chapter 3 Daniel's favorite toy (work in progress)

Vincent regained his calm, obviously hiding some uncomfortable details to his own family was much more difficult, for this he prepared this truth to hide what he really wanted to hide

Vincent took a deep breath and came "clean" with an expression of defeat "the situation it's bad, I already told you that Daniel's case it's the worst we have seen, the energy isn't just stronger, but it's a lot stronger, if he doesn't cultivate his soul to green level, his body can't become older than 7 and the limit regardless of the soul level it's 10 years old, older than that and the energy will break the seal, so unless he accepts the rest of the inheritance and becomes a soul cultivator he will always be 10 years old"

Phoebe said "only 10" softly with tears in her now red eyes "what can he do with an eternity as a 10-year-old" she continued while holding Joseph's right arm tightly, they were both angry at Vincent for hiding things, but now was not the time, they had other priorities

Joseph who always tried to see the glass half full tried his best to keep himself grounded and support his wife and said "there are many things he can become, a scientist or a singer or maybe a lawyer, after all, appearance is not that important since the child look is always trendy between the old monsters, but at least for now he is safe and there's always the protector offer"

as soon as he finished phoebe turned to face him, and punched him in the gut, as he flew through 5 walls and headed towards the lake at the back of the castle, Joseph was busy wondering what he said to trigger her, but soon after splashing into the lake he realized his mistake

the process to leave the mortal body and turn into a spirit body had a price, without a body made of flesh and bones many desires were lost, and some were strengthened, but the final result was always that the person in question changed some more and some less

many believed that the person one becomes, is a completely different person from who he or she was, in many races abandoning the mortal body also means abandoning their racial identity, and soul cultivators would often become people without a motherland

Phoebe was one of those many because before being apprenticed to Sophia she was an orphan that was lucky enough to be adopted by a nice woman

at that time the woman was cultivating the soul because she had little talent as an energy cultivator, but when the woman finally formed the spirit body, she didn't care about Phoebe anymore her desire for kinship and family was lost completely, and her desire to travel became the only important thing

so she went to travel abandoning the barely teenage Phoebe who was then found by Sophia, but it took a long time to gain the little girl's trust, and the scar remained in her heart even now that thousands of years had past

Vincent who also just remembered after seeing his son fly away like a cannonball said "don't worry too much Phoebe, nothing happened yet"

while Phoebe was still worried, she forced herself to calm down, after all, Vincent was right nothing happened yet, while she got back to her seat Joseph came back in, his black hair and clothes were completely soaked and dripping all over the floor

as Joseph arrived in front of phoebe he said "I'm sorry you know that sometimes I don't think things through before I talk"

Phoebe glared at Joseph but then relaxed and said "it's ok, I may have overreacted a little"

after peace was restored Vincent continued to talk, without caring one bit about the walls with human-shaped holes in them or the now wet carpet, the castle was a powerful treasure, that would clean and repair itself among many other things, stuff like this simply wasn't a problem "every year the day of his birthday I have to take Daniel to the protector, so she can use the formation to make him age another year, so he will hopefully have a seemingly normal childhood till he becomes ten, I'll let you two decide how much you want to tell him and when" he wanted to tell that being honest was better, but in this situation, he couldn't muster the courage to say those words

after discussing a few more details the couple left, and Vincent walked to the window, a small tear appeared in his left eye as e muttered "Sophia a necessary lie it's still a lie, but in this case, I believe it's better than the truth" and started to work on some documents he left unfinished to be present at the birth

in his room, little Daniel was sleeping with a cute angelic face, without anyone knowing that he will one day be known in every corner of the known universe

soon a year passed and being stuck in the body of a one-day-old baby, there wasn't anything Daniel could do apart from eat sleep, and discharge, because of that it was a rather uneventful year, Phoebe was still on a long military leave, and Joseph barely did a few concerts, and left his teaching post to his disciple Joshua, so apart from some visits from Obelix, Andrea, and Sophia's brother who everyone called uncle White and some other friends of the family nothing really happened

there was only one exception, in front of Daniel's room there was a pedestal with a glass ball on it, inside it was something that looked like mercury but kept swirling and moving on its own like it was alive, from the moment Daniel put his eyes on it this became his favorite toy, the only object that could grab the little guy attention, completely ignoring all the toys and plushies his parents prepared, but proving beyond doubt that he was indeed a Specter

every member of the Specter family has this insane need to collect, Vincent likes to collect whatever catches his attention during a trip, sometimes it's a painting some other weapons, and even figurines or oddly shaped objects, in fact, the Specter castle whose size can be freely changed, it's so big for one purpose only, that is to display the seemingly Infinite collection of souvenirs

from the outside the castle had a luxurious style, so anyone would expect the interior to be decorated luxuriously as well, but after it fell in Vincent's hands if it wasn't for the display cases in every room and corridor, even in the bathrooms, the interior decoration would be in a modern minimalist style, the furniture, and appliances where the strictly necessary one to make place for the display cases who were too many to be counted

there were of course a few exceptions, one being the library which contained books written in hundreds of different languages and contains part of the collection of Sophia, and another exception was Joseph's and Phoebe's bedroom and office that contains Joseph's collection of music and musical instruments, and last Phoebe that after being infected by the Specter family started her collection of trees, of course, Daniel's bedroom was also free of display cases

