proving his age, Daniel started to throw out questions like a machine gun "What is death? what is a soul? for hazardous material sphere, do you mean the fun ball? what is school?"
soon the stunned Vincent's mind became a mess, he thought "ho s### now I have done it, he asked the D question, should I tell him or wait for those two to return?, mhmm with Joseph we were honest and he had nightmares, I'll try to distract him with what I can answer"
Vincent cleared his voice and said "you should have seen the apple size white ball inside you, that is your soul, the soul is the source of life, something can move without a soul but moving it's not enough, for example before developing a soul the nanite in what you call the funny ball, where considered things, but now they are alive, you will soon understand it better than me, after all, you are cultivating the soul with your aunt Andrea sutra, as for school it's where you go to learn" Vincent was satisfied with his answer vague but truthful
but soon after Daniel crashed his dreams "what is death? what is life? what is cultivating? what is a sutra?" Daniel didn't know how big an apple was, being less than two years old, apples came in a little cup and it's eaten with a spoon, alternatively, it was a character in a children's book, so he didn't realize his grandfather's mistake
Vincent started sweating and was in awe at how innocently a baby could ask these questions, that even tenth stage cultivators wouldn't have the guts to respond with confidence, after thinking for a moment he said "you see Daniel the first two questions don't really have an answer they are more something to comprehend, for the other questions, cultivation means to practice a technique to increase the lifespan and or the energy, while a sutra is a record of the words of the wise, the one you have, was found by your aunt when she was young and she perfected it, turning it into the best one there is to cultivate the soul"
Daniel responded "I don't understand but sutra should be the song I hear from the sun"
Vincent asked "song?"
Daniel responded nodding "yes like the ones dad listens to every day, but I like the sun's one more"
at that point, Vincent laughed and said "keep the song a secret, never tell it to anyone but you're aunt ok?"
Daniel asked "Why?"
and Vincent replied "because that song it's very important to your aunt and she only gave it to you"
Daniel nodded as he understood, then his attention was once again robbed by the nanites as he ordered them to keep swirling because he liked it
later Daniel asked his grandpa to go to the lake where he spent most days and started 'tanning' even if he had the same rosy complexion and never actually gained any tan color, and in the meantime, he was looking at his soul
this time, he saw that the white balls were two, but they were different his was like a well-defined sun at the center, while the nanites one was the same size but it was just a generic sphere and was orbiting around his, like the planets orbit around the sun in the model of the solar system above his baby cot
the white strands of energy kept coming to his sun, but then from his sun half of the energy went to the ball around it keeping both souls on the same level
Daniel didn't know yet, but the size of the soul was fixed and increased only when rising in soul quality or with very rare, almost impossible to find treasures that no one would use lightly, because they could also cure the soul if it was damaged and was much better to keep them as medicine
but another method existed, since Daniel's soul was much bigger than the nanite's, their soul increased in size to match it as a benefit for dedicating it to their master, but this only happened because Daniel didn't know what he was doing, normally no one would risk their life and offer their soul energy to someone else, as the risk of corruption was too high
soon after Vincent went back inside the castle, and after thinking of a way to attract his nephew's attention he finally found one, when he came out of the castle he was holding a bucket and two small and simple fishing poles with no reel just a simple line, float, weight, and hook
he took two chairs who were already there on the lakeshore, then put the bucket who was now filled with water from the lake in the middle, and sat on the left chair
without saying anything he made a small container appear from nowhere, from inside he took a small red and white berry he fixed it on the hook, and with a gentle push the line entered the water without even creating a ripple
in the meantime a wildly curious little Daniel appeared behind him, soon the float went down the surface and with a decisive flick of the wrist the hook was set and a ten centimeters white perch broke to the surface and went to Vincent's hand who carefully removed the hook and put it in the bucket
at this moment Daniel's eyes were glowing with interest, and he said to Vincent "I want to do that too"
Vincent at this moment was happy, his plan worked perfectly, but soon he realized of a rather big flaw in it, Daniel had still the body strength of a 1 year old, earlier when he brought Daniel to the lake he was just thinking about what kind of bonding activity could they do there, without thinking if Daniel actually had the ability to do it, after all, this old man wasn't used at taking care of babies since his own one was born almost twenty thousand years ago
in this pickle the only solution Vincent found was creating a prerequisite "fishing it's an art before doing it you have to learn a lot of things" he took a little blue book out of nowhere and continued "here read this"
he passed the book to Daniel who took it, but soon later he became red because of the new mistake he made, as he saw Daniel opening the book and turning page after page without stopping
15 minutes later Daniel finished and said "ok, what's the next step"
Vincent asked "you read it?"
