Claire Kagenou just turned eight this year and has a brother two years younger than her named Cid Kagenou.
Claire herself is an outstanding young girl.
The Kagenou lineage has produced countless dark knights, and as such, expectations on her are especially high.
Her brother, Cid, on the other hand... is depressingly average.
He's not stupid or anything, and it's not like he hates exercising. But no matter what they make him do, it all comes out flat and uninspired.
If the two of them were a painting, Claire would be smack-dab in the middle, the focus of the work, and her brother would probably be mistaken for some bystander just passing along behind her.
— A mismatched pair of siblings.
For some reason, realizing that's how people saw them upset Claire to no end.
<<•>>
In the Kagenou household, dark knight training begins when you're six.
Claire is eight, so she started two years ago, and she's already to the point where she's won a youth tournament.
Her brother Cid just turned six, so he started training recently, too, but...
"Bluuuh... Sis, you're so strong..."
Pathetic words tumble out of his mouth as he crawls along the ground.
"C'mon, that was only a light tap. Don't go crying over something so weak!"
Claire looks down at Cid and prods him with her wooden practice sword.
"H-hey, cut it out…!" Cid squirms, clearly not enjoying himself.
"Look, you can still move. See? The only reason you go down so fast is because you don't have any guts!"
"This is tyranny…"
"Good grief, you're pathetic... All right, I just had a great idea." Claire grabs Cid by the scruff of his neck and starts dragging him off.
Their father watches over their training in the mornings, but after that, he has work, so he leaves them to practice on their own.
They don't have a choice in the matter, of course.
Cid looks up at Claire as he slides along the ground. "Wh-where are we going?"
"You're too much of a wimp, so we're gonna go do some special training to build up your character."
"S-special training...?"
"Baldy told us, remember? The Scarface Gang is camped out in the forest nearby."
"Baldy" refers to their father.
Their mother was the first to call him that, and Claire followed her example. Children do learn from their parents, after all.
"Uh-huh, and he told us not to go anywhere near it..."
"Yeah, and that's why we're going!"
"Huh? That doesn't make any sense!"
"If we do, you'll be able to build up some guts!"
"Th-there's no way! W-we shouldn't..."
"See, you always wimp out so quickly! I won a tournament, remember? It's fine, you don't have anything to be worried about."
"I-it was a youth tournament... Oh, geez..."
Claire continues dragging Cid along, and eventually they leave the grounds via a side path and make their way to the forest.
<<•>>
The two of them have been walking through the forest for about two hours.
"C'mon, Claire, we should go home, this is dangerous..."
Claire yanks Cid by the hand as she plows forward. "What are you talking about? We just got here!"
"It's almost noon. Mom's gonna be worried about us."
"T-true... If we don't make it back for lunch, she will be mad."
Their father might be a baldy, but their mother is a demon.
"Yeah, think of how mad Mom'll be," Cid agrees.
"...Fine. Today's special training is now complete! You feel a little braver now, right?"
"Oh, yeah, yeah, definitely."
"I'm doing this all for you, so you should feel thankful!"
"Oh, I do, I do."
"All righty, let's head back!"
With that, Claire turns around to head back the way they came-and bumps into someone.
"Hey, no one said there'd be kids round these parts..."
As they hear the deep voice, seven men emerge from the thicket.
Their bodies are clearly trained and their swords are clearly used. These are no ordinary villagers.
"Wait, are you people the Scarface Gang?!"
"Hah, the girl's heard of us! Sorry, kid...but you ain't makin' it home alive."
They look down at Claire and sneer evilly.
"I-I should be the one saying that to you!" Claire draws her child-size sword.
However, her hands are stiff and shaking.
One of the bandits draws his weapon. "A dark knight to-be, huh? Maybe if we were normal bandits, you coulda pulled something off, but..."
"Wh-what's that supposed to mean...?!"
"Bad news, kid, but we ain't your run-of-the-mill thugs. Every member of the Scarface Gang is a dark knight. We go after all sorts of well-guarded noblemen and companies, and we've got an international bounty on our heads of over a hundred million zeni. Even a whole group of dark knights couldn't take us down."
Claire glances at her brother trembling beside her, then steps forward to protect him.
"S-so what?!"
"You're pretty cute, kid, so you'll probably sell for a decent chunk of change. The boy's gotta die, though."
