The strange standoff between the two ended when Aisha appeared.
“What are you doing, facing each other like that?”
“Mom!”
Jeron ran straight to Aisha and immediately hugged her. When Luzbel had asked if he should hold him, Jeron hadn’t moved an inch and had only thrown a heavily guarded look instead.
“Oh my.”
“I was looking for you for a while.”
“Hm? You were?”
“Mm.”
Then the Marquis appeared behind Aisha.
“…Were you with that person?”
“You should say Grandfather, Jeri.”
“…”
Being asked to say something he didn’t want to say, Jeron clamped his mouth shut.
Before, he had called servants this one or that one, so it seemed that when Jeron didn’t want to refer to someone, he spoke like that.
Still, it was a relief he didn’t do the same with Luzbel.
At least he called him politely, “Your Grace.”
“Good morning, Jeron.”
Ahem. After clearing his throat for no reason, the Marquis greeted Jeron, and Jeron instantly frowned deeply.
It wasn’t that he disliked the Marquis’ greeting so much as the fact that he had already heard that greeting enough times today.
“Jeri? Grandpa is greeting you.”
The stubborn Marquis had mustered up the courage to greet him first.
No matter how much Jeron resembled Luzbel in appearance, he was also Aisha’s son, so it seemed he was willing to try to get along with him.
Aisha had asked him to, after all.
“…What am I supposed to do when someone greets me?”
With an unwilling expression on his sulky face, Jeron bowed his head slightly.
“Hehe.”
The Marquis, having finally received a greeting, smiled and patted Jeron’s head.
“?”
Jeron reflexively lifted his head. His expression was clearly reluctant, but the expressions of the adults watching him were nothing but pleased.
“Alright, then shall we go eat breakfast together?”
“Yeah.”
But that expression only lasted a moment, and Jeron naturally spread both arms, trying to be carried in Aisha’s arms as they moved.
“Jeron, Dad will carry you.”
Before Aisha could even reach out her arms, Luzbel snatched him away.
“Oh my!”
Hearing the word “Dad” come out of Luzbel’s mouth first, Aisha exclaimed in surprise, then soon smiled warmly, pleased.
“…Why are you doing this to me…?”
Jeron muttered resentfully.
“Aisha’s wrist hurts.”
“…Hiiing.”
At that one sentence, Jeron had no choice but to lower his arms. In that regard, he was no different from Luzbel.
The weakness of both father and son was Aisha.
In any case, realizing he probably wouldn’t be carried by Aisha, Jeron strongly insisted that he would walk instead, but it was no use.
“Seriously, why are you doing this to me…?”
“What?”
“…”
In the end, he had to be held in Luzbel’s solid arms.
***
Jeron couldn’t adapt at all to the changed atmosphere of the manor.
Up until now, the only one Jeron had leaned on was Aisha.
Flora, who stuck by his side and took care of everything for him, wasn’t bad, but there was no sense of reliance there. After all, she was just a maid.
But now, something was strange.
“That concludes today’s lesson. It seems His Grace has come.”
Viscount Ludan finished the lesson with a bright smile.
It wasn’t time to end the lesson yet, but the Viscount calmly gathered the lesson materials he had brought with him, then slipped right out after a light greeting.
He showed no sign of fear or worry about the Duke who had suddenly arrived.
As if this had all been agreed upon in advance.
Anyway, wondering what Luzbel who had appeared out of nowhere was going to say, Jeron watched quietly, when an unexpected remark came out.
“Jeri… is it alright if I call you that?”
“…All of a sudden?”
Luzbel kept trying to move closer to him.
“You can call me Dad too.”
“No thank you…”
“Jeri.”
“…”
“…Jeri.”
‘Ugh, seriously…’
Jeron felt a slight chill run through him.
He knew Luzbel was trying, but the change felt far too sudden.
And why was his expression so gentle like that? Why was he showing him that look he used to show only to Aisha?
Of course, it was still a bit stiff, but compared to before, his complexion looked much better.
“Jeri, would you like to take a walk with Dad?”
“Huh.”
Seriously, why was he like this?
“What is wrong with you? Did you eat something bad?”
“It’s not that.”
“It’s not?”
“It’s not.”
Luzbel answered firmly that it wasn’t.
“Then what on earth is this about?”
No matter how hard he tried to understand, he couldn’t.
“I realized it. That I had been wrong to you all this time.”
