The Head Maid had slipped back into the Savior Demon King Army’s temporary camp like a shadow crossing firelight.

Victor could swear to his beloved Hattie that when he went to the fridge for a second cup of yogurt, the sofa by the hearth lay empty like a cold stone.

Now the Head Maid—heart sharp as a knife, a prim mask veiling a night no one could enter—sat quiet on that sofa, her spine straight as a spear in moonlight.

She cradled a near‑circular, jade‑sheened piece and carved at it with a blade, chips falling like pale snow.

The thing looked like a human skullcap, a moon‑pale bowl of bone.

“Want to know what I’m doing?” Her voice skimmed the room like a thin sheet of ice over water.

Revulsion rose first, a cold wave; action came after—he only wanted space between them and the darkness like a drawn line in sand.

He lifted the paper cup of yogurt with his unbroken arm, a small white moon raised in greeting to the Head Maid.

“This is Miss Vangibia’s skullcap,” she said, words laid out like stones on a shore. “Without accidents, it would sit in a subterranean cavern’s sacrificial tower, the ‘cost’ of a contract between humans and the Sea God Xien. Now it’s in my hands—do you grasp what that means?” Her gaze was a lantern in deep water.

She scraped the blade twice, a cricket of steel, set it down safe, and turned the piece—indeed, the shape of a human skull, with a translucent jade glow, the hallmark of fishfolk bone under sea‑green light.

“I think—” After half a year together, he’d learned she didn’t care much for ceremony, though her own manners were flawless like lacquer. Leaning on the doorframe, he sipped and tried to think like his superior under a cloud of steam. “Big Sis intends to steal the ‘proof of a contract with a Divine Being,’ to void the sea’s protection, dealing a heavy blow to Helena or even a disaster for the fishfolk?” His guess fell like a stone into a dark pond.

“That’s an excellent proposal, sweet and intoxicating like spiced wine,” she said, a smile thin as a blade. “Yet what’s the point?” Her words drifted like mist.

“Uh… it would make you happy?” His tone was unsure, a candle flame in wind.

“If only me—or a normal Demon King—that’s not wrong,” she said, voice as even as a plumb line. “Note your employer is the Savior Demon King Andor, my master—he pursues meaning and value, and hates waste born of laziness. So set aside my will. Think as the Demon King Army, a whole, like a fleet on the ocean.” Her eyes held the room like a compass star.

“So we align with the boss,” Victor said, nodding like reeds in a current. “I’m with you, Big Sis. But—I don’t get how this thing helps us. Maybe… we extort Helena?” The thought was a hot coal in his palm.

The Head Maid’s gaze was pure disdain, frost over stone.

“Blackmail—ha, what a beautiful, darling word,” she murmured, licking young lips, swallowing like a snake in grass, lifting skull and knife as twin moons. “But what do we gain? What does Helena have that’s worth forcing? Imagine someone using your most precious thing to twist your arm—would you forgive that? For instance, Hattie.” Her words were fishhooks in water.

Victor pictured it; rage flared like a furnace. “I’d kill him.” Brimstone drifted from his lips, a faint sulfur haze threading the camp like smoke.

She shrugged, light as a bird on a wire, without reproach.

“That’s why we never extort. It yields negative value, like salt in a wound,” she said, voice steady as rain. “We hand out candy, no big stick; fools drawn by sweets can only blame themselves, like moths to flame. Now, premise set: Vangibia’s skullcap is proof of a contract with a Divine Being. Without it, the Sea God can’t shelter humans; within seven days it must be restored, or this year’s contract breaks. What did that make you think of?” Her question rippled like a pebble dropped in a well.

No matter how he thought, he couldn’t explain why the skullcap sat in her hand, like a moon pulled from the sea.

He even suspected his top boss was preparing a world‑wide war, planting seeds of disaster like runes carved on bone, storm‑script ready to bloom.

He’d seen half a year of their tech and sorcery, black science and black magic beyond the horizon; he didn’t doubt his workplace could evade a Divine Being’s eye, even raise a blade against one like an eclipse over a temple.

From the start, he’d never doubted the Head Maid could get the skullcap, like a spider plucking a prize from a guarded web.

A sacrificial tower that calms the whole ocean must have terrifying sentries, ranks of guards like a forest of spears; but he didn’t think any human walls could stop the Savior Demon King Army’s infiltration, like knives sliding through silk.

