It was noon, and the blazing sun hung high overhead.
East Blue, Shimotsuki Village.
On the dirt road leading to Shimotsuki Dojo, quite a few farmers were bent over in the rice paddies on either side, swinging sickles as they harvested the ripened rice.
With his hands in his pockets, Sephiroth strolled toward Shimotsuki Dojo while admiring the pastoral scenery.
When he was about to reach his destination, he saw Kuina sitting on a roadside stone, constantly wiping away her tears with a handkerchief.
Her eye sockets were swollen and her eyes were red. She had probably been crying for quite a while...
Seeing this, Sephiroth quickened his pace, crouched down, and looked at the blue-haired little girl with a puzzled expression.
"What's wrong? Why are you crying?"
"Today, I told Father that I wanted to become the world's greatest Great Swordsman. But he told me that girls have certain physical limitations... that they can never become the world's greatest Great Swordsman..."
Hearing that, Sephiroth immediately chuckled. He reached out and rubbed the little girl's head, comforting her.
"Don't listen to your father's nonsense! What determines whether someone can become the world's greatest Great Swordsman isn't gender, but talent and perseverance."
"Really?"
Kuina blankly raised her head and looked at the silver-haired young man whose handsome features were almost strangely bewitching. A trace of hope rekindled in her eyes.
"Of course it's true... This world is vast, and it contains all kinds of different races! By your father's logic, the race that should produce the world's greatest Great Swordsman ought to be the Fish-Man Race, whose natural arm strength is ten times that of humans, or the Giants, who are born enormous and incomparably powerful... There would be no place at all for ordinary humans like us to compete for