Bruno did not immediately answer the request to visit Japan, or more specifically its capital, to meet with the Ruling Dynasty of Japan. Rather, he would do so at his own leisure. It was nothing urgent and could wait for some time.
Emperor Meiji had sent a letter that traversed by sea and railway to the German Reich, requesting Bruno to visit and witness what his passing thoughts had given birth to: a rather exceptional machine gun for the time. It was something that was most certainly superior to anything fielded by the Imperial Japanese Army in his past life.
Or at least it had the potential to become such a weapon once it had gone through proper prototyping, experimentation, and so forth. It had taken roughly four years for the German Reich to go from the conceptual stage to passing military trials for the small arms Bruno had given them.
But that was because Bruno had provided them with a very detailed understanding of what to make, while the German Reich’s engineers, especially those at Bruno’s family’s factories, had a capable knowledge of machine guns already.
Whereas Japan had yet to field its own domestically manufactured machine gun, relying instead on designs built by foreign powers for the limited use they saw during the Russo-Japanese War. The fact that they had only just begun prototyping a little over four years into development was rather usual for arms manufacturing.
Bruno suspected whatever they had to boast about would not remotely resemble the same product once it reached its final stages of development, trial, and manufacture. Because of this, he was more than willing to put off this meeting, which was merely an excuse for a diplomatic visit to Japan at the behest of the Japanese Emperor.
Something he would normally jump at the opportunity for; so then why was he so adamant about not immediately responding? Because it was his youngest daughter’s birthday today. And he had no intention of leaving his home under any circumstances.
Unless it was something like an all-out civil war requiring his command to put down, Bruno would not be leaving his estate today. Elsa had, of course, used this occasion—which only happened once a year—to gain as much affection from her father as possible, who, unlike her mother, was commonly out of the home from the earliest hours of the morning until the final hours of the evening.
And that was assuming he was actually in Berlin and not on some diplomatic meeting elsewhere or, God forbid, a deployment overseas. Because of this, Elsa was constantly around her father, even when her friends and extended family all visited the estate to celebrate her birthday.
Only Heidi could compel the girl to go socialize with her classmates, as her tyranny was something the young girl deeply feared. It was only after Heidi approached the girl—who was sitting on her father’s lap while happily chatting with him—that Elsa fled off into the distance to properly greet her guests.
“Elsa von Zehntner! You have been hiding away from your friends and cousins for far too long! You can’t just keep clinging to your father all day like a little leech! Go greet your guests and have some fun this instant, or so help me God, I will go find a wooden spoon!”
Elsa pouted at her father with pleading eyes, silently begging the man to forestall his wife’s wrath. But Bruno simply chuckled and shook his head. He had enjoyed spending time with his children, as it was something he often didn’t have as much time to dedicate to as he might have desired.
But ultimately, the girl’s mother was right; she needed to properly socialize with her guests. And hence, Bruno picked the girl up off his lap and stood her down in front of him, where he got on his knees and patted her silky strawberry-blonde hair. Out of all of his children, she was the only one who did not have a golden head.
Though which of her parents she had actually inherited it from, Bruno didn’t really know, as both Heidi and he were carriers of red hair. At least two of Bruno’s eight brothers had red hair, while several of his uncles and aunts had it as well.
The same could be said for Heidi and her half-siblings, as well as her cousins, uncles, aunts, etc. Frankly speaking, the little girl probably got it from both of them. The simple act of petting the girl’s hair with an affectionate gaze was all that was needed to get her to comply with her father’s wishes without complaint.
Even if she had just moments ago silently pleaded with the man otherwise, all with tears in her azure, blue eyes.
“Elsa, today is your special day. And everyone wants to wish you a very happy birthday. I will be here waiting for you after they have all gone home, but now is the time to go be with your friends and well-wishers. So, be a good girl and go have fun, alright, baby girl?”
Elsa immediately smiled and hugged her father before running off, promising to do exactly as he said. Meanwhile, Heidi stared at the man pouting with her arms crossed. She refused to say a word to him until he dragged her into his arms and kissed her forehead, the size difference between the two of them being quite adorable to the onlookers as he did so.
“What? Are you perhaps angry that she doesn’t listen to your scoldings?”
Heidi honestly couldn’t stay mad at Bruno when he acted so romantically with her, let alone showed off his good side as a father. She knew all too well the man was battling with some inner demons due to all the horrific things he had seen on the battlefield.
And she also knew that he suppressed those demons every time he was home, making sure that his children never saw the haunted side of him. For him to go through such lengths for the sake of their family was something she deeply admired about him.
Thus, any resistance she had toward Elsa obeying his words and not hers immediately crumbled as she melted in his arms, letting him have his way.
“Fine… I don’t mind playing the role of the bad guy so long as you keep being such a benevolent father to those little brats!”
Bruno broke out into a hearty bellow of laughter as he hugged the woman tightly from behind and kissed her on the cheek before whispering something in her ear that turned her face red with embarrassment.
“You’re absolutely adorable when you’re angry, did you know that?”
Heidi felt like she was going to pass out from embarrassment as many of their friends and family gazed upon the two of them acting so shamelessly in public, ultimately forcing herself away from Bruno’s arms while making some excuse to escape from his grasp.
“I’m going to go check on the kitchen staff! If they have started preparing the cake without me, I swear to God I’m going to tear them a new one!”
Bruno laughed and shook his head as the love of his life scurried off like a frightened little rabbit. It was only after she was gone that three of his brothers approached him.
Two of them, Bruno had grown up enduring their abuse before eventually burying the hatchet altogether and forging an unbreakable bond as brothers in arms in Russia: Ludwig and Kurt. The third was a brother Bruno had seldom seen since becoming an adult.
Out of Bruno’s eight older brothers, he was more or less on speaking terms with four of them: Ludwig, Kurt, Christoph, and Franz. The other four he only ever saw at the annual family gatherings or during other rare important family events, like campaigning for their father or Ludwig’s election.
Maximillian was the third oldest of Bruno’s brothers; he was one of the two redheaded siblings that Bruno had. But unlike Elsa, who had her father and mother’s sky-blue eyes, he had an almost mint-green eye color.
The man had mid-length hair that was properly styled in a respectable fashion, and like most members of Bruno’s family, he was clean-shaven. Though he was quickly approaching his forties, he didn’t look a day over thirty.
Slow aging was a common occurrence in Bruno’s family, with Bruno himself approaching the thirty-year mark but looking half a decade or more younger, even with his unhealthy coping habits. He and his siblings most certainly got this slow aging gene from their mother, who even now, in her mid-fifties, looked not a day older than forty.
In fact, his mother had married very young, as was common in the era, having been married off to their father when she was in her mid-teenage years. She had nine sons over the course of nine years and was in her mid-twenties when she had Bruno, the last of her children.
Their father, however, was roughly thirty at the time of Bruno’s birth, making him around the age of sixty currently. He, unlike his wife and children, looked his own age. And because of this, people commonly mistook his wife for the wife of his eldest son rather than himself.
Either way, Bruno was most certainly surprised that Maximillian had decided to approach him with two of his other brothers. If Max was approaching him now, it meant the redheaded bastard required something of Bruno. Thus, he stood there waiting for the man to make his request of him on the day of his daughter’s birthday.
