Risou no Himo Seikatsu - Volume 10 - Chapter Aft

Appendix — The Lord and Maids’ Home Renovation

The inner palace was considered, as a rule, to be a place closed to men. Other than its lord, that is.

That was true, but practically speaking, there were more occasions where men were allowed in than one might expect.

While the inner palace was indeed “a place,” it was also a building. General use of a building caused wear and tear, which meant it needed maintenance. Keeping men out even then would mean the country needed craftswomen. Female physicians would be required for emergencies, and the women would have to move the stone as well.

That was, in a word, unrealistic.

Therefore, while the general rule remained that men were forbidden from the inner palace, there were multiple exceptions. Today, Amanda had come to inform the remaining maids in the palace of one of those exemptions.

“There will be, from tomorrow onward, craftsmen coming and going within the inner palace for a period. I expect you all to be even more aware of yourselves than usual to not bring shame upon our establishment.”

“Yes, head maid.”

Satisfied at their response, Amanda nodded before continuing. “They are going to be constructing a sauna. This will be near the annex. Therefore, I expect you to be particularly diligent in cleaning around that annex and the gardens in the area. Understood?”

“Yes, head maid,” they chorused again.

“Your own appearance is, naturally, equally important. Ensure you bathe properly and your clothes are laundered. This is the blazing season, so ordinarily, a certain level of slack would be tacitly approved, but it will not be from tomorrow. You are to display the pride of maids of the inner palace.”

“Yes, head maid,” they repeated for a third time.

They were so in unison that one could be forgiven for thinking the response was mostly rote by this point. Taking it as the fruits of their training, Amanda nodded several times before giving her final warning.

“However, the most important thing to remember is that you must not wantonly appear around the men. We senior maids will be the ones predominately coordinating with them, so you should all keep out of their sight as much as possible. On the off chance that is unavoidable, you are not to speak and are to leave as soon as your role is fulfilled. Understood?”

“Huh? Then what’s the point in dressing up?” one of the maids murmured.

“You there!” Amanda exclaimed, sharp eyes pivoting her way. “Did you have something to say?!”

“No, head maid!”

Any other muttering was well and truly stifled.

◇◆◇◆◇◆◇◆

The next day saw, as planned, a profusion of new people appearing within the inner palace. They wore rough shirts and pants dirtied from work over well-built bodies.

The group was around a dozen people, all men. There were carpenters, masons, blacksmiths, and laborers. All of them were types who would normally never be allowed within the inner palace.

Particularly attention-grabbing was the tall man in the center, surveying the area. Part of that was due to his height, being half a head taller than any of the men around him, but the main reason was a more fundamental aspect of his appearance. He had light brown hair and gray-blue eyes. While the Southern Continent’s sun had tanned his skin past being mistaken for “white,” it was visibly a shade different from that of a Capuan.

The man was one of the Sveans, a sailor on the ship Freya had helmed from the far north. While the sailors on the Glasir’s Leaf obviously made their livings through either sailing itself or as warriors, there were a surprising number of people with other talents in the crew.

There were many dangers to long sea voyages. Frankly, it was a job where you could easily die. That meant they were always recruiting. The people who took up such positions were often from sailing families, but just as many were second or third sons who could not take up their own family’s trade.

Nicolai was a perfect example of that. He was one of those with alternative skills. Aiding his family earlier in life meant that he knew how to build a sauna from scratch.

Naturally, that claim wouldn’t allow him access to the inner palace in and of itself. He had needed to make a prototype outside before being granted permission to enter the inner palace.

The man’s head pivoted this way and that before he spoke. “So, we want it over by that building, right? Is there a water source? Saunas don’t take as much water as a bathhouse, but they still need it. Plus we’ll need a cold bath, since you gotta take a dip in one when you’re outta the sauna. A natural pond or winter snow’d be better, but that ain’t happening around here.”

