"…Hah?"
For a moment, it felt like time in the parlor had stopped.
Hadn't winter only just ended not long ago?
The reason was obvious.
Because even the warm spring breeze blowing in from outside the window seemed to refuse to enter this room!
All thanks to the short sigh Estelle had just let out—a sigh that converged toward absolute zero.
Already, her pupils had completely lost their usual composure as the perfect maid, trembling finely with indescribable contempt and revulsion.
"…What, exactly, did I just hear?"
…Wow.
This really seems like a huge problem, doesn't it?
"Ah, no. That's, what I mean is…."
I waved my hands frantically to make excuses.
But before my words could even continue, the air in the room began to change ominously.
—Crackle.
"Huh?"
I doubted my own eyes.
The silver tray Estelle had swung at me.
From its edges, white frost began to form, and before long, even the steam from the teacup I had been about to drink froze solid and clattered to the floor!
'No, it's really freezing?! What is this?'
Beyond simply cooling down, frost was physically settling in the surroundings.
This was something that shouldn't happen.
Was it magic?
'Yeah, it must be magic.'
And that was exactly the problem.
Because in this romance fantasy world, there were exactly two types of people who used magic!
First, just incredible geniuses.
The type where the magic-obsessed, ultra-handsome Tower Master would flip his lid and kidnap them to the Magic Tower, so encountering them outside the Academy was harder than plucking stars from the sky.
Second.
Black magic! Unregistered magic users!
There was no way these people, who trained in magic while avoiding the gaze of that crazy Tower Master, were normal!
In this world, they were the insane terrorist & assassin organization that proudly formed one axis of the villains!
If Estelle were the former, she would have been taken to the Tower long ago, so there was no way she'd remain as the head maid of Viscount Asche's household.
Then could it be the latter…?
Estelle, the unidentified black magic assassin who attempted to assassinate the Crown Prince?
'I'm fucked.'
The cerebral cortex activated instantly.
First, pretend I didn't see the magic.
The fact that a strong person's identity is unknown means everyone who witnessed their strength died.
'…Let's pretend I didn't see. I absolutely have to pretend I didn't see and resolve this situation first.'
I clenched my jaw, which was trembling violently,
and put on the most pitiful and harmless expression I could.
"E-Estelle! Calm down! It's a misunderstanding!"
"A misunderstanding? Which part of that beastly statement—asking me to lift my dress because you want to see a garter belt—leaves any room for misunderstanding, Young Master?"
Estelle shot back, treating me as lower than an insect.
"Truly, truly, you are an irredeemable piece of trash. I'll overlook how you played cheap tricks on Acting Manager Lydia with pulp this and that, sucking the soul out of a woman;
you threw harassment at your childhood friend, the young lady, that she couldn't even handle! And now, after all that, you're sexually harassing the only maid in this mansion? Do you truly possess even a shred of reason in your head?"
A barrage of scoldings poured down without rest.
I couldn't even refute a single one because not one word was wrong.
Blinded by the creator's pure desire to visually confirm the harmony of the perfect maid uniform's skirt pleats, tension, and garter belt, I had lost all sense of reality.
Asking a woman outright to show her garter belt, which practically counted as underwear—wasn't this a situation where even calling the police wouldn't leave me with anything to say?
"I must have been crazy! No, that's not it, there's a reason! It's all for the family!"
"Are you planning to unfold some miraculous logic about how it is for the family that you want to lift my skirt? A cheap, depraved noble who can't even make excuses properly!"
Aah, I'm dead.
A cheap, depraved noble, completely failing to notice the maid is a black mage and walking straight to my death.
It's unfair, so unfair!
How was I supposed to know that one of the worst villains in this romance fantasy would be the maid of a third-rate extra noble family!
This unfair world setting!
Damn you, romance fantasy author!
I said I like harem adult male-oriented worlds!
Snap.
Something snapped inside my head.
It was definitely what people called—the string of reason.
And for good reason.
"Estelle Orot."
The voice that flowed from my lips contained not a single iota of emotion.
"I won't say it twice."
It was coercive.
"You're my maid, aren't you. Estelle."
"……Young Master?"
