Rena's feeling of apprehension was well-founded, because when Ume walked out of her small room fifteen minutes later, the young butler's jaw practically dropped.

She had completely destroyed the maid outfit!

...Or well, kind of.

The 53-year-old dragon had taken abundant liberties with altering the dress. She had effectively cut off certain portions of the uniform and sewn on additional sections of fabric, to the point that she had practically taken apart two separate maid uniforms and combined them into a single outfit. It was a chimeric monster worthy of Frankenstein's recognition, and the product was entirely novel.

To put it bluntly, it no longer looked like a french maid uniform.

The style was distinctly asian (in an Earthly sense), and Ume clearly preferred a more oriental style with wide loose sleeves and an overabundance of fabric. The flowing robe was secured with sashes, and an obi was wrapped around her waist and tied in a large bow. The closest approximation was a japanese shrine maiden's kosode and hakama, except that the outfit was clearly sewn together from patchwork materials.

+ + +

"This..."

Rena was about to say that this wasn't allowed.

Obviously, the point of a uniform was so that all the maids and butlers in a household could wear the same thing. Uniforms encouraged camaraderie, discipline, and obedience. It simply wouldn't be a uniform anymore if every staff member was allowed to customize their own clothes, and the household would descend into chaos if everyone showed up to work and did whatever the hell they wanted.

For a commoner, it was absolutely necessary to conform and line up with the others —

...although... in Lord Gawrgaru's household, there actually weren't any other maids.

Hence, Rena hit a frustrating roadblock.

Technically, since Ume was the only maid, she could modify her wardrobe any way that she wanted without clashing with any of the existing staff. There was no precedent to conform to, and there was no official rule that Lord Gawrgaru's maids needed to wear the same attire as Lady Gwendolyn's maids. In fact, it was socially desirable if each household had its own unique uniforms, so it made sense to alter the maid uniforms that they obtained from Lady Gwendolyn's estate.

However... wasn't this too... unique?

It was too different from the original design.

Rena instinctively wanted to criticize it, but he struggled to find something to fault in particular. Although Ume's maid uniform was different, it was practical, unassuming, and modest. Unlike the strict bodices and corsets of classical french attire, Ume's modified dress looked comfortable. The 53-year-old dragon had even sewn pockets into the apron, as if she was fully prepared to climb into a cramped chimney to clean out dirty soot. 

Rena's only complaint might have been that it wasn't attractive or fancy enough.

That said, that was a hardly a criticism, as servants weren't supposed to be eye-catching. Proper maids and butlers were supposed to be flies on a wall, and it was better if they were neither seen nor heard by their lords and masters. In this sense, Ume's dress alterations were remarkably sensible for a snake monster who supposedly did not understand human culture.

In the end, Rena couldn't bring himself to say anything.

He hung his head in defeat.

+ + +

"We're late to the morning meeting..." Rena sighed ruefully. "Can you... follow me quietly... and not destroy anything else, please? I can give you a tour of the mansion later, but there's a staff meeting at 7 o'clock in the morning every day. As a maid, you will be required to attend it along with the rest of us."

Ume nodded in understanding.

"The law of conservation dictates that energy cannot be created or destroyed," the 53-year-old dragon replied wisely. "Practically speaking, destroying matter is inconvenient, so I don't like to obliterate atoms either. The destruction of mass releases too much energy, and it's rather annoying to deal with the excess power, so I end up overheating easily."

"What??"

"I won't destroy anything else, I promise."

Ume smiled harmlessly at the butler.

"Okay......"

+ + +

The two of them started walking through the hallway, and the atmosphere was extremely awkward again. Even though it would take ten full minutes for them to travel through the mansion’s vast corridors, the young butler hardly spoke, and the halls were completely silent aside from their footsteps. They had nothing to talk about, and Rena was not in his best mood.

His assignment was to help the shapeshifting snake monster get started as a maid...

...Which was a completely absurd idea, if you thought about it rationally. 

Monsters were not people, and if you asked a hobgoblin to dress up in a maid's outfit — putting on the clothes was the easy part, yet the true challenge was turning a savage creature into a civilized being. Goblins were a brutish species, and violence was in their very nature. No matter how long you spent trying to teach a babbling hobgoblin to curtsy and show table manners, a hobgoblin would always revert to their primitive, aggressive, and wild ways. This was a well-proven fact with extensive amounts of observation and scientific documentation, and it justified the discrimination of inferior species.

In the Conshire Isles, subhuman species like goblins, gargoyles, and blood-sucking imps were not given human rights.

Training a monster to act like a human was a futile endeavor, and common sense dictated that it was no more meaningful than attempting to train a parrot to say 'hello'. There were rare documented cases where Beast Tamers successfully drilled human etiquette into captive goblin specimens, but this was typically considered the exception rather than the norm.

It could be considered a exotic hobby perhaps —

The rich and powerful often flaunted their status by raising dangerous pet tigers and training them to purr like lap kittens, and Rena could only assume Sir Gawrgaru intended to attempt something similar with his newly acquired snake monster. Every noble family had a monster or two hidden in the basement, and aristocrats seemed to enjoy bragging about their trophies to each other.

This genderless snake monster was clearly an excellent and rare specimen with especially convincing shapeshifting abilities.

...Rena just hoped that he wouldn't be repeatedly dumped with the unfortunate and dangerous role of taking care of it from now on...

He feared for his dwindling life expectancy.

+ + +

 

The two of them reached the entrance of the servant's common room. Rena was about to turn the doorknob to introduce Ume to the rest of the servants, but he suddenly froze when he heard a chorus of voices through the closed wooden door.

"Lynch! Lynch! Lynch the monster!" Muted voices chanted aggressively from the lounge area.

"Lynch! Lynch! Lynch!"

"It's suspicious! Jonan found and reported two dead bodies, and it was right after the giant snake monster arrived!"

"There were snake bites all over its legs! And Luleise heard weird hissing noises in the garden last night!"

"Isn't that proof enough??? The monster is guilty!"

"Poor Charles... murdered by a giant snake... his wife his pregnant too..."

"Everyone vote! Lynch or no lynch! Vote now and we'll present this petition to our lord! We shall not give an unchained monster free range on these premises! Servants have died as of last night, and their families grieve over their deaths. Any of us could be the next victim! We must have justice and we must act now!"

The color drained from the young butler's face while his hands rested on the doorknob.

Rena turned his head slowly and looked back at Ume.

"This... You..." He muttered incredulously. "...It wasn't you, was it? Please tell me you didn't kill someone last night???"

The mysterious young dragon stared wordlessly aback at him.

The innocent and pure expression in her eyes seemed to say that she did absolutely nothing wrong.

Yes. Ume was as sweet and harmless as an angel~

Indeed, Ume never did anything wrong.

∎