A native craftsman, advanced enough in age to be called elderly, put a hand to his chin as he answered. “As far as ponds are concerned, there’s the fountain in the garden. If we want a water source, though, the bath draws water from a central source and automatically fills and drains when the dividers are removed. It’d be a fair bit of time and effort, but we could set up the same thing here. The only other water source would be the well. Women are usually the only ones around, so we’d rather not force them to haul water from there.”

As you could gather from the man’s immediate, fluent explanation of the environment, this was one of the royal family’s engineers. The knowledge of the two palaces’ blueprints, water supply, wall thickness, and so on was all crammed into his gray-haired head, so he was required to live within the royal palace. It was an awfully restricted life.

While part of the reason for his age was due to the time and dedication it took to gather all the knowledge and expertise his position required, that wasn’t all. It was also because an older man’s weaker legs meant that it wouldn’t be as much of a hardship to be restricted in his movements as it might be for a younger man. There was also the rather harsh perspective that someone his age wouldn’t last too long anyway, so it would be best for confidentiality’s sake.

In the truly harsh countries, people with such classified knowledge would lose more than just their job when the time came, so Capua’s treatment was actually relatively progressive.

“Yeah, not the best job to foist off on the women. Definitely can’t get the girls of the inner palace to do it.”

“Be different if it were my wife.”

“You got that right.”

While the older workers were chattering away, the younger men were looking around uncomfortably. That was hardly a surprise. This was the inner palace. While Zenjirou was well at home there, it was the most mysterious place in the country—somewhere a normal person would likely never tread. It was a space forbidden to men other than Zenjirou, so they felt out of place even in the gardens.

The youths’ roving looks finally caught sight—albeit distantly—of something.

“Ah?!”

“They’re there!”

“For real?!”

Three of the young maids had just caught the gazes of the young workers as they hurried past to fulfill their duties. They had likely noticed the men in turn. They stopped briefly in surprise before offering an almost encouraging wave in the men’s direction.

A roar went up from the men.

“They were looking at me!”

“Don’t be an idiot—it was me. The only reason you can even think that’s ’cause you’ve never seen your own face.”

“Shut it. Move, already; I can’t see!”

They’d started making a racket, forgetting their place. Since Zenjirou had essentially been royalty from the moment he had stepped into this world, he likely didn’t see things the same way as the locals. However, apart from a few exceptions, the maids were all daughters of nobles. And they weren’t “just nobility” either. Their upbringing, personalities, and even appearances had led them to be selected as “appropriate for the inner palace.”

In other words, they were almost literal flowers on peaks far beyond the commoners’ grasps. Seeing them, even from a distance, and having them smile and wave would almost inevitably set the men off.

However, this was the inner palace, a place ordinarily barred to them. Being allowed an exception to that rule did not mean they could cause a commotion over the maids.

“Hey! What do you think you’re playing at?!” the older man demanded, his voice stronger than his aged appearance would have suggested.

They yelped.

“B-Boss! We were just...”

The youths came back to themselves, even if it was a little late. But their boss wasn’t going to let them off so easily.

“You fools!”

The younger men all took blows to the head hard enough that you could practically see the sparks fly.

◇◆◇◆◇◆◇◆

As for the young maids who had been the cause of the outburst, they were currently receiving karma—or at least a long lecture from Amanda.

“How are you three so thoughtless? I told you time and again that you needed to take the longer route today. Your laziness causes these issues.”

Weathering the unceasing lecture with suitable expressions and hunched shoulders were the three problem maids: Faye, Dolores, and Letti.

The craftsmen would be present around the annex today, so they had been told to take the longer route when walking outside to avoid contact with the visitors as much as possible. However, the problem maids, living up to their moniker, had taken a shortcut, allowing themselves to be seen.

Their apologies came in turn.

“We apologize.”

“We were in the wrong.”

“It won’t happen again.”

Their expressions certainly appeared regretful, and their voices were feeble, but Amanda wouldn’t let herself be taken in by it to offer them sympathy. She knew the girls were not chagrined in the slightest. They had just perfected the skill of looking so and letting the lecture wash over them. The only way she had of correcting their behavior was a physical approach.

She had spoken to the craftsmen about something that would serve this punishment perfectly. Therefore, she decided to delegate the task to the girls in front of her.

