Chapter 2

Hello, Ann here, I've recently turned 3 years old and I've reached the point in understanding the language that I can listen to most conversations without problem, and I've discovered some things, especially about my mom recently, that have immensely helped my information gathering, what is that you ask?

Well it turns out she … likes to gossip, like a lot. I suppose it makes sense, after all there is not much to do if you don't work and it isn't particularly time consuming to take care of me since I'm not a normal child.

Most of her free time is spent talking with our neighbors and that inevitably leads to gossip, most of it is useless, like how the butcher's wife cheated with so and so or how some kid wrecked some windows yesterday, or how the lord of the city is very fond of beastwomen and other equally non- important information.

However it helped a lot to learn the language and every once in a while important information came up, things like how magic is real and relatively common, monsters exist and like any good isekai, so does the adventurer's guild.

And, it turns out, my father is an adventurer, that is why he almost never is home, because his requests are often merchant escort missions or other tasks that require him to be away for long periods of time. Those kinds of missions give good rewards for relatively low risk, so for a man supporting his family its a very good option.

This new information made me think on my future, what do I want to do, with my knowledge it would be very easy to find some job in which I could use my knowledge from my past life, this would be the safe option, as I would probably be able to excel and be relatively risk-free, or I could go out into the world and become an adventurer, like my dad, and explore everything this world has to offer at greater risk of losing my second life.

It was while I was thinking about this that my mom saw my focused face "Ann, what's wrong sweetie" she said softly, I couldn't exactly tell her I was thinking about my future career, no 3-year old would be stressing about that, so I made something up on the spot "Mom, is being an adventurer dangerous? All of your friends say so, is dad in danger?" There, that sounds believable, given I've recently heard about that.

"Well…" my mom says with a conflicted look on her face "it's nothing to worry about sweetie your dad is very strong, he'll be fine, you know, even a superd wouldn't be a match for him" She says, clearly trying to ease my mind

"Really?! But aren't they super strong and scary?" I act amazed, I think shes exaggerating, after all superds are like a boogieman, so I assume it's to make my dad seem super-strong.

"Mhmm, it's true" She says and kisses my forehead, "He'll be fine, maybe one day you will be as strong as him, but only if you sleep early and eat your food"

"Okay mooom" I say and she leaves me to think once more.

It gets a little tiring, acting like a child, but it sure beats being seen as weird if I suddenly behave like an adult so it's necessary, so, back to thinking, what should I do? Live a boring but safe life or a fun or dangerous one, well, it's not really much of a question is it? Do I really want to live a second life and essentially achieve nothing of importance? Hell no, I've been given a second chance, no way in hell I'll spend it in mediocrity, and given the fact that magic is real here I can guarantee there are things here I could have never imagined, so when I'm ready I'll become an adventurer and travel all around this world to see everything there is to see and maybe I'll find a bigger purpose, something that calls to me.

With newfound resolve the next step is to plan, and I think I have a couple of good ideas, unfortunately I have to be a little older for that so for now I guess I should try to enjoy my second childhood, *yaaawn* And that starts by going to bed right now.

…

When I woke up that morning I expected it to be like any other day, I'd get dressed, eat accompany my mom in her daily chores and then in the afternoon go with her to a neighbor's house so she could spend the time talking with her friends and I trying to get any info I could, however, it didn't go like that.

After my mom finished her chores and we had lunch, she looked at me and said, "Ann, do you want to go to the park?"

I stopped trying and failing to build a tower of wooden blocks higher than myself and asked "to the park? Why?" I hadn't been there before and wasn't sure why she brought it up, at the same time my Great Leaning Tower of Roa (10 blocks stacked on top of each other vertically) that I spent 20 minutes setting up fell over.

"Oh I just thought it was about time you made some friends of your age, I know you like talking with my friends but surely you'll have more fun playing with other kids"

Hmm, I thought about it, while I don't particularly want to be around a bunch of annoying little kids, I definitively want the chance to explore a bit of the city, even if it's just the surroundings of the park, so I agreed "Sure! It sounds fun" and off we went.

The park was a lot closer than I'd thought, it was in the opposite direction of the market in a space between a couple of streets I'd say about 10 blocks (there weren't really blocks but about that distance) away from my house, it's a weird distance were it's not far but I certainly wouldn't let a 3-year old walk that alone.

On the way there I saw a couple of normal shops but one of them in particular caught my eye, it looked fairly new, a bookstore, of course, I couldn't read the sign yet but it had an image of a book and inside a couple bookshelves were there, it could only be a library or a bookstore, either way I definitively have to go there someday if I want to learn more about this world.

Once we arrived at the park, I could tell this place was built for children, it looked like a park you'd see at any school, only less metal and plastic and more wood, there were a couple swings, some regular playground things like monkey bars, an open area for playing games some benches which were occupied by mothers watching their children and a big tree on top of a small hill where a bunch of children were gathered.

We started walking toward the benches, and I recognized some of the women were my mom's friends, so I assume their children are here too, before we arrived at the bench my mom turned around and said to me "I'll be here waiting, go ahead and have fun, but be careful not to injure yourself okay Ann?" She said while brushing my hair.

"All right mom" I replied and waved goodbye to her and her friends and started to walk toward the park.