Daniel simply nodded
Vincent thought that he had to be sure and asked "what's the best bait for the arctic eel"
Daniel after a fraction of a second responded "ice silkworm or the liver of an ice elemental creature whatever those are" after all he memorized the words but had no idea what an ice silkworm or ice elemental creatures were
Vincent was flabbergasted and asked "since when can you read?"
Daniel responded "15 minutes ago"
Vincent finding it hard to believe could only ask "how?" after all 15 minutes was when he gave Daniel the small book
he didn't really expect an answer but Daniel as if he was talking of the most common thing in the world responded "you, mom and dad always read me stories while I look at the images and words, before going to sleep, those things" he said pointing at the nanites in the ball "put together all of the memories and learned how to read then shared it with me and I learned how to read, why grandpa is it wrong?"
Vincent finally realized something really troubling, for Daniel who knew next to nothing, whatever happened was normal, he didn't have an example to follow, so the fact that the nanites created the ability to read with a few memories and passed it to him was a normal thing not worth mentioning, suddenly he felt lost, without proper knowledge and guidance who knew what would happen to his grandson, those two were still fighting about school while he was teaching things to himself.
surrendering to his nephew, Vincent responded "no it's not wrong Daniel, you are very smart, I'm sure you'll be a great fisherman in the future if you want, but for now you're still too little and can't hold the fishing rod, but grandpa promises that as soon as you grow up he will bring you to fish in lots of different places, ok?"
Daniel watched his hands than his grandpa's hands and said "I understand, how do I grow up?"
Vincent said "with time"
Daniel asked "what is time"
after laughing, Vincent responded "1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10 this are 10 seconds, 60 seconds turn into 1 minute, 60 minutes turn into 1 hour, 24 hours turn into 1 day .." explaining Daniel the simplified 360 days year instead of the 365 days one after all, different planet's had different methods to measure time, based on the hours of light in a day so a simple standard for the entire federation was necessary
as Vincent finished the explanation Daniel thought for a moment then nodded and asked "how much time do I have to grow up?"
Vincent started laughing again and responded "you are now 18 months old, when you become 5 years old you should be strong enough to catch the small fish in the lake after all even if weak they are still spiritual beasts"
Daniel immediately said "42 months, 1,260 days, 30,240 hours, 1,814,400 minutes, 108,864,000 seconds, ok"
Vincent coughed hard and Daniel thought for a moment before saying "spiritual beast? are they not fish?" as if nothing out of the ordinary happened
Vincent ignored the mathematical skills and said "whether they're fish cats or elephants if they can cultivate they are spiritual beasts"
Daniel nodded while looking at the white fish swimming in the bucket and said "I see"
Vincent totally decided to leave the job of teaching Daniel common sense to the couple, and instead enjoyed pampering his grandson
he took Daniel in his arms, and holding the fishing rod, he 'assisted' or better, gave Daniel the illusion that he was fishing, showing him how to do it
after a while, Daniel went playing with the fish Vincent caught, and soon asked "why are you putting these many fish in the bucket"
Vincent answered "I got a craving for grilled fish, do you want to eat grilled fish with grandpa?"
Daniel asked "I never ate that, is it good?"
with a light chuckle, Vincent responded "your grandpa grilled fish is really, really good, the secret is to put olive oil, 2 cloves of minced garlic, a spoon of minced parsley, and salt to taste in a small cup and paint the fish with it as it cooks"
Daniel obliviously asked what garlic and parsley were, and Vincent responded he would know soon enough, and when he finally had enough fishes, he took them back with Daniel and showed him all the process, then helped Daniel clean and eat the fish
as he took a bite Daniel exclaimed "grandpa's grilled fish it's delicious"
Vincent said "glad you liked it" while patting his grandson's head
the day continued like this with a blissful grandpa and a question machine gun grandson, till it was past dinner time and 2 figures covered in dirt and dried blood, one with a big smile and the other with clenched fists entered from the portal stunning the old Vincent