Harold Richard Blackwood.
The master of this manor, who now employs me, and father of the abomination who will make me his maid in the future.
No, no, no. Take that last part back because there’s no way in hell I’m going to be his maid of honor now that I’ve regained my memory.
Anyway, he’s the only man in the manor who doesn’t give me creepy looks.
“Welcome, my lord.”
The memories imprinted on Lilith’s mind from working in this mansion for a year and my instinct to stick to my maid duties to survive forced me to bow to him.
“Yes.”
Harold brushed past me with a blunt reply and walked straight to a table in the center of the room.
He sits down in the farthest chair in the room and picks up the papers on the table.
As you can roughly infer from this reaction, this is a man who doesn’t feel much for me or anyone else in the first place.
His eyes themselves were empty as if he wasn’t looking anyone in the eye, and not once in this world have I ever witnessed them change.
In my previous life, I’d seen it a few times in-game.
<…What do you think you’re doing, Ethan?>
<My maid won’t listen to me and keeps trying to go somewhere! Lilith is my exclusive maid!>
<…That isn’t true, my lord. I’m only here to wash your bedding….>
<Shut up, shut up, don’t talk back!>
<*SNAP!*>
<Ahhhh!”>
<…Is that why you’re running around the mansion with your maid on a leash, whip in hand?>
<Yes! Because she’s mine, and that means she’s not going anywhere!>
<Hah….>
The only time we see emotion return to Harold’s eyes is in any incident involving Ethan.
Of course, the emotion in his gaze was mostly a mixture of pity and compassion, but never in a good way.
I don’t know how that perverted bastard got away with it, but his father, Harold, was a relatively sane human being.
That didn’t mean that this Harold would be on my side, though I hadn’t thought that for a moment since I’d gotten my memory back.
Like I’ve said before, this Harold was a fucking son of a bitch.
<…just don’t be late for lunch. I told them to make your favorite tomato soup today.>
<Yes!>
<Now, if you’ll excuse me, master, I’m going to….>
<I’ll have another maid tidy up Ethan’s bedding. From now on, you will make getting along with Ethan your top priority and keep him company at all times.>
<Yes, master….?>
<Hurry, Lilith! I have to tell everyone that you’re my bitch before lunch!>
<Now, just a moment, master, that’s the men’s….>
<*SNAP!*>
<Ahhhh!!!>
Fuck.
The expletives started flying out of my head as soon as I remembered the flashback scene that I had to watch almost every time I entered the Lilith route.
The Lilith storyline was famously polarizing in that it “saved” Lilith, who had been abused by Ethan for years and had her mind absolutely broken.
Naturally, as a unicorn, this plot was an extremely unpleasant development.
As you can see from the flashbacks, for me, whose primary goal is to escape and get away from the cult, Harold was an enemy but never my ally.
He wasn’t a bad master when it didn’t involve Ethan, but when it did, he was an idiot father who would never restrain his son no matter what he did.
It was rather dangerous to befriend Harold.
He wasn’t the kind of person you’d ever WANT to get to know in the first place.
“…….”
Harold sits down in his office, poring over papers while I’m just standing there.
A few papers in his hand fall to the table with a cursory glance, and he opens his mouth just before picking up another stack.
“My lord.”
“…Ah, yes. I had something to tell you.”
…Looking at that reaction, if I hadn’t interrupted him, I would have stood there like a pumice stone for another two hours.
Isabel had taught me how to do this, how to speak to someone at a time when they wouldn’t be offended.
Setting the papers he was picking up down on the table for a moment, Harold moved his eyes up and down my body as if to ‘observe’ me.
He gave a small nod, as if he understood the cause.
“Starting tomorrow, you will work in the kitchen for a week. Tell the maid that I have instructed you to transfer.”
“What?”
“There have been several people asking unnecessary questions about your appearance, so I want you to work somewhere out of sight until they’re gone.”
“Ah….”
“Do you have any complaints?”
“…No, I don’t.”
I can’t complain. In fact, I’d welcome it with open arms.
I couldn’t have asked for better news than that I wouldn’t have to see my grandkids for the next week.
