The young seemed to have boundless energy.
After hauling steel at the orange grove construction site all day, Ace did not even need a moment to catch his breath.
Carrying the steel spike he had sharpened himself, he walked barefoot across the beach, still damp from the evening's receding tide, and waded into the shallows.
The seawater rose past his ankles and knees, splashing into tiny white waves against his sturdy calves. He bent forward slightly, angling the steel spike beneath the surface, his eyes, sharper than his age suggested, fixed on every silver shadow swimming beneath the shimmering water.
Whoosh-!
The steel spike shot into the water like white lightning!
When he raised it again, its tip had pierced a plump sea bream that was still desperately thrashing its tail. Its scales reflected flecks of gold in the sunset.
Expressionless, Ace pulled the fish off the spike and threaded it onto the grass rope at his waist with practiced ease.
Yet the rope held only four or five miscellaneous fish, each barely the size of his palm.
Ace frowned and looked toward deeper water. There were big fish out there, the enormous groupers he had once hunted off Foosha Village, capable of ripping open an adult's chest. But the tide was too low now. If he rashly ventured into deeper water and got caught in a rip current, even he would struggle to escape.
It was not that he was afraid to take risks.
It was just-
"Ace, come back before dinner."
For some reason, the image of that blue-haired older girl gently reminding him surfaced in his mind.
Ace pressed his lips together, rested the steel spike on his shoulder, and turned toward shore.
The rolling wooded hills behind the Orange Grove had once been home to ferocious