I knocked on the duke’s—my father’s—office's door, and after a moment heard an annoyed “Come in,” from inside. As I opened the door, a thin, sour-faced man with sunken eyes and greyish-blue hair who was sitting behind a desk furrowed his eyebrows slightly, almost imperceptibly, at the sight of me.

“Raynold. What do you want this time? Please do make it quick, I’m busy.” He said as he went back to pouring over his documents.

I did a small bow , purely out of protocol, and said in a faux-respectful tone, “Hello, father. I’d like you to provide clothing and rooming for my new personal maid.”

He looked up at me with an narrowed, suspicious eyes and said, “Have you truly gone mad, Raynold? I thought even your lacking mind had finally understood this, and yet you come to my study once more with the same old request. I made myself abundantly clear last time, and the last, and all the many other times you asked. If you want personal maids, hire them yourself. Nobles, especially those of the high echelons, should learn to manage their own funds. You will never learn that by constantly leaning on your father for support.”

‘Yes, yes. ‘I need to learn to manage my own funds’. What a shitty excuse, the very same one he gave Raynold every time he came to beg for even a single maid in the past. I can’t believe he just accepted that bullshit as-is for so many years.’

I put on a concerned expression, but inwardly, I was smiling diabolically. “Oh, but  you misunderstand father, I already bought one. She is a slave, now bound to me. So, since she is now part of the estate’s staff, I only asked for something that all staff is provided with.”

He looked at me like I was some kind of alien and said, raising his voice slightly, “You say you bought a maid? When did that happen? I was informed of no such thing More importantly, how did you buy one, in the first place? I know full well you spent all of your allowance on that unwieldy sword of yours.”

I kept up the facade, putting on a nonchalant expression, and added, “Oh, but I’m the son of a great ducal family, of course a measly sword wouldn't take up all of my pay, which I saved up for over a year?”

Of course, I wasn't as calm as I seemed to be.

'Actually it did cost all my money, you bastard. Giving me that puny monthly stipend. Well, he doesn’t have to know that.'

Clearly a bit flustered, thought he did a good job of hiding it, my father spat out a reply. “W-well, in that case, why not buy those clothes yourself then? It’s your maid after all.”

‘Oh, how naive, you’ve fallen right into my trap.’

Once again, I put on a distressed expression to prevent the evil grin from appearing on my face.

“But I spent all my allowance already... I’m afraid I’d have to wait until next month for that. But… it would be terrible if unsavoury rumours about our house making their maids wear rags were to spread right, father? If it were not for the good of our house, why would I have bothered you like this? Please take care of this matter.”

Leaving those words hanging in the room’s now frozen air, I nimbly turned around and left through the door, barely able to contain my laughter. ‘Seriously, your type is so easy to deal with. How stupid did the past me have to be to always fall into your and your sons’ petty schemes?’

I skipped my way back to my room, extremely satisfied with myself. But, when I got there, I was shocked to see Aina curled up against a corner, her whole body shivering as she sobbed quietly.

I immediately ran up to her and asked her what was wrong. Eventually, between sobs and tears, she replied;

“So-sorry, master Ray. Sob, just...I was, sniff, so happy when you carried me and, sniff, and talked to me, hic, but then you left me alone...Sob sob, I don’t want- hic, I don’t want to be left alone anymore... I'm sorry for, sniff, for being so selfish...I-I promise I'll do anything you ask me to, A-as long as you keep me...waaaahhhhhh!!”

As the dam broke and she began to full-on wail, I tenderly propped her up and hugged her. Then, I brought her head to my shoulder, then said to her ear, “It’s okay, it’s okay. I’ll never leave you alone, you hear me? I promise.” I put her face in front of mine as I said the last part, my deep blue eyes staring straight into hers to show my sincerity. I then immediately hugged her again.

Once she finally calmed down, I broke the hug, and tackled something that had been bothering me for a while. “Come on, we have to get you cleaned up, you smell... well, like a dirty dungeon cell.”

‘I don’t have enough affinity to use Rinse on other people. As it is, it would take me a bigger amount of mana than my whole mana pool to do it. Well, this is good in it’s own way... Fuck, I'm such a selfish prick, wanting to take advantage of a poor girl like this... at least I freed her from slavery, which eases my conscience a little bit... it's still a dick move, though.'

She looked at me with horror-filled eyes and said, as she backed up, “O-Oh no, I-I’m so sorry master,” she fell to the ground on her knees. “Me, a disgustingly thin and ugly and foul-smelling slave... crying... and shamelessly hugging her master... ple-please punish me.” She pushed her head down onto the ground, her whole body shaking slightly.

As my heart dropped, I groaned, regretting my choice of words instead of having opted for a more subtle approach.

“Come on, don’t be like that, I forgive you. And I'll let you know, in my eyes, you're incredibly beautiful." She didn't seem to really believe what I said, but I knew it wouldn't be so easy to overturn her common sense just like that.  

Fortunately, patience was something I didn't lack. I caressed her cheek, and gave her a sincere smile. "You don’t want to be alone right? Then let’s go into the bath together.” She slowly got up, but then I swiped her off her feet and walked with her in my arms towards the bathroom.