Immediately after King Arthur showed his gratitude towards Aiden and Flynn, the rankers of the Tower whom he had secretly contacted from the moment the explosion went off arrived.
The situation was then explained to them, after which they began to drag the offenders away to the Tower for investigation and questioning.
Following that, the nobles also began to go back to the adult's hall while others decided to start heading home. Today had been a far more stressful experience than they could've ever expected.
The King, Queen, Dukes and Duchesses from the big families and from some small families however, stayed behind, along with their children to discuss a few things.
"We already have our hands full with delving into fissures but Obelisk really is a thorn in our sides…" Selena said with a frown.
"We got too relaxed…" Leopold said with an even deeper frown.
Duke Reinhart and Duke Noah nodded their heads in acknowledgement at Selena and Leopold's words.
"The Tower's rankers and executives have been wondering why they suddenly reduced their vices drastically for the past year" Sebastian stated with a similar deep frown mirroring Leopold's.
"Maybe this was also part of their plan…" Duke Noah added.
"They were trying to draw attention away from themselves… Give us a false sense of security so they could sneak under our radar" Queen Hela declared.
"We really would've been screwed big time if not for your sons Leopold" King Arthur said to Leopold.
Leopold who should've been ecstatic that the King praised his sons let out a sigh inwardly.
'Haaaa… They're always doing dangerous stuff like this. I'm worried about the future…'
Snapping Leopold out of his thoughts was Anna's voice.
"I would like to formally apologize for the way I behaved an hour ago. It was unbefitting of a Duchess and I also disrespected the Royal Family and his highness greatly. I'll willingly accept any punishment that you decide to dish out" Anna said, her head respectfully and somberly bowed towards the King and Queen.
"If you're going to punish her, then please punish me along with her" Leopold also joined in, his head also bowed down.
King Arthur who saw this inwardly let out a small chuckle.
He then glanced over to his Queen and saw a nostalgic smile on her face. Selena also had a similar nostalgic smile on her face. A rare occurrence to say the least.
'The both of them really haven't changed all that much since our academy days…' King Arthur mused to himself after which he then spoke up.
"Raise your heads" he commanded.
Leopold and Anna promptly raised their heads up, awaiting whatever punishment Arthur was going to dish out to them.
"Normally, a severe punishment would be given for going against my orders, but, due to your sons and their willingness to put themselves in harm's way to protect so many other people, it would be distasteful of me to punish both of you considering just how much they saved our skins"
Anna who listened to the King's verdict felt so relieved after hearing his words and as a way to show her gratitude, kept bobbing her head up and down while thanking the King and Queen profusely for letting her off despite how improperly she behaved.
Leopold also offered his gratitude, albeit more formally than Anna.
"Well, all's well that ends well…" Sebastian said to himself as he watched both of his friends thanking Arthur.
He then heard a beep from his smartwatch, after which he then saw that it was a notification from one of his social media apps.
Upon clicking upon the notification, the app navigated him to a video that was currently trending and after watching for a few seconds, his eyes widened.
He then spoke up as he watched the video.
"Anna, Leopold… You might want to see this…"
Flynn who had been watching all of them while resting his back on the wall from a distance had a slight smile tugging at the corners of his lips as he watched his mother's head bobbing up and down as she thanked the king along with his father.
After watching for a few more minutes, he proceeded to move towards the reception that was probably less crowded.
He and Aiden needed to talk but right now, Aiden was talking to Adrian.
He had no idea what they could've been discussing about, but upon seeing the smiles on their faces as they did, he figured it must've been nothing special.
As he began to move towards the doors of the hall, he noticed that a lot of nobles were looking at him with newfound light in their eyes.
Some even had looks of awe on their face but he kept walking at his own pace without even taking in their admiration.
Suddenly, he heard someone call for him.
"Flynn!"
He knew whose voice it was and as if to express his annoyance, he turned around with a sigh and asked.
"What do you want Lucas?"
Lucas Ellfire, along with Ben Steelblade and some other young nobles Flynn could not recognize were moving towards him and they all stopped a few meters away from him with Lucas at their front.
'What is this? A gang movie?' Flynn inwardly asked himself.
Lucas who still had the usual disdainful and haughty expression on his face spoke up after a few seconds.
"Just because you can now somehow defend yourself in a fight means that you're any better. Your mana core rank is still very much at trash-level so don't even think for one moment that you're hot stuff. At the academy, I'll show you what true power is so you better be on your guard"
"Haaa… What are you really Lucas? Some third-rate villain in a novel?" Flynn asked with a tired expression.
He then continued immediately after without even allowing Lucas to get a reply in.
He could see that he was visibly annoyed by his response but he wasn't in the mood to deal with some entitled noble brat.
"Is that all you wanted to say? If that's all, then goodbye"
Flynn turned around and kept walking casually without waiting for Lucas's response. Even if he did, Flynn had decided that he wouldn't respond again.
Although Lucas was visibly pissed by Flynn's words, he held it in and looked at Flynn with disdain in his eyes, after which he muttered under his breath.
