Mika stared at the mansion in awe, though calling it that didn't do the building justice. Rather than a house, it was more like a large villa! Seeing it from the air was one thing, but when she got close and personal, she realized how huge it truly was. 

In the villa, the main building stood over 15 meters high. Pearly white walls made from marble were lined with stunning carvings. Each column had a unique, hand-carved carving. A perfect alignment of red ceramic tiles covered the roof. Tinted glass covered all the windows in the building. The walls were embellished with sculptures and bushes, adding to the sense of wealth and elegance.

And that's not even all!

Upon entering the villa through one of the entrances, Mika was greeted by a massive, elaborate fountain spouting water rhythmically and artistically within a vibrant green garden with every leaf perfectly trimmed. 

Even the grass was trimmed the same way!

It was hard for Mika to be anything but speechless when he saw how symmetrical and well-kept the entire place was. 

As she walked through the villa in a daze, no longer chained up, her mouth hung open wide. She had never seen anything so extravagant in her life that she didn't even know how to react.

“Amazing, isn’t it? Bernard interrupted Mika, waking her from her trance. 

Nodding, she glanced at the butler. Mika replied, "...Yeah." with a dazed expression. “It’s quite something.”

Seeing Mika's stunned expression, Bernard was filled with pride. Although he didn’t own the villa, he worked for the man who did! His eyes turned to the building, and he introduced it, "This is the Emporvas Villa, named after the family head, Darius Von Emporvas. It is over 600,000 square meters in size, not including the surrounding land, and cost close to 5 billion USD to build.”

“USD?” Mika asked, tilting her head.

Bernard paused and looked back at Mika, “You don’t know what USD is?”

Mika shook her head since she had never heard of such a thing. How could she? She spent most of her time asleep, training, or sleeping when she was born. After that, she was teleported to a jungle far from human civilization. Finally, mercenaries captured her and sold her on the black market. As a result, she had little knowledge of human societies in this world.

Bernard cleared his throat and explained, “USD stands for Universal Standard Dollar. All human counties, kingdoms, and empires share this decentralized universal currency backed by the Mana Stone Standard."

“Mana Stone Standard?”

Observing Mika's confused expression, Bernard sighed and made a mental note of it. 

“It basically means that 100 USD is the equivalent of 1 Initial-Stage Mana Stone,” Bernard explained.

Mika just nodded without showing any particular reaction. She had no concept of whether 100 USD was a lot of money or not. However, after thinking about it for a second, she came to a realization and gasped!

“Y-You’re telling me this place costs 50 million Initial-Stage Mana Stones?!” 

A smile spread across Bernard's face as he nodded, thinking to himself that this is how children behave. 

"While that isn't exactly accurate, since Master Darius did not pay most of that amount with Mana Stones, you aren't mistaken."

Mika looked down, and her mind pictured pathways of mana stones instead of the stone tiles she was walking on. As much as she wanted to hop off and walk on the grass, she felt she would be stepping on piles of cash with muddy shoes if she did so. 

Seeing this, Bernard chuckled, feeling like she was finally acting like a child, "It's okay to touch something. If the things here were so easy to break, the place wouldn’t be worth so much money.”

Mika just absentmindedly nodded but didn’t take his words to heart. 

Bernard knew what Mika was thinking but didn’t bother addressing it. Signaling for her to follow him, he walked into the house. 

“Come. Let me show you around the house. Then, I’ll get you settled in your room where you can rest. I’m sure you’re tired of sleeping on the cold hard ground in a jail cell.” 

Mika nodded, still feeling a bit overwhelmed with everything, but followed nonetheless. 

Aurelia watched everything out of the corner of her eye and snorted in disdain, but there was a look of unconcealed pride in her eyes. 

‘That’s right! Look at how amazing my father is, you country bumpkin! Look at what you’d miss out on if you decided to become my maid.’ She thought but made no more moves to try and convince Mika to do so. She was still feeling angry and ashamed from earlier. 

Finally entering the building, Mika’s eyes wandered to every nook and cranny in the villa, not wanting to miss a single detail as it was all so fascinating. Just like the outside, the inside was just as symmetrical, clean, and perfect. 

Paintings hung all over the walls, sculptures lined the edges of the hallways, and there were all sorts of trinkets everywhere. This was all very impressive, but what Mika found more shocking was the number of servants and guards!

Everywhere she looked, there was either a guard, knight, maid, or servant, none of whom were ordinary people. The guards and knights all looked strong, with big muscles and carrying around weapons. That made sense. 

However, Mika could hardly believe her eyes when she noticed concealed knives in the maid’s stockings and daggers under their dresses. Each of them moved silently through the house, making as little noise as possible, and their presence was incredibly thin as well. 

If Mika weren’t looking right at them, she’d have difficulty sensing them, even if they were right behind her.

She could also tell that Just from the mana fluctuations alone from these people, she could tell that most of them were stronger than her! 

‘Damn! What did I get myself into?!’ Mika thought, cursing the System for suggesting this. She was like a lamb who had just entered a den of wolves! All she could do now was hope that none of them wanted a bite out of her.

‘I feel like I’d be safer back at the Black Market.’ Although Mika didn't know whether to laugh or cry, she felt extremely fortunate that Bernard didn't force her to become a servant because if he did, there was very little she could do.

‘I still have [Blink], but I can only travel up to a meter at a time with it. I’m sure Bernard, or any one of these servants for that matter, could catch up to me with minimal effort.’ Mika thought. 

