On Monday, Sue and Kenji wake up and let the children stay in bed, as Kenji will be working from home until Wednesday.

  Lee wakes up and, after getting dressed and having breakfast, he goes into the woods to look for more material to craft a new bow and arrows.

  As he gets to the cave he usually relaxes in, he is taken aback, as there inside he finds a pile of bones. On closer inspection, he realises that they are the bones of a boar. “Could this be the remains of the Sabretooth Boar I killed?” He gets closer and notices a crack near the left eye.

  Lee is so distracted examining the bones that he jumps at the sound of a soft bark; turning around, he finds the brown wolf. “So it is the remains of the beast boar.” Lee then approaches the wolf and this one lowers its head and nudges Lee in the chest softly; Lee then lifts his hands and rubs behind the wolf’s ears affectionately. With a chuckle, Lee murmurs, “Wolves really are just like dogs.”

  Lee then walks into the cave again, and examining the tusks of the boar, he notices that they are resistant and feel like metal. So he holds onto the skull and kicks the tusk trying to snap it free, but he still is not strong enough to do so. Then the cave turns pitch dark and Lee notices that it is only due to the wolf having entered. With its paw, it pulls the skull out of the cave; once outside, the wolf stands on its back legs and then slams both front paws on top of the boar’s skull, shattering it into fragments, and the tusks fall loosely onto the ground.

  “Thank you,” Lee says and picks up the tusks to examine. As he turns them around in his hands, he notices that half of the tusks are hollowed. “Interesting; they are as black and sharp as obsidian,” he says, tapping the top end of the tusk. “But they seem as light and resistant as titanium. This would make a perfect dagger; if I had two of these, there would be no need to have wasted the arrows.” Lee then puts both tusks in his backpack along with some bones before exploring a bit more.

  Eventually, he gets to the area he was looking for; looking up at the tall bamboo, Lee smiles, but then that smile turns into a frown. He contemplates how to chop them down as he scratches his chin. Looking at the wolf that has followed him, an idea forms in his head. “Can you cut this down?” Lee asks the wolf, then makes a claw with his hand and waves in a downward motion at the bamboo.

  The wolf just tilts its head to the side, so Lee gets closer and points at its paw, making a slashing motion again followed by pointing at the wolf then at the bamboo. But the wolf still doesn't understand what Lee is trying to say.

  So Lee turns around and starts to break thinner but sturdy bamboo with karate chops; after doing so to six of them, a handful of memory fragments resurface and in them, not only does he see the images but he also feels that the persons in the memory fragments seem to gather some sort of inner energy into their hands. Lee experiences the heat inside that spreads up the body and down the arm to the hand that breaks concrete blocks and thick timbers.

  “Qi?” Lee says, opening his eyes. “Was that Qi gathering to enhance the strength of the hand?" Lee looks at his reddened hand as he remembers the feeling; then inside his body, he feels the heat, but in his body, it feels like the heat of the flame of a lighter rather than the heat of a fire.

  Recapping the memory, Lee still manages to move that heat to his hand at the fourth attempt; then he swings his hand down and the bamboo snaps at once, almost like it got cut with a dull blade.

  Then Lee hears a crashing sound behind him; turning around, Lee finds that the wolf broke the bamboo that is as thick as Lee’s arm. Lee looks at the wolf and smiles. “Thank you,” he says to the wolf with a bow, out of habit.

  Lee gathers more smaller bamboo sticks for arrows and ties them with a rope and secures them to his backpack; he then grabs the end of the thicker bamboo and starts to drag it. But then, as Lee is holding onto the bamboo, he finds himself lifting off the ground; turning his head, he realises that the wolf grabbed the bamboo and lifted it. Lee lets go and lands on the ground.

  This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  The wolf takes the thicker bamboo to the edge of the woods; Lee then stops and motions for the wolf to stop. “It is best if you don't show yourself; my family can get scared.” Almost as if understanding, the wolf drops the thick bamboo down and nudges Lee in the chest before heading back. As the wolf is turning around, Lee reaches into his backpack and takes a beast gem. “Here you go, Brownie; you can have this one as a thank you for your help,” Lee says and throws the beast gem up in the air, and the wolf catches it.

