Hours slipped by like drifting cloudbanks, and after this mishap and that twist, Yugong Jingyue was, unlucky as a snagged sparrow, caught by Yugami Rexiao and Yugami Rexi.

“Second Sis, how should we punish you?” Their voices were sweet as syrup and cold as steel. “Oh, right. Since you’re so keen on us being maids, then today you’ll be our maid. Pamper us till we melt.”

“Mm. Otherwise we won’t forgive you.” Their smiles bloomed like lotus, but their eyes were winter ice.

“Hmph—so petty. I’m not being anyone’s maid.” Her tone was the flick of a fox tail, stubborn as a stone in a stream.

“Is that so. Then we’ve got no choice.”

“Yeah, guess there’s no helping you, Second Sis.” Patience thinned like paper; even gentle reeds will snap in a storm.

The sisters, crisp as blades drawn, seized the Book of Day and the Book of Night, pages unfurling like wings.

“Second Sis, accept your fate. Book of Day, page one—Binding Magic: Chains of Light, activate!” Rexiao’s page flashed like dawn on water, and a handful of radiant chains sprang from thin air, streaking for Jingyue like meteors.

“Book of Night, page three—Binding Magic: Dark Mire.” Rexi’s voice fell like dusk, and the floor under Jingyue turned soft as wet loam; her body began to sink, the ground now a swallowing bog.

“Boo-hoo, so sad. Rexiao-chan, you’re really raising a hand against your sister?” Her words were tears on porcelain, but her grin was a cat’s. She rose, light as thistledown, slipping past chain and mire.

“Bad kids need a proper lesson—Hurricane Arrowfall.” Feeling wicked delight fizz like thunder, Jingyue forced the winds to converge with her control magic eye, fusing gust to gale, then shed a sky-wide rain of arrows toward the sisters like a storm of silver leaves.

“You tricked us first and won’t apologize, and now you call us bad kids? Book of Day, page ten—Guarding Magic: Sanctum Reflect!” Rexiao’s cry rang like a bell.

A half-dome of light bloomed, a bright shield like a rising moon.

“Book of Night, page five—Amplification Magic: Energy Reinforce.” Rexi’s voice layered night over gold; the shield turned gold and violet, spinning like a cyclone, and it flung every falling arrow back.

“Ay, that was close—whew.” In the heartbeat of reversal, Jingyue zipped aside, her body flickering like a fish in rapids, out of the splash zone.

Boom. Boom. Boom. The arrows hammered the ceiling like hailstones. Noise rattled the rafters. Good thing the Mizumi Clan’s manor used the world’s finest materials—no arrow pierced that ironwood sky.

“Damn you, Second Sis! You like flying? Then fly till you drop!” Seeing Jingyue as leisurely as a heron, Rexiao’s temper flared like dry grass. Pages flipped fast as sparrow wings. “Book of Day, page thirty-one—Light Attack Magic: Spiral Pillars!”

A handful of colossal light pillars roared upward, caging Jingyue like bamboo stalks in a storm, and then—

“Rexiao-chan, you idiot! You’re using a spell this strong indoors? Xiao Yue will blow her top. Uwah, I better scram—Spatial Transfer.” Panic sparked like static, and Jingyue’s body vanished without a trace, breath snuffed like a candle.

“Honestly, casting a wide-area spell here will drag us down too, Rexiao. Book of Night, page twenty—Defense Magic: Veil of Night.” Rexi’s tone was cool rain on hot stone.

KABOOM. All the pillars erupted at once, shockwaves pounding the ground like drums; doors and windows in several rooms blew out like leaves in a gale.

The sisters stood unharmed under Lingsaki’s timely defense, shadows wrapping them like silk.

“Where’s Second Sis? Where’d she go?” When the smoke thinned like morning fog and no scent of Jingyue remained, Rexiao’s heart dropped like a pebble. She’d slipped away again.

“Second Sis is tough. What do we do?” Rexi shut the Book of Night, shrugging like a willow, helplessness a quiet sigh.

“What else? We find her.” Determination rose like sunrise.

“Okay.”

But as they turned to move, a maid uniform rustled like rain on leaves, and Yugami Yue appeared behind them as if poured from shadow. “You’re not thinking of just walking away, are you?”

Her smile was skin-deep; her voice carried a chill like wind off grave stones. Cold sweat beaded on the sisters like dew.

“Heh, of course not. We’re not those kinds of people, right, Rexiao?”

“Mm-hmm!” Their laughter was brittle glass. They flipped open both books, ready to shift—but—

“Your mouths say one thing while your hearts drum another.” Yue moved like lightning; she snatched the Book of Day and the Book of Night, tucked them into her apron like captured birds. “If you don’t clean this place spotless, I won’t return them.”

She turned with graceful frost and left without waiting for protest.

“How can this be—!” Their cry flew up like startled geese. Remembering Yue’s haunted smile and grave-cold tone, they swallowed hard, picked up brooms and mops, and started scrubbing, the tools clacking like oars.

Meanwhile, in a certain garden, petals swaying like lanterns.

“Whew, that was close. Almost got caught by Xiao Yue. Poor Rexiao-chan and Rexi-chan.” Jingyue’s relief floated like a light breeze through blossoms.

Yue looks gentle as warm tea most days, but when she’s angry, she’s a thunderhead. Strict as winter. Feeling that storm-front approaching, Jingyue fled without a blink.

“Xiao Yue is really scary. If she catches me, she’ll nag all day.” She teased a butterfly on a flower, her finger a reed, her sigh a soft flute.

“Oh? So that’s how I live in your heart, Jingyue? How sad.” The voice behind her trembled like a sobbing violin—the one sound she least wanted.

“My, what a coincidence. Isn’t that Xiao Yue? Ah, right, I just remembered I’ve got something to do. See you—eek!” Jingyue reached for another transfer, but Yue snagged her like a hawk. “Sisters indeed. Same thoughts. Same tricks.”

Yue’s hands kneaded Jingyue’s cheeks like dough with stern warmth. Her breath was a low storm.

“Mmph.” In that grip, Jingyue let go of escape like a leaf letting go of a branch. Limbs went limp; she slumped in Yue’s arms like a cat after rain.

“Jingyue, honestly. You’re an adult, yet you play pranks like a child and love to lie. And you know Rexiao and the others adore the Little Emperor—how can you joke and deceive them about him? You almost tore down half the house. Should I say—” Yue’s lecture flowed like a river in flood, unstoppable.

Listening to it, Jingyue’s heart sank like a stone in a well, and inside she screamed, feelings boiling over like a kettle—“Xiao Yue is so annoying!”