The Dracula Castle, Milano.
Dennis was pacing back and forth in his room with a worried expression. He had even stopped playing games.
"How do I convince mom and dad? How do I do it… how… hmm… there should be some way… think, think, think, think…"
Dennis had a lot of unfinished work present on him. His parents had given him tasks to do so that he doesn't slack around and completes it. It was for Dennis's own benefit.
But in the end, Dennis was Dennis and he ended up slacking as usual and didn't finish it. Had he known that he would be invited by the Prince in a war, he wouldn't have slacked as much.
A few minutes of thinking later, Dennis sighed and gave up. He went to his study table and sat on it.
He smacked both his thighs and said while readying himself, "Alright Dennis, you can do it."
He was motivating himself to get to work and finish it as soon as possible.
While Dennis decided to work hard, the Dracula Castle had a visitor.
It was a butler in black and white uniform sitting in the courtyard of the castle. He was sipping on some tea and was waiting for the Draculas to arrive.
The servants of the castle notified them and it didn't take long for them to come give the butler a visit.
As Duke Reynolds Dracula and Duchess Fiora Dracula walked towards the courtyard to see the visitor, they couldn't help but be surprised when they saw the visitor.
It was a butler from the Royal Clan and they didn't even have to notice the insignia attached to his chest pocket. Just his demeanor alone was enough to let them know of it.
Both walked towards the butler and said in a neutral tone, "Greetings."
They hid their surprise of knowing that they had been visited by a servant from the Royal Clan.
Noman looked at them and nodded his head. "Greetings. Please have a seat, I've got something to talk to you about."
The two nodded and sat down.
Noman looked at the two and went straight to the point, "I am here to take Dennis. He will be joining His Highness in a war in the Neutral Continent."
"What?" Reynolds felt he didn't hear it properly. The butler was here to take his kid and dump him into a war? That was not acceptable! It was a matter of safety.
Noman repeated himself and when he was done, Fiora said, "I am sorry, but we can't let him go to war. He's just a child and there are a lot of risks involved in this."
Noman stared at them for a few seconds as he heard that. Wasn't His Highness the same age as the Dracula's son and not only that, despite participating in war, he was even able to marry so many high rank beings. Is he even considered a child?
Noman's mind subconsciously made a comparison between Lith and Dennis since both were of the same age. He was really surprised to know that he hadn't estimated his Prince well. He always thought highly of the Prince, but it seems it wasn't enough!
After staring at them for a few seconds, Noman said, "His Highness, who is the same age as your son, is participating in the war."
Duchess Fiora nodded his head. "We know. But there definitely must be guards around to protect him in case any mishap occurs. Who will be there to protect our son? If something happens to him, there's nothing the Royal Clan has that can compensate us for it. To us, his life matters more than anything in this world."
Despite being strict to Dennis with his studies and training, Fiora was still his mother. She genuinely cared for him even though she may whoop his ass for slacking off and beat him as punishment. Dennis was her only son and her motherly instincts were bound to act up if it concerned the safety of him.
Noman heard all of Fiora's words and nodded. He could understand her reasoning.
Though Lith may not know it, but he accidentally ended up selecting the best person for this job. Noman was an angel who was gentle with his ways and no matter how much the situation would escalate or how much someone in front of him was cursing him or being angry, he wouldn't budge or get provoked.
Dealing with the Draculas needed patience and had it been Ruben here instead of Noman, he would've already kidnapped Dennis and sent the Draculas a Royal Decree formally stating the reason as well. The Draculas would have no way of retorting to it and could only sigh and be sad.
Noman on the other hand understood the emotions of the Draculas; he was all in for talks and soft approaches. He wouldn't force the Draculas like Ruben unless absolutely needed and if there was no other way.
"I understand your emotions. But please let me correct you, His Highness is not guarded by anyone. He's alone in this." Noman told them.
Duke Reynolds raised an eyebrow and asked, "How is that possible? Does the Royal Clan not care about the Prince?"
Noman shook his head. "No, it's the opposite. The Royal Clan, or more correctly, the Queen and the Princess, they care a lot about the decision of the Prince and since it was the Prince who asked about going to war and experiencing things on his own, the two respected his decision and let him go."
"There's no one guarding him. He's on on his own out there. But yes, I wouldn't lie about one thing. There are two people watching over him and one of them is me. It's not guarding him, just watching him."
Duke Reynolds sighed. "So I was right. There are guards."