“Very well. You will be demonstrating that regret through your actions. Am I understood?” she asked with a sweet smile.

The three knew that couldn’t mean anything good for them. Still, they had no right to refuse.

“You are.”

“We understand.”

“Of course.”

Despite their strained expressions, the trio could only agree.

That evening, their premonitions were fulfilled with backbreaking work.

“Hup. And that’s—”

“Less than half.”

While Faye and Dolores had the breath to talk, Letti’s breath was coming in halting gasps. They had been required to fill a simple wooden bath near the annex with water from the well.

The bath was a long rectangle built of wood. It was a model of the bath that would be built next to the sauna. Of course, the actual construction would be made from stone and half-buried in the ground; this was merely to judge the size and amount of water it would require.

It was too fragile for someone to actually use, so there would be no one bathing in it, but it could at least be filled for testing purposes.

It was much smaller than the huge bath in the inner palace proper, but filling it with water was still closer to torture than work.

“We’re...never...going...to mana...ge...this...every...day!” Faye complained.

“Right!” Dolores replied.

She and Faye were doing better, while Letti was still gasping for breath and couldn’t even speak properly, being the least fit of the three of them. Her light brown hair was plastered to her forehead with sweat, almost seductively.

Why were they doing this? The biggest reason was the issue that afternoon, but there was a more practical reason as well. The sauna was being built for Freya, who would soon be taking over the annex, as a cultural homage to her home country. However, adding new furnishings was not such a simple process. The sauna and attached bath called for a large amount of water. It was a given that transporting water to a place that had not previously required it was not an easy undertaking.

Channels were normally excavated between the palace’s water sources and the baths by calculating the amount of water needed and the difference in elevation.

Magic was a part of this world, so the actual excavation was made much easier by way of earth manipulation, but automatically filling and draining baths was a major undertaking nonetheless.

If the water supply could be eliminated, the construction would be far simpler. That was actually the norm. Filling a bath via bucket was hard labor, but part of that was because it was three women doing so. For a large man—or ten—it wouldn’t be worth remarking on.

Even if they hired laborers each day, it wouldn’t be enough to make much of a dent in the coffers, but this was the inner palace, so only women would normally be within it. With the various checks required for them, it wasn’t easy to simply increase their numbers either. That was why the craftsmen had discounted the idea to begin with. It would add to the time and effort—and therefore budget—but their only choice was the plumbing system.

Amanda had suggested that they try out the manual approach once to be sure. The results were visible at a glance. Things were just as bad as expected.

The evening had passed and the sun was well below the horizon when the three maids stood over the moon’s brightening reflection in the now-filled bath.

Faye and Dolores were breathing raggedly, while Letti was on the verge of passing out. She had practically given up entirely for the latter half of the job and made a single trip in the time it had taken Faye to make three. Still, the other two hadn’t complained both because Letti usually picked up the slack when they were cooking and because their relationship was so strong.

Either way, the three had finished their punishment and could hear crisp footsteps making their way closer. They knew who it was just from the sound. They would normally have leaped up immediately, but they didn’t have the energy left to do so.

The person in question—Amanda—stood in front of the three collapsed maids and spoke. “Good work. Judging from your state, it would seem the work is too much to push on the maids.”

She wasn’t devilish enough to scold them for their slovenly appearance and demand that they stand up straight. Still, even the thanks was barely enough to make them raise their heads.

“Lady Amanda...we can’t...”

“It’s too hard...”

Such statements from the two to the head maid took considerable courage, but the work had simply been that hard. Even Amanda seemed to feel somewhat guilty about it, but she cleared her throat to deflect those feelings before continuing, unconcerned.

“Creating new waterways will inevitably lead to construction taking longer. In other words, the men will be around the inner palace for longer. The only way to shorten that would be to forgo those channels. I will admit that if the other maids here were not as careless as you were today, I could suggest them even if it would lead to the time frame increasing.”

There was an unspoken question laced into her words, although it was more of a threat than a question.

“I-It will be fine!”