"Don't you dare touch a hair on Cid's head!!"
Claire makes the first move.
She's far faster than any eight-year-old has any right to be, and she slips in front of the man in the blink of an eye.
Clang- a metallic noise rings out.
"Damn, you're pretty fast." The man blocks her attack with ease. The two of them lock swords.
"Rgh... Cid, run away!!"
Claire gathers strength in her arms, hoping to buy even a second more.
The moment she does, she suffers a tremendous blow.
"Urk —!"
It's a kick.
In the middle of their sword-on-sword struggle, the man launches a casual kick her way.
That's all it takes to smash Claire into a tree and send her crawling across the ground.
The difference between children and adults is despair-inducingly big.
"Gah..."
"Y'know, you weren't half bad. For a kid, that is."
"Cid... Run..."
All she wants is to let her brother escape, nothing more. But her wish goes ungranted.
"D-don't bully my sister!"
Waving his wooden practice sword around, Cid charges into battle.
"Cid... You can't..."
A tear drips from her eye.
"Oh, buzz off."
The man's sword cleaves toward the young Cid.
When she sees her brother fly into the air and crumple lifelessly to the ground, more and more tears flow from Claire's eyes.
"No... Cid... Cid…!"
— A precious memory flashes across Claire's mind.
She was only three at the time, so her ability to understand her surroundings was still developing.
Her parents had taken their eyes off her, and she accidentally knocked over a pot that had been on the fire.
Boiling water came gushing over her head.
She was only three, so there was nothing she could do.
Yet at the very last moment, someone yanked her back from behind. She fell on her back and avoided the water by a hairbreadth. She was saved.
And the one who'd pulled her backward was Cid, even though he was only one year old.
Claire's memories from that far back were all hazy, but that wasn't the only time Cid saved her.
Whenever she was about to fall out of a window, whenever a stray dog was about to bite her, whenever she got lost and started to cry, Cid was always there to protect her.
Even though nobody believed her, and even though the memories faded with time, he was always there for her.
That's why she hated it when people thought of them as mismatched.
She wanted everyone to know just how amazing he really was.
But because of that, she put him in harm's way.
"Cid... I'm sorry... I'm so sorry..."
As her consciousness begins to fade, Claire stretches her hand toward her brother's still body.
She thinks she sees him casually stand up, but surely that's just a trick of the eye.
<<•>>
The dark-haired child stands up as though nothing ever happened.
"Aaand...scene for the side character who runs in like a dumbass to save his sister and gets one-hit KO'd. I pulled that one off pretty well, if I do say so myself."
"W-wait, I'm sure my slash hit you..."
The bandits gawk at him in confusion.
"Nah, all it hit was some of the slime I'm testing out."
A lump of slime shimmies down from under the boy's shirt and flattens out on the ground.
"Huh, slime...?"
"Its durability isn't exactly up to par. Guess I gotta go collect more."
The boy sighs in exasperation.
He's surrounded by bandits on all sides, yet he doesn't seem afraid in the slightest. What an odd child.
"I was planning on coming and crushing you guys tonight, you know. But my sister does tend to be a bit of a wildcard."
As he talks, the boy picks up his sister's dropped sword.
"I ain't got a clue what to make of this kid. But hey, whatever. This time, I'll make sure I —"
The man's voice suddenly cuts off.
"Cough-bluh!"
He clutches his throat and launches into a coughing fit, hacking up blood.
"Huh...? Why're you guys so weak?"
Fresh blood drips from the child's sword.
The man whose throat got sliced collapses.
"Wh-who the hell is this kid —?!"
The bandits, who watched it all play out, draw their swords in unison.
"I couldn't see his slash! This ain't no normal kid!"
"It's fine, circle around him! He's just a boy, we can surround him and crush —"
"— Exactly."
The boy has already made his move.
"Wha —?!"
"At the end of the day, I'm still just a kid."
The second head gets lopped off.
"B-behind us!!"
Surprised screams sound out.
"My body and magic are both still developing. If you guys surrounded me, that'd be it. I'd have no way to break free."
The boy's voice comes from between the trees as a third and fourth head go flying into the air.
"This ain't real! H-how's the kid so fas —?!"
"Nah, I'm not that fast. A kid's body can't take much more strain than this, see."
Unable to make out Cid's movements, the bandits have no way to fight back as he slices off their heads one after another.
