"Greetings, Lady Bethany." Lucius said with a smile, as he greeted her with the etiquette of a noble.
His right hand was placed right below the broach as he slightly nodded his head. If his rank was lower than her, he would have lowered his head, but since it was above, just a nod was enough. Lucius had already memorized all the etiquette of a noble beforehand so that he would never make a mistake.
"A-Ah… Young Lord Asher, welcome!" Bethany said, fumbling over her words and blushing.
"The pleasure is all mine. Pardon me if I came without invitation, my friends assured me that it would be fine." Lucius stated.
"Of course it is, isn't it, Bethany?" Andrew suddenly said.
"Yes, yes. If I knew you were so approachable, I would have sent a personal invitation to you too." Bethany replied.
"Haha, it's fine then. At least we get to meet properly now." Lucius stated.
They exchanged a few more pleasantries with everyone before going to take a drink for themselves. Kiana silently followed Lucius from behind while keeping a calm face, and Donald did the same.
Just as Lucius had taken a glass of wine, he heard something.
~Crack~
~Crash~
"You imbeciles! Can't you even serve properly! Servants like you should just be beheaded at once." A blonde man who was wearing a white suit cursed.
In front of him, a maid could be seen lying on the ground while her head bled. There were a bunch of broken glasses and a tray lying near her feet. It was evident that this maid had some conflict with this blonde man just now.
"Young Lord Keith!" The voice of Bethany could be heard coming from the side.
She hurriedly approached them and saw the scene.
"What happened, young lord Keith?" She asked with concern.
"What happened? Well, what happened is that this maid does not know how to behave with guests, that too a noble guest!" Keith answers with a scowl.
Bethany seemed a bit lost but then secretly clenched her fist, before speaking.
"Guards! Take this maid away!" Bethany ordered.
The maid was too scared to speak about anything when the guards carried her away. She knew that anything she spoke about now would only cause her more problems. Lucius watched everything carefully and recognized who this blonde man was.
"So this is the son of Viscount Drew… Keith Drew." Lucius muttered. 'He will be easy to deal with…' Lucius further thought.
"Well, well, well! If it isn't Young Lord Keith!" Lucius said while approaching.
The blonde man, who still had a scowl on his face, turned around.
"And who the he-…." He was about to say something in his rage but then saw the silver broach on Lucius's chest.
"Inanis…" Keith whispered under his breath.
His scowl instantly turned into a smile as he spoke, "pardon me, young Lord Asher. I was too bothered by that servant that I did not recognize you quickly."
"Don't worry, it happens. What can we do about such servants when they don't know their worth?" Lucius said.
"Ahahha! Young Lord Asher knows how it is. Servants like these should be happy that they get to serve us and should do their absolute best. Yet even after that the maids, here don't know how to appreciate our touch." Keith said causally.
"Ah, I see." Lucius simply nodded his head in understanding.
'He's just making this easier for me…' Lucius thought.
While Lucius and Keith were talking, Kiana was observing them. She was a bit shocked upon seeing how Lucius had casually said those words. She had not expected him to dismiss servants like that, since she knew how he usually acted with them.
Lucius had been respectful at the very least to every servant in the Inanis mansion, and she had never seen him get angry with them either.
'No, no… there must be some other reason for him to act like this. There is no way he would say something like this normally.' Kiana thought to herself while shaking her head.
Captain Donald was also watching the entire debacle and was completely unfazed. He had seen far too many occurrences such as these and knew how most nobles were. He often thanked Etara that the Count and his family were such much better than others.
In addition to them, there was one more person who had been watching it all. This person was none other than Bethany Harrels herself. She was upset that the maid of her family had done such a mistake, but she could not blame the maid either.
Bethany knew the character of Keith when she invited him and had expected him to harass the servants. She had even warned the servants to not protest when that happened, but there was not much she could do at this point.
If it were not for her father's insistence and friendship with Viscount Drew, she would have not even chosen to invite Keith here.
When she had seen Asher and his behavior, she found him to be a breath of fresh air. But then seeing him interact with Keith so freely instantly changed her opinion of him.
'Humph, all of them are the same.' Bethany thought to herself as she clenched her hand secretly.
But just as she was thinking this, she saw Asher whisper something to Keith. She did not see Keith's expression at that time, as it was blocked by Asher's head, but once Asher moved, she saw the face of absolute fury on Keith.
She traced his gaze and saw that he was looking towards the other two maids that were currently cleaning up the broken glass on the ground.
"No…" Bethany felt her heart fell.
But then she saw something that terrified her. A soul chilling smile appeared on Asher's face as he watched Keith walking towards the maids.
~Crash~
~splat~
In the next moment though… everything changed. Keith was lying down on the ground with a long shard of glass pierced through his neck.
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