The square trembled with each step of the bandit leader.
He was a mountain draped in scars. His bare chest was smeared with streaks of black ash painted into crude wing-like shapes. The flames made his skin glow red, every muscle taut like iron rope. His cleaver wasn't a weapon—it was a slab of iron jagged at the edge, wide enough to split an ox in half.
Villagers shrank against the burning walls. Mothers clutched children. Even the bandits themselves stepped aside, heads bowed, no one foolish enough to block their chief.
And in front of him stood a boy.
Orin. Seven years old. Shirt torn, blood dripping down his chin, grinning ear to ear as though the night was nothing more than a festival. He bounced on his toes, fists clenched, his eyes sparkling with wild joy.
"Finally," he said, his voice too bright, too eager. "Someone who looks like fun."
The leader sneered, jagged teeth glinting. His voice was stone grinding on stone. "You'll be my first brat kill tonight."
The cleaver blurred down.
The earth split with a boom. Sparks, dirt, and stone fragments burst into the air. Villagers screamed, covering their heads.
But Orin wasn't there.
He had darted sideways, bare feet skidding through the dirt, his small frame light as air. He landed in a crouch, dust curling around his toes.
He laughed, loud and raw, ringing above the flames. "Too slow! My grandma swings stew pots faster than that!"
Gasps tore through the villagers. A farmer dropped his pitchfork.
"He dodged it…?!"
The leader ripped the cleaver from the ground, fury twisting his scarred face. He swung again, this time horizontal, a black arc slicing through firelit air.
Orin dropped low, rolled under, and came up at the man's side. His fist, tiny but sharp, drove into the giant's knee.
The bandit leader staggered half a step, more from surprise than pain. His eyes widened.
Orin bounced back upright, chest heaving with laughter. "Yes! That's it! Don't let me get bored now!"
"Monster…" a villager whispered.
The leader's roar drowned them all, shaking the flames.
The cleaver swept again, low and brutal.
Orin didn't run. He sprinted toward it.
Villagers screamed as the boy charged straight into the death arc—then gasped as he vaulted at the last instant, planting a foot on the flat of the blade and springboarding upward. His small hands gripped the giant's arm, and in a blink he was climbing.
Like a lizard, he scrambled up the scarred back until he perched on the man's shoulders.
"Wheee!" he hollered, laughter slicing through the chaos.
The leader thrashed, trying to shake him off. But Orin leaned down and bit his ear.
The roar that followed rattled windows.
"Stop squirming!" Orin shouted, fists hammering the side of the man's head. "You're ruining my aim!"
The villagers froze, horror etched on every face.
"That child…" a woman gasped, hand trembling. "He's enjoying it."
The leader clawed behind him, finally catching Orin by the collar. With a furious yank, he tore him free and slammed him into the ground. The dirt split.
Orin bounced, caught again, and flung into the wall of a burning hut. Timber cracked, fire hissed, sparks cascaded.
"ORIN!" Yira's scream ripped through the night. She shoved past panicked villagers, knife flashing, eyes locked on the smoking rubble.
The leader strode forward, dragging his cleaver, sparks trailing. "Brat. You bleed, you break, you die. That's all."
From the wreckage came coughing. Then laughter.
Orin stumbled out, clothes shredded, skin streaked with soot and blood. He spat red into the dirt, wiped his chin with the back of his hand, and grinned wider than ever.
"Hahaha! That one hurt! Finally!"
Gasps rippled. The villagers' faces drained of color.
The leader growled, voice like rolling thunder. "You laugh at death?"
"Of course!" Orin's small chest heaved, body trembling—not with fear, but with excitement. "What else is fighting for?"
And then the firelight bent.
Shadows clung too close to his body, curling like smoke, streaked with faint lines of blue light—like lightning trapped in darkness. The air around him thickened. Dust lifted at his feet.
Villagers recoiled.
"What is that…?"
"Cursed… he's cursed…"
Yira's breath caught. Her chest tightened. Terror and pride twisted inside her.
"ORIN!" she screamed, voice raw. "STOP! YOU'RE GOING TO TEAR YOURSELF APART!"
But Orin only turned, blood dripping from his grin, eyes blazing with joy.
"Why stop," he roared back, "when it's just getting fun?"