To someone who might perhaps be the worst villain in this world,
"Lift your hem."
I was giving such an order.
I thought this was the only way I could survive.
◆
Ian.
Ian Asche.
Estelle Orot recalled the name of the young master of the family she served once more in her head.
Someone who couldn't even handle his own affairs properly.
Someone who always hid behind others whenever an incident occurred.
A pathetic existence in whom not an ounce of masculinity could be felt.
The man who had been miserable and irredeemable until just moments ago no longer existed in this room.
"I won't say it twice."
"You're my maid, aren't you. Estelle."
"Lift your hem."
Those three short, coercive words.
With pupils so cold and empty that not a single thread of emotion was mixed in.
Beneath that overwhelming gaze that seemed to treat her as a possession, Estelle nearly forgot even how to breathe.
The cold air that had frozen the room melted away in an instant.
A sharp shiver ran down her spine, and uncontrollably hot heat surged up from within Estelle's body.
'When on earth… did the Young Master change like this?'
Estelle took in the man before her with trembling pupils.
The young master of the past had merely been a foolish, pathetic shut-in who didn't know the first thing about women.
But recently, he had changed noticeably.
Hadn't he seduced Lydia with eloquent speech? Didn't he casually cast flirtatious remarks at his childhood friend, the young lady Lena, who dropped by constantly, saying he liked women with big mouths?
Whenever she saw those unfamiliar appearances, a corner of Estelle's chest would surge with an inexplicable pain, as if being pricked by needles.
And now, that man was directing an exceptionally heavy and coercive order solely at her.
Rationally speaking, it was an absurdly rude and vulgar request.
A situation where she could smash his head with the silver tray and leave the mansion right now and still have nothing to answer for.
'That's clearly the situation I should be in.'
But Estelle could not kick through the door and leave this room right now.
No, it was difficult to refuse.
Rather, this moment, bound by that cold gaze, felt perversely sweet.
'Right. No matter how ignorant and good-for-nothing a noble the Young Master is.'
In this empire, there was no way she didn't know what heavy meaning it held for an unmarried woman to show her undergarments to an unrelated man—to say nothing of her most intimate underwear, a garter belt.
It was no different from the meaning of submission, offering everything of herself.
'In other words.'
It was too serious and dominant to dismiss as simple perverted desire or a joke—the voice and eyes the young master had just shown.
'Could that have been… though oppressive, a confession that you are mine?'
Her breathing grew rough.
She had to refuse.
She had never seen or heard such a trashy confession.
Cold reason was telling Estelle to refuse.
But at the same time, another thought occurred to her.
What if she refused this shameful order here, standing on her pride?
It was obvious.
That irredeemable young master would undoubtedly run to that tactless childhood friend or that paper merchant woman and make the exact same request.
He would cast this heavy gaze that had been directed at her toward another woman.
'Wouldn't that be better? Rather than getting entangled with a maid like me, it would be better for the Young Master to be with a proper noble young lady….'
The moment her thoughts reached that point.
'I don't want to.'
Estelle gritted her teeth inwardly.
'I truly don't want that.'
To have this intense, violent possessiveness directed solely at her stolen away by another woman?
She alone had always silently watched over the bottom of this man named Ian Asche that no one else could handle.
Everything of this man, even these vulgar and dangerous desires, had to be entirely hers.
Yes.
So this was the emotion.
She slowly, very slowly, took one step closer to Ian.
The rustling friction sound of the maid uniform echoed unusually loudly.
She slightly bent her body, meeting the gaze of Ian's coldly frozen, empty pupils.
The heat had vanished at some point, and Estelle's eyes held a coldness like no other.
Estelle's lips trembled faintly.
She closed her eyes deeply, as if pondering,
then opened her mouth toward Ian in a voice full of contempt.
"Promise me. Young Master."
The fingers of Estelle's white-gloved hand gently gripped the frills of the black maid uniform.
"That you will never… make this request to any woman other than me."
Confirming that Ian had swallowed dryly and was frozen blankly, Estelle very slightly raised the corners of her lips.
"Then…."
The hem of the skirt made a soft rustling sound as it was pulled up slightly.