5 The Moon Rising

As the days passed, they repeated this routine. The patterns of words and phrases continued and the boy slowly became proficient.

Eventually, he had learned how to speak in about four months.

"Hi June."

She woke up frantically, "Holy fuck, I'll never get used to you talking."

"You just said a bad word."

She frowned at him, "It's okay for adults to swear."

"Okay June. Why?"

"Don't accept everything I say as fact. People will lie to you." Placing both of her hands on his shoulders, she furrowed her brows, and began shaking the child.

"What?"

"Sometimes, it's alright to be a little skeptical even after someone answers a question."

"Why would they lie though?"

"I don't know. There are an assortment of reasons, whether it be because they don't really know, they're just assuming, or because everyone else says so."

"Okay. What does assortment mean?"

"Like, a collection of things."

"Alright thank you. Wait, so why do you swear when I can't?"

"…Damn it. Alright, wait and let me think of an appropriate answer…"

"Okay! I'm gonna go eat."

'This damned glutton."

They were definitely outside the realms of normality. This kid had perfect memory. They could copy just about anything after watching once. And despite their appearance, they didn't seem human, which was too be expected.

The first time she asked where he was from… he said he was from nothing, when asked to elaborate, he said he didn't know. So that was definitely alarming.

That and his lack of presence. Even with the fact he didn't bother hiding his footsteps, it was still difficult to discern that someone was there.

Remember she had to think of an answer she began pondering what an appropriate one would be.

She decided to just tell them the truth, "Hey Kali! I thought of an answer."

Walking back in while holding a sandwich, he looked attentively.

Pointing at him, she began talking, "Okay! So! The reason why people don't like children swearing is because it's typically considered rude. And since swearing is typically considered rude they don't want their children to swear. As other people may consider their child rude when they aren't. I think…"

"Ok!"

With a strained expression, June couldn't help but wonder what this child would end up like.

"June do you want to spar?" He was of course completely oblivious to all of this though.

She sighed, "Alright."

———

Being covered in protective gear, Kali got ready.

June questioned why they even wanted to practice, there was nothing more she could teach him about hand to hand combat. Well, not anything that would apply to him. This child was a robotic hand to hand fighter.

Of course, he was missing a few things. Like intuition and experience, but these were all things that came with fighting a similar level of opponent. Something that June was bad at replicating with her abilities.

Besides this however, his fighting style was nearly as efficient as it got.

Throwing the first punch, she blocked the hit with one hand.

Pushing them away, she placed both arms behind her back.

Dodging and weaving, she studied his movements. She watched his eyes just sucking everything in.

She had met nobody else like it.

Ducking and slipping through punches, she started kicking back.

The thing she found fascinating about the kid was his level of self control. In sparring, he almost never changed in the intensity of his strength or speed. Typically, people would begin punching harder and faster as a result of having all their attacks being ineffective.

But not him. His attacks simply changed in timing and variety.

He also had virtually infinite stamina, seemingly incapable of getting tired. Either that or he just ignored it.

She had tried to teach him how to cultivate for a bit, but he had no talent for it. Then again, talent was probably the wrong word for it.

He was basically unchanged by the energy.

It was like his body was unable to even contain an ounce of qi. It was odd since even if someone's body was crippled, they would still be able to absorb it if someone nonstop pumped qi into them, but when she did it with him, it was like trying to soak up water with an iron sieve.

Fortunately, even without cultivating at all, he was still stronger than most average kids that looked his age.

After continuing their back and forth for a few minutes, June decided to change tempo.

Snapping her fingers, a multitude of flaming orbs formed.

The few students she had a while back always called her a evil piece of shit whenever they were training.

Fortunately for her this time, she was dealing with someone staggeringly abnormal.

Readying himself for action, he placed both hands on the ground. Taking a knee, he was in position.

She had used this sort of attack various times before. Whether it be due to habit or limitation, she always formed twenty at a time, and they only ever came at him one to four at a time.

After being fired, they were typically unable to be steered any further. However, on a few occasions she was able to completely control their movements, managing to change their direction and speed multiple times in a row.

Seeing the approach he planned, she smirked in amusement. A running position? This was certainly new.

Springing off his back foot, he leapt into a mad dash towards her.

This time however, all twenty orbs fired at him. Weaving in and out of danger, he found himself being attacked in nearly all directions.

Still, he managed to avoid each one. Dodging with an unbelievable grace, June couldn't help but be impressed by it.

Having managed to reach her, Kali threw a spinning back kick, only have his foot be grabbed.

Twisting his leg around and using the other, he attempted to kick her in the side of her head.

Blocking the strike, she smiled, "Holy! Calm down!"

With her letting go of his leg, Kali fell to ground without resistance.

"Alright."

"Jeez, you're relentless."

"June. What am I?" The child spoke robotically.

"I don't know." She answered honestly.

"Am I human?"

"…Yeah."

"What do you mean by that? I'm almost completely sure that I'm not."

"Hmm. Let me elaborate then. No. You aren't human. But you're close enough. You breath, eat, sleep, and look like one."

"Is that really all it means to be human?"

"Nah, but I have a feeling it won't matter. As long as you treat others kindly and reasonably, you'll be human enough."

"…"

"Just think about how others feel about things and perhaps you'll be able to reach a conclusion.

"Okay June, but you're the only person I know."

"I know that." She smiled unabashedly.