Even though Rina had already been comforting the sobbing Clara in her arms for five minutes, the blonde still showed no signs of stopping. Instead, it seemed as though Clara nestled herself even deeper into her embrace. But since it was still nighttime, it was her duty to send her mistress to sleep. So, Rina decided to end the current skin-ship session right here.

“Clara, you seem to be tired from nursing me, thank you. But as you can see, I'm fine now, so you should go to sleep. Besides, you'll wake up Marianne if you keep doing this.”

“Too late, I'm already awake.”

Strangely enough, the response Rina was expecting didn't come from the sobbing girl in her arms, but from the brunette who had been sleeping beside her only minutes ago.

So feeling bad about waking her up, Rina apologised to her, “Sorry, Marianne, were we too loud? Thank you, too, for looking after me.”

At Rina's words, Marianne stood up and stretched herself for a few seconds, before she spoke up, dismissing Rina's concerns, “No need to apologise, Mistress, I was pretty much awake from the very beginning and just pretended to be asleep. Instead, you should talk to the overgrown baby in your arms, before tucking her into bed. She was very worried about you.”

After saying this, Marianne naturally received a deadly glare from Clara, which was why she continued, “Well, before I get myself killed by the overgrown baby, I'll excuse myself, good night, Mistress, Lady Clara.”

With these words, at which Rina couldn't help but chuckle, Marianne made her way to the door and left the room.

Only when they were alone, did Clara let go of her maid again. She then cleared her throat with a red shade on her face after her embarrassing and childish behaviour, and said, “I'm glad you're awake now. Are you hungry or thirsty? Wait a moment, I'll bring you something.”

However, before Clara could even leave and fetch something to eat and drink from the kitchen, Rina grabbed the blonde's wrist and shook her head.

But Rina did not stop her mistress, because it is unheard of for a noble lady to serve her maid. Rather, it was the fact that she neither felt hungry nor thirsty at all. On top of that, it was currently nighttime, so she figured it wouldn't hurt to wait until breakfast. So, Rina voiced just that.

“I'm neither hungry nor thirsty at the moment. So no need for that.”

When Rina said that, she had expected Clara to simply acknowledge her wish. However, what she got to see instead, was how Clara raised her eyebrows, “What do you mean you don't need it? You've unconscious for four whole days. How could you not be hungry?”

“F-Four days?!”

Even though Rina was a little surprised that she had been sleeping for four days, it didn't really mind her that much. True, she was a bit confused as to why didn't feel hungry. After all, this world wasn't modern-day Earth, where it was possible to feed nutritions to unconscious people through tubes. So, while letting her drink water during these four days was somewhat possible, feeding her was certainly not. But as this problem only concerned her body, she didn't want to waste any more effort thinking about it, so tried to move the conversation forward to more important matters.

“Well, like I said, I don't feel the need to eat right now. Plus, it's in the middle of the night. Making something now would only cause problems.”

“... Fine, when you put it that way...”

Luckily, Clara was easily persuaded. So Rina could finally push the subject to the one loose end that had been on her mind since she was still in the village, and asked, “Where is Fran?”

Although the Duke's spy had told her four days ago, that the elf was still alive, Rina had yet to see her. Additionally, because she could hardly trust that man's words, she was still concerned about Fran's well-being.

“After you three came back, she immediately left, saying she had something to do at the royal palace.”

Fortunately, Clara's words eased her concerns, allowing Rina to let out a small sigh of relief.

However, Clara picked up on the subtle gesture and, thus, puffed her cheeks. “Here I am, watching over you and caring for you. And you? You worry about another woman.”

At her mistress's pout, the only thing Rina could do was smile wryly. After all, she already knew what was about to happen as situations like this had already occurred several times. In the next few moments, Clara would make her feel bad, then make her apologise, and in the end, make her promise to fulfill a wish.

The sad thing about this was that even though Rina knew Clara's tricks, she had never come out on top of this 'battle' and would still end up being played like a child. Though, whether or not she deliberately played into the blonde's cards like this just to indulge her beloved mistress, not even she herself knew.

But to Rina's surprise, none of that happened this time. Instead, Clara just chuckled, stood up, and said, “I'll let you off for tonight. I still have a lot of work to do tomorrow, so I'm going to get some rest for now. You should do the same.”

Having said that, the blonde walked to the door and opened it. But instead of going out, she paused, turned to Rina, and muttered, “Thanks for waking up, Rina.” Only then did Clara finally leave.

When Rina was alone, she got up and scanned the room, realising that she was in the mansion's infirmary used for the staff who felt unwell during work. Then, after a moment's contemplation, she decided that she would just stay here for the night.

With that sorted out, there was one last thing she wanted to check before going back to sleep, and that was the condition of her body. To do this, she ran both hands over her body, to see if she could feel her own touch, and indeed she did. After what had happened to her back in the village, she had thought that her sense of touch and pain might have been gone forever. Luckily, it wasn't.

