Shinichi's first year passed in a fog of helplessness. His adult mind remained trapped in an infant body that refused to cooperate with even basic movements. He couldn't walk or speak properly, but he could observe everything around him.
Every conversation between servants became information he stored away. Every discussion about magic his mother had with visitors turned into lessons. Each book Stelle read to him before bed added to his growing understanding of this world.
The Sunvolt estate treated him with careful politeness that fooled no one. Servants spoke kindly to his face, but their eyes told the real story which is pity mixed with embarrassment. He was the family's greatest shame, and everyone knew it.
His father visited exactly three times that first year. Lord Ryose Sunvolt would stand in the nursery doorway with those golden eyes identical to Shinichi's and simply stare at him like a broken tool he couldn't figure out how to fix. Then he would leave without saying a word.
Stelle tried to compensate for her husband's coldness. She held Shinichi constantly, played games with him, and filled his days with stories about legendary heroes and powerful mages.
But even she couldn't hide the sadness that crept into her voice whenever magical training came up in conversation. Her son would never be a hero or a powerful mage, and everyone knew it except Shinichi himself.
On the night of his first birthday, he lay alone in his crib and reached deep into whatever part of him held his magical core. The Weaver had told him to trust his mind, so he focused on the connection between his scientific knowledge and this world's magic system.
Something answered him. A voice bloomed in his thoughts, soft and distinctly feminine. "Hello, Shinichi."
He jerked so hard he nearly rolled out of his crib. "Who are you?"
"I'm not an intruder. Think of me as the bridge between what you were and what you can become. You can call me Mynd—the manifestation of your mind, the gift the Weaver promised you. Your knowledge given form and voice."
When Shinichi closed his eyes and focused harder, light bloomed in the darkness behind his eyelids. A small girl appeared in the center of that light, with golden hair that's identical with his.
"I chose this appearance because I thought a friendly face would be easier to work with than some abstract concept," she explained, spinning once in place.
"I'm here to help you understand what you truly possess with that Light magic of yours. Together, we're going to prove that to everyone."
From that night forward, Mynd became his constant companion in the space where consciousness met magic. She taught him how to connect the science he knew with the magic this world used, showing him possibilities no one else in this world could even imagine.
...
...
The years crawled by at an infant's pace. Walking came at fourteen months, speech at eighteen. By age three, Shinichi could hold basic conversations and had started exploring the family library with his mother's help.
The servants gradually stopped whispering around him because they simply forgot he existed. His father stopped visiting entirely after Shinichi turned two. Even Stelle's visits became less frequent as she focused on managing the estate and educating his older half-siblings, children who actually had useful magic.
The isolation suited Shinichi perfectly. It gave him time to train in secret.
At night, when the manor slept, he would sit in his room with Mynd's presence bright in his mind and work on understanding light at its most fundamental level. They didn't waste time creating simple glowing orbs—anyone with the weakest affinity could do that. Instead, Mynd taught him how to manipulate photons in ways physics alone never could, how to increase their frequency and energy and density through magical means.
By age five, Shinichi created his first laser with concentrated beams of light intense enough to burn through solid wood in seconds. He practiced in the abandoned section of the estate where no one bothered to go, carving patterns into old furniture and watching the wood smoke under his control.
At six, he mastered refraction and learned to bend light around himself until he became completely invisible. It took months of practice to hold the effect steady and account for every angle, but eventually he could walk through the manor as a ghost in his own home.
By eight, he had moved far beyond what anyone considered possible for Light magic. He generated ultraviolet radiation that could sterilize wounds and kill bacteria.
He created infrared beams that produced heat without visible flame. He learned to manipulate existing light rather than just creating new sources, bending and shaping what was already there.
The abandoned east wing became his laboratory. He spent hours there with Mynd's guidance, pushing his magic into unexplored territory.
He created constructs from solidified light and barriers that stopped physical objects. He generated holographic illusions by manipulating how light reflected off surfaces. His focused beams cut through metal that would take blacksmiths hours to forge.
"You're learning fast, but you're still holding back," Mynd told him one night when he was nine.
"Remember, this is magic combined with your knowledge. There are no limits except your own imagination."
"If you can imagine something and understand the principles behind it, you can make it real. Light isn't just photons anymore, with your affinity, light is whatever you decide it should be." That revelation changed everything for him.
At ten, Shinichi created his first true masterpiece—a sword made entirely of condensed light that was solid enough to hold, sharp enough to cut through steel, and light enough to move at blinding speed.
The blade glowed with inner radiance and left afterimages when he swung it. He called it the Lightbringer.
By eleven, he had learned to fly by manipulating the photons around him to generate lift and thrust. He created barriers that bent incoming attacks around him using refraction and reflection.
He generated flashes bright enough to temporarily blind anyone looking at them. He could sense his surroundings by reading how light bounced off surfaces, giving him awareness that extended far beyond normal vision.
Most importantly, he learned to hide everything he could do. He only showed the weak, pathetic Light magic everyone expected like small reading lights and minor healing glows that barely closed cuts. He played the role of the family disappointment while secretly becoming something this world had never seen before.
Now, at twelve years old, Shinichi stood in his training ground within the abandoned east wing. Moonlight streamed through broken windows across dust-covered furniture and cracked floors. In his mind, Mynd watched with her ever-present smile.
"Show me what you've learned," she said. "Show me everything."
Shinichi raised his hand, and light answered his call. This wasn't the pale, flickering glow from his affinity test twelve years ago.
This light was alive and completely under his control. It swirled around him in ribbons of pure radiance, splitting into every color of the spectrum and beyond.
He created a dozen orbs that orbited him like miniature suns, then transformed them into blades, shields, and chains with simple gestures. He bent light around himself and vanished, then reappeared across the room in a burst of radiance. He focused a laser at a stone column until it began to glow red-hot.
"Beautiful, but you can do more," Mynd whispered. "Show me your imagination."
Shinichi reached deeper into his power. He created armor from hardened light that covered him completely. He formed wings of pure radiance that spread from his back and actually lifted him off the ground. He generated a storm of dancing light particles that responded to his thoughts and filled the room with brilliance.
The abandoned room blazed with light, transformed from a dusty ruin into a realm of infinite possibility. When he finally released the constructs and let the light fade, his breathing came heavy from the exertion, but his golden eyes shone with satisfaction.
Tomorrow, he would return to being the family disappointment, the boy with the weakest magic who everyone pitied and ignored. That was fine with him.
Let them think what they wanted. When the time came to show the world what Light magic could really do, they would all realize they'd been wrong from the very beginning.