Part of me wanted to jump up and down and run around.
Of course, I can’t do that, because even Harold would look at me like I was mentally ill.
“That’s the end of the instructions. Your seniors will still be in the kitchen, so learn what you need to do tomorrow morning and leave.”
“Yes, sir!”
“You are dismissed.”
“Thank you, sir!”
Barely concealing my creeping smile, I hurried out of the office, closing the door behind me.
The smile never left my face as I walked to the kitchen.
I was happy that I wouldn’t have to deal with them anymore, but there was something else that made me even more excited.
It was the fact that starting tomorrow, I wouldn’t have to go through another meaningless day.
I would be transferred to the kitchen, a space that would usually never be allowed for a first-year, low-level maid.
It meant it was finally time to do something with this “Lilith Rosewood” body.
Kitchen duty.
In this world, a maid had many duties, including, of course, working in the kitchen.
Cooking itself was the chef’s domain, so there was clearly no room for a lowly maid to interfere, and the kitchen was strictly off-limits to maids.
However, everything else, such as serving and washing dishes, was taken care of by the maids.
I often went to the preparation room right next to the kitchen.
Sometimes, however, when a manor house had many guests, as is the case now, the maid’s job was mise en place. In other words, prepare everything in advance before cooking.
Washing fruit and peeling vegetables was something that anyone could do, even if they didn’t know anything about cooking, and there were only a limited number of cooks to prepare and serve the food.
Being asked to work in the kitchen at this busy time of year meant doing all of this prep work and washing dishes, so having direct access to the kitchen was a massive plus for me.
It meant that the stage was finally set for me to use some magic with this Lilith.
‘I swear, I thought I was going to get sore from holding it in.’
It’s only been a week, but I can’t help but get a little sore from the moment I realized I could use magic.
The problem was I couldn’t use it randomly due to various circumstances.
For one, if anyone caught Lilith using magic with her body, it would be more than just a minor disturbance.
In this world, only those of noble lineage could wield magic, and very few commoners could.
It wasn’t a law, it was just the way things were. The blood of the nobility had a special mana that allowed them to use magic, and so on.
If any commoners could use magic, they would be the main characters of Luminor Academy, or at least, on par with the main characters.
…and the character I possessed, Lilith Rosewood, was also one of the main characters of Luminor Academy.
The fact that Lilith can use magic is, of course, one of the reasons why this seemingly unremarkable commoner maid became the main heroine of the game.
‘…Conversely, it’s the fact that she can use magic that makes her roll around like a dog throughout the game.’
I’ll explain how Lilith can use magic, and why she can do so that causes her to roll around like a dog, later.
What matters now is that my transfer to the kitchen created an environment where I could use magic for the first time.
In this world, magic is a blessing reserved for the nobility.
If it were known that Lilith, a commoner, could use magic, all eyes would be on her, whether she liked it or not.
When that kind of attention is drawn to a powerless commoner girl, it usually never ends well.
It wouldn’t be the first time the world’s benevolent nobles had to deal with a magic-using commoner maid.
Furthermore, most of Lilith’s magic was support-based, such as buffs and shields, so it was virtually impossible for her to resist with magic in a situation where she felt her life was in danger.
Therefore, I had to keep the fact that I could use magic a secret.
Not to Harold, not to the other nobles, not even to my best friend Isabel.
‘I’ve always played as the protagonist, so I didn’t realize how restrictive it was, but as Lilith, it’s a real constraint….’
If it was just a matter of staying undetected, the simplest solution would be to use magic out of sight.
The problem was that most of the mansions in this world had “magic detection barriers”.
No matter where or when you used magic in the manor, it was bound to be discovered.
They would know exactly where in the manor, who used what magic, when, and by whom.
But in the entirety of this large, spacious manor, there was only one place.
The exception was in the kitchen, where the magic detection barrier had been lifted to use all kinds of magical tools.
This was the moment I could finally fulfill my pent-up desire to unleash my magic.
‘It’s been a long, long period of persecution, and I’m sick of it.’
A sensation of surging magic coursed through my entire body.
It was now time for Lilith to take center stage.