“We won’t be so careless again!”

“W-We’re sorry...”

Faye and Dolores had already regained the energy to speak, and even Letti managed to muster the wherewithal to respond to that.

The job had been effective for its purpose, it seemed. While she felt like it may have been slightly excessive, Amanda decided to take it as a success.

“Then I shall deal with the cleanup. You have done enough today. Once you recover, you can return to your rooms. Oh, do not forget to eat and bathe, even if you are tired or it will impact your work tomorrow.”

“Right.”

“Thank you...”

Letti just managed a noise, her earlier energy now spent.

The three of them leaned back thankfully and waited to recover.

◇◆◇◆◇◆◇◆

About a month passed after those pitiful events. The ceaseless work of the craftsmen—helped in no small part by a generous infusion of labor from earth magic users—had seen the sauna and cold bath completed.

The bath would fill with water when the partition was removed, and it could be uncorked to drain. The sauna itself was tightly sealed to keep the hot air inside. The building’s wooden construction made it stand out somewhat from the surrounding stone buildings, but that was a nice touch to symbolize the induction of a new piece of culture.

The sailor from the Glasir’s Leaf had signed off on it, but that wasn’t the be-all-end-all of the project. Freya would be the one to use it in the future. Until then, Zenjirou and Aura were the two who could avail themselves. They were all-important figures in the country, almost without peer.

It had happened in the same way with Zenjirou’s initial success at making soap, but once something was completed, it needed to be verified as being safe. Therefore, the maids had a new job: to test the sauna.

The inside of the building was home to a U-shaped bench, which was a protrusion at a comfortable height for sitting. It took up every wall apart from the entrance. There were two burners at the center of the cramped room and two in the corners. There was a wooden ladle that could be used to splash the heating stones on the burners to steam up the area.

There were several layers of cloth along the seating for added comfort, and you could even lie down on them if the fancy took you. There was also a sturdy pedestal right in the middle of the room for oil lamps to use as a light source. The room had no windows to keep the steam in, and this was how they were dealing with the lack of illumination. This time, though, they were using one of Zenjirou’s LED lamps.

Not even the blazing season could compare to the heat and humidity of the sauna, and the maids were slumped and soaked in their own sweat, covered in a single wrap of cloth.

“So hot...” came the complaint from Faye, the first to speak up.

“I’d call it intense...” Dolores teased from her side. Still, Dolores wasn’t particularly at home in the environment either.

“It’s...hard to breathe...” Letti managed from her position elsewhere on the seat. Her full chest was heaving up and down as if she wasn’t getting enough oxygen. While Capuans were used to a certain level of both heat and humidity, there were limits.

Faye turned to the girl opposite her. Her friend’s expression hadn’t even faltered.

“You look the same as usual, Louisa. Aren’t you hot?”

The black-haired-and-eyed girl answered her senior’s question dully. “I can feel the heat. However, I have been trained, so this is still within my tolerance limit.” Her posture underlined her claim, as she was sitting with a straight back.

At her side, Mirella was practically the opposite. “You’re inc...redible,” she said. “I’m imp...ressed.”

Mirella was struggling even more than Letti, unable to get full words out. She seemed to be particularly vulnerable to the sauna. Actually, she seemed to have a relatively low tolerance for anything unpleasant at all.

Dolores, sitting opposite the girl, gave her a kind reminder. “Mirella, you know you don’t need to push yourself, right? If it gets too much for you, head to the other room. There’s a cold bath waiting for you there.”

Mirella smiled, shaking her damp hair from her face as she answered. “Thank you.”

The majority of the maids were nobles. The current exceptions were Louisa and Margarette, along with the head of cleaning, Ines. Even so, there was an indelible hierarchy among the noble maids.

Mirella was from the highest-ranking family among them. She was the niece of Count Márquez—a particularly influential noble—and had lost her parents in the war, so she had been brought up in the family proper. The manners drilled into her were the perfect embodiment of high-class nobility. Of course, being from a high-ranked family did not necessarily correspond to well-drilled manners.

