Servant has been away from my side for quite a while, like a wind that slid out the window; I don’t even know which floor he’s reached now. It’s not that I can’t live without him, but without him the day tastes like lukewarm tea, all spice gone.

Ever since I sent Servant to the Northern Abyss Continent, each day peels off like a dry leaf—plain, silent, dull. In short, I’m bored out of my mind.

I’m not like Servant, dreaming of circling the world; this world is a painting I’ve stared at too long, colors faded to ash. For hundreds upon thousands of years, with the Mizumi Clan pressing all sides like a mountain, the chessboard of power barely shifted.

So yes, you could call this a “prosperous peace,” a lake holding its mirror longer than any in history. That’s fine by me; people say you thrive in hardship and die in comfort, but I prefer calm waters to seas hacked by war.

Maybe it’s just my nature. I loathed the days before unity, when smoke clawed the sky and people starved like withered crops; finding a quiet corner was like hunting moonlight.

—Hmph. Enough digging into old bones. I should think about today. Day after day of reading turns to stale bread; what else can I do?

With those wandering thoughts, I peel back my quilt like a cloud, slip from bed, and start switching my nightgown for the usual long dress. That’s how it should go—until my wardrobe yawns open, and several maid outfits glimmer inside like pale lilies.

“…That looks like what Servant wears?”

Servant’s build is about the same as mine. Should I try playing the maid, doing maid things—cooking, cleaning, the small tides of daily life? I tilt my head at the lineup of styles, bows, and lace, a sparrow eyeing trinkets.

A few minutes later…

“Perfect.”

I knot the ribbon into a butterfly behind me and stand before a tall mirror, satisfaction warming me like sunlight on snow. My white hair flows over shoulders and back, and a lace-edged maid headpiece rests like frost on a branch. The maid outfit is white—cream-white skirt, pale white apron—soft as milk.

The dress blooms with ruffles, bows, and tiny ornaments, less the humble calm of a classic maid and more the gleam of a winter palace. The skirt stops at the thigh, so I wear white tights at the hem and gray-white boots below; white suits me like moonlight to ice.

Whichever way I look, I’m a proper maid. Just as that thought ripens, the door opens with a creak, and a gorgeous blonde maid—Servant’s eldest sister, Yumigawa Senki—steps in carrying breakfast like steam rising from a bowl.

“Xinuo Miss, you’re awa—!!!”

Her lovely eyes go wide like lanterns, disbelief painted across her face.

It takes a long breath before Yumigawa Senki returns to herself. She blushes, shifts her gaze, and asks, “Uh, may I ask… Xinuo Miss, why are you dressed like that?”

“Because I’ve got nothing to do, so I want to do maid things to pass the time.”

I walk to her, lift a bowl of noodles from the tray, and eat as I speak, steam curling like mist. The taste is a bit bland, but the bite is good, like firm strings under the chopsticks.

“Huh?!!!”

She can’t make sense of it, and words tumble. “Xinuo Miss, you don’t need to! Give anything to me! If you’re bored, you can play with Littlesky and the others!”

Am I that pampered? I sigh, soft as snow, at her coaxing look. “Yumigawa Senki… be honest. Do you see me as the type of young lady who needs someone attending her every moment?”

“…Pretty much. When Emperor was around, you had him do everything.”

She mutters it like a mosquito in summer, small but impossible to ignore. Rude, calling me out like that—though it’s true. What can I say? Servant cares for people like a house-spirit; food, clothes, shelter, travel—he’s good at it all. A born maid, the all-around kind.

“Morning, Sister Xinuo! Xiaoya and I came to play—!!!”

An adorably petite girl with long silver hair and eyes like sapphires bursts in, pulling along a beauty who looks like a maiden yet wears the crown of the Elf King.

Servant’s little sister, Yumigawa Nozomi, and Elyar see me and freeze just like Yumigawa Senki did. Sisters, indeed—reactions like echoes in a valley.

“Waaah waaah waaah waaah!”

Little Sister drags Elyar over, thump-thump-thump, and stares at me with eyes sparkling like stars on a pond. “Sister Xinuo is wearing a maid outfit! What happened?!”

“Nothing much.”

I pinch Little Sister’s soft cheeks, doughy and warm—while Servant’s away, she takes over his job of squeezing mine—and repeat the same answer.

“I see.”

Elyar nods, calm as a forest. “Boredom gnaws like a rat; you reach for chores to drown the quiet. When I lived on the Central Continent, I often felt like that.”

“Mhm, mhm. With Big Brother gone, life loses a lot of fun,” Little Sister agrees, her voice like candy melting.

“Yumigawa is so popular.”

“True, and I get it.”

Eastern Moon Aixue and Faya step in and sigh with a feeling like wind over grass. Servant is popular? I think it through… with his looks and temperament, he draws people like moths to a lantern wherever he goes.

Come to think of it, there are plenty of women in the Nine Cold Labyrinth. Sending him alone is like a wolf in a sheepfold—no, a sheep into a den of wolves. A small, sour pebble rolls in my chest. What’s that about?

“No helping it. Emperor has a kind of pull that makes you want to stay near him.”

Yumigawa Senki gives a wry smile and starts gathering the dishes, clinking like shells. She moves to take them to the kitchen, but Faya stops her. “Uh, Miss Senki, let me handle the rough work. See you in a bit.”

Without giving Senki a chance to protest, Faya leaves with the tray. Senki’s skill with housework is… devastating; for every plate she washes, two would shatter like ice under a hoof.

“So, Xinuo Miss, is there anything you want to do?” Eastern Moon Aixue asks, her tone as gentle as rain.

“Any little chore is fine. Laundry, cooking…”

“No way!!!”

Before I can finish, Yumigawa Senki and Little Sister cut in, voices braided together like twin strings.

“Why?”

“Because Xinuo Miss—Sister Xinuo—your status isn’t suited to things like that!”

Status? What’s wrong with my status?

“…In short, Xinuo Miss—Sister Xinuo—shouldn’t do that kind of thing!”

Under their steady, overlapping refusal, I can only let it go, the idea drifting away like a leaf on water. Still, why is my status wrong for housework? In their whole flurry of objections, they never gave a reason.