Its been a long time

I Dinner has already started. The guest has already entered the hall. Right now, I am in my room looking in the mirror. There are not many guests have been invited. The majority of them are all our close allies, like the Dunphy family, whose been serving under our family for generations. There are a total of two houses that works under us. The Dunphy and Carlos. The Carlos family is a baron house which is close to the borders of the Khar Desert. These houses are one of the oldest families who have been ruling the pendragon layer all this time along with us.

Every year after the harvest festival has ended in each region, all the families are invited to the Duke's house for a celebration party. The party is a means to get together with each other and also discuss the future growth of the land. Both houses brought their family member along with them to attend the party.

But this year we have some additional guests who came from the capital. They are here for some discussion and also for an inspection of the land. I am guessing that the main reason they came here is to observe us. Usually, they do this every one or two years and they would visit us when there is no particular event happening on our land. This time they intentionally came at this time of the year. So we had no choice except for inviting them.

The reason for this sudden observation trip is probably related to the people who are eying our land, the people whose presence I have sensed in my dream. We are not some mindless people who live in the countryside. We have a huge military and huge production of livestock. It's safe to say that half of the continent depends on our production. That's why even though we are a bit weak in terms of the noble status as we are not the pure blood Gondor noble because of our huge money and power in the military they were forced to respect us.

With the delegation from the capital and the Dunphy family, the remaining people are from the Baron Carlos family member. Mr Carlo is always a straightforward man. He never had any problem with anything and he is always loyal to the Redeemer and the Gondor. Even in my dreams, I had seen that Baron Carlo who have lost his house after our family's downfall, stayed loyal to the Kingdom of Gondor.

He has one son. His name is Rocky Carlo. He is a veteran soldier and also the commander of the Redeemer army. He works at the castle by managing and training the soldier regularly. Part of our military strength also came from his excellent commanding skills.

As I was thinking about the visitor Claire entered the room. She slightly bowed her head she respectfully said, "Master, everyone has arrived in the hall and the party is about to start."

I looked at her as her head is still down. Today for the occasion she is wearing new clothe and some jewellery. I looked at her for a few seconds before opening my mouth, "Go! I will be arriving shortly."

After giving my permission she began walking toward the door, but before she could touch the doorknob I opened my mouth again, "By the way, you look good in this new dress!" I don't know what happened to me at that time but I couldn't stop my mouth.

She became quite surprised after hearing my phrase and stood still for a moment. She turned around and bowed her head saying, "Thank you, Master." After that, she quickly runs out of the room. But at that last moment, I saw her blushing.

****

As I stroll through the hallway, I started to feel quite nervous. This will be my first time meeting Ann. Though I had met her one year ago, at that time I am a fool who didn't know what was good or bad. I even made her cry in our first meeting. "Damn, I am a dumbass," I said to myself.

I walked close to the door and opened it. Immediately, the whole hall room of people began staring at me. But I don't care much about them. I started moving my eyes around the hall and soon spotted a figure in a red dress. She has blond hair and two ponytails on her head. Even amid all the people, she stands out the most as her beauty radiates like the sun.

When we were married she used to hide her face often. Her beauty is mesmerizing and often leads to unwanted attention. So she was always extra careful. As I was glancing at her, I noticed she is also staring back at me. Our eyes met each other and soon a huge amount of nostalgic feelings surged inside me. On that day in my dream, I saw her dead body lying in our destroyed house. I never thought that I would see her again. My eyes became red as I nearly cried with happiness, but I controlled myself.

I went down the stairs and nobly greeted everyone by saying, " Ladies and Gentlemen. I am Aaron Kacper Redeemer. Today I welcome you all to our party."

Soon people started gathering around me to greet me. Among them, Ann's father greeted me and asked, "Master Aaron, It's been a long time. How have you been?"

"I have been well Sir, Jonathan. How is your health?" I replied.

"Good, good. I am so good that tomorrow I'll be fighting a friendly match with Sir Rocky here."

He said that by pointing toward Mr Rocky who is also close by. Mr Rocky quickly responded with, " What? When did I ever accept that proposal?"

"Oh come on, it will be fun and a good inspiration for the knights too."

Rocky Carlo and Jonathan Dunphy are close to each other and are also the same age. While Jonathan assumed the position of a landlord Rocky remained a warrior and didn't marry anyone yet. But they were still good friends and occasionally they practised with each other.

