"…
…I don't think just 'hate' is enough to describe your stance on them."
George chuckled lightly and he noticed the slight traces of fear in Eliza's eyes, casually placing his hand on the girl's head and ruffling it.
"Hey!! I spent a while doing that this morning!"
Seeing as he had successfully turned her attention away from his earlier outburst, the man only sighed and spoke.
"Certain things are more complicated than you think, little girl."
"Complicated? I just so happen to be dating a walking Demonic Hand encyclopaedia. I doubt anything about them would remain complicated to me for long.
Even without that, I'm sure I'd understand exactly whatever it is."
"We'd come back to the first part of your statement later.
The fact that you'd understand is precisely why your mother and I want to keep you from knowing."
"You always did take your elder sister's words as the law."
Eliza only sighed and retied her hair into a single ponytail, taking some strands and twisting those into a small French braid, before standing up and dusting the sugar pieces and bread crumbs off her lap.
"Ignoring the Demonic Hand issue that you were never planning on telling me about, I have to admit I was initially annoyed upon discovering you had been tailing me all this while.
I also know that you most certainly did tail me for far much more time than you said you did, but that's not important."
She turned and faced her uncle who was looking at her with slight confusion, staring right into his bright green eyes as she continued.
"What's important, is that you indeed saved my life that day, and for that, I thank you."
Eliza concluded her words with a 90-degree bow, something that had George's jaw drop in shock for a moment, in the next, he suddenly panicked and moved to raise her body up.
"no-no-no, Lady Elizabe-!
Eliza, you don't need to thank me, I was just-"
"You know…even if I'm the Patriarch's eldest daughter, you're still my uncle you know? You do not have to tack on that 'Lady' title to me.
Besides, there's no one else here so that's even more of a reason for you not to do so.
Why did you even suddenly revert to that way of speaking?"
"…True.
I don't know why I suddenly panicked and spoke that way. But this is for when it's just us two.
If I do not show the appropriate level of respect when we're in the presence of others, then the other families in the clan might dare to slight you."
George's words only made Eliza snort as she rose her head and spoke.
"Dare to slight me?
The current me is not the kind of person those brats can dare to slight."
The man only showed a wry smile in response to his niece's words, gauging the power she currently possessed as a superior stage master and nodding in affirmation to her words.
'None of the current younger generations can match up to her.'
"Well, I may have probably been on the same level as them if did not go along with Evan's escapades.
Speaking of which, after Evan and I are done in the beast kingdom, I think I'm gonna tell Evan about the clan and prepare to bring him over."
Every time the name 'Evan' came out of her mouth, George's brow twitched and the frown on his face became deeper until he could not hold his annoyance in anymore.
"About this 'boyfriend' of yours…"
"Hmm? What about him?"
George's lips twisted awkwardly as he thought about his current mixed feelings towards Evan.
He originally did not like the fact that some random kid dared to court his sister's daughter, but that same kid was the one who contributed greatly to messing up the Demonic Hand's plans and dealt the final blow to the bastard who killed his sister, permanently killing him.
Even if Evan did not know about this, his evaluation in George's eyes had risen greatly.
"Do you really think he's serious with you?"
"Huh?"
"Don't forget that the boy is the son of the Prime Minister of a major world power.
Even though he's 'free' now, when he grows older, he'd no doubt be called back to his family by his father, and since he's the next Duke, they might completely disregard your relationship with him and arrange some sort of political marriage for him.
I've seen this happen dozens of times in various countries."
The man studied Eliza's expression closely as he spoke, but the girl did not react how he had expected and instead casually sat back down before opening open another strawberry juice pack as she replied.
"Speaking of the next Duke, Evan said he planned to give his title back to his elder brother; I think his name was Arned? Arnold?"
"You really believe he's gonna do that?
Even if he has gained some level of power and influence with his recent actions, it's still not to the level of what he'd gain with the title of Duke of the Great Western Empire.
You think he'd give up the chance to get all that power and authority?"
Instead of replying, Eliza only looked at her uncle in silence as she sipped her juice before finally asking.
"You hate Evan or something?"
"…"
"Come on uncle, this is supposed to be my dad's job, not yours."
"If the boy truly wishes to be with you, he'd have to be screened by both me, your father, and your Grandfather."
"…are you guys tryna kill him or something?"
"…. probably not."
"Probably?!"
George chuckled lightly upon seeing Eliza's reaction, and was about to pat her head only to have his hand smacked away by the younger girl,
"You're gonna mess up my hair again!"
"You can redo it again, can you not?"
"Yeah, but it's stressful to do it over again."
"Really? But Elder sister usually changes her hairstyle multiple times in a day."
"Ugh…don't compare me to my mother. I really have no idea how she does that."
After successfully diverting the topic to the matter of her hair, George's eyes flashed lightly as he turned towards the direction of the Capital City and thought to himself.
'Evan Del Eris, huh? There's something off about that boy. It makes no sense for the lifeline between his body and soul to be so out of sync, after all.
Besides that, I believe he's connected to that strange being who teleported me to where that necromancer was on that morning, making me fight and weaken him, as well as teleported me out right after I saved Eliza.
That being did say something about 'Evan's story'…'
George sighed softly, deciding to put those thoughts to the back of his mind for now and enjoy some quality time with his niece who seemed to have an endless supply of snacks to share with him.
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