The villa was packed with people, covering all sides and blind spots, making escape impossible.

Mika glanced around, feeling numerous gazes locked on her, and sighed. Instead of feeling free, she felt like she was locked in a maximum-security prison.

‘Whatever. I’ll just deal with things as they come and hope this Darius person isn’t unreasonable.’

She spent the next few hours touring the villa with Bernard, and he only stopped once he had shown her all the rooms she needed to know. Mika did get to see a training room, but it was closed off as nobody was using it at this time of day.

Afterward, Bernard led Mika to her room, which was relatively normal compared to the rest of the house. It had a queen-sized bed, a desk, a closet, a bathroom, and two tinted windows.

Mika nodded, appreciating the simplicity of the room, and walked inside. 

“This will be your room for the time being,” Bernard said, “Until the Master returns, you’re free to go to any of the rooms I showed you. If you wander somewhere you’re not supposed to be, the guards will warn you, so try not to walk around too much.”

Mika nodded, not having a problem with that.

Bernard smiled and said, “Alright. Then, I’ll let you rest up for the time being. I’ll come tomorrow morning to get you, as I’d like to see your skills firsthand.”

Mika’s neutral expression finally cracked, and her lips curled up, “Sounds good! I’d also like to see how I fare against trained guards!”

The smile on Bernard's face widened, and he left the room under Mika’s expectant gaze, closing the door behind him. 

The moment Mika was left on her own, she released her lungs of all the air they had been holding.

“Haaa…!” 

Mika felt so emotionally drained in that one sigh that her eyes almost fell shut. Today was a roller coaster, but it somehow ended with everything in her favor. 

Forcing herself to stay awake, Mika raised her fists to the ceiling and yelled, “I’m free!! I’m finally free from that shithole!!”

As much as the Emporvas Villa seemed like a giant prison, it was infinitely better than an actual dungeon! At least here, she wasn’t chained up like a dog, forced to interact with criminals, and kill other people for entertainment! 

It only saddened her to leave Little Yokutora, the tiger she met in the Noxious Jungle, behind, but she swore that she’d release it from Butcher’s hands once she had enough power and influence. 

“Maybe I can ask Aurelia’s father, Darius, about this,” Mika mused, “With how the butler acted, I can tell that this guy can’t be that unreasonable. As the saying goes, ‘Servants mimic their masters.’ If this Darius guy were a bad person, I would’ve been able to tell by the way his servants acted, but each one kept their distance, focusing on their work while keeping an eye on me from a distance.”

While what she said wasn’t exactly true, it wasn’t wrong either. If Darius were such an egotistical asshole, Bernard never would’ve allowed her to sleep in this room, nor would he have removed the chains. 

From the gazes of the servants working in the house, Mika could tell that each one enjoyed their job and respected their master. Not one of them had the eyes of someone who was unwilling to be here, which was another plus.

Now, everything she had just seen could be fake, and all of this could be a trap, but the way Aurelia acted was a dead giveaway that Darius was a person everyone respected. With how the girl shut up and became ashamed as soon as Bernard brought up her father, Mika knew right then that the man was at least half-decent.

“I just hope he will release me from here if he doesn’t want me to become Aurelia’s trainer,” Mika muttered. She was most concerned about that. Being Aurelia's teacher was secondary.

“Anyways, I’ll deal with that when the time comes. For now...” Mika hopped onto the bed, and as soon as her head hit the pillow, she fell asleep. 

That night, she slept better than she had ever slept before.

***

Twelve hours later, at 7:00 am, Mika’s eyelids quivered for a second before slowly opening. 

After seeing the unfamiliar ceiling, her eyes widened, and she sat up, almost pulling out her sword on instinct.

However, she quickly calmed down as she recalled yesterday’s events. 

“Ah! That’s right. I’m staying at Aurelia’s house right now.” 

Mika glanced around the room, then breathed a sigh of relief, seeing that nobody was there with her. 

‘It seems I haven’t adjusted to living in human civilization yet.’ Mika sighed, then got out of bed. However, when she stood up, she froze. 

“What the-!?” She clenched her fists a few times and jumped up in the air, “Since when did my body feel so light?!” 

A smile crept up on her face as she dashed around the room and threw a few punches. She could tell she was stronger today than yesterday, but that’s what puzzled her. 

Why did she feel so much lighter and more powerful today?

“Is it because of the good night’s sleep I got?” Mika guessed, hitting the nail on the head. It’s been a long time since she’s had even a somewhat decent night’s sleep.

In her previous life, she was constantly training or fighting, with numerous dangers all around her. Getting any kind of sleep in that situation was already a blessing. Then, she spent the last year and a half living in a jungle, with death around every corner. Even with the mushrooms protecting her, she didn’t feel completely safe.

Perhaps the only time she was able to sleep peacefully was when she was a baby, but that was more so because her body needed that to do that to live.

However, sleeping in a nice comfy bed in a temperature-regulated room, with guards stronger than her protecting everyone inside, caused her to relax more than she had thought possible. 

“So, this is how rich people sleep.” Mika said aloud, “How envious.”

*Knock!**Knock!**Knock!*

As Mika was reveling in her newfound strength brought upon by last night’s sleep, she heard a knock at the door. 

“Miss Mika, it’s me, Bernard, the butler. I have come to escort you to the training grounds.”