"No." Noman still shook his head. There's only people watching over Lith, not guarding him. Had that been the case, the guy who took Lith's photo wouldn't be alive by now.
Reynolds didn't talk any more on this topic with Noman. He knew Noman wouldn't understand and Noman wasn't going to explain himself any more than this. The matters related to the Royal Clan were always confidential.
An awkward silence fell in the place.
Noman sipper tea again and asked, "So, are you going to bring Dennis here or do I have to go to him?"
Reynolds looked at his wife and she looked back at him. They both sighed together. They couldn't go against the words from the Royal Clan but they also cared about the safety of their child. They couldn't just throw him into the lion's den and think everything would be okay, could they?
"Don't worry, Dennis is His Highness' friend. We'll be watching over him as well." Noman put out one final thing. If even by this they weren't convinced, then he would have to use methods he didn't want to.
Fiora looked at Noman and asked, "is there a way we can watch Dennis as well?"
Noman stared at her and blinked a few times. He couldn't believe that the Duchess was this ignorant about things. "Duchess Fiora, are you perhaps not updated with the geopolitics?"
Fiora didn't understand why Noman suddenly asked this question, but she replied, "I've not been watching news lately."
"Makes sense. The war which Dennis would be attending is being livestreamed by the government officials in the Neutral Continent on a lot of online video streaming platforms. You can pick any and watch the war." Noman explained.
"Hmm? Really?" Fiora turned to look at Reynolds and asked with a questioning gaze.
Reynolds shrugged. "I have no idea. I am busy with the affairs in our own society."
Fiora took out her phone and searched the stream. She soon found the one Noman was talking about and the scene that she saw in it greatly shocked her.
"I-Is… Isn't that the P-Prince!?" Fiora pointed at the screen with trembling hands.
Reynolds knitted his brows as he saw such a reaction of his wife.
He looked at the screen and soon noticed a dashing silver-haired figure sending his lance towards a skeleton and one-shot killing him. This video was played again on the screen but in slow-mo and the lance was shown more clearly again and so was Lith.
Lith's hot figure was seen throwing the lance, but the problem was, his face wasn't there in the video. It was blurred out. Only his god-like body was there and had Reynolds not seen Lith when he was younger, he wouldn't have believed it that it was him over there.
"That… does look like His Highness…"
Even Reynolds was stupefied as he saw this video. From what the video description said, Reynolds realized that it was Rank 8 healer than was one-shot killed and who killed him, the name wasn't there.
"It is His Highness. We have talked with the CNC officials beforehand, everything related to him is blurred and everything about him is confidential. To not get too much attention on him, we made the faces of a lot of people get blurred as well." Noman put out his thoughts.
Fiora this time looked at Noman as if he was an idiot. "What's the point of hiding the face? He'll still get a lot of attention on him."
"Hmm? How so?" Noman asked, curious.
Fiora facepalmed as she heard that. "You… Do you not know how his body appears like?"
Noman looked at the screen Fiora was holding and noticed Lith's body. He looked back at her and said, "I know how His Highness' body is and I don't think there's any problem with him."
"No! His Highness' body is too perfect to ignore. Everybody will know it's him if any word about it were to leak." Fiora said.
Noman looked at the video again and then said, "You don't have to worry about it. The data is well protected. Anywho, about Dennis…"
"Take him. We can't really say no, can we?" Reynolds was the one to speak this time.
Reynolds thought about things and only then did he agree to this. He knew that Dennis had a few artifacts on him that could protect him and there was also one artifact that could summon Reynolds or Fiora directly, so he wasn't worried too much.
But he and his wife tried their best to not put him into danger if possible, but with how their situation was, it wasn't possible to stop Dennis from entering war anymore and he gave up.
Going against the Royal Clan was not a good idea and he knew that this matter may even escalate a lot if he wasn't careful and things would be really bad.
So in the end, Reynolds gave up and agreed when he was half assured that Dennis wouldn't be harmed to death.
Fiora was still against this but she kept quiet when Reynolds said that. She knew he must've thought about things. But she was still hesitating on letting Dennis go to such a warzone.
The talks with the Draculas ended and Noman left the city of Milano after taking Dennis with him.
.....
A/N: Normal chapter. Only one bonus left to give away. I'll do it soon.
Upcoming goals:
906/1000 Golden Tickets (+3 bonus)
325/1300 powerstones (+1 bonus)