'That doctor's got a good head on his shoulders.'
Ever since he had started getting his hearing under control, thanks to his new and improved soundproofed nursery, Anthony had gotten in the habit of eavesdropping whenever Clemence visited.
At first, it was because he was worried Clemence would say that his symptoms were because of a demon possessing Thomas and Vira's son's body or something along those lines.
After that, it was because while Anthony was currently too little to learn from Clemence, he could learn by listening to him explain to his parents about what he had or hadn't found. And when it became clear that Clemence wasn't finding much and thus not giving Anthony a lot of new information, Anthony listened purely out of curiosity.
It came almost as a shock to the reborn dragon, but training all the time without seeing immediate and complete results was tedious. Anthony got bored or tired of training his body by wiggling around in his crib or controlling his hearing quicker than he would have liked.
Of course, the sooner he completed or made significant progress with his training, the sooner he could get started on his quest for vengeance.
But when he was still Anastrus, Anthony had spent millennia indulging his whims and desires. He didn't do what he didn't want to unless it was absolutely necessary.
He roamed the world for new knowledge when he wanted. He offered lesser beings favors in exchange for interesting knowledge or information since it was a fun and simple pastime he never got bored of. He slept when he wanted. And when he tired of doing something, he found something new to do.
However, Anthony had realized that the very same leisure babies had that let them do what they wanted was the same limitation in that they didn't have anything to do. Ordinary babies wept, slept, played, and ate. Anthony didn't weep or play. Instead, he trained. But that still only left him with three things to fill his days with, which seemed never to change or end.
Anthony felt like he would sleep, wake up, eat, train, sleep, wake up, eat, and train on repeat forever.
The only consolation was the fact that he had grown and made enough progress to be able to move around more. He could crawl!
And, although rudimentary, he could also start doing push-ups, crunches, and squats, so his physical training had grown by leaps and bounds.
Anthony had also long since gotten tired of trying not to raise any suspicions with Thomas and Vira, so he just ignored them, even when they entered his room and stood at the door, watching him.
"Honey, do you ever look at our son–"
"Yeah, all the time."
"...And think that he's very, like, determined?"
"You mean when it looks like he's working out?"
"Yes."
Vira grinned as she held up her bicep in front of Thomas.
"Who wouldn't be when their mom is like this?"
Thomas gave Vira a deadpan look.
"He's a few months old. What does he know about muscle training?"
"It's genetic. Our baby got it from me, just like I got it from my dad, just like he got it from my gramps."
Thomas sighed. He doubted even Vira was working out right after leaving her mother's womb. But it wasn't like Anthony being active was a cause to worry. If anything, it was a good thing.
"Besides, isn't it just his physique?"
Vira shrugged as she looked at Anthony doing squats while holding onto the edge of the crib to keep his balance.
After Clemence brought up the idea of Anthony having a special physique and it being the cause of his strange behavior, Thomas and Vira adopted that explanation. And they used it for anything that couldn't be attributed to ordinary baby behavior.
Of course, Anthony didn't do much of anything in the first place. The only things that made him stand out from other babies were the vacancy that had filled him during his first month and a half out of the womb, the fact that he never cried, and his overly sensitive hearing, which had thankfully not gotten as bad as after that visit to Clemence's.
But not crying was just a quirk that Anthony seemed to have naturally. And the incessant glaring that not even the grumpiest babies had was probably something similar, just that it was partly inherited. Even Vira had to admit that the way Anthony's face scrunched up when he frowned or glared was exactly the same as when she did it.
So, until or unless something happened that gave Thomas and Vira a concrete idea of what Anthony's physique was, everything was because of it. It made it easier for them since they could limit their worries. And since they noted down everything they attributed to the physique, it made it easier, albeit more time-consuming, for Clemence to look for a specific physique that would match.
'Hmph. Not even my great self has heard of something as ridiculous as this physique. There's no way a village doctor has.'
Well, Clemence, Thomas, and Vira also didn't know that a Dragon King's soul had slipped into Anthony's body or how such a feat would be impossible for even the most powerful known physique.
Housing another being's soul was one thing, and it could probably be achieved with some proper magic rituals and modifications. But the larger the discrepancy between the soul and the host, the greater the magic and modifications necessary.
The magic ritual for Anastrus' rebirth was the robed mage's spell. And the modifications to the host body were already in place in the shape of an innate physique.
However, something as simple as a physique, a mere variation in the human body, shouldn't be enough to make up for the difference in strength between one of the most powerful beings in the world and a feeble, newborn human baby.
Anthony wondered if Thomas and Vira could remain so lighthearted if they knew about that aspect of non-baby behavior. He was almost curious about what would happen if he told them.