The aura pulsed once, blue sparks dancing in the smoke. Then Orin charged again, faster, harder, laughter tearing from his throat like war drums.
The cleaver came down like a storm.
Orin met it head-on.
His fist slammed into the flat of the blade.
CRANG!
Metal screamed. Sparks burst. The edge of the cleaver warped, steel bending like tin.
The leader's eyes widened. "Impossible—"
Orin's grin split wider. "Not impossible. Just fun."
He leapt, knee smashing into the man's jaw. Bone cracked. The giant stumbled, spitting teeth into the dirt.
Orin landed, spun, and drove a fist into his ribs. THUD! CRACK! The man gasped, stumbling back.
The cleaver swept again, desperate. Orin ducked, his heel flashing up. WHAM! The steel shrieked, the weapon snapped, half the blade clattering into the dirt.
The square went still.
A boy. Seven years old. Bare hands bending steel.
Orin only laughed louder.
"More! Don't fall yet, giant!"
The bandit leader, now weaponless, swung with bare fists the size of stones. Orin caught the blow on his forearm. The ground cracked under the force, but the boy shoved back, snarling through his grin.
Then he leapt.
He clambered up the man's chest, fists pistoning into his face. Left. Right. Left. Right. Blood sprayed, bone cracked, the giant's roar faltered into choked grunts.
"Fall! Already! FALL!" Orin screamed, voice breaking with manic joy.
The man staggered, knees buckling. Orin dropped down, both fists smashing into his ribs. CRUNCH! The giant toppled onto his back, dirt trembling beneath him.
Orin didn't stop.
He climbed onto the man's chest and pummeled his face. Again. Again. Again. THUD! CRACK! SMASH! The roar of a giant collapsed into silence.
The leader lay still.
Orin straddled his chest, fists dripping red, breathing ragged, grin stretched too wide.
The smoky-blue aura flickered once more around his small frame—then slowly thinned, dissolving into the night as his shoulders sagged, his breathing slowed.
The fight was over.
Silence blanketed the square.
The villagers stared, unable to speak.
Then panic rippled through the bandits still standing.
"Chief is dead!"
"Run!"
Weapons clattered, feet pounded. They fled into the forest, scattering like frightened animals.
The villagers did not cheer.
They only watched the boy who sat on the corpse of a giant.
"He killed him…"
"With his bare hands…"
"That's… that's not human…"
Some whispered prayers. Others pulled children away, eyes wide with fear.
Yira stumbled forward, dropping her knife. She grabbed Orin by the shoulders, shaking him.
"Orin! Stop! Enough!"
He blinked at her, grin still there, blood painting his teeth.
"Stop?" He laughed, hoarse and ragged. "I don't want to stop."
She shook him harder, tears spilling down her face. "You'll die like this! Can't you see? Look at yourself!"
For a moment, something flickered in his gaze—then his grin snapped back.
He pushed her hands away, stood atop the bandit leader's chest, and raised his fists to the sky.
"I'll be the strongest in the world!" he roared, voice splitting the night. His laughter followed, wild and unhinged. "And when I'm the strongest—every girl will line up to marry me!"
His cry echoed through the smoke and fire, burning itself into every witness's heart.
A boy. A monster. A maniac.
And none could look away.
The villagers still whispered, torn between awe and terror, when the last of the bandits vanished into the treeline.
The fire hissed. Smoke curled skyward. Orin still stood on the giant's chest, fists raised, laughter slowly fading into heavy breaths.
None noticed the figure watching from the shadows of the trees.
A man—tall, shoulders broad, hair tied back in a warrior's knot. His simple traveling clothes were torn from long roads, and a long staff rested across his back. His eyes, sharp as a hawk's, had followed the chaos from the first torch until the giant's final fall.
He had come by chance. Drawn by screams. Prepared to intervene.
But by the time he reached the edge of the village, the fight was already over.
By the hands of a child.
His gaze lingered on Orin, on the cracked ground, the broken steel, the corpse of the bandit chief. On the faint traces of smoke and blue sparks still fading from the boy's skin.
"…A monster… no," he whispered, a slow smile tugging at his lips. "A warrior. In the shell of a boy."
For a long moment, he stood in silence, arms folded. Then he turned back into the forest, footsteps light but mind restless.
This one… will shake the world someday.