Their responses gave me pause, but it seemed they approved of the strategy itself.
“Well then—”
“…Master.”
“What is it?”
“Kanade will work hard to gather the intel. So I want a special reward.”
It made sense for Kanade to ask for that.
This mission would vastly exceed a normal maid’s duties by any measure.
Not to mention the city info she already brought yesterday.
“Sure, what would you like?”
“…I want to fight you for real, Master. No holds barred. Until I’m satisfied.”
The instant I heard Kanade’s wish:
“Oh ho—(CRACK!)”
“Heh heh—(CRACK CRACK!)”
Lady Yuzuriha flared her killing aura while cracking her knuckles, while Suzuha twisted her lips into a ferocious grin, popping her finger bones.
What are these two doing getting so worked up over a maid!?
“Hold on you two, stay. Or rather Kanade, are you sure you want that? I’m just an ordinary civilian guy with no real combat training.”
“The new master has quite the amusing sense of humor.”
“I’m not joking…well, if Kanade insists, I guess it’s fine.”
While I may be untrained, Kanade is also just a maid.
Her footwork seemed assassin-like when we first met, which surprised me. But in terms of martial skill, she’s an amateur.
So it could be a fair match after all.
As I accepted it, Suzuha and Lady Yuzuriha began whispering furtively:
“…However, to emanate such an overwhelming aura of absolute strength…this maid is no ordinary servant…!”
“…Yet to challenge Suzuha’s brother would be folly. She will be utterly thrashed, her pride shattered into pieces, the reality that she is but a weak maidservant hammered into the depths of her soul! After all, even the pinnacle of the Amazoness was no match for him…!”
“…Come to think of it, Lady Yuzuriha, you challenged brother first too, didn’t you…?”
“…W-Well, what else could I do upon discovering such a singularly martial man?! Who could have fathomed he would be so overwhelmingly powerful…!”
“…I guess brother does give off a surprisingly unimposing aura in his words and demeanor. So everyone underestimates his battle prowess at first, only to get thrashed. That’s why it keeps happening…”
I couldn’t make out exactly what they were saying, but from their tones it was clear they were badmouthing me to some degree.
*
After that, I spent the day sparring with Kanade out on the plains until sunset.
Kanade was surprisingly strong for a maid—
so formidable that if Suzuha from not too long ago were the opponent instead, Kanade might just win.
“This…this…!”
“Come to think of it, when a maid swears loyalty to her master after fighting him, isn’t that kind of like the friendship that blossoms from battle? Don’t you think there could be something to that?”
“Why…can’t I hit him…damn…!”
“I mean, Kanade’s needles are poisoned, you know. If they hit you, you’d die.”
Kanade’s deadliest attack was an extremely hard to see thin needle.
She threw it at insane speeds, precisely aiming for vital points.
As I dodged it, I remembered something similar from when The Wandering Silver-Haired Vampire soiree and Yuzuriha was targeted by an assassin. The needles then were also crazy thin and sharp like this.
So if Kanade can unleash assassin-level sharp attacks like that, she must be an incredible maid.
Suddenly I noticed
Suzuha and Yuzuriha were sitting on the meadow, having a picnic tea party while watching our fight.
“In that case Yuzuriha, as the commentator. Is Kanade’s fighting style fundamentally that of an assassin?”
“That’s right. It’s rare for a maid to learn self-defense and assassination techniques. Though I’ve never heard of a maid with such high combat abilities…”
“Ah! Kanade the maid feints with her needles and goes for a jumping knee!”
“And a double roundhouse kick combo! An ordinary knight would be killed three times over by that attack. The jumping knee opens a hole in the chest, and the roundhouse kicks blow the head and body apart.”
“But Kanade’s attacks don’t seem to be having any effect on Brother at all! He’s taking them completely unguarded with a casual smile!”
“Ah, it seriously breaks my heart…She landed her full power strike on an unguarded opponent and it did no damage at all, like he just got stung by an insect…ahhhhhhhh”
“Yuzuriha? You’re not supposed to get depressed while commentating you know?”
I decided to just leave them be since they seemed to be having fun.