“…What does that… mean?”
“Do you know why I became obsessed with Aisha?”
“…Why?”
“Aisha was the only one. The only person who was ever gentle with me. For generations, House Valencia had a bleak atmosphere. There was no warmth like there is now.”
“…”
“So I became greedy and wanted to have her. From the moment we first met, there was never a single time I forgot her. Even after I knew she loved someone else, I couldn’t give up, and in the end I took her for myself. Not knowing it would become poison for both of us.”
“Ah.”
“I said it before, but I don’t want to see you grow up like me.”
“…”
Jeron’s eyebrows twitched.
“Because I was unhappy. Don’t carry on that unhappiness.”
He meant it.
In Luzbel’s eyes, which had always been cold and chilling, a subtle warmth could be felt.
Could this really happen?
Everything felt sudden and hard to understand to Jeron, but at least he knew it wasn’t a lie.
He had survived by being sensitive to others’ moods, after all.
“Why…?”
“To be more honest, I had no affection for you.”
“What? What are you…?”
“But everything I said earlier is sincere. Thanks to you, I realized my shortcomings, and I even gained hope that maybe I could change. I became a father without being prepared, and I am truly sorry to you.”
“Really?”
At Jeron’s muttered words, full of disbelief, Luzbel lowered his head deeply.
Whether in front of Jeron or in front of Aisha, he was a sinner.
“You don’t have to believe it.”
From the start, he never expected his apologies to be accepted.
“You can just stay as you are.”
Luzbel said it as if making a vow to himself.
***
It was, quite literally, a hard-fought struggle.
Jeron was watching to see how far Luzbel would go, and Luzbel kept pressing forward even after being rejected, again and again.
What was funny was that the Marquis had joined that silent war as well.
At first, the Marquis thought that since Aisha seemed to dote on the child, it would be good for him to get close too.
He also realized that he had been childish in how he dealt with the child, and changed his mind toward trying to treat him better.
But seeing that Luzbel was trying harder than expected, a strange sense of rivalry sparked.
“Jeri! Come play with your grandpa!”
“Jeri already agreed to go for a walk with me.”
“That doesn’t look like the face of someone who agreed at all, does it?”
At the same time, the two men’s gazes locked onto Jeron.
He looked slightly worn down from being harassed so much, yet he didn’t seem to dislike it.
“Hm. What should I do?”
That was because Jeron had, before he knew it, mastered the art of handling two grown men.
His eyes were brimming with mischief, and the two adults, who had to be Jeron’s choice no matter what, held nothing back.
“I’ll buy you a toy.”
“I can buy those too. I’ll buy you two.”
“…I already have more than enough.”
In just a few days, the toys the two of them had brought him could fill a truck.
With a Duke and a Marquis competing, there was no extravagance like it. There was already a whole playroom made just for him.
As a result, Jeron had lost interest in toys.
“Aw…”
So toys didn’t work?
Since this had never happened before, both of them were flustered.
“I will play with Mom. Today, both of you are eliminated.”
And Aisha, who had been watching the two of them with great amusement, was startled. She had been chosen without doing anything at all.
The two of them felt unfairly wronged, but since it was Aisha of all people, they couldn’t really say anything.
“Then let’s all play together.”
“…Together?”
“Yeah. You’ve only been receiving toys and never really played with them properly, have you, Jeri?”
“…It’s boring.”
“That’s because you play alone! If we play together, it’ll be way more fun.”
Both adults knew how to spend money, but were terrible at actually playing with a child, so it was only natural that Jeron would get sick of it.
At the suggestion of playing together, Jeron seemed tempted and nodded, saying okay.
And so, for the first time in several days, one child and three adults headed in a line toward the playroom that had suddenly made its place in the Ducal manor.
Now Jeron was calmly nestled in Luzbel’s arms.
The excuse about Aisha’s wrist hurting worked extremely well, and after being held continuously, it had become something he was used to.
“What should we play?”
“Um… I don’t know, Mom, what do you want to do?”
“Is it okay if I choose?”
“Mm!”
The maids watched the warm, cheerful scene with pleased expressions.
And when Aisha arrived at the playroom…
“Alright! Mom wants to play this!”
Without a moment of hesitation, she chose one toy.
It was a playhouse set.
“…When did I ever receive something like that?”
Jeron blinked, looking as if he didn’t really understand what it was.
