Around town travels
Whispers of who’s here today
Maids most contrasting
Today was a special day for Licorice.
It was an ordinary day for everyone else though, so things in Gensokyo moved on as usual. It was the height of spring, with fallen cherry blossoms covering the ground and the sweltering sun made most wish that they had electric fans. Unfortunately for those people, electricity wasn’t exactly common place in Gensokyo, so they had to make do with flapping paper fans and making offerings to various gods to bring better weather.
Speaking of those who needed paper fans, of course, most of them were puny human mortals like Licorice. However, outside of Sakuya, Reimu and Marisa, our heroine hadn’t seen any humans. More precisely, she hadn’t seen any ordinary humans for a while now. She had began missing those of her own kind.
Thus, when the time for Sakuya to go on a regularly scheduled shopping trip came, Licorice jumped at the opportunity to follow her toward the way to civilization. The head maid had objected of course, she didn’t see a need to drag along someone who’d only hold her back.
Only upon the insistence of the mistress, who wanted to see how her new maid would fare, did Sakuya agree to let Licorice travel with her. No matter how absurd or disagreeable the mistress’ orders were, Sakuya wouldn’t object, only replying with a handful of witty comebacks before giving in. She wouldn’t be a perfect and elegant maid if she didn’t do so.
On the way to the Human Village, named after the fact that it is the only human village in Gensokyo, Licorice had her first opportunity to analyze the head maid properly. Sakuya couldn’t disappear from sight like usual when she had to make sure that Licorice wasn’t eaten by a passing youkai, otherwise the mistress would be angry at losing her maid / pet / blood bank. There was also nothing else for Licorice to do but watch Sakuya as they walked, the head maid elegantly killed off any conversation she tried to start about the weather or anything that’d break the ice.
The thing that occupied Licorice most was Sakuya’s face. Contrary to our heroine, who constantly turned her head around to scan the immediate area, Sakuya looked forward with a blank expression. This made her look a tad airheaded, but considering her age and expertise, Licorice shot down any internal notions doubting the head maid’s intelligence. In general, Sakuya’s facial expression was one that our heroine could only describe politely as a ‘poker face’, and impolitely as a ‘resting bitch face’. She didn’t seem to have any other expression other than this, other than the professional smile she donned while greeting welcome guests and a smug smile she donned while ‘greeting’ unwelcome guests.
However, upon further deliberation, Licorice found that Sakuya’s behavior did make sense. She had probably taken this same path countless times, probably even before Licorice’s great-grandparents had been born. It only made sense that the head maid would have lost interest in the environment long ago, and perhaps new emotions were hard to come by after having lived for so long.
Her young appearance oft made one forget the fact that the head maid was most likely older than the Industrial Revolution, the Enlightenment, perhaps even the Renaissance. There was even the possibility that she had visited Eastern Rome before its end, or Western Rome, maybe even the Roman Republic? Had Sakuya learned her comebacks from Diogenes, observed the stars on a ziggurat, used her power to help the pyramids be finished on time?
For all Licorice knew, Sakuya’s real name might be Eve, and humanity might have begun from the woman in front of her.
Our heroine felt like she might fall into an existential crisis if she stared at the head maid for too much. Feeling a shiver run down her very much mortal spine, Licorice promptly stopped contemplating the heavy implications of immortality. The perfect and elegant maid somehow managed to be scary even when she was not saying anything or pointing a knife towards one’s general direction.
Thankfully, she was soon greeted by the houses that constituted the Human Village. She wouldn’t be alone to face Sakuya anymore. The village wasn’t as small as its name implied, but it wasn’t that big either. It was the size of a town, with buildings in a very much Japanese style, filled with people that, forget fitting in the Reiwa era (2019- ), would barely even fit all the way back during the reign of Emperor Meiji (1868-1912). It was as if, similarly to Sakuya, the humans of this village had frozen themselves in time.