After arguing with each other Jonathan managed to convince Rocky, "Ok, ok, I will join your stupid practice match." Mr Rocky accepted the offer and quickly turned his head towards me and asked me, "Young Master, you should also join tomorrow. I heard that you have been working out recently?"

I knew that information might get leaked at one point but it doesn't matter now. Over the one and a half months, I've been training nonstop and building enough magic and strength that right now I'm an average C rank fighter. So knowing now will not create any huge problems. I replied with a humble tone, "Just the physical training. It felt that I had too low strength and I needed to improve my health a little."

"Oh, so that's how it is. Regardless, you should join us soon. I bet you didn't learn anything about the sword, did you?"

"You are right. I am still completely ignorant about the sword. I am looking forwards to our training together." Hearing my answer Rocky become quite happy. Jonathan also became happy for some reason.

As I finished talking with the other people, soon I made my way toward Ann. She is standing quietly next to her mother who is talking with my mother and Mrs Carlo. I walked in front of her and bowed my head slightly.

"It's been a long time since we have met. How have you been, Ms Dunphy?"

I looked at her. For some reason, she is looking rather surprised as if she had never expected this to happen. She replied to me with a blush on her face, "Thank You, Master Aaron. I have been well. How have you been?" Right now she is super embarrassed and she is showing a shy expression, but for me who knows her pretty well, I know how bossy she can be. She gets super embarrassed easily and when her head gets cools down a little she quickly changes her mood. There are the time I had seen where she even beat me up if I ever embarrassed her in public.

But that's what made me want to tease her more. As I looked at her with a smile and replied to her, "Oh I am fine. Thank You very much. By the way, Miss Ann you look very beautiful in this dress. Would you care to have a dance with me?" A direct attack. Right now Ann is like a hot red balloon. Her face became completely red. Close to her my mother and everyone else were also quite surprised. Especially my mother, who probably never thought that I would be this bold. After my proposals, everyone close by started looking at Ann to hear her answers. Even the delegation from the capital started paying attention. With all the heat in her head, she quickly agreed, "It's my honour to dance..... to dance with you." She bites her tongue. I started enjoying her show even more.

****

Dancing at a party is always the noblest thing of all. But at our parties dancing is not always that important. We usually hire a bard, who plays music in the background to lighten up the mood.

I took her hand and walked down to the middle of the hall. Right now we are the only people who will be dancing so the bard changed the music to a romantic song. We started dancing to the rhythm of the song. Every noble child has to learn how to dance from a very young age. So we both are kind of good at this. As we started dancing, I looked at her more closely. She is also looking at me. Her face is red as a tomato, but she also had a bit of an angry look on her face. I didn't pay any attention to them as I started focusing on the dance.

As our dance ended, the entire ballroom started clapping their hand and cheering us. Amidst the loud clapping, I leaned forward and asked to her, "If you don't mind tomorrow can you accompany me on a date? I want to apologize to you for embarrassing you in front of everyone." Hearing this she didn't say much, but she nodded her head before running off to her mother.

" Did she accept it or not?" I asked myself.

****

"It's a wonderful dance master Aaron!" After our dance ended, a plump man approved me from behind. He was one of the people who came here as a representative from the capital. His name is Duublee Roosevelt. He is from a prestigious Roosevelt family.

"Thank you very much, Mr Roosevelt," I replied to him with thanks.

"No, no. I should be thanking you for letting me watch such a nice performance. Anyway, care to have a chat with me." So he is direct. I didn't want to show my colour in front of them today. But Ann is much more important. Though it's a problem, the solution is also easy. Right now this guy is interested in me. Even a fool can understand why he wants to talk to me. He wanted to judge my character before planning their next move. But I am also 50 steps ahead of you. I can't just let you guys make any haste plan. As of right now, I have zero political power.

If I remember correctly in both dreams today's event played differently. In the first one, I acted arrogantly at the party but Duublee still talked to me in private. He asked me various things related to the kingdom and our land and I answered every single one the wrong. But in the second dream, he didn't talk to me since I was acting like pussy. So I guess they thought that I am a pushover and it was easy to destroy me.

I replied to him, "Of course. Lead the way." I will crush you eventually but for now, I will answer everything in a kind and garbage way, making them confused. They will not decide anything rashly while also delaying all their plan in order to observe me more.