"How much did he misunderstand?"
"Well, almost everything, to the point that he wanted to request the Marquis to let him go back home."
"Is that why he requested my father's audience?"
Lucas just nodded his head and prepared to leave.
"That is all. I have nothing else to report. May I leave now?"
Lucas yawned and looked exhausted.
Ernesto just waved his hand to let Lucas go.
Ernesto thought for a moment before he walked out of his room and entered the room beside his bedroom. It's Ndulou's room.
He entered the room without knocking.
There, he could see Ndulou sitting beside the window, watching the stars in the clear night sky.
"They said you're a very educated young master, but you didn't even know how to knock?" Ndulou said that without looking at him. He kept his gaze outside the window.
Ernesto didn't respond. And walked closer to Ndulou's bed and sat down.
A few moments of silence filled the room. Ndulou felt suffocated by the silence, so he spoke first.
"What is it, young master?"
He looked toward Ernesto, who was sitting comfortably on his bed.
"Bored? Need to play?"
Ndulou thought that Ernesto might be bored again and visited his room to bother him.
"Don't go home, I need you here." Ernesto softly said those words to Ndulou.
Ernesto thought to refocus his vision and review all the commonsense that he had forgotten because of spending so much time running around fighting enemies he had met in his previous life.
This turn in his regression was so peaceful that he ended up messing up and forgetting that this Nudlou in front of him was a fifteen-year-old innocent child. In contrast to his previous life, he was busy finding Ndulou and Fenrir or keeping Ndulou alive. His previous regression doesn't give importance to wealth and status because those things are useless in deadly fights and wars.
"Why? Is it because you cannot mess with the Duke's son, so you're messing with me?" Ndulou's frown became worse since he could see the bright smile of Ernesto being outlined because of the bright light from the moon.
"He really loves to mess with me." he thought inwardly.
"We can mess with him whatever you want. The Duke won't even bother us." He responded while smiling, "I won't leave you alone again. Did you get lonely?" he mischievously asked.
Ernesto wanted to apologize, but he doesn't know how. So he ended up making fun of him instead.
"Lonely asshole." Ndulou walked closer to his bed and pushed Ernesto out.
"Isn't your language becoming more rude?"
Ernesto stood up and looked at Ndulou, who was lying in his bed, covering his whole body with a blanket.
"That's just your imagination."
"Let's have breakfast with my father tomorrow."
Ndulou didn't respond and stayed covered in his blanket.
Ernesto stared at him for a moment, then left the room using teleportation.
Ndulou sensed the use of magic and removed the blanket that was covering him. "He teleported? What a lazy punk. His room is just next door."
However, Ernesto did not teleport back to his room but to his father's office and directly into his father's lap.
Flinched!
The Marquis was still busy with his work, even at night. He had thrown out his pen and papers because of being surprised by the sudden appearance of his thirteen-year-old child, who instantly appeared in his lap.
The butler picked up the pen and papers and looked at Ernesto with a gaze, saying, "You are bothering our lord again," but didn't voice it since he was afraid of being sent flying again.
"It's already late, father. Still working?" He looked up at his father while still sitting comfortably in his lap.
"Well, I am almost done." His hand gestured to his butler to leave the room. The butler bowed down first and silently left the Marquis' office. "What do you need?" he asked his child while pinching the child's left cheek.
"Oh!" The child wouldn't leave his father's lap even if he got pinched. "Nothing much." He paused for a moment after deciding not to mention what he originally wanted to talk about. "Duke Ayam's son is here," he told him instead.
"I know,"
His father removed Ernesto's untidy ponytail and started to neatly fix his son's hair. "I already sent a message to the dukedom. Why bring the child here?"
The Marquis was surprisingly patient in talking about his son's weird activities.
"Watson is pretty idiotic- ack!" His father pulled his hair to warn him not to call the Duke's son an idiot. "Okay, fine! He is quite slow, but he said he wanted to join our study."
"He did? Where did the two of you meet?"
"While I was sight-seeing."
"That is why you left the child alone to study?" Ernesto twirled some strands of his hair around his finger. "Well, I was careless. I won't skip class again, but you need to change the teachers! They ridicule Kuya Nudlou!"
"I know, but I won't change the teachers. They are the best in their fields."
This time, Ernesto stood up and faced his father with an upset look. "What? Why? Those bastards treated Ndulou lowly!"
"Even if I change them, the new teachers might treat Nudlou that way, too. It doesn't change the fact that he has a low status. Just stay with him in every class so he won't be mistreated."
"Status! status! status, my ass!" He goes back to sitting on his father's lap while grumbling about the nobles' weird society.
"Does that even matter?" he asked.
"It does matter, child; you won't be able to freely live like this without your status." The Marquis stood up and effortlessly carried his tall son into his arms. Ernesto was okay being carried by his father. He also wrapped his arms around his father. "Oh, you can call me a privileged child," Ernesto jokingly commented, while inwardly he wanted to say, "I wish you could freely announce Kuya's real status too."
He badly wanted to ask the marquis to take his real eldest son to the family registry, but he could not do that now.
The Marquis chuckled at his son. He walked out of his office and was now walking toward Ernesto's room. The father-son is already wearing both of their pajamas.
The two became silent while heading toward his bedroom. It took them a while to reach his room because the Marquis's office and his room are far from each other.
"Father." he called out to his father once they reached his room. "What happened to my older brother?" Ernesto asked his father, even though he already knew the answer. José Oliva put his child in bed, looking surprised. "Why do you— whom do you hear that from?" The Marquis' eyes were shaking anxiously.
"I just know? Why?" Ernesto acted like an innocent and curious child.
José wondered how much his child knew. His shaking finally stopped, and he calmly responded to his child, "He is long dead. It's already late. Sleep now, child." José tried to escape his child's curious question.
Ernesto just smiled at his father's response, but he was sighing internally. He felt bitter about his father's life decisions, but he could not disagree because it was for the safety of his older brother.
"Let's have our breakfast together."
The Marquis caresses his son's head and responds, "Okay, see you tomorrow."
"Good night, Father," Ernesto sweetly said to his father after his eyes became heavy and, little by little, he was falling into his dream.
"Good night, son." The usual low and sharp tone of the Marquis became soft and caring.
José watched Ernesto fall asleep before he moved out and entered the room next door. The Marquis moves so lightly that a sound cannot be heard. He stared at his eldest son, sleeping soundly.
Numerous scenes flashed past his eyes. Feeling the passage of time, he gently sighed.
Saying nothing or making any sound, he left the child's room with conviction in his eyes.
"This is the right thing to do," he thought to himself.