"Just wait till we get to the academy..."
Flynn who had now walked a fair distance away from Lucas looked forward to see Amelia staring at him with complex emotions in her eyes.
The silvery green haired youth who couldn't be bothered by her gaze just walked past her, pretending that he didn't notice her.
As he did, he inwardly thought to himself.
'I really just want to rest and get a good night's sleep at this point. I wonder when the Royal Family and the Ducal houses will be done with their conversations…'
"Yo!" Aiden said as he walked over to Flynn.
He had finally left Adrian and just as he was about to talk to Flynn regarding the huge changes they had already made at the early stages of story, he heard his mum's voice calling him.
"Aiden Belmont! Flynn Belmont! Get over here right now!"
Both Aiden and Flynn felt a shiver run down their spines the moment they heard their mum call them like that.
Their mum usually uses terms of endearment to call them but on the rare chance that she called them by their names, they knew they were screwed.
'I thought she said she'd scold us later!' Flynn inwardly complained to himself as both he and Aiden swiftly walked back over to their mum.
"On your knees now! Both of you!" Anna commanded.
"Yes ma'am!" the two brothers responded like they had been nurtured at a military school, immediately getting on their knees without even minding the confused stares they were getting from other nobles.
"Do you know what you did Aiden?!" Anna asked, her voice icy and cold.
Aiden who tried to rack his brain about what could've caused this sudden turn of events looked at Sebastian and Leopold who just shook their heads in sympathy.
They had both tried to stop Anna a few minutes ago when they all saw the video of Aiden flipping through the air on a motorcycle and phasing through what seemed to be an illusion of a wall but Anna was not in the mood to listen to them.
Anna upon seeing this immediately began to storm over to him, her aura switching into full-on scolding mode.
She was already really worried and also quite annoyed that they had both done something so reckless after they had promised that they wouldn't but she had decided to leave them be considering they had done it to save so many lives.
However, after seeing the stunt Aiden had pulled with the motorcycle, she immediately lost whatever suppressive strength she had over her anger and decided that she was going to chew them out right here and now, especially Aiden because of how dangerous what he had done was.
Flynn as a result, became collateral damage as she also scolded him along with Aiden, even though she had originally planned to leave them be.
"You're always so reckless! Both of you! You did something really similar just a year and some months ago!"
Selena and Queen Hela who watched Anna continuously scold her two sons without care for the time and place she was at, both glanced at each other, chuckled at the sight before them and just smiled with a singular thought on their minds.
'She really hasn't changed even after all these years…'
Anna continued her motherly scolding for what seemed to be about ten minutes without a single care in the world.
By the time she was done, Aiden felt and looked like as if his soul was barely hanging onto his body.
Flynn on the other hand was in much better shape, although he looked even more tired than he previously was.
Some of the younger nobles, especially Caroline, Adrian and Beatrice who saw this sight of the two brothers looking like they had their souls sucked out of them burst into laughter while wiping tears from their eyes.
For the longest time, they all had not seen people who were so unfiltered with their lives despite the fact that they were nobles. It was a pretty amusing yet fresh sight to see for so many of them.
Both brothers slowly dragged themselves out of the hall they were presently in and over to the reception hall that was now quite empty after they made another half-hearted promise to their mother that they wouldn't do something so reckless again.
"Why was I scolded even more than you?" Aiden asked bitterly with a mumble.
"Perks of being the older brother" Flynn replied.
"You!… Haaa~…" Aiden sighed and responded with a tired glare to Flynn as they kept trudging through the long hallways.
As they got to the reception hall, they proceeded to move out of the hall instead.
Upon stepping out of the large automatic glass doors, a cool night breeze washed over both of them, tousling their hair and giving both of them a calming sensation. Aiden was the first to speak up.
"Say Flynn?"
"Yeah"
"Do we have a thing for bashing people's heads into the ground in our family?"
"Huh?"
"Well, remember the warehouse incident?"
"I do, but what's this about exactly?" Flynn asked with a squint.
"Dad bashed the bodyguard's head a few times into the concrete after landing on him. I did the same just a few hours ago to one of the guards and you probably also did the same, considering the hole that was left beneath the heads of those two masked men"
"Hmmm… I see your point…"
"Maybe. Just maybe it's hereditary" Aiden said with a slight smile on his lips.
"Maybe…" Flynn also replied, a slight smile also tugging on the corners of his lips.
-Woosh…
Another cool breeze blew by, causing their shirts to flutter with the wind. Flynn was the one who spoke up this time.
"We've completely messed up the storyline haven't we?"
"Yes we have…" Aiden responded calmly.
"We won't be able to depend on it anymore" Flynn continued.
"I know" Aiden responded after which he then added.
"But it'll be alright... I hope. We'll deal with the consequences of our actions as we move on…"
"Yeah, and this won't be the last time…" Flynn said as he looked at his brother.
Both of them then smiled knowingly at each other before they then chanted in unison.
"Because we're just getting started!"