In the end, my fight with Kanade continued until sunset.
Finally looking satisfied, Kanade’s eyes sparkled as she said,
“There’s no doubt about it. I’ve finally found my true master.”
As she said something like that and rubbed up against me like a cat, I pet her head and she nuzzled her head into my chest happily purring.
In any case, it seemed she had fun.
READ THE ORIGINAL TRANSLATION AT LOCALIZERMEERKAT.PAGES.DEV
6 (Uentas Grand Duchess Perspective)
Inside the palace of the Uentas Principality.
Ayano von Uentas, the reigning Grand Duchess at the top of the duchy, was spending a peaceful afternoon tea time.
“Your Grace, would you like another pudding?”
“Hmm, but if I eat any more I’ll get fat…”
Surrounded by documents in her office, Ayano wavered under the temptation of the pudding, just an ordinary girl at heart.
Her face was quite plain. A closer look revealed she was somewhat cute.
Her chest was on the smaller side. Her figure was a bit stout. Her lower body had a fertile shape and thick legs.
She had been secretly worried about the little pouch of fat that had recently become pinchable on her belly.
“Then how about a refill of your tea instead?”
“Yeah, I’ll have that. Thank you.”
With a townsgirlish appearance and polite speech even towards subordinates,
anyone meeting Ayano for the first time would undoubtedly be surprised that she ruled over the mighty Uentas Principality, one of the great powers of the continent.
And that fact was a complex for Ayano herself.
(Toko and I are the same age, but…her aura, face, figure, and magical power are so overwhelmingly superior it’s laughable…)
While the Uentas Principality and neighboring Drosselmeyer Kingdom were fundamentally hostile nations, they weren’t in a constant state of tension.
There were temporary lulls in the fighting, or if not that, at least opportunities to interact at prisoner exchanges or royal ceremonies.
A few years ago,
during a war the Uentas Principality seemed positioned to win against Drosselmeyer, a single girl nicknamed the “Killing Goddess” turned the tide, decimating the upper military ranks.
The peace faction then tried to marry off the then-Princess Ayano to a Drosselmeyer prince as a diplomatic move.
When she first met the two Drosselmeyer princes, they just sneered “What a country bumpkin” upon seeing Ayano, leaving her dismayed at their blunt insult to her appearance.
But what truly crushed her came after, when the princess and her friend consoled Ayano:
“Really, I’m so sorry. My idiot brothers, well, they just have no tact at all. I hope you can ignore them?”
Toko and Yuzuriha exuded an aura of supreme nobility so potent that Ayano was utterly devastated anew.
Unlike the two idiot princes, Toko and Yuzuriha there had the aura of a ruler of the highest nobility.
Their beauty was utterly divine.
Their figures, perfect, with Toko’s long slender legs and Yuzuriha’s enormous breasts.
Ayano realized with utter despair just how ordinary a girl she was, despite her title—
“…My Lady, Lady of Uentas? What’s the matter?”
“Oh, nothing. Just reminiscing about the past.”
Convinced that her country would surely meet its end if they made enemies of Drosselmeyer Kingdom where those two resided, Ayano resolved to give her full effort from then on.
Fortunately, Ayano had a talent for military affairs and political strategies. At the very least, more so than the other nobles.
Ayano became a commander of the royal guard, then the chief of staff, and amidst her father the Duke and brothers falling one by one in battle, she somehow became the new Duchess herself—
And recently, the intrigue she had set in motion in a neighboring country finally bore fruit.
A coup d’etat that split the nation in two between the prince’s faction and the princess’s faction.
Taking advantage of that opportunity, the Uentas Principality launched a war that merely appeared to other countries as them being the aggressors, and finally came to occupy the entire Lohengrin teritory bordering their lands.
(The Lohengrin teritory is a trove of underground resources—not just gold and diamond mines, but even mithril mines…! Acquiring that land was the long-held ambition of us in the Uentas Principality…!)
The successive Margraves of Lohengrin squandered the land’s riches without proper reports to the royal family, so the new Queen Toko is likely unaware. But the Uentas Principality, having conducted intelligence activities against the enemy for many years, grasps its true value precisely.
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