While the idea behind this is at least somewhat interesting, the implementation of Robert (and Darius to a lesser extent) in the first chapter was absolutely infuriating, speaking as someone who has studied how to sword fight and appreciates the difficulty of the art. I suck, and I've been studying for a year and a half. So having someone say 'oh, even a magical race with a built-in learning disability that only studies it as a minor can learn this stuff easy peasy' is a bit aggravating. And as far as the many vs one fights go, two on one is at least four times as difficult as one vs one. There is not one man alive or dead that could come out on top of a one vs five melee.

I realize that you will probably never read this, or even care, but I have been wanting to get that off my chest for a while.

Thank you,
Twokeyz

I look forward to reading more!

(This was meant to be posted before review of chapter 2)

If the children age one year for every two, how old are Darius and Mary? In the last chapter, you mentioned that the war broke out when they turned 17 and you made it sound like a relatively recent event. If this is the case, then Darius and Mary would, physically, be only 9 years old. Why would a 9 year old be having sex or be such a skilled combatant? For the ages to work, it would make more sense that the children's aging would slow around (or post) puberty so all your details check out. Otherwise, Leonidas should be the only to age so slowly.

Other than that, I like the direction the story is going so far and I look forward to reading more. Like Mary, I am wondering what Robert's deal is. How/why was he trained by Drault? What is he hiding?