Although she wasn't completely against getting rid of those senses, she figured that it would have been inconvenient at the very least. After all, how could she react to a possible threat, were she unable to feel that someone or something that was touching her?

So, slightly relieved, she lay back down on the bed and closed her eyes to call it a day.

***

The next morning, Rina woke up as usual, just before sunrise. She left the infirmary and headed for her own room to change into her maid uniform and freshen up. Afterwards she went to the kitchen to prepare the breakfast. Arriving at her destination, she opened to door and walked in.

Usually, at this time of day, she would be the only one awake, aside from the night guards. After all, with her high-spec body, that doesn't need much rest and doesn't consume much energy, she's a very early riser, regardless of when she goes to sleep.

This was why she was so surprised to find someone already in the kitchen.

“Marianne? You're early.”

At the sound of Rina's voice, the only other person in the kitchen turned around and shrugged. “Well, I had more than enough sleep yesterday, so I just stayed up the rest of the night and read some books.”

“I see.” With this acknowledgement, Rina started a fire and began preparing the ingredients for breakfast. Luckily, she didn't have to think much about what to make, as the meals had already been prescribed by specialists to ensure that the Dragonherz family's meals were varied and nutritious.

So, both Rina and Marianne stood side by side preparing breakfast in silence, until Marianne decided to break it ten minutes later.

“How are you feeling? Shouldn't you at least rest for a day or two? I'm sure Lady Clara wouldn't mind.”

At the brunette's question, Rina simply shook her head before she answered, “No, I'm fine... Thanks to you and Clara.”

“Well, if you say so.”

With that the conversation died down again. Marianne continued chopping vegetables while Rina was stirring the soup in a huge pot on the stove. Then, five minutes later, having made up her mind, Marianne put the knife down and turned to Rina.

“Tell me, Rina, what happened when I was out?”

Hearing this, Rina stopped as well and turned to face Marianne. “What do you mean?”

“Something bad must have happened. When I woke up back then in the village, you looked like you were about to die. Even though you had no injuries, your academy uniform was badly damaged and full of holes and burn marks, and to make matters worse, the inn room was full of blood. So, what happened?”

At those words, Rina just remained silent, turned her attention back to the hot pot in front of her, and restarted stirring the soup in it with the ladle in her hand.

Marianne noticed that the redhead had no intention of answering her question. Despite that, she didn't give up and changed her method. “You know, Lady Clara is going to grill us about this. You were in pretty bad shape and unconscious for four days, after all. So, if you want to hide something from her, wouldn't it be better for us to align our stories?”

“It's not that I have anything to hide. It's just that nothing worthwhile has happened. The villagers just had a small problem with me and I would feel bad if I dragged you into this. In fact, I'm sorry you got knocked out because of me.”

These were Rina's true thoughts. None of what had happened had anything to do with Fran, Marianne, or Clara. That's why she truly didn't care.

Though, there was a spy of the Duke always luring around, what indeed concerned them. But unfortunately, exposing him would be probably more to their detriment that to their gain, so she had to keep it to herself.

However, while Marianne was not as good as Clara, she could still look behind people's facades to a certain extent. So it was easy for her to see through a girl like Rina, whom she had observed for several years. That was why she easily noticed that there were a few lies mixed in Rina's answer. But as of now, the redhead showed no intention of revealing them, so Marianne just gave up and let it slide.

About half an hour later, when they were almost finished and had cleared away the cooking utensils, Marianne stretched herself, before saying, “Can you take over from here? I'll go and check on our other duties.”

“Yes, see you at breakfast.”

Nodding to Rina, Marianne headed to the exit and left the kitchen.

Now alone, Rina returned her attention to the pot that only needed a few more minutes of simmering. At that moment, however, she suddenly felt dizzy, which was to be expected. After all, with all the blood she had lost back in the village, four days of rest wouldn't be enough to recover from it. It was no wonder that she would feel anaemic from time to time.

However, because Rina was unprepared for this sudden dizziness, she stumbled and bumped into the stove, causing the the cooking utensils neatly placed next to it to fall to the ground, along with the pot containing the soup.

In a panic, Rina reflexively grabbed the hot pot mid-fall with her bare hands and put it back on the stove.

Marianne, noticing the sound of the cooking utensils falling to the floor, peeked into the kitchen and asked, “Rina? Is something wrong?”

This prompted Rina to turn around and hide her hands behind her back. “N-No, nothing, I just tripped and knocked a few things over.”

“Oh... You have to be careful in the kitchen,” Marianne warned before she then offered her help.

But after receiving “Not many things fell over, so I can do it alone” from Rina, Marianne just added, “Fine, if you say so,” before she left again.

When Rina was alone again, she sighed in relief, took her hands from behind her back, and looked at her palms. Instead of the usual pale, skin-coloured palms, she saw two red and swollen hands.

'It's gone.'