Chapter 30: Nothing like an old cliché.
"...Evelyn-sama, are you alright?" Eve asks as I follow the castle road to the city.
"I am, I just got annoyed with those guys..." I say as I think, trying to remember how far the city is from the castle. Normally I would need a carriage, but no one would help me, so for now walking is all I can do.
"Hmm...Evelyn-sama, I felt a lot of hostility...if they bother you so much, I could make them disappear," Eve says, as if threatening them with death was something common.
"No, I don’t want that," I say, while Eve seems surprised.
"Why?"
"Because if I did that, I wouldn’t be any different from them. They are trash, but I won’t stoop to being trash like them. Besides, one day I’ll be queen, and you can be sure I’ll give them the worst jobs and replace them all," I’ll rub my success in their faces with a smile.
"Now, let’s leave that aside, let’s go, we have to buy clothes!! And other things, of course," I say with more enthusiasm when it comes to clothes than buying other things.
"Hahaha, of course, Evelyn-sama. Do you want to climb on my back? I believe I can run fast enough for us to get there much faster," she says as I think about it.
"Ah, I think that might work...actually, it’s better not to, I think my dress wouldn’t arrive there well, and you’re carrying your sword on your back with a piece of string," I say, declining.
"But I can carry you like the princess you are, you don’t have to be on my back," she says as I shake my head due to embarrassment.
"Okay, then, Evelyn-sama, if you change your mind, you can let me carry you with a smile," Eve says as I agree. Anyway, it shouldn’t take too long to reach the city.
...
...
...
"M-Miss Marie, I-I’m sorry about this," a maid kneeling says as I look coldly at her.
"You stupid whore, look at my dress, it’s ruined!! How can I walk around the city with my dress ruined? You destroyed my dress!!" I say angrily. How can she be so stupid to spill one of the strongest drinks in the store on me?
The color of this will never come out of the dress, which has a high rate of absorbing liquids, so this stain will be hard to remove, and even if removed with magic, there will be an obvious and different trace.
"Does something need to be done, Marie-sama?" a more experienced maid asks.
"Get rid of this failure, and let’s go to a clothing store, I need a new dress," I say, starting to walk away, giving my back to the maid coldly, ignoring the maid who begins to cry, trembling in fear.
"M-Miss M-Marie, w-wait, I..." She tries to speak, but immediately I hear a wet sound and a snap with a slight sound of falling, the comforting silence returning.
"Why did you bring a novice?" I question as the more experienced maid approaches me.
"I apologize for this failure. I was trying to teach new things and give opportunities to the younger ones, but it seems I misjudged that maid. It was my mistake. Do you wish to punish me?" She asks as I see her cleaning the blood from a dagger.
"No, just choose better next time. I don’t want any more irritating mishaps like this happening, you know?" I say, giving her a second chance.
"Understood, Marie-sama..." She agrees as I think of something, looking at her appearance. I hate to admit it, but this maid is a very good and efficient maid.
Her name is Lotte Immer, and since she’s only 156 centimeters tall, I feel more comfortable with her serving me because I’m also short.
She’s a girl with a sleepy appearance, with long, almost black, dark blue, wavy hair tied in two loose braids that fall over her shoulders.
Her eyes are a pale violet, always half-closed, giving the impression that she’s about to fall asleep at any moment.
Her movements are slow, but precise, as if everything is being done in slow motion, and yet, everything always ends up perfectly clean and tidy.
Although her personality is Lethargic, Sarcastic, Resigned, Observant, and Extremely Intelligent, I like how well she serves me.
"Hey, you’ve been around for a while, I heard a rumor that my father accepted a human into the kingdom for some kind of exchange, or peace measure, whatever you want to call it. What do you know about that?" I ask, interested.
Apparently, the Demon King has let a human come and even given her a protection law, something related to a peace attempt or something similar, which caught my attention.
"I believe I know a few things. First, this human has been in the kingdom for at least 7 days. She was hosted in a hotel to wait until she was summoned to the castle."
"Second, she will have lifetime access to the castle and its facilities, which will allow her to live in the castle and use almost everything there, so she will be treated as an important guest, despite being a mere human."