  Lee drags the bamboo the rest of the way into his house. Kenji, who was sitting outside with his phone in his hands, notices Lee drag the bamboo, then he is surprised at the length of it.

  “Lee, I was about to call you,” says Kenji, approaching and helping Lee carry the bamboo. “This must be five metres long. Why do you need this?”

  Lee drops the bamboo at the work-shed where he practises his shooting. “It’s to craft a new bow,” Lee says and shows his dad the old one. “This one broke, so I need a new one.”

  “Alright, but does it have to be this big?” Kenji asks looking at the bamboo.

  Lee shakes his head, then from his backpack he takes the two Sabretooth Boar tusks. “No, some will be for the bow and some to make two daggers.”

  Kenji takes the tusks from Lee and examines them. “How do you turn these into daggers? Even if you do, what can you do with them? Are they going to be decorative?”

  Lee chuckles. “They might be in the future, but for now it will be to cut and stab if another beast approaches me like the boar did on Saturday.”

  Kenji shakes his head then crouches down. “Lee, you are only five; you should be playing video games or watching cartoons. Why do you keep going into the woods? You have time to grow up, be a child, and do child things.”

  Lee looks at the ground, then speaks. “I will do it for the rest of the week.” Lee then looks at the bamboo and the broken bow. “But can I make the new bow first?”

  Kenji sighs. “Fine, if you really promise that you will do child things for the rest of the week and weekend, I don't mind that you do that bow of yours.” Lee nods with a smile, and Kenji stands up and as he is heading back inside he adds, “If you need help ask me; I will be finishing work earlier today.”

  Lee, after looking at the bamboo, drops his backpack on a hanger in the shed and goes inside the house to make a sandwich; once satisfied, he gets a marker and starts to work on the bow.

  He loses track of time, and having his headphones on, he jumps when Kenji places a hand on his shoulder.

  “Dad, you scared me,” Lee says removing an earphone and pausing the music.

  Kenji shakes his head. “I have been calling you for a while; come eat something.” Lee looks at his phone’s clock and notices that it is coming to four in the evening.

  After eating, he goes back to finishing the bow; this time Kenji goes with him. “Can you show me what you have done and how?”

  Lee nods and explains to his dad the process he took. “So now I need to sand down the shaft and polish it before adding the leather for a better grip and attaching the string.”

  “What about the daggers?” Kenji asks looking around.

  Lee points to the table on the far side. “I have done them; I just need to add something so that they don't separate the blade from the handle, and when I go back into the woods, I will rub them on a rock to make them sharper.”

  Kenji looks at Lee and starts to think. Then he goes into the abandoned gym and comes back with a box. “This used to belong to my grandfather; it is probably safe enough that you could use.”

  When Lee approaches, he smiles. “Dad, this could be in a museum,” Lee says as Kenji removes the machine from inside the box. “This is a stone disk grinder and polisher,” Lee says pointing at the two wheels.

  “So you know how to use it?” Kenji inquires, and Lee nods slowly; noticing his expression, Kenji chuckles. “Don't need to say anything else; you know but don't know how.” Lee gives his dad a smile and nods.

  After plugging in the machine, Kenji sharpens the daggers as per Lee’s instructions; then he goes back into the old gym and brings a drill and makes a hole in the boar's tusk as easily as if he was drilling plywood instead of something with the hardness of pure steel.

  Inside the grinder box, Lee finds a softer grinder; attaching it to the machine, Lee uses it to sand down the handles of the daggers, the bow shaft, and arrows; then, using something like tree resin mixed with beeswax, he polishes the bamboo, giving it a shiny coating that will harden and create a protecte layer on the bamboo.

  “Thank you for the help, Dad,” Lee says standing back and looking at the bow and daggers on the workbench.

  “No problem,” says Kenji. “To be frank, it was fun; maybe because it’s something different, but it was fun.” Kenji then picks up one of the thin bamboo sticks and asks, “What is this for?”

  Lee shakes his head. “That is to make the arrows, but I don’t have any feathers, and the bones I brought from the forest are no good.”

  “What else can you use?” asks Kenji.

  Lee shrugs. “I could just make them sharper in the end, but I will go to the woods and look for stones; there is a cliff where rocks are always falling.”