching, I practice the basics of Argus Kingdom’s army swordsmanship, which leaves much to be desired, but I better not show off to avoid questions I cannot answer.
But now that I am 3 years old and have shown that I am not as accident-prone compared to other kids (Besides the whole almost killing myself with aura incident), I am given some leeway to explore the backyard of the mansion on my own.
That is where the real training began, I had to shake off 3 years of rust from not practicing martial arts. I started with the basics of karate, taekwondo, kung fu, and muay thai, then I moved on to emulate the movements and motions of the more grappling martial arts like judo and aikido, too bad I don't have anyone to practice my grappling with. Lastly, I moved on to martial arts that involved weapons, to aid in this endeavor, besides my new wooden sword, I borrowed a broomstick from the servants cleaning supplies. The broomstick may be a bit too long for me at the moment, but I will make it work somehow.
During the first few days of practice, I would be gone for hours at a time, which would make Emma, my parents, and the servants worry. This led to questions that I did not want to answer, I ended up telling them that I was catching beetles, poking ant nests, and things along those lines, you know, gross boy stuff.
They all gave me a “boys will be boys” look and accepted my excuse. All except Emma, she is giving me the look like she does not believe me. Dammit, I think she is on to me, we definitely spend too much time together.