Vincent felt very proud about the whole thing, like the fact that Daniel chose a piece of his collection meant that his collection was somehow superior to others, but as a good hoarder, cough I meant collector, he was a little sorry to lose a relic from the war against the replicators

in fact in the glass ball made of a diamond-like material, there was the head of a high-tier replicator he defeated

after the end of the war, the central hub where there was the brain of the replicators' was had been erased completely, bringing the end of their entire civilization that was built on the bones of their creators, and to make sure they won't be able to raise ever again, the singular nanites were also formatted so that they won't have even their basic program, but cultivators had no use for a high level technology they couldn't control and after a few interested studied them, the nanites where simply melted and recycled

all this happened almost 15 thousand years ago, so if it wasn't for the fact that Vincent saw this as a collector item, and kept it, this type of nanites probably wouldn't exist anymore, even if they can only move around in their melted form proving that their still 'alive' but empty

in fact, there are various types of nanites, the ones approved by the Sun Federation laws are those used for medical purposes that can't work with metals so they can't self-replicate, but the ones in the diamond-like ball are remnants of the replicator civilization

not only could they replicate, but at the peak of their civilization a handful of nanites could take control of an inhabited planet below D grade in a week, that meant a planet in which living beings could at most reach the fifth stage, after all to replicators cultivation doesn't mean anything, they fought with technology, and the minerals on a D grade planet are good resources to make ships and weapons, not every component has to be made with the best materials

anyway, since it wasn't dangerous anymore, grandpa Vincent sacrificed this souvenir, with a look that made it seem like he was about to cry, even if not even an hour later, the glass ball was replaced by one of the myriads of things he keeps in the space storage crate in the basement, while the few that are really precious and dangerous were kept hidden in the family vault with the other Specter's collections

as his first birthday arrived, Daniel was brought to the formation, where he saw space for the first time, his parents had read picture books to him and shown the images but the real thing was something else

alas, he mysteriously fell asleep and the trio of Vincent Andrea and Obelix used the formation to make him age, he woke up the next morning with the body of a 1-year-old boy, he now had some darkest than night black hair growing, and his eyes were bright and cyan

not knowing or understanding any better, and hearing his parents giving fault to someone called growing, he kept playing with the ball and making his first crawl now that his body allowed it

that same morning he was sitting by the lake with his parents, when he started hearing a strange song humming from within himself when he was hit by the sunlight, this wasn't the first time but today was different after the song started his perspective changed, he was looking down at himself from above, and he saw a little sparkle inside him slowly absorbing a little sun orbiting around it

soon after white strands of energy were flowing from behind his new point of view to the sparkle, while he stood under the sun and listened, but it wasn't really a song, it was the chant of the great Sun soul-nurturing sutra, and his mind was getting sharper with every strand of energy the spark absorbed

this was obviously not normal, normalcy was to spend great effort to actively attract 1 or 2 strands of soul energy to refine the Sun seed, and drag the result to the spark with even more effort, even with the matchless sutra, the energy coming on its own to the spark shouldn't be possible

but that didn't continue for long, because after not even 10 minutes, Phoebe brought him back under the shadow of the umbrella and said "you're still too little for a tan, stay here before you become a roasted pepper" but Daniel liked the song and kept trying to put an arm under the sunlight making the chant start again

his parents obviously saw that but attributed it to him liking the warmth of the sun on his skin so they let him be, and didn't imagine even for a second that a baby who was 1 year old was not only cultivating but doing it in a way that was absolutely ridiculous and unheard of

after all, having a strong soul didn't mean having a sensitivity to soul energy, especially when they never trained it and relied on the natural evolution of it that comes with the breakthroughs in spiritual energy cultivation, that make their soul energy unrefined and prevent optimal soul development

with the passage of days, the white strands kept accumulating, making the family worried that Daniel was, in reality, part lizard, because of all the time he spent basking in the sun

and not even six months later the sparkle in his mind exploded and became a bright white Sun the size of a watermelon, afterward his mind became very clear and far ahead of what a 1-year-old should be capable of, not only that, his memory was getting better, and he remembered things he couldn't a while ago, but those memories where still hazy images and voices he couldn't put together, after all, he's still a baby and lacked even the most basic knowledge