Ever since the boss treated the Colonna imperial palace as a tourist spot, strolling with his girlfriend and mailing photos like postcards from a conquered reef, Victor stopped believing humans held any advantage against the Savior Demon King Army’s tide.

His superior, the Head Maid, never bothered to explain; her favorite line snapped like a banner in a black wind: “How do we do it? Does that matter? Villains can do it; villains know everything; villains are omnipotent—only then worthy of the name. Otherwise, they’re petty crooks.”

Gradually, Victor stopped caring, like waves settling after a storm.

Still, as she’d said, the Savior Demon King Army moves by rules—meaningful sacrifice, valuable deeds, fairness and justice, a triad like scales, sword, and lamp.

To Victor, it felt like an aesthetic—sublime, pure—like a temple etched in frost; but whose aesthetic was it?

Maybe the boss’s? He didn’t think that role‑player and big spender had philosophical taste; that guy used philosophy like a mask to look cool, a feather fan in a street fight.

Victor didn’t know and didn’t want to. He worked five days like a plow ox, and spent two with Hattie under a warm lamp; that was enough.

“Thought it through? Got an answer, Victor?” Her voice was a bell in fog.

“No,” he said, a sigh like steam. “I think you could craft disasters by the dozen, but for value… maybe sell it to another Demon King.” The idea glowed like a hot ember tossed to another hearth.

“Tossing the hot potato and watching a tale where a Hero faces a disaster—Divine Being unable to shelter humans—and retrieves the proof within seven days,” she said, smile thin as paper. “Interesting, but far off the mark. You’ve done reverse thinking; now do the reverse of reverse. If I restore this skullcap to the tower within seven days, can’t we treat it as if nothing happened?” Her words moved like a tide returning to shore.

“…” Still the same problem—what’s the meaning? The drum beat hollow.

“Vangibia’s sacrificial rite is… pain? Glory? Tragedy?” She weighed the words like stones, then let them fall. “Hard to define. But this is certain: her body was quartered, her blood dissolved into the sea’s eye like red ink in blue water, her flesh became bait for fish, her bones ground to powder to soothe the raging land beneath the sea. Only this skullcap kept its shape, moon‑hard amid dust. So the Hero girl can hardly keep anything to memorialize seven days of friendship. My master decided to help before Vangibia died, and the task dropped onto me like a black feather.” Her tone was a tide under starlight.

“So you stole it?! Planning to gift the skullcap to Miss Saya? Just for a little thing like this?!” His voice cracked like thunder in a teacup.

“I only intend to scrape some powder,” she said, calm as snowfall. “That’s not damage. Better than grabbing some random trinket from Vangibia’s home, probably. Liking a keepsake is the Hero girl’s business, not mine.” Her fingers turned the bone like a pale moon.

He hadn’t expected that reason; surprise rippled like rings in a pond.

He really didn’t want to know; the boss’s vast, bold worldview washed over his small‑minded ways like a flood over sandcastles.

At the same time, he confirmed it again: his superior was brutal and bloodthirsty, yet controlled, bound by self‑set rules like iron under silk.

Maybe they were rules from a Divine Being; the Savior Demon King Army might have accords with gods, treaties written like constellations.

He understood enough. A good employee—in a villain enterprise—keeps his head down if he wants a quiet life, like walking a narrow bridge under the moon.

“By the way, Victor.” Her words cracked the air like a whip.

“Any other orders?” He straightened unconsciously, a bamboo stalk in wind.

He took another sip; from that slip in emotion, the yogurt and air warmed, a lukewarm mouthful like swamp water.

He decided to put it back in the fridge first—after work—fine, after killing—then drink, a cold cave waiting behind a steel door.

“Call Dulan and Berenz in,” she said, tone like an iron chain. “Berenz should be in the underground dungeon, torturing prisoners for fun. Dulan—I don’t know. Go look. He’s probably asleep somewhere like a log.”

“Mm…” The sound fluttered like a sparrow.

“We’re starting work, Victor. Show some pep.” Her cadence was a drumbeat before battle.

“Oh…” His reply sagged like a slack rope.

“You might die,” she added, a cliff edge underfoot. “So, give it everything.”

“…” The dying part—must refuse, a shard of ice at his nape.

His fingers brushed the hidden knife at his belt; the ill omen from her words eased a little, a strip of steel catching dawn.