"Jack! Come and meet the kids of the hour!"
"Haha! Let the kids meet first! We are getting old and need them to get used to other's their own age!" Jack looked down at his son as he nudged his son forward, "Go on Jason, introduce yourself..."
Jason looked nervous as he looked more to Edmund as he spoke, "H-Hello, my name is Jason."
"Nice to meet you Jason, this is my son and daughter who are turning six today." Edmund turned to the twins and looked at them as he gestured for them to introduce themselves, "Go on."
Ambrose and Lily glanced at each other before giving an awkward, "H-Hello..."
Seeing this Edmund covered his face with his hand in disappointment, "And your names?"
The twins looked surprised as they looked at each other again as if asking why didn't the other say something. After staring at each other for a few moments they turned their attention back to the child.
Ambrose spoke first with his awkward tone, "He-Hello... Umm... My name is Ambrose..." After saying his name he elbowed his sister.
Lily followed suit as she coughed once before clearing her throat and speaking in a similar awkward tone, "Umm... Hello?... My name is Lily..."
Seeing how they acted Edmund was starting to wonder if these children were really his kids. His kids talked down to him whenever they saw him farming. His kids spoke with confidence whenever they talked about what they did. Yet here were two children that should be his, but instead of confidence they spoke with a question even when simply saying hello!
With a hand over his face, Edmund spoke, "Why? *sigh* I am sorry Jack. They haven't talked with many people, but normally they aren't this shy."
"HAHA! It's okay! Just look at my little Jason, he can barely say hi as well! HAHA!"
The fathers started talking and laughing together making fun of the three who didn't know how to talk.
Ambrose knew that if he was meeting Jason now, he would likely be invited to his sixth celebration soon. So he gathered his courage and started talking again, "Hey, Jason, umm... do you like plants?"
Jason gave Ambrose a confused look as he asked back, "Why would I like something that has to do with chores?"
Joining the conversation Lily loudly spoke out, "How can you not like it?!"
Four children looked at each other in confusion. All of them wondering what is wrong with the other person.
Aroura who had been silent the entire time spoke up with her own question, "What is chores?"
Although Adeline and Edmund had tried to impose chores on the twins, they had always pushed back enough and brought enough food that it was basically ignored. Aroura on the other hand was almost always with her siblings and simply followed their example. Their parents had already felt helpless with the twins and didn't even try to impose chores onto Aroura.
Lily who hadn't stopped hugging Aroura spoke up and explained, "Well chores are tasks that parents impose on their kids. But doing things like that is boring and not much gets done anyway, so we often made up our own chores to placate mom and dad."
Jason looked at the pair in surprise as he looked at them in wonder, "So you don't have chores! You get to make it yourselves!" Suddenly forgetting all nervousness Jason almost jumped in excitement as he asked loudly, "So can you just say running around is your chores for today and your parents agre~e'?!"
Ambrose seemingly frightened backed up from the screaming child and got closer to his sisters, "No, chores are tasks that should help with something so we bring food home. Or increase the productivity of the farm. Aroura you learn how to read and write as your chores as it is something that will help you in the future when you have to take your Mana exam."
Suddenly Jason stopped all happiness as he realized that his idealized life vanished in front of his eyes. Looking down he seemed to find all his nervousness as he spoke softly, "Oh-... I wish I had more time to whittle..."
Aroura didn't have any of the nervousness of her siblings and spoke excitedly, "What's whittling!"
Looking around nervously, Jason spoke while avoiding eye contact, "Well... Whittling is... Well... It is when you have this knife... and... you have this piece of wood... well you use the knife to shape the wood... and yeah... that is whittling..." Jason spoke with more and more nervousness until his voice got softer until he stopped speaking entirely.
"OOOH! Can you show me!" Aroura shouted excitedly. After all, she had heard plenty about farming and genetic engineering from her siblings, but nothing about this new fangled 'whittling' thing.
Seeing her interest, Jason spoke up with some newfound confidence, "Umm... Sure! Um, do you have some wood?" While saying wood he took out a small knife from his pocket.
"Yeah! Wait here!" After saying that Aroura wiggled out her sister's arms as she quickly ran to find wood. This left her siblings standing awkwardly.
Feeling like they had lost their support, the twins began to look around awkwardly. This awkwardness only lasted a few seconds, but for the twins, it felt like an eternity as they struggled to act natural.
Thankfully Aroura was there to save them from the strangly silent atmosphere, "Here!" Handing Jason a piece of wood, Aroura waited excitedly as she wondered what he could do with it.
Jason seemingly finding his place in the world quickly grabbed the wood and got to work carving it with a very serious face. Granted this seriousness was on the face of a child leading him to look a bit silly.
The twins were left standing wondering what they were even doing. Aroura was staring intently at Jason as he skillfully whittled away at the piece of wood.
Luckily, or unfortunately considering how you view the world, someone else decided to join them.
"COME ON! Mom said we have to talk to them!" A little girl was pulling her brother hard by the arm.
"NO! Let me sit in peace! I am so tired from rushing the chores this morning!" Although he was complaining, he obviously didn't put any force in pulling away from his little sister.