Five. Six.
Now, only one bandit remains.
"— Ah, I getcha. You're right. You ain't that fast. You're just makin' it look like you are."
A metallic noise rings out, and the slaughter comes to a halt.
The bandit with scars running all across his face is blocking the boy's sword.
"Your body's light, so you can accelerate and decelerate like crazy. But your top speed ain't nothin' much."
The bandit leaps backward and puts some distance between them.
"To make up for your body's shortcomings, you had to catch us by surprise, rattle us, and take us down one by one. Good thinkin' for a kid your age."
"Thanks kindly. By the way, does that mean you're Scarface?"
"That's me all right. Scarface, in the flesh." He readies his large knife.
Then he vanishes.
"—Behind you."
He's facing the boy from behind. As Scarface brings his oversize knife down, the kid turns and swings his sword.
The two blades meet — and the boy goes flying.
"You're light."
The tiny body spins through the air. Then he makes a graceful, feline landing.
'Cause I jumped backward. My hands are all tingly now, though."
The boy shakes his hands like he's trying to return sensation to them.
"You picked a bad fight, kid. My power, my magic, my speed — all of them are stronger than yours."
"True enough." The boy accepts the assertion.
"It's a damn shame... I may be a washout now, but I once walked the path of the blade, too, so I can tell. If you had ten...no, five more years, you coulda been a dark knight known the world round."
"Could be."
"It's a shame the world's gotta miss out on that... But my revenge comes first."
Scartace vanishes once more.
A moment later, his knife whistles through the air and slashes through the boy's body.
It should have cut him right in half.
"What...?!"
The boy's body offers no tactile resistance.
The moment Scarface thinks he's cut the kid in two, the boy's body disappears.
Then he hears a young voice behind him. "That was an afterimage."
"Impossible — !" Scarface whirls around to see the boy standing behind him, unharmed.
"Kid's bodies are fragile, so they hit their limits quickly. Which means all I gotta do —"
The child-issue sword comes slashing down.
"—is break those limits."
It casts a beautiful silver arc through the air as it strikes at Scarface.
"So fast...!"
It's a miracle he's able to bring his knife up to block in time.
Scarface grimaces as the heavy impact makes his hand go numb.
Now they're locked blade to blade.
Given Scarface's strength, he should be able to send the kid flying with ease.
However...
"Rgh, I can't move! Why —?"
No matter how much strength he puts into it, he can't make the knife move an inch.
Suddenly, the air trembles. The boy's magic swells up to incredible levels.
"Wh-why's your magic...?"
The boy's eyes are glowing red.
"Overdrive."
The knife cracks-then shatters into pieces.
The fragments sparkle as they shoot through the air.
Sliced in two, Scarface watches his own blood fly up as he topples to the ground. On his face, his eyes are frozen wide in shock.
The boy looks down and coughs up some blood.
"Cough... Guess that's too big a burden for a kid's body to bear."
He wipes the blood off his lips.
He cleans the blood off the sword.
"I give that thirty out of a hundred. A real shadowbroker would never get pushed so far."
He sighs.
<<•>>
"Sis, wake up!"
Hearing her brother's voice, Claire immediately snaps awake.
"Cid —?!"
"Thank goodne — urk!"
Claire tearfully squeezes Cid as tight as she can.
"Oh, Cid, you're okay! Thank goodness! Oh, thank goodness..."
Her chest is bursting with relief and regret.
"I'm sorry! I'm so sorry. You must have been so scared."
"Urk... Grh... Can't breathe..."
"Cid, Cid, Cid. Wait, what happened to the bandits?"
Claire's wits return to her, and she glances around.
The bandits are nowhere to be seen. The only things around them are bloodstains.
"Some...some bounty hunters came, and they all ran away. Then the bounty hunters went after them…," he replies as he struggles in her arms.
"I see... I guess that makes us lucky."
"Need...air..."
"Thanks for trying to save me, Cid."
"Uh, no problem. I did get sent flying, though..."
Claire shakes her head.
She's remembered an important memory she'd been on the verge of forgetting.
"You've always been saving me, Cid. Since the very, very beginning..."
That's what she loves about him.
"I'm going to become stronger. Then, once I'm strong, it'll be my turn to save you."
She squeezes him tight, determined never to lose him again.