Who Brought the Head Maid Back? - Chapter 31

“I was truly terrified, Captain of the Guard.”

Marie, the housemaid, pretended to tear up while making a show of wiping her eyes. At that, another maid roughly rubbed Marie’s face with the hem of her skirt and spoke tenderly.

“Oh dear, Marie, you must have been so scared. Don’t cry.”

Marie made a fierce face at the touch, which clearly carried a personal grudge, but as soon as the skirt hem pulled away, she returned to a pitiable expression. Then, with her eyes shining brightly, she spoke.

“If the Captain hadn’t been there, I would have suffered a great ordeal. Wouldn’t we have, girls?”

Led by Marie’s instigation, the maids nodded their heads vigorously.

“Of course, of course.”

“Oh, absolutely.”

“We are truly grateful.”

Unaware that the hobby of these strong Northern women was eating men for breakfast, Vernon grinned broadly, filled with the pride of having protected young maidens. He thumped his chest and shouted loudly.

“If anything like this happens again, notify the guard station immediately. Do you understand?”

“Yes!”

“Oh, how reassuring.”

“We believe in you, Captain!”

Leaving behind the maids’ passionate support, Vernon left the scene triumphantly. Only after he had completely disappeared did the maids show their true colors.

“I had a hard time holding back my laughter,” Marie muttered, massaging her shoulders. “I was hunched over trying to act fragile, and now my bones ache.”

She then gazed toward the outer castle with a look of regret.

“The Head Maid must be busy; she didn’t come.”

“I know. What a waste. It was such a good opportunity.”

Evie, the smallest maid, rolled her shoulders and smacked her lips. Since she had been the one trembling the most realistically, it was natural for her shoulders to feel stiff.

“Those people from the capital talk tough, but they are actually quite soft.”

Another maid nodded in agreement.

“If it were the North, we would have started by hitting them in the back of the head with a log. But they called out ‘My Lady!’ first.”

The maids marveled simultaneously.

“Is that like a preview, saying ‘I am now going to attack you’?”

“So polite.”

“Well-educated.”

Then, Marie laughed sinisterly and asked the maids, “So, are you going to go easy on them just because they’re soft?”

At those words, the maids snorted in unison.

“Not a chance. We need to fix their mindsets so they never look down on the North again.”

They put their heads together and began to whisper excitedly. Various gruesome ideas were tossed around: letting a burning rat into their quarters while they slept, mixing laxatives into their meals, or breaking a lance and lightly gluing it back together. Someone even suggested that breaking their legs might be better.

Amy, who arrived late, gasped at the sight. Cecil, who was standing nearby feeling restless, tried to defend her friends.

“Those, those girls speak harshly, but they are very gentle.”

At that moment, as if on cue, the following conversation reached their ears.

“Let’s drown them in a wine barrel, and when they’re woozy, push them down the stairs.”

“You’re too soft. What do you mean stairs? It should be the top of the tower at least.”

Amy looked at Cecil without a word, and Cecil shrugged her shoulders, trying to force a smile.

“Well, they’re just talking. They won’t actually carry all of that out.”

Amy looked incredulous, as if asking if she really believed that. Cecil, now cowering like a turtle, sweated and muttered, “Actually, almost all of it.”

“Enough.”

Amy knew that Northerners were rough and fearless, but she closed her eyes tightly and let out a sigh.

“Still, I’m glad nothing happened. What if you girls had been hurt?”

Cecil, who had always lived a life of winning and never imagined they would be in danger, had a strange look on her face at those words.

“If we had happened to be hurt by the knights?”

At Cecil’s hesitant question, Amy grimaced as if to tell her not to even say such a thing.

“Then I would have stormed in immediately to settle the matter with the Crown Prince.”

“You would go to the Prince?”

Cecil blinked at the unexpected remark. She hadn’t expected Amy to go that high up. Amy said firmly, “The knights belong to the Prince. The responsibility lies with the Prince for failing to properly control his subordinates.”

Then, she looked at Cecil suspiciously. “Surely, you didn’t do this on purpose, did you?”

“Oh, of course not!”

Cecil waved her hands excessively and gave a forced laugh. However, cold sweat was trickling down her back.

In truth, she had found it eyesore to see the Crown Prince and his knights swaggering around the castle lately. So, she had hatched a plan with her fellow maids to take them down a notch before the banquet began.

They had picked a day to lure the knights in after getting them drunk. While they acted as the intimidated victims, Cecil had intended to bring the Head Maid to witness the scene.

Amy spoke strictly. “This is likely a needless worry, but be careful. If we are crawling on all fours, the knights are as good as being on horseback. Can there be a competition? It’s a fight that is a mismatch from the start.”

As Cecil hung her head gloomily, Amy comforted her softly.

“I’m not saying you are inferior. It’s just that you can’t rush at someone you hate and end up getting your own head cracked. I don’t mean you should just endure it either. You are my responsibility, so the fighting is my job. So, please value yourselves. Do you understand what I mean?”

“Yes.”