“It’s hot, isn’t it?” asked Nilda, a bright smile of enjoyment on her sweat-streaked face. She was next to Mirella, opposite Letti, and hailed from the Gaziel family as the head’s second daughter. In terms of rank, her family was on par with the Márquez family. Moreover, Nilda was not the family head’s niece, but his daughter. There was no one more highly placed in the inner palace.

At a push, Viscount Regalado’s daughter would be on the same level. However, influence and tradition aside, the family was that of a mere viscount, so overall, Nilda would be ranked higher.

Despite this, while her father was indeed the margrave, her mother was an ordinary villager. Nilda herself had been raised as a commoner until she was eight, so her manners were likely the least refined of anyone in the room. In fact, she had broken conventions on several occasions since entering the inner palace. The fact that no one particularly disliked her in spite of that was practically a talent of its own. Because she was who she was, no one pulled her up on acting and speaking through her emotions.

“Sorry, I can’t take anymore,” Nilda said finally, staggering to her feet. The others exchanged looks before joining her with a smile.

“I’ll come with you.”

“Likewise.”

“Well, if the younglings are going, I guess I’ll follow along.”

“There’s no need to force ourselves to stay.”

“Yup, let’s get out.”

The maids traipsed out from the sauna behind Nilda. Waiting behind the door was a tub full of cold water. The young maids jostled each other in an effort to be first, jumping in and letting out happy yells.

“Guh, that’s great!”

“Indeed it is.”

“I feel like I’m alive again.”

“I quite agree. The waste from our sweat is being washed away, and I feel like a new woman.”

“I can understand why Princess Freya’s country is so fond of the custom.”

“This is wonderful.”

Faye dunked her entire head under, but no one there would chide her for it. That was just how pleasant the cold water was after reaching their limit in the steam.

All of them now had reinvigorated expressions. Even Louisa’s usually blank face was home to a slight smile.

The maids spent a while washing off the sweat in the cold water. The problem was that everyone present was new to saunas. Therefore, every one of them made the common mistake of first-timers:

“It’s cold.”

“I’m freezing.”

“I can’t feel my fingers.”

“I can feel my temperature dropping. My capabilities are doing the same.”

“Yup, we stayed in here too long.”

“Aha ha, my body’s freezing.”

That was, of course, staying too long in the cold bath and letting the chill permeate their bodies. But correcting the mistake was surprisingly simple.

“Let’s warm up again, then.”

“That’s probably the only option.”

“Agreed.”

“Indeed. Next time, we should ensure that we moderate our time for cooling off.”

“True. Embarrassingly enough, I will be joining you.”

“Yay! We’re all together.”

The girls all willingly headed back to the room they’d previously fled.

◇◆◇◆◇◆◇◆

Several days had passed since the inner palace was furnished with the sauna. The young maids were completely hooked. Sweating in the sauna and washing off the heat in the water...then, once they were cold, jumping back into the sauna and repeating the process without chilling themselves too much...

Some of them, however, had started using it differently. Some began by using the cold bath. It could be considered a clever plan, in fact. After all, Capua was on the Southern Continent and currently in the midst of the blazing season. The temperature was easily over thirty-five degrees even at night. The humidity was high as well, so the weather was like a milder sauna. Therefore, cooling off first made a certain amount of sense.

The problem maids had taken things a step further to make another discovery: iced juice, shaved ice, and ice cream were even better if you had them after you’d steamed yourself in the sauna.

There was a problem, though. The freezer that Zenjirou had brought was fairly big, being a five-door model. Still, it had its limits, and regardless, its owners were Zenjirou and Aura.

Zenjirou was currently in the Twin Kingdoms, but the maids still didn’t use the freezer much more than usual. Each maid could therefore only eat so much ice and ice cream. Unfortunately, that amount was not enough to satisfy their new cravings.

So the three put their heads together. The delicious ice cream existed, and they wanted to eat more of it. They pondered the solution for a while before coming upon one surprisingly easily.