Licorice passed the walls of the village no problem, through one of the grand gates allowing passage. The buildings were all constructed of wood, hay and brick shingles, with paper windows covering their walls in place of glass. Shops lined the streets, a different noise and smell emanating from every corner. Their signs were written in Japanese, with a script so cursive and old that someone non-proficient like Licorice could barely read what’s written.
This was the peak of human civilization in Gensokyo, and it utterly failed at impressing Licorice. I did not accidentally travel back in time, right? She looked over at Sakuya, standing next to her. The head maid didn’t accidentally send us to the past, I hope. Looking at how Sakuya was still keeping the same expression, of being expressionless, our heroine ruled out the possibility of accidental time travel.
Sakuya took out a piece of paper from her apron, containing her shopping list. Licorice didn’t understand why she needed a shopping list, someone as ancient as her should have improved themselves to become a genius that could memorize their shopping list perfectly and elegantly, or so our heroine thought. “Alright. Bottle of milk, dozen eggs, one fresh body…” The head maid read the list out loud, slowly and surely. A passerby bumped into her. “Hey, watch where you’re going! Where was I? Uhm… Bottle of milk, dozen eggs, one fresh body…” She was speaking to herself while standing in the middle of the street.
Licorice watched Sakuya with surprise. Seeing her fumble over a simple shopping list suddenly made her seem… Our heroine thought it was absurd to use this word to describe a fellow member of the homo sapiens, but the head maid suddenly seemed a whole lot more human. Was this what she had missed about Sakuya when she constantly kept away from Licorice?
After a minute of staring at the shopping list, it seemed that Sakuya was satisfied. She put the paper back in her apron, and began patrolling the shops. “Morning.” She greeted a man behind a stall with cold professionality.
“Morning miss-” The man’s tone changed when he noticed his customer. “…W- What do you want?”
Sakuya picked up a bottle of milk from the counter. In turn she took out a large bottle of wine from under her apron and left it on the counter. Licorice was curious as to how that fit there, but the head maid probably wouldn’t giver her any proper answers. “Is that enough?”
“Ah, yes.” Trading milk for wine was more than a fair deal.
“Good.” Sakuya promptly left the stall, Licorice following suit. She saw some eggs on a stall just opposite the road, and made her way there to conduct business. While Sakuya was busy shopping, Licorice was busy eavesdropping on the man that they had just bought milk from.
“Who was that woman?” This question came from a woman operating the next stall over to the milk dealer.
The milkman was the one to answer. “The maid of the devil. You know, the human working up in that mansion?”
“Ah that one! I haven’t seen her in a long time…” She leaned closer to talk to the milkman. “My great-grandma used to sell tea to the mansion. The maid hasn’t aged at all…”
“Huh, really? Is she even human at this point?” The milkman looked even more creeped out by Sakuya’s presence. “There’s also the odd one next to her. From her appearance, she’s definitely a youkai. What are they up to?”
The woman shrugged. “That devil in the mansion tried to cover the land in mist once. I bet it’s up to something equally diabolical.”
Declaring someone to be not human due to their appearance… Where have I heard that before? Licorice was beginning to notice something concerning: most passersby were throwing equally suspicious looks at them. It seemed that the maids of the Scarlet Devil Mansion were not a welcome sight in the Human Village.
While Licorice had been slowly deliberating on the chances of an angry mob attacking them, Sakuya was concluding her purchase of eggs. “Two, four, six… twelve.” This time she took out another bottle of wine from her apron, which seemed to contain massive hammerspace, and put it on the stall as payment.
However, Licorice noticed something odd. “Lady Sakuya, aren’t there eleven eggs in the box?”
“Huh?” Sakuya began counting the eggs again, this time going by them one-by-one. “One, two… eleven.” She didn’t want to believe that she could make such a simple mistake, so she counted two more times. Seeing that she was almost scammed, the head maid leaned over the stall, one of her hands moving toward her apron. Licorice was afraid of what she might pull out of there. “What does this mean?!” She pointed toward the eggs that were clearly not a dozen.
