As I dusted my hands off and appreciated my handiwork, I was attacked from behind. "Don't you dare act like your telepathy is dropping out idiot." Eve said growled as she casually kicked me into the cage. "Now I can't ruin Quatal's day with you, but I suggest you get started on that."
"Yes dear. Quatal, so what do you wanna do today?"
"Boar-B-Q. I also want to go see the people at the mine, I never said thank you to them for looking after me until you and Mama got there."
"Sure thing."
We both hugged and kissed Eve goodbye, then we headed off for a father-daughter bonding day.
I quickly began to worry about the local boar population though, Quatal's hunting abilities were no joke and I quickly had ten in my storage, this inspired a quick lecture on sustainable hunting.
"Papa, I know you don't like it, but I really want to fly with you."
"Quatal, I love you far more than I hate flying. I will go for quick trips any time you want, but I just meant that I'd need to work on being able to fly with my own wings."
"Yay!" Quatal quickly transformed then after I climbed on and prepared myself she took off, but kept the speed low.
"Quatal, I meant to ask, why are you looking more human lately? You used to like keeping some scale patches and couldn't even be bothered to add pigment to the human skin.
"I wanted to be more like Fala, she's super pretty."
"Ah, so you wanted to be more like her did you. Has she said which she prefers?"
"She said she liked the scales more, but I wondered if she just liked being prettier than me."
"Quatal, I won't tell you what to do with your body, but know your parents love you both scaly and human, the original and the new human. We love our daughter very much and you said you felt more comfortable in scales, don't sacrifice comfort for being pretty. I'm sure that's what Fala wanted to say as well."
"Okay Papa, human skin is still uncomfortable, but the scale dresses make it feel more natural can we go order some more? I've been growing a lot lately so I wanted to drop some off to the man that you were teasing before."
"Sure, we will get some skin over to the woman as well, she can get some clothes ready to keep up with your growth spurts."
Quatal wasn't joking about growing a lot at that time, she had been quite small and very straight bodied, standing at only about four and a half feet tall and barely a foot wide. She was a shape-changer, but she still had a natural human form and Eve and I wanted her to be comfortable in that body.
We arrived at the mine and she ran around thanking everyone while I prepared the barbecue. The sight manager eventually came over when he had finished his work for the day.
"Greetings, Adam. I see the little lady has grown up a lot since you took her home."
"More than I care to acknowledge." I chuckled briefly. "On that matter, I want to thank you personally too. Thank you for caring for our daughter, it is a debt I would like to repay."
"Think nothing of it, it was the pleasure of everyone here. Seeing such a vibrant life born here after the tragedy before, it helped clear out the cursed atmosphere. Truly, she saved this mine in that short time. Even if she was threatening to kill us all "If Papa doesn't come back"." He chuckled.
"Now she only talks about stopping me from eating the babies..." I sighed. "Oh, right, that's a secret but Eve and I are expecting by the way. I'm sure Quatal will want to bring them here when they arrive so they can see where she was born. I think she will be an active big sister."
"Congratulations! I'm honoured to be told though this will be the first time you deal with the baby days, so I think you're forgetting it will take some time for them to be ready to see this place." He laughed with joy.
"Hey, for all we know they will grow in days and be children in a week. Transcendence certainly made pregnancy a hard nut to crack, I doubt the weirdness will end with birth."
We both laughed, then when it was ready we all ate the obscene amount of boar.
Quatal and I then returned to town, dropping off skin for preparation, then taking some to the seamstress to place a large order.
"What do you want to do next sweetie?"
"I want to fight."
"Fight?"
"Uh huh. I want to get stronger and Cali wants to give you a piece of his mind to."
With that we returned to The Garden, a spot on a northern peninsular she had yet to see, far away from anyone else.
"Okay Quatal, come at me full force, everything you have."
"Papa. I want to get strong. I hate seeing you get hurt. I hate seeing Mama cry. I'm little and weak and that mean lady could hurt me and make you both cry. Make me strong."
I held back tears as I nodded. "Then Quatal, try to kill me. Until you can fight without restraint, even against me. Someone will always be able to hurt you and make us sad."
She nodded back and pulled Caliburn from her storage.
As soon as she put him on she lunged at me with incredible speed.
"I see, you didn't really move, just stretched with a partial transformation. Good." I spoke as I deflected the armoured fist then punched her, even if she was protected by a barrier, the inertia of a full power hit sending her flying left her dizzy.
"Papa, I feel sick."
"If I didn't protect you you'd be dead and Mama and I would be crying for the rest of time. I can't make your body strong, the difference in our abilities is too great, but I will teach you how to fight like me. Getting used to the dizziness and keeping a strong stomach is part of that."
Quatal nodded, then tried the exact same attack again. With a sigh, I made to counter her in the exact same way, but she transformed completely in to a smaller snake form at the last second, coiling around my arm then changing her upper body back and punching me in the head.
She may have lacked strength enough to hurt me, Caliburn on the other hand did not and I was sent bouncing along the ground until I came to a sudden and complete stop and launched back at her after healing.
"You learn quickly and you're creative, you will be a great fighter one day my lovely daughter, so I'll let you work on the fighting part yourself, I'll just make you dizzy until you get used to it."
I then grabbed her arm and span a dozen times in a second before releasing and letting her skim across the ground in her barrier. "Think I over did it a bit."
She arrived back to me a few minutes later sobbing. "Papa, I threw up."
"Oooo, don't worry princess, here you go." I quickly cleaned her up. "You're going to be sick a few times sweetie, don't worry, that is something else you need to get used to okay?"
"Mm hm. Papa, I don't think I can do it again today though, can you please fight normally?"
"Once more? It's good to always do things once more than you think you can manage, it will help you grow, even while using magic."
"Okay papa." She dried her eyes and shook off the tears, then charged in with an almost hypnotic flurry as she used her transformation abilities even more fluidly to make limbs disappear and reappear, shrink and stretch.
"You're amazing Qua-" Suddenly I felt the all too familiar sensation of a blade sinking into my gut. "I thought you didn't like pointy things after the bad men hurt you." I asked as I stepped back of the blade and healed.
"I don't, but I can't hold back. Not if I want to get stronger."
"Okay, well then I will make a sword too, mine won't hurt you obviously, but you need to get over that fear so no one can use it against you okay?"
"Mm hm."
I conjured a sword of stone then told her to try and defend, as expected she froze the moment she saw the sword cutting towards her. "Quatal, you're gonna make Mama and Papa cry, freezing like that."
My words seemed to snap her out of it and she held up Caliburn, who was in the form of a single armoured gauntlet and a dagger like a snake fang. The moment I connect though, she buckled and went limp making the force of the bow send her flying again.
I didn't wait for her to come back that time, I let her fly and bounce and crash, but I followed closely and cleaned her immediately when she threw up again.
"Sorry Papa, I got scared."
"Don't apologise sweetie." I picked her up and positioned her on my back. "You were incredible, I'll train you like this as much as possible, now why don't we go get some snacks to fill that empty belly of yours."
"Only two platefuls, my tummy still feels icky."