The first year passed slowly. The next three vanished like rubber on asphalt.
Time, Leonardo realized, moved differently when you had a goal.
He didn't waste a second.
In the public eye, he remained a polite and respectful heir—quiet, mature for his age, and still recovering from the loss of his parents. His guardians ensured he was shielded from the media, his name mentioned only in passing when DeMarco Motors filed patents or made appearances at niche auto expos.
But beneath the surface, he was building something far greater than what anyone could see.
By age eleven, Leonardo had outgrown every tutor Alfred could find. Mathematics, physics, and mechanical theory came easily, almost instinctively. Alfred, always composed, began to raise an eyebrow whenever Leonardo corrected engineering concepts or referenced vehicle dynamics papers not yet published in this timeline.
Still, the butler said nothing. His duty was not to question the boy's brilliance—it was to ensure it had room to flourish.
Leonardo began customizing engines in the garage with limited tools and strict rules. At first, it was harmless disassembly—observing, learning, recreating. But as the months went on, he began tweaking. Adjusting ratios. Reinforcing mounts. Designing small-scale fuel injectors and timing chains that outperformed their factory variants.
By twelve, he rebuilt a discarded 1970 Plymouth Barracuda engine block into a smoother, more efficient prototype that shaved a half-second off its quarter-mile theoretical time.
He never told anyone.
He just stored the notes in a locked cabinet, labeled under a fake name: A. Kratos.
Meanwhile, his physical training intensified. Without gym trainers or digital apps, he used stopwatches, rope, old weights, and the dirt trails behind the estate to build endurance. He boxed in silence. Shadowed imaginary opponents. Practiced hand-eye drills using tennis balls and garage walls. No wasted movements. No wasted time.
Alfred eventually hired a fencing instructor, framing it as "a refined art for a young gentleman." Leonardo accepted, hiding a grin. Footwork. Timing. Precision under pressure. It wasn't just fencing—it was combat mathematics.
At thirteen, he submitted his first patent anonymously through a shell company he'd set up under Alfred's supervision—who still wasn't sure how the boy had learned what a holding company was, much less how to structure one across state lines.
The patent was for a "variable compression ratio piston sleeve"—a revolutionary concept that gave naturally aspirated engines the benefits of modern turbo adaptability. Nobody knew who filed it.
And that's how he wanted it.
He didn't want fame. Not yet.
Instead, he focused on legacy.
That same year, he applied—quietly—to Stanford University's Advanced Engineering Acceleration Program using a proxy name and mailed-in entrance essays. He submitted physical handwritten exams under a blind submission system and passed with the highest score in the program's recorded history.
By fourteen, he'd completed the core curriculum for an undergraduate Mechanical Engineering degree.
Stanford never knew they were educating a child.
Alfred did.
But again, the old man said nothing.
Only once did he speak on the matter, in a rare moment during a rainstorm on the estate balcony.
"You're not like other children, sir," he said, tea in hand, watching the clouds roll in.
Leonardo had simply replied, "No, Alfred. I'm not."
There was no further discussion.
No one—not Alfred, not the staff, not the professors whose papers Leonardo quietly dismantled in academic journals—knew about the system.
He hadn't even unlocked it yet.
He could feel it there, buried in his mind like a dormant engine. Waiting. Watching. Calculating. It hadn't offered anything since his reincarnation.
And he hadn't asked.
Because he knew the moment it did awaken, everything would change.
And he wasn't ready for change.
Not until he'd built the foundation with his own hands.
Not until he proved to himself that even without cheat codes, he was dangerous.
He studied people, too.
Leonardo spent time at the DeMarco company headquarters under the guise of observing board meetings and attending family-held shares sessions. He never spoke much, but he watched. He paid attention to how power flowed—who deferred to whom, how lawyers presented contracts, and how engineers failed to sell ideas not because they were bad, but because they lacked persuasion.
In the quiet corners of those meetings, he listened to conversations in passing: market projections, rumors of competitors, whispered threats of merger attempts.
He began leaving notes. Anonymous suggestions, written in perfect cursive and slipped into the suggestion box or mailed in with fake names. One such note—advising the early switch to lightweight aluminum alloy in the street car division—saved the company nearly three million dollars in manufacturing costs within a year.
Alfred read the report. He didn't say a word, but he bought Leonardo a new drafting table that week.
Leonardo also learned the streets—not by participating in races, but by observing the culture. He'd sneak into local tuning garages under the protection of silence, his face always obscured by a hoodie or a mechanic's jumpsuit borrowed from the estate's staff. He asked questions, offered simple but effective suggestions, and left before names were exchanged.
They started calling him "Kid Ghost." A myth among hobbyists and entry-level racers. Nobody had proof he existed. Just strange stories—about a boy with hands too small to hold a torque wrench properly, but somehow capable of squeezing fifty more horsepower out of an aging Civic engine block.
He never stayed in one place long. He wasn't ready to be seen.
He wanted the world to feel him before they ever saw him.
On his fourteenth birthday, he rebuilt his first full car from scratch. It was a tribute to his parents: a modernized version of the S-12 prototype with performance upgrades based on his own design. It was never registered. Never raced. It stayed hidden in the estate's underground garage, waiting.
He nicknamed it Revenant.
Four years passed.
And with them, a boy became a phantom.
A myth in underground engineering circles. Rumors swirled about an anonymous prodigy creating blueprints so advanced they bordered on science fiction. A few whispered about a "Ghost Architect," but no one could confirm who or where he was.
No photos.
No voice.
Just results.
And now, he stood at the edge of fourteen—taller, sharper, no longer the child who woke to tragedy, but the architect of his own destiny.
The canon was four years away.
Toretto's crew still ran small-time local races. Brian O'Conner hadn't yet gone undercover. The streets were still quiet, but the roads were warming.
And Leonardo DeMarco was nearly ready to step onto the stage.