The owner of the stall, who was so scared that his soul might fly out of his body at any moment, gave in and quietly handed another egg to Sakuya. She, in turn, drew her bottle of wine back and stabbed the table with a silver knife she pulled out of her apron. The merchant fell bumside first out of fear. “Excuse me, I was just thinking that maybe, you’d like to meet the business side.” She then turned around and left with her dozen eggs.
Licorice followed her, only to notice something even more odd. “Lady Sakuya… You just left a silver knife for the merchant. Aren’t those expensive, as in, more valuable than wine?”
“…” Sakuya paused. It looked like she hadn’t thought this through. Her careless act meant that she had accidentally paid the merchant a whole lot more. “…right.” Suddenly, the knife reappeared in Sakuya’s hand.
“When did you-” Licorice quickly arrived at the answer. She probably paused time and picked it back up… Still, how did she make such a mistake? Our heroine looked at Sakuya. She was still maintaining her poker face, perfectly and elegantly.
Their last stop was a funeral parlor. Compared to the other buildings in the Human Village, this building looked like it was constructed more recently. Licorice remained outside, while Sakuya went inside. What business does she have there? I’m pretty sure that nobody has died in the Scarlet Devil Mansion. Her question was answered when Sakuya came out carrying a large and long object covered by a blanket. Putting two and two together, our heroine figured out that this object must be a human body. This is probably what she meant by ‘one fresh body’…
With this, Sakuya’s shopping list was complete. Licorice was glad to get out of the human village; the disdainful looks thrown at them was a bit too much. The maid pair walked out the village, looking mighty suspicious due to what Sakuya was carrying…
Sakuya suddenly stopped walking. Still looking at nothing in particular, she talked “Are you not afraid?” This was the first time that she had initiated conversation with Licorice during the entire day.
Licorice didn’t know how to reply at such a sudden and vague question. “Huh? What am I to be afraid of?” Other than your temper, maybe.
“My mistress instills fear in the hearts of men. Time bends to my will. I’m currently carrying a human corpse.” Her voice, maybe this was just a misconception now held by Licorice, but her voice seemed to carry the slightest hint of some sort of emotion. “I’ve seen, you’ve seen, how ordinary humans react to my presence. So…” She slowly turned around to meet Licorice’s gaze. The head maid stressed every syllable. “Why. Are. You. Not. Afraid?”
The question was still overly vague, but Licorice did her best to give an honest answer. “Because…” This was a pretty heavy question on our heroine’s part. A child vampire with unfathomable power… A time bending maid… And a human corpse… She did tend to do her best to forget such heavy-hitting manners, but being confronted directly had left her no choice. “I… The mistress is honestly terrifying, but she’s like a child, I don’t… I don’t think she’s an evil, or bad person.” I’m just surprised that I haven’t been murdered yet. “I don’t think that, considering how easily you went in and out of the funeral parlor, you obtained that body without permission.”
“It’s the body of someone who recently drowned. They’ll be made into dinner for the mistress.” Sakuya stated so matter-of-factly. She seemed to be gauging Licorice’s reaction.
“Right, if they haven’t been murdered for that express purpose… I don’t see a problem with it, really.” Licorice was more of the utilitarian type, or so she probably was. She herself had forgotten any life experiences that might have shaped her thoughts. “And… About you.” Licorice took a few steps, getting closer to the head maid. “I’m honestly afraid because of you. I… I don’t know what you have lived through, and I get that you’re nervous about me.” They were directly eye-to-eye now. “I don’t want to be enemies with you. I don’t think you want to be enemies with me, I hope that’s not the case. I’m afraid that we might end up hating each other for no reason, but I’m not afraid of you in particular.” Our heroine conjured a smile. “We’re human after all. We do stupid things.”
Sakuya was silent. She had to turn around to avoid the gaze of Licorice. With a deep sigh, she uttered only one word. “…Fool.”
“Huh? What?” Licorice felt the emotional atmosphere she tried to build collapse. “What does that mean, Lady Sakuya?”
The head maid refused to answer, and avoided showing her face to Licorice the best she could while they marched back to the Scarlet Devil Mansion.
Thanks for the chapter!
Thank ye for reading!