There wasn’t enough for the three of them. One person eating the portions meant that they’d have three times the amount. Faye and Dolores were usually fairly unreserved to begin with, but even Letti was rather unyielding when it came to food. Therefore, the three of them were having an endurance match in the sauna with their combined portion of ice cream on the line.

Their juniors watched them oddly as the three remained utterly silent.

“Um, I will be heading out first,” said Milagros, tilting her head and blinking her slanted eyes before standing.

Slightly taken aback by the lack of response to their roommate, Manora and Monica exchanged glances before speaking.

“Um, Faye?”

“Letti, we’d like to head out first.”

Faye usually doted on Manora—one of the few girls who was smaller than her—and Letti had a good relationship built on a mutual love for and sharing of nice food with Monica. However, their usually kind—albeit eccentric—seniors remained serious and nonspeaking. They were essentially trying to minimize even the smallest expenditure of energy but hadn’t told their compatriots.

Feeling somewhat guilty about their younger colleagues standing there awkwardly, Dolores waved her hand to say they could leave. However, due to her odd expression and being slumping against the wall, it looked more like she was chivvying them out.

“O-Our apologies.”

“Excuse us.”

“In a while.”

The three of them jostled past each other to get out of the room. The problem maids were left alone in silence.

None of them were trying to verbally provoke each other, but there was a heavy tension between the three. They were all firmly convinced that they’d be the last woman standing. Regardless, they had both physical and mental limits.

The first to reach hers was Dolores.

“Phwah, no more.”

She was the calmest and most rational of the three, so it was all but inevitable that she would be the first to drop out. Pushing herself any further could make her ill, she’d decided, so she headed for the bath.

“You should both call it quits soon. I won’t mock you,” she said before leaving.

Faye and Letti were now the only ones left. Faye was still there out of stubbornness, while Letti was there due to greed, neither being able to stand. Sweat trickled down their bodies as they spared each other glances.

Their stalemate was eventually challenged unexpectedly. The door thumped open as someone entered the room.

“Oh, you’re both still here?” asked Amanda, appearing from nowhere. The two stiffened immediately and let out noises of shock. The younger maids were certainly not the only ones using the sauna. Amanda and the other heads also used it.

The two came to an understanding by exchanging looks. This wasn’t a situation in which to fight. They needed to get their stories straight and leave before Amanda started questioning them.

“Sorry, we overstayed a little,” Letti said. “Come on, Faye.” She stood to divert Amanda’s attention.

Faye tried to follow. “Right... Huh...?”

“Faye?!”

“Faye?! What’s wrong? Can you hear me? Faye?!”

Faye blacked out. The next thing she saw was the familiar ceiling of the living room in the inner palace.

“Huh? Where...”

A familiar voice speaking in an unfamiliarly soft tone answered her uncomprehending murmurs. “Thank goodness, you came around.”

“R... Right. Lady Amanda?!”

She immediately moved to sit up, but Amanda put a hand gently on top of her.

“You shouldn’t get up just yet. You might not remember, but you passed out in the sauna.”

That was what finally prompted Faye to understand the situation she was in. She was currently lying on a sofa in the living room, her head resting—of all places—on Amanda’s lap. Amanda was speaking in a tone softer than Faye had ever heard from her as she stroked her hair.

“What a disaster. I know it is our duty to test how it should be used before our lords and ladies could, but you went above and beyond the call of duty there, Faye.”

“Ah...”

She could more or less understand what was happening. Amanda thought that Faye had been using the sauna normally and then fainted.

“I had half expected it, but it would appear the sauna can cause us to swoon in much the same way as a hot bath if we remain in there for too long. Princess Freya knows how to use it, so that may be another matter, but perhaps we should ask Her Majesty and Sir Zenjirou to refrain from using it for a while.”

“Ah, right...”

Amanda gently handed a cup to Faye as the maid offered her half-hearted answer.

“Here, this is fruit juice. Do you think you can drink it? There’s ice in there, so take care.”

“Th-Thank you.”

She was done for if the truth came out. Faye was well aware that she had collapsed due to her own stupidity, but she had to keep her expression in check and avoid pulling a face at Amanda’s kindness.