The place was silent after Aurelia announced that he will be removed from the clan. His sisters were looking at their mother in shock, with Valeria and Fleur being the most shocked at it and was very expressive due to their young age.
They had started to miss Armaros and his presence in the mansion and while it was the same for their sisters and mother, due to their young age, they weren't that mature to hold back their feelings.
But they were able to do so due to their upbringing while they stayed at the clan. Valeria missed her brother dearly since everyone treated her the same and didn't give her the same affection that he had given her.
Fleur soon followed it as she also missed the presence of her brother and it felt empty in her home. Even with all the servants and family, the place was too quiet and it didn't have the presence of her brother who would talk and care for her treating her like a little child, which was something that she shared with her younger sister.
Fleur didn't like how she was being treated like a little child, but she now missed it as she didn't get the same care that he had given her.
Solana was also in the same boat, though she was able to hide it well as she only did so in private as she would hold one of the birthday presents given to her by her brother as she reminisced about him, as she would sometimes look at places where he would spent time with and would find it to be empty.
Arianne was quite close to her little brother, since she was quite young when he was born. Unlike Claudia, due to her younger age, she had felt drawn to him, but after a while she had learned about the clan and the relationship between the two of them had become a bit estranged. She didn't think much of her brother as she had cared more about training her and making herself worthy of being a Dawnbringer. But when he was exiled and the time passed, she came to miss his presence in the mansion, but she couldn't do anything as she didn't know why she would be missing him and the way he had treated her.
Claudia, being the oldest of the sisters, was there when her brother was born and had clear memories of him. She had seen him as a baby and like with her sister she had spent some time with him, but then she learned that he was weak, far weaker than she and Arianne were.
She had been brought up as a member of the Dawnbringer Clan, and everyone of the clan who carried the blood of the hero, were born stronger than normal humans, they were physically stronger and had large reserves of Mana. But her brother was weaker than them and his mana levels were only above average.
She didn't think he would go far and felt some contempt at the fact that her brother was so weak and a member of a prestigious clan like her own. And with his refusal to use magic, her opinion of him worsened. She wouldn't give him much thought and the servants also didn't have much respect for him as well.
She wondered why he acted so different from a normal Dawnbringer. He didn't carry himself with the same pride and confidence that was expected of them, nor did he act as seriously as the rest of her younger siblings and didn't have the poise. He always acted kind towards her which was something that bewildered her as instead of making himself worthy of their name, he would spend time with her and her sisters and showered her with smiles and good words.
She never came to understand him and due to how different he was, she would avoid him even more so, and he would also remember her birthdays and give her gifts, and he did the same for the rest of her sisters as well, which puzzled her as they didn't find their birthdays as important events.
It was the day of her birth into the clan. But she has to prove that she is someone who is worthy of being in the clan to begin with, as it was what would be expected of them. She felt surprised when he was exiled from the clan, but she thought that it wouldn't matter much.
But soon, she started to miss her brother. His voice, his face, his presence in the mansion. Without him, there was a distinct silence and coldness to the place. When Valeria asked her to wish her birthday, she did so robotically as she didn't know why she would ask that when it was Armaros who would say that to them.
That was when she had come to realisation that he wouldn't be greeting her on her birthday due to his exile. And contrary to what she had thought she would feel, she felt sad as she realised that fact and was once again confused at her own feelings as this was not something that a Dawnbringer should be feeling.
And when she had come with her family to this village, she thought that she would be going back with her brother, not for her to hear him actually want to relinquish his place as a Dawnbringer.
He wanted to remove himself from the family because the clan wasn't following the oath that they had sworn and that they weren't giving importance to the people and only to themselves.
And she didn't know how to feel about it, as now even her own mother, the Matriarch of the clan had said that he was removed from the clan. She didn't know what expression she was making, but she can see that her sisters felt uncomfortable. And as for Fleur and Valeria, they were looking at their brother with wide eyes and she could see some fear in them as well.
She would've reprimanded them for showing fear for something like this, but even she didn't know what to think or feel about this situation. She had never thought that her brother would actually want to remove himself from the clan and relinquish the name of a Dawnbringer, something that none in their history has ever done.
Armaros looked at his mother and ignored his sisters as he wanted to make sure that she was actually telling the truth and not some lie. If it was before then he would've believed her instantly, but the way she was acting was different from how she had acted before he was exiled.