Alright, what to do, I looked around the park to see where should I go, there are a lot of children near the tree, but I don't really want to be around so may hyperactive kids so soon, so I kept looking around and found a boy around my age playing around the monkey bars and climbing some trees around it, he was alone, but didn't seem to mind it, I saw an opportunity here, this kid seems like the type to go exploring and if he's alone that means I won't have to deal with a lot of kids, so I started walking towards him.

When I got closer I noticed something, the boy had cat ears! I guess my first friend in this world will not be human, what a coincidence, once I was close enough he was back to climbing the bars, but this time he got to the end and started hanging from his legs so I was looking at him and said, a bit awkwardly "Hello, my name is Ann, what are you doing? Would you like to be friends?"

He stared at me for a couple of seconds with the most deadpan look I'd ever seen in both of my lives, still hanging upside down mind you, an I noticed some of his features in this time, the most notable were, of course his cat ears, which were twitching as if listening to something, but also his eyes, which were cat-like and amber in color, his brown hair was quite long for a boy and didn't seem to be taken care of very well, and his skin was tan, all in all he was the perfect picture of a wild and carefree kid, and his intense staring was starting to make me nervous.

After about ten seconds that felt like 10 minutes of staring, the boy suddenly moved, he swung backwards and grabbed a bar behind him with his hands, released his feet and started swinging the other way, ignoring me completely. An "Ehhh?" escaped out of my mouth, and I had the most dumbfounded expression imaginable, this kid!? What's his deal!? Is he one of those silent types? Or did he just not like the look of me? At least say hello back!

I was surprised by both the athletic ability of this kid and his disinterest in me that I stayed with a surprised face for a bit before I said "hey! Don't ignore me, its rude!" However he didn't even turn back and kept moving around the playground, so I followed him, I climbed on the monkey bars and went to the little wooden platform at the end were he was, just when I was about to reach him, he looked back at me and did something unbelievable for a kid, he got up on the railing of the platform and jumped, grabbed a low-hanging branch of a tree nearby and with his momentum swung forward and got up the branch and quickly climbed some more to a comfortable spot on the tree and sat down, looking at me with a smug face, as if saying 'Bet you can't do that'

Now, I'm not a gymnast, but even I can tell that was impressive for his age, but I was too angry to realize that though, I mean the nerve of him! I couldn't let this slide, so I looked around, the tree he was in was tall, on its trunk there weren't any branches low enough for me to climb from the ground, so if I wanted to reach, I'd have to use the same branch he used, or climb from another tree.

Obviously, I can't replicate what he did, I don't have the skill or fitness to be able to do that, but I don't have to do it exactly like him, he was just showing off, so I got on the railing and jumped to grab the branch, I was barely able to reach, but once I was there all I had to do was move along the branch until I reached the trunk and used that as a support to climb the branch, it was hard for my small arms and hands but I managed to do it, after I recovered my breath a little, I noticed the boy was looking at me a bit surprised, I guess he didn't expect me to be able to reach him, after that he got up, came to the same branch I was and stood in front of me, he was a bit taller than me about two or three fingers taller, "Ray" he said.

"Huh?" I replied still a bit out of breath.

"Ray, that's my name" he repeated in a monotone voice. "Let's be friends"

I was surprised he decided to talk, after all it seemed as if he didn't want anything to do with me, but I guess I impressed him somehow by reaching him, I was still a bit pissed about him ignoring me before but it was kinda fun to chase after him so I guess I'll let it slide, but only after I even the scores a bit.

"Alright! Let's play some more! I'll race you to the tree over there!" I said and jumped off the branch before he could get ready, the fall was a bit high but after properly bending my knees and rolling after hitting the ground, I started sprinting toward the tree that was about 100 meters away, Ray, who was caught off guard by my actions was slow to jump off the tree and start running after me "That's not fair!" he yelled at me, but it was too late as I was already a quarter of the way there and he was barely starting.

However, my advantage was quite short-lived, I greatly underestimated Ray's speed and when I looked back he was gaining ground on me pretty quickly, with a bit over halfway left I had to pick up my pace or I would lose, so I pushed myself harder and was able to barely reach before him.

"Haah.. Ha.. how are you so fast? Haa.." I asked while breathing heavily, Ray on the other hand, seemed to be only a bit winded, he looked at me and shrugged his shoulders "I just am" and then sat next to me on the tree trunk, we stayed there for a couple of minutes while I recovered.

We kept playing together for hours after that, climbing trees, playing tag, hide and seek and other such games, I almost always lost, however I didn't mind it to much as I was having fun anyways, when the sun was setting, my mom came over to pick me up, and when she saw me all sweaty and dirty from running around, she frowned said "did you have fun? Try to not get so dirty next time"

"Yeah! I made a new friend" I said while smiling "Well that's nice, come on let's go home, it's getting late" she said and held my hand, when we were walking away I turned around and waved goodbye to Ray and left.

On the way home, the tiredness hit me, after playing around all day I was getting really drowsy, so I was walking quite slowly, when we reached home, I ate, cleaned myself and fell asleep immediately on my bed. Today was fun, I expected to be annoyed by the kids, but Ray was nice to be around, he is not loud and annoying like regular children, so I could enjoy being around him, hopefully I'll see him around, next time.

And like that, I fell asleep.