Cecil nodded demurely. Amy thought she was discouraged and felt sorry for her, but in reality, Cecil was so happy she didn’t know what to do.

‘It failed, but I feel good.’

Seeing the Head Maid sincerely worry for them made Cecil’s heart feel warm. She was certain that from this moment on, she and her colleagues would respect and follow the Head Maid even more.

That afternoon, Amy headed to the Bigo at the top of the inner castle with Melbourne, the butler.

The inner castle was the primary living space for the Lord’s family, but the tower where the Bigo was located was narrow and high, making it unsuitable for residency. Naturally, it had been excluded from urgent repairs and was not in very good condition.

As Amy used a key to open the iron-barred door that had been sealed for a long time, Melbourne looked around curiously.

“I knew it existed, but this is my first time entering.”

“One cannot enter the Bigo carelessly.”

“Except for when the previous Grand Dukes sent representatives to check it at the beginning of their reigns, this door has never been opened.”

“Is that so?”

Amy thought with a frown. If they only sent representatives to check, the contents inside must truly be insignificant.

‘Well, there wasn’t much of great value on the list either.’

The first Grand Duke Neudelman, recorded in imperial history, was not originally part of the empire but was the heir to an independent Northern kingdom. After the kingdom declined rapidly following the death of his father, the first king, he submitted to the Imperial Emperor and became a Grand Duke.

Even then, he didn’t live long and died young without an heir. Accordingly, the treasures held since the kingdom’s days were scattered by collateral relatives. By the time the Emperor sent the next Grand Duke, the storehouses and Bigo were likely already empty.

Amy gave a bitter smile. ‘If there had been anything useful at all, they wouldn’t have given this place to Lord Noah.’

To think that a value capable of turning the world upside down was hidden in a land neglected since the early days of the Empire, the thought made her feel dizzy.

‘I skimmed through the records of this place as soon as I arrived in the North.’

She hadn’t found what she wanted because there was less data than expected. However, the public perception that the North was under the protection of the Empire was wrong. They were surviving on their own. Surviving the harsh cold, the lack of resources, and the frequent provocations from the ethnic groups beyond the Black Mountains.

‘I was trying to look into the Viscon tribe, but something is strange.’

Despite frequent invasions, the damage to the Duchy wasn’t great. To put it lightly, it was like they hit once to see the reaction and then went back. Of course, the Duchy, being hit for no reason, would have been annoyed.

‘That’s also why the Empire ignored the requests for support.’

It wasn’t Amy’s place to say, considering she had exaggerated that fact to help the Duchy become independent.

‘The storage list mentioned official documents passed down from the first Grand Duke, so maybe I can find something there.’

Didn’t the people of the North manage to uncover the secret before the regression? Whether that process was shrouded in mystery or was just a coincidence, Amy was determined to find it somehow, even if she came up empty-handed in the Bigo.

‘I have confidence in my persistence.’

She was the stubborn person who had endured for years even while eating like a bird and being skin and bones.

Melbourne, who was cautiously looking around the Bigo, asked, “What are you looking for? What should I do?”

“Ah, there should be a bundle of official documents. Could you look mainly around the bookshelves?”

The Bigo was in good condition for having been sealed for a long time. Perhaps because of the north-facing window, the books hadn’t faded, and it was moderately dry with no mold. There was a lot of dust, but she was prepared for that.

“Oh, I’ll have to organize this at some point.”

Amy planned to settle all the bothersome tasks while she was in the North. After adding cleaning to the very end of the to-do list in her head, she calmly examined the inside of the Bigo.

Before long, Melbourne found several bundles of official documents that were yellowed and withered.

“Will you be looking at them here?”

“Removal is prohibited.”

Amy brushed the dust off the desk and sat down to open the documents.

“I’ll lock up and head down on my own, so you go ahead. Make sure no one comes up to the tower.”

“Understood.”

Left alone after Melbourne departed, Amy immersed herself in reading the documents. Luckily, official documents up to the previous Grand Duke were all included. After searching diligently for three or four hours, she finally found what she wanted. She straightened her stiff back and smiled.

A sigh of relief escaped her. Jack and Dwayne were working hard outside; if she couldn’t properly use the magic tool they had found, she wouldn’t be able to face them.

“Now, shall we cross-check the list?”

Since the most urgent matter was settled, it was time to work as the Head Maid. Amy moved busily around the Bigo, checking if anything differed from the list. She appraised the value with a hawk’s eye, and as expected, almost everything was safe to discard.

‘Now that Lord Noah has the right to dispose of them, I should file a report and clear them out once I get approval.’

Then she would slowly collect treasures to make the Bigo plentiful. That way, Lord Noah could give a magnificent gift to the Grand Duchess when he marries later. And pass them down to his children as well.

‘Everything seems to be going well, so I feel good.’

She was the satisfied smile while walking to the window to close it after having opened it for ventilation. The moment she placed her hand on the window frame, she spotted the Crown Prince standing as if hiding in the shadows of the castle wall below.

‘Huh? How did the Crown Prince get into the inner castle?’

Something smelled suspicious. Amy narrowed her eyes.

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