The same day evening;
Egrein City, Northern Qudour;
*Ding dong!
The doorbell was rung inside a lovely mansion located in an affluent neighborhood of the capital city.
Azzy and Flora were standing outside while wearing matching black hoodies and jeans, following the trend of twinning.
The doors were opened after a few seconds and Azzy watched an old man neatly dressed as a butler welcoming them at the doorstep.
"Welcome home, Lady Flora" "Welcome to Edward's mansion, Master Gary, I presume?"
As Azzy nodded in return, Flora dropped her usual cold gaze and jumped at him to give a hug to him with a smile like a little girl, "Grandpa Van."
The butler was startled and whispered, "Lady Flora, your in-laws are here."
"Eh?" Flora was taken aback, "Why?"
"Probably to test… *Ahem* your relationship." The butler hesitatingly said as he took a glance at Azzy. Even he was unconvinced that they are a couple, much less the people waiting for them.
"Alright," Flora nodded in understanding and looked at Azzy, locking her arm with his, "You ready, babe?"
Azzy felt uncomfortable by her sweet tone and more than so, her way of addressing him but he had to keep his word and nodded firmly. "Yeah, let's go."
As they entered the mansion and walked past the foyer, Azzy saw about seven people sitting in the living room and talking with each other.
They stopped chatting at once as Azzy and Flora entered the living room. Without any surprise, everyone was taken aback to see Azzy. As it appeared, his looks weren't the only thing they were surprised about.
Matilda, the gracefully looking lady, unlike her bookish image from the past, had criticized her sister in front of everyone. "Flora, I told you that we will be having guests. Pay attention to your image."
Matilda then turned toward the middle-aged-looking couple, and slightly bowed with a bit of nervousness on her face, "I apologize, mother-in-law, father-in-law for you had to witness that."
Shen then gestured for her sister to also apologize to their in-laws. Flora's expression changed. She looked like she was about to argue that she never heard about it but she swallowed her pride and slightly bowed her head for the sake of her sister.
Just as she was about to apologize, Azzy grabbed her hand and said with a smile, "Ms. Matilda, we were actually on a date and forgot the time. And this is an unofficial meeting between your family members anyways. Let's not get too serious by thinking about formalities that change with time, okay?"
Azzy's words took everyone by surprise, even including Flora. He supported Flora and mildly lectured Matilda at the same time. What's more surprising is that somehow the listeners felt like he was stating a fact instead of his opinion.
"You must be Gary," coldly replied Matilda, who didn't like Azzy. She further said, "You are quite younger than I expected. If I didn't hear the details beforehand, I would have thought that my sister is dating her student."
In response, Azzy maintained his smile and lied with the prepared statement, "I'm 43 years old you know, pretty much in my middle ages, if talk in terms of a civilian."
"Eh? 43?" Matilda's father-in-law reacted to his statement. "You are 5 years older than our Flora?"
As Azzy nodded, Matilda's mother-in-law commented, "You not only look quite younger than your actual age but also had the demeanor of a high-class noble. I say Flora's choice is good."
"EH? Noble?" Matilda was taken aback by the reactions from her in-laws who don't stand the sight of anything filled with indignity. She clarified them, "Mother-in-law, you are mistaken. He is a commoner."
However, her reply didn't appear to go well with her in-laws. The mother-in-law immediately scolded her with the same look of sternness that Matilda was earlier giving Flora, "Hmpf, the surname isn't everything as a child would usually take the surname from their father's family. A commoner like you who doesn't have a shred of nobility in your blood doesn't understand it.
I'm sure that this boy definitely has an ancestor of royalty. I can see it from the way he walked earlier, the way he looks at people, the way he defends his love, and the way he talks."
This time, it was Azzy's turn to get surprised.
This old woman was just a civilian. How was she so sure about his ancestry? Or was she just bluffing around by throwing things around to see if she can strike the target in the dark? He wondered. At the same time, he also felt a bit pity for Matilda for getting such a mother-in-law.
The mother-in-law then looked at Azzy and stood up, raising her hand for a handshake. As the father-in-law also followed suit, Azzy shook their hands with a smile, "The pleasure is mine."
After her handshake, the woman's hand shivered slightly and she mumbled as her eyes widened, "A special one."
"Hmm?" Azzy heard her clearly and his curiosity about this old woman increased. As he felt nothing special about her aura too, he asked the Reaper. Surprisingly, the Reaper also said that he doesn't feel anything different about this woman.
Azzy thought that he was thinking too much and proceeded to sit down alongside Flora before Matilda bombarded the couple with questions as if they were called for interrogation.
Starting from how they met and how they became a couple to Flora's likes and dislikes, Matilda asked Azzy a number of questions.
Azzy gave every reply according to what he and Flora prepared together. The more Matilda heard of them, the more she felt suspicious that this is an act as the answers were too perfect. In her view, a relationship cannot be perfect.
In the end, she asked a decisive question, "Don't mind me asking such a question but does our Flora have any bad habits?"
"What are you saying, sis? I don't have…" As Flora tried to defend herself, Azzy nodded with a smile.
Matilda couldn't help but smile and point her finger at Azzy, "Well, I don't think your boyfriend agrees with you."
"Babe?" As Flora looked at him and made some gestures with her eyes, Azzy ignored her and said, "Glacy is too full of herself, she's an absolute drunkard, doesn't know how to manage her finances and squander it away, speaks a lot when she gets drunk and even releases cold mist into the surroundings without knowing, she's also cold and doesn't smile to strangers."
"Uhhh… that's not…" Flora was stumped at once as it wasn't a part of the script they prepared together. She couldn't help but glare at him.
Meanwhile, the father-in-law who was also in the same situation as the others couldn't help but ask, "Son, do you really love her?"
In response, Azzy let out a smile and answered, "If you truly love a person, you gotta love their positives and negatives. After all, both of those qualities are the part of a person. And one shouldn't fall in love with a particular quality of a person but the person themselves as a whole."
"Incredible." Matilda's in-laws seemed to be impressed and even Matilda was surprised by how much clarity he had.
As the final question, she asked the question that's been circulating around the globe for ages.
"You seemed to know what you are truly talking about. Then, can you answer this? In the future when you marry Flora, one day, if your mother and Flora fall into a trap and are abducted by the enemies, who will you save?"
This content is taken from (f)reewe(b)novel.𝗰𝗼𝐦