Family Meeting

It's monday again, can I have your votes?

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As expected of someone who held the position Archduke, her family mansion definitely screams 'high-status' in literary sense, even the entrance gate was massive, not to mention it's designed beautifully.

From what estimate the gate must be at least 15-20 meters at height, and inside was a large acre of land and most of it was made into a garden.

I can even see maids and gardens working on it, despite it being almost night. It makes me wonder if the term overnight pay exists in this timeline.

Lawine was greeted by guards of the mansion, and later a handful of maids and a single butler arrived to greet her.

"Well, then let's get going." 

But before we followed her, the maids took care of our baggage, and carried it toward the mansion.

—

It was definitely an eye opener, to be in a mansion this big. Rich people really live in a different world compared to us poor people.

As we got inside the mansion, different and luxurious furniture was all over the place, exotic paintings and items were hung and placed across the mansion hall.

Most of it was for appearance sake to keep their high profile status toward other nobility.

There's many things that are completely unnecessary around this place, but I wouldn't point it out anyway. It's their house they can do whatever they want from it.

I'm here as a guest not as a reviewer, as we arrived deeper inside the mansion, we reached the middle and at the wall was a beautiful painting of Lawine's family.

Her mother, father and two elder brothers, thus herself.

Clearly Lawine's appearance was more like her mother's gray white hair and that perfect oval face. The only thing that she inherited from her father was her blue eyes.

While her two brothers, the eldest has brown hair with slight whitish highlights and has the sharp face of their father.

I mean their father looks like someone's born to be a politician kind of vibe, that strict face certainly says more about his personality.

Then there's the second brother who is perhaps Lawine's male counterpart, gray white hair, blue eyes and a perfect mix between their mother and father appearance.

Seeing that I was looking at the painting at the walls, Lawine said. "That's everyone from my family. The woman who is my mother Louise, my father Eckhart the man with light brown hair. Felix the eldest son of the family and lastly Frederick the second son."

It's a mystery unknown even to me, in the series her brother was unnamed, same with her mother and father, it's nice to know something that others didn't.

"It's nice to have a family, you should cherish it while they're still around." I said offhandedly without any significance to my emotions.

But Lawine took it differently and misunderstood my intention. "Ah, I will definitely heed your advice."

I didn't notice the guilt and concern on her face, then I replied. "Right, where do we sleep?"

Lawine snapped out of her previous thoughts, then quickly answered. "R-right, follow me to the guest hall where there's plenty of empty rooms for you two to choose from."

—

After putting all of our things together, as we decided to sleep in a single room where there's two bed, we went to the dining room to meet Lawine's family, mainly her mother and the rest of her brothers as the head of the house was currently busy with the matters in the royal palace and would be staying there for at least a few days.

Honestly I'm glad that he's unavailable because he looks intense, either way it's time for us to meet her family.

As I arrived at the dining room with the girls, finally I saw her family sans the father in front of me.

To be honest, they look better in real life than the painting on the wall, but then again a painting couldn't really capture the realistic essence of their appearance.

As the mother noticed our arrival she greeted us formally. "Welcome the guests of my dearest daughter. I'm quite surprised when our youngest suddenly sent a notice that she'll have two guests today. My daughter, who is known for not inviting anyone to our household, suddenly brought two people into the mansion all of the sudden."

Lawine grumbled and a bit embarrassed of her reputation being exposed toward her idol and friend. "Mother…"

"My, my this is certainly a first for our youngest to act like this, yes I understand dear that you're embarrassed but you're so adorable." Her mother said teasingly at her daughter, then looked at our direction and said.

"Since you're already aware of my name and my sons, because I'm sure that my daughter told you our names. I'll be straight with you since this isn't really anything formal and I dislike formalities as they're pretty pointless and time consuming. Why can't people just be blunt and forward with their intentions? This is why I don't like being part of the nobility, politics is something I can't stand."

Woah, what an unexpected personality here I thought that the lady of the house would be more formal and graceful, but to think she's someone who dislikes politics and is very blunt about it.

No wonder Lawine was different compared to the nobles I heard about, if she has a mother like this. It is no wonder her perspective is skewed, not that it is a bad thing.

"Mother…" Lawine looked resigned, the same could be the same for her brothers as if they were used to this kind of thing.

Her mother didn't really mind those words, as she's more concerned about the guests, which is us, than her reputation as a proper noble lady of the house.

To be frank, I like her already. If every lady of nobility is chill like her then there would hardly be any problems at all.

But that's just wishful thinking.

"So, I would like to know the names of my daughter's guests." Louise the mother of Lawine said.

Well, I guess it's time to introduce myself once again, normally I wouldn't be so informal with a noble, but this was an exception. The lady of the house stated herself that she dislikes willy washy things that nobles do, so I'll keep things simple and short.

"I'm Stark and a friend of your daughter." I said that while facing her directly.

Hearing that blunt and clear statement, Lawine blushed at my words, while her brothers frowned at this, however the lady of the house, Louise, absolutely liked my introduction and made a great impression toward me.

With a wide smile on her face, she said. "I like this child, blunt and direct unlike some people I know. Where did you find him my dearest daughter? I wish everyone was as direct as him."

"Well she did find me alright, by dropping off my body." I said with a smirk.

And just like that the lady got interested and predictably she asked for the complete story. "Tell me everything about it."

And thus started to explain the entire thing about how the two of us met and at the end Lawine's mother laughed at the bizarre meeting between the two of us. "How unique your first meeting was, it's been a while since I laughed like that. Stark, if you ever have the intention of courting my daughter in the future you'll have my blessing and support. I may not know you but I already like you more than those snobs from other nobility houses that wanted my daughter's hand for marriage. You may be commoner but I don't mind if you're going to be my son-in-law."

That was really shocking to hear, this lady is just blunt like fillers don't exist in her mouth. Lawine herself became red as a tomato hearing her mother's words about me courting her would be fine and I have her blessing.

I caught her looking in my direction for a moment, but when she saw me looking at her, she quickly turned away from my gaze becoming more flustered and then glared tearfully at her mother. "W-what are you saying mother?! I-it's way too early for me to get married!"

"T-that's right mother Lawine is way too young for marriage!" The eldest brother joined his sister.

"Yeah, that's right!" The second brother also joined.

However, the mother looked at them in confusion and answered. "Who said anything about marriage? I never implied anything about it, I only mentioned giving him my blessing."

"That's essentially the same thing!" Felix slammed both of his hands into the table.

"It's not, my son."

"No! I won't allow my cutest little sister to be married to anyone for that matter! In fact, she promised that she'll marry me!" And at the moment everyone stared at him with a weird look.

I realized that this guy is a siscon, either way the meeting between us and Lawine's family was becoming a mess.

—

Author Notes - Welp, at least they're nice and not like this typical nobles.

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