"And third, she’s in the city. Some colleagues said that 4 days ago, she caused a bit of a mess by defending a small demon from another," Lotte says as I think about it.
’Curious...’ I’ve never seen a human, so I’m interested in this. After all, it’s a human, a being of another race and culture. I wonder if she’s even fit to set foot on our continent.
’Well, I don’t think that matters much.’ I decide to follow the path to find a clothing store and discard this dress by buying a new one.
...
...
...
"Evelyn-sama, what are you thinking about?" Eve asks me as she sees me pensive. We’ve been walking for 20 minutes and we’re finally reaching the city.
"Just about the city..." I lie. I’m actually remembering the game. If I’m not mistaken, the heroine is already in the city, and today would be the day that Marie would meet her, which is the gateway for the player to try to start Marie’s route.
Of course, even if you ignore a route, you can always try it on certain occasions, but the point is that Marie is probably in the city too, so I might end up running into her.
’Well, I just have to be careful, after all, I don’t want to steal the beginning of Marie’s route...and this isn’t the best start of a route either.’ In the game, Marie meets Grace in a clothing store, with the two bumping into each other and falling to the ground.
Marie was buying a new dress because an inexperienced maid spilled a drink on Marie’s dress, and as retaliation, Marie just had the maid eliminated. Another maid then kills the inexperienced maid by cutting off her head.
It’s a bit bizarre, but it’s a [Dark] game, so it was obvious that even the start of the route would begin in a bizarre scene, after all, it’s a game of change. The candidates for the throne who start out horrible slowly change.
With love, understanding, care and affection, they open up and become better people. Just let the heroine do the "softening" work on my siblings, and I’ll take care of Esther.
’Well, Marie is arrogant. She’ll try to go to an expensive clothing store because she has money. As for me...I don’t have much. I need a store that’s a little cheaper.’
Marie usually only wears custom-made dresses. In this case, it’s just because she didn’t have much choice, so she decided to go to a store. As for me, I can’t afford to have someone make dresses for me, so I have to go to a store.
Fortunately, I know the city more or less thanks to the game’s content, since the original Evelyn hardly ever went far from the castle, so she doesn’t know anything, but she memorized maps in her head.
Combining my knowledge of the game’s routes with the map I remember, I can locate myself very well...I think.
’It’s impossible for me to get lost.’ There’s no way I can get lost. I just need to think about the map and follow the path.
"Evelyn-sama, where are we going?" Eve asks as I think about which store is of good quality, but not too expensive, in short, the beginner’s store.
"We’re going that way!! It’s the way," I say to her confidently, I wish this confidence would last.
"..."
"..." We walk for 15 minutes, and in the end, I was "right." I didn’t get lost, I just made a few wrong turns.
"Evelyn-sama...where are we?" Eve asks.
"W-Well, we’re in the city...on some street...T-Tsk...don’t look at me with pity!! I was sure it was that street. There’s no way I could have messed up that badly. The clothing store must be around here somewhere," I say nervously.
"So we’re not lost?" Eve asks with a silly smile.
"No!!! It was just an undesirable miscalculation..." I bet it was my bad luck. I can’t be that bad at following routes when I knew the places in the game and had a map in my head. I think fate is playing a trick on me.
"Hey! You there, girl with the suspicious cloak, could you help me and tell me what street this is?" I stop a girl walking with her face hidden in a cloak. She looks at me and stops walking, soon she starts to come towards me, crossing the street.
"Sorry, I don’t know. I’m new here and I’m lost," she says as I click my tongue. If she’s lost, I can’t ask for her help.
"Sorry to bother you, then. You can go. I hope you find your way soon," I say as she nods politely and tries to walk away, but as she turns, she doesn’t notice a carriage.
"H-Hey, watch out!" I quickly grab her hand and pull with all my might. She, caught by surprise, is pulled by me and falls on top of me on the sidewalk.
"W-WHERE DO YOU THINK YOU’RE TOUCHING!!" I yell at her as she grabs my breasts, but I see inside her hood and see Grace, realizing the famous romantic cliché of the girl grabbing the girl’s breasts when she falls.
She looks at me surprised and blushes in embarrassment, while I look at her in shock, having run into the heroine in what can only be a universally annoying cliché.