But he couldn't see any form of deceit in her eyes and so he concluded that she truly did agree with his wish to be removed from the clan. And to be honest, he didn't feel sad about the fact that he would be removed from the clan, as his experience there wasn't pleasant, except for his nanny Mary, and perhaps his family.
If he thought about it, he was closer to his nanny than he was to his own family. And he couldn't help but draw parallels at the fact that even in his next life, his relationship with his own flesh and blood was a bit estranged.
And now that he would be removed from the clan, he felt strangely relieved at the fact that he would not longer be tied to the clan. No longer tied to their expectations, their demands and their wishes. They already have his sister who have much more potential than he does, so losing him wouldn't matter much to them.
He looked at his mother as she has her usual stoic face, though he could see some difference in her facial expressions and her eyes which seemed to be conflicted, and he wondered if she was conflicted about the fact that her own son had refused her, or she was feeling this way because a member of the clan wanted to remove himself from them.
In any case, he wasn't about to ask her about it, especially since he felt like a weight had been lifted off his shoulders as he then took out the pouch containing the money that they had given him as she looked at it alongside his sisters.
"This is the money that you had given me when I left. Now that I am no longer a part of the clan, you can have them back. I didn't use a single coin." Armaros said as he held it to her.
Since he knew that he was going to a place for a while, he had taken his pouch with him to make sure of its safety, after all, the total money in it was a lot, but he didn't think that would be able to give it back like this.
He noticed her looking at the pouch in surprise as her eyes widened as she looked at it before she looked at his face.
"You didn't use any of them?" Aurelia asked in a tone of disbelief.
It has been roughly a month since Armaros had left the mansion in exile, and the fact that he hadn't even used a single coin from the money that she had given him, she felt a pang of pain in her chest as she looked at the pouch.
"Yes. I had my own money and I did work as an adventurer to earn more. I kept it with me in case I was short of money, but I didn't have that difficulty." Armaros said to her as he had been able to live in the city with the money that he himself earned.
His sisters looked at him in surprise at his words, a more subdued expression of surprise on Aurelia, Claudia and Arianne as they just heard his admission of living on his own.
All of them had led a life of luxury, having the best food, best weapons, clothes, home and everything. The entire reason Aurelia had given him that much money was because she believed that he wouldn't have been able to live with the meager amount he has, and that he would crave luxury like he had at home.
She also didn't want him to live in a downtrodden inn in any backwater village that was made of wood, as he is... a member of the clan, so he should at least be able to live in a good house.
She didn't expect him to be able to live without using the money given by her and a part of her didn't believe him.
So she took the pouch and used magic to see how many coins were in there and there were exactly 100 gold coins inside the pouch, the same amount that she remembered giving him when he had been exiled.
"It's true. You didn't use any of the money I gave you." Aurelia said in surprise as she looked at her son, as she couldn't believe how much he had changed.
His sisters were also looking at him as he had changed even more in their eyes. They knew that the things they have is of the highest quality, whether it was food or clothes, and that the ones in the city aren't up to par with what they were given, so the five of them thought that he would've used the money given to him to get them.
But now they are hearing that he has lived by using his own money that he had and they didn't know what to feel about it, as it wasn't what they expected for him to do.
Aurelia herself was surprised at the feelings she felt when she saw that the coins were all there as she looked at the pouch in confusion.
'Did I want him to lie? So that I can tell him that he... needed my, needed our clans support?' Aurelia thought to herself in confusion as she experiencing such emotions as she looked at it.
"You can keep it with you. You can consider it as a parting gift from the clan." Aurelia said to him as she held it back to him.
"There is no need for that. I have been able to live with the money I earned. But if you want to give me a parting gift, then I would like to keep the armor and sword with me." Armaros said to her as he tapped on the sword given to him.
Aurelia was silent at his worries for a few seconds before she put the pouch away and looked at her son.
"Alright, you can keep the sword and armor as a gift from m— the clan." Aurelia said to him as she corrected herself quickly so no one noticed her slight slip up.
"Thank you. I humbly accept your generosity, Matriarch." Armaros said to her in a respectful tone as he bowed to her, and called her Matriarch instead of mother like he always did, without the same warmth that he usually had.
Aurelia and her daughters flinched when they heard him call her as the Matriarch instead of the usual mother, as if he was a stranger to her due to the tone as well. They could only look at their brother/son and wonder how much he had changed in such a short time.