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As I walked between the few cliques that formed and eavesdropped on their conversation, I was pleasantly surprised to find their topics of conversation not as snooty as I thought they would be.
Sure, there were a few “my father can beat up your father” or “my family is richer than your family” conversations going on, but most of them were what 1 would expect from 8-year-old kids.
Most of them were discussing what their favorite hobbies were, stories they read, or plays they watched, some of them were showing off trinkets or ceremonial weapons like the dagger I have strapped to my waist, and a few of them were even showing off what spells they could perform. This put some of the serving staff on edge, making some of the guards or butlers come over and ask them to avoid using magic, or at least avoid letting their spells fly.
I guess they are too young to have any real prejudice ingrained in them yet, but they are still keeping away from the group of commoner scholars, and maybe the commoner scholars are doing the same and keeping away from the nobles. But it seems the merchant kids do not have the same aversion as some of them are also mingling with the commoner kids.
As I browsed my options of groups to join and introduce myself, I locked on to a group of 3 boys who for lack of a better description, looked more… academically inclined. In not so pleasant terms, nerds.
I can do nerds, hell, most of my friends from my previous life were massive nerds, the only difference was they leaned too hard into larping and ended up in plate armor and whaling on people with blunt weapons.
As I got closer to listen in on their current conversation, I quickly realized 1 of them was talking about bugs, more specifically, his beetle collection. I did not expect a noble kid to like playing with bugs.
The 2 other boys were listening with rapt attention at the novel idea of keeping and raising bugs to watch them fight. While beetle boy was captivating the attention of the other 2 boys with the exploits of his prized beetle named Harris, I slowly and silently inserted myself into their triangle.
It took a solid 10 seconds before 1 of the other boys noticed a larger than average 8 year old standing beside them and let out a little squeak, this made the other 2 boys do the same and did a small hop away from me.
I chuckled internally and apologized, “Sorry for frightening you, I was just interested in the stories about your beetles.”
Hearing what I said, beetle boy puffed up his chest and huffed, “I was not frightened… just… just surprised!” the other 2 boys echoed their agreement.
Deciding not to argue semantics with children, I stuck out my hand for a handshake, “Hi, I am Luke Ironcrest, what are your names?”
After some hesitation, beetle boy took the lead and shook my hand, “I am Rupert Lockewood, this is Victor Thorne and Geoffrey Stirling.”
While shaking their hands, I looked at their family crest. Rupert and Geoffrey are from mage houses while Victor is from a knight/martial house.
After shaking their hands, I kind of drew a blank of what to talk about next, and as I wracked my brain for a subject to bring up that would interest 8 year old boys, the 1st thing that came to my mind and escaped my mouth was, “Have any of you ever been out on a goblin subjugation before?”
Nice work me, real smooth…
But after giving it a couple of seconds for my words to massage their way into their minds, and excited looks to appear on their faces, it seemed like I made the right move.
Like most young boys, even the more academically minded, they seem to be drawn to stories of battle and glory. So I told them a heavily edited version of the exploits of subjugation force to not scar their young minds.
After I was done sharing my story, Victor complained, “I wish my father allowed me to tag along to watch, but he says I can only come with him when my sword forms are “up to standard”, he only takes my older brother along.”
I tried to cheer him up and gave him a friendly pat on the shoulder, “Cheer up, there will always be monsters around to fight, no need to rush.”
After my icebreaker story, it was easy to flow into the conversation. That's 1 thing I like about kids, it is so easy to get along with them.
After we spent some time chatting, other noble kids approached our group to say hi to the 3 boys in my group. Turns out most of the noble kids know each other from previous meetings that I did not attend due to my… condition.
I shook some hands and introduced myself to the noble and merchant kids, then nodded along as they talked about the latest fads that were coming from the capital, but soon got bored.
As I looked for a way out, I saw 1 of the girls who was a merchant kid keep looking in the direction of the scholars in the corner, so I inched away from the group I was currently listening to and subtly moved towards her.
When I was right beside her while she was looking at the scholars, I asked, “What are you looking at?”
She released a soft squeak as she turned to me and got her composure back, “I… emm… my father asked me to make friends with everyone, and I was waiting for the right time to go over and greet that group, oh, I am Rowena by the way, you are Luke Ironcrest, correct?”
“I am, nice to meet you.” I said as I shook her hand and continued, “I was also thinking of going over and greeting them, shall we go together?”
As etiquette classes and especially Mum drilled into me, when escorting a lady, offer your elbow. So I did. Rowena blushed and held my arm as we started walking away from the group, I noticed a few glances but nobody said anything as they went back to their own conversations.
