A few days later, on a day off.

The maids of Rosric Palace were up at the crack of dawn, running errands for Lorian and their future master—me.

Almost all of them carried bundles of manga with scandalously revealing covers, tossing them, bundle after bundle, into a pit we’d dug in advance.

Now and then, a maid got tempted and tried to sneak one away “as a keepsake.” Lorian’s personal maid, Miss Roberta—the palace’s head maid—caught them on the spot.

“You two over there! What are you hiding? Once we’re done destroying these, I’ll have the dorms inspected again. Don’t push your luck. Toss every last book into the pit! Hm? What is it, Miss Hill?”

My maid, the Great Goddess Hill, was also acting as a supervisor. She leaned in and whispered something by Miss Roberta’s ear.

“W-what? You! Stop right there!”

Miss Roberta called out to a maid, reached into the girl’s skirt, and drew out a manga from beneath the hem.

She quickly shot Hill a look of open admiration.

“As expected of Lord Arisa’s maid. Your insight is impressive.”

“Insight? Impressive? I only did what Little Ya wanted me to do.”

Hill tilted her head. She probably didn’t catch the nuance of human speech. Miss Roberta mistook it for a cool act and looked even more awed.

I mean… Miss Roberta, this has nothing to do with insight.

You’re already an excellent maid… for a human.

After all, Hill is a Goddess.

I shook my head and ignored the two battle maids nearby whose “maidly fire” had just flared into a scuffle.

Beside me, Lorian gently draped a coat over my shoulders.

“Big Bro Arisa, put this on. Otherwise the dust will dirty your clothes.”

She habitually stood just behind me. She’d helped me so much lately, yet my adorable childhood friend never once tried to claim credit.

“I’ve had the maids buy up as many copies on the market as possible of that book you mentioned, Big Bro. Soldiers also reclaimed most recent sales under ‘possession of restricted materials.’ A small remainder is hard to recover, but it shouldn’t matter much.”

“Phew… Humanity’s honor is finally saved.”

More importantly, mine and Fuu’s honor had screeched to a halt at the cliff’s edge.

I looked at the copy in my hand, Femboy x Crossdressing Big Shot, and let out a long sigh.

Just a few days ago—thanks to a chain of mortifying events—I finally uncovered the true face of the ero manga artist “Whisper Teacher.”

That industry heavyweight who shamelessly used me and Fuu as protagonists in femboy ero works… was Fuu’s kid sister, Flan.

She’d stepped onto the path of “ero artist” all because of a “not-so-healthy book” I gave her when we were kids. When you get down to it, I’m the root cause of the recent rumors and the looming crisis for humanity’s reputation.

At this point, punishment was off the table. Little Flan’s been frail since childhood. She finally has a dream. I can’t smash it.

And as a righteous, upstanding Hero, I won’t do what those villains in H-doujins do and blackmail Flan into anything “shameful.”

Couldn’t do the bury-the-scholars part, so I picked the book-burning option instead. After I learned the publisher’s name from Flan, I begged Lorian to rush a buyback, with extra pay, of the latest batch of Femboy x Crossdressing Big Shot.

Little Flan really is marching down her dream road. This new release alone, we recalled over ten thousand copies. That’s not even counting the ones we couldn’t recover…

As her self-proclaimed big brother, I… couldn’t feel happy. Just destroying them meant finding time to dig a special pit…

Leaving one copy in my hand as “evidence of shame,” I glanced at the bundled filth filling the pit.

“Hill, Miss Roberta, you can start the disposal.”

Once the books were piled up, we only needed a single spark. One fire, and my honor—and even humanity’s—would be washed clean.

“As you command, Lord Arisa.”

Miss Roberta bowed to me, then turned around.

As Lorian’s maid and the head maid of the palace, Miss Roberta really was full of surprises.

“Ignite Flame!”

A hot flame blossomed in her palm. The book-stuffed pit roared into a sea of fire.

A small blaze in Roberta’s hand. A grand blaze to scrub humanity’s image. As long as this black history vanished, even if the Elders of the Elvenfolk showed up in a few days, I could face them with my head high.

“I didn’t know you could use magic, Miss Roberta! Amazing. Truly worthy of an excellent head maid!”

I meant it. Miss Roberta dipped her head and didn’t answer.

Shy? No, that’d be weird. She’s such a capable maid…

While I was overthinking it, I felt a wave of… grievance from Hill’s direction.

The Great Goddess has been a little off lately. Today, she was even stranger. She looked between me and Miss Roberta with a hint of displeasure, then zoned out like a koala for a moment.

Finally—

[Snap]

With a crisp snap of the Great Goddess’s fingers, the pit that had been an inferno… was empty.

As in, nothing. No burning books. No thick smoke. No fire.

Miss Roberta, being closest to Hill, froze.

I was about to patch the awkwardness when Miss Roberta suddenly grabbed Hill’s hand, eyes shining.

“Whoa! Miss Hill, that was definitely an ultra-high-temperature flame that incinerates everything in an instant! As expected of Lord Arisa’s maid!”

Miss Roberta! Please stop firing up that suspicious “maid spirit,” okay!? There isn’t normally a maid like Hill!

“No. A black hole,” Hill said, completely serious.

Hill, don’t answer that so deadpan! Normal people can’t process that!

I ignored the two abnormal “maid ladies” and let out a long breath.

That batch of evil reading… finally gone.

Thinking that, I patted Lorian’s head.

“Lorian, thank you. Really. Without you, I wouldn’t have known what to do.”

“Hehe~ So now, Big Bro Arisa, compared to that suspicious Elf woman named Furide, who do you think is better?”

Her direct attack left me reeling. My gaze wandered, and my face felt a little hot.

“Y-you… you are.”

…Wait, no! Lorian, Furide is just a hypothetical rival, a straw target! Because he’s a guy—

I opened my mouth, and Lorian looped her arm through mine.

She didn’t give me a chance to explain. She rubbed her cheek against mine, then tugged me along.

“Alright, alright, Big Bro Arisa. It’s a rare day off. To thank me for helping you, hurry back and pay your marital dues! And take a bath first, okay? Dust-face won’t smell nice.”

No…

Um, Lorian…

I think there’s a decisive misunderstanding between us that I haven’t cleared up, so don’t pull— ah~ ah, hey~~