I somehow managed to get Ethan to eat my impromptu creation.

With the mess cleaned up and the dishes washed with Clean, I got right to work on my quota for the day: tending to the vegetables.

First, I used my remaining mana from cleaning the dining room to neatly slice off a few garlic cloves. Emptying my mana to the bottom, I popped five large cloves of garlic into my mouth.

All to replenish Lilith’s nearly 250 mana capacity in one go.

 

“Ughhhh…!”

 

It was still painful due to the unaccustomed aroma and pungency, but it was training that had to be done to survive.

The only way to make this agonizing moment a little less painful was to chew it quickly.

In the spirit of chewing through the worst of it, I somehow managed to squeeze five cloves of garlic into my mouth before shoving the remaining pungent mass down my throat.

Immediately afterward, I felt the sensation of my emptied magic energy being filled up enveloped my entire body.

 

“Bleh! Ughhhh…”

 

A terrible feeling of nausea also enveloped my body, which was hard for a human high school girl to endure.

Fortunately, I managed to hold it together with my willpower and didn’t end up throwing up the contents of my stomach again.

The five garlic cloves in my stomach replenished my mana and increased its maximum.

 

『Current Mana: 245 / 245+1』

 

…Five garlic cloves, yet a whopping increase of 1 in my maximum mana.

 

“Shit…. It almost feels like I’m reaching enlightenment….”

 

On the first day, growing my mana was quick and easy, as swallowing half a garlic clove increased the maximum amount significantly.

However, the current Lilith had entered a period of extreme inefficiency, requiring five garlic cloves to be swallowed to increase her mana by 1.

At this point, it was actually much faster to level up than to increase my max mana.

I was leveling up faster than I was maxing out my mana, which is something I never did in my previous life.

Now, though, I’m a maid used to pay debts who can’t even leave the mansion, let alone level up.

Even this growth was essential for me to maximize my leveling efficiency in my spare time.

 

“Heh, heh, heh, heh….”

 

Do you remember the senior maids? Those assholes…. I’m gonna fuck them all up one day when I get the chance….

Of course, I was the one who decided to chew garlic and grow magic, but if it weren’t for those assholes, I wouldn’t be in this mess today.

Regardless of the outcome, the pain I’m suffering now was caused by those bastards.

If I don’t think about it that way, I don’t think I’ll ever be able to bear the pain.

Pulling three potatoes from the sack, I cast Clean three times simultaneously.

Thanks to the triple casting, which I was now competent and proficient at, I peeled the three potatoes and they turned smooth and round.

 

“Ha, ha, ha….”

 

…I never thought I’d get used to multicasting with a potato peeler, let alone anything else.

Even triple casting was a skill I didn’t learn until my second year at the Academy.

I chuckled unintentionally at how fast I’d improved.

The remaining potatoes were also triple cast, peeled three at a time.

I cursed the damn seniors for throwing me into this garlic hell in the process.

 

Slice.

“Ariana…”

Slice.

“Alicia…”

Slice.

“…Catherine…”

 

One after the other, the potato chunks that tumbled into the cauldron looked like the skulls of the three maids.

As I stared at the sight, I muttered a threat that no one could hear.

 

“You wait and see, you bitches, before I leave this mansion one day, I’m going to screw you all over one way or another….”

*THUD*

“…Ahhhhh!”

 

“……?”

 

I was in the middle of peeling potatoes when I suddenly heard the sound of someone falling near the kitchen.

It was accompanied by a high-pitched scream, presumably from a woman.

…along with a voice that somehow sounded familiar.

 

“…What?”

 

Ethan must have returned to his bed…. right?

The voice didn’t sound like Ethan’s at all, but that didn’t mean I could relax.

Not to mention, I’d just been in the kitchen, triple-casting magic.

I didn’t want Ethan, or anyone else, to see me using magic.

I cautiously opened the half-open door inward, hoping that the voice I’d just heard belonged to Isabel.

Alas, my hopes were dashed again.

It wasn’t Isabel, but another maid, who fell on her ass in front of the kitchen door.

 

“…Senior Catherine?”

 

One of the senior maids at Blackwood Manor, with her short stature and pink hair.

Catherine, one of the seniors who had given me a quick treatment, was looking up at me from her position on the floor.

 

“Hehehehe…!”

 

I don’t know why, but she seemed like she was about to burst into tears at any moment.

Catherine Lane.

One of my seniors in the manor. She had the earliest morning start of any of the maids until Lilith began her shift in the kitchen.

With Lilith’s transfer to the kitchen, she, like her peers, is able to enjoy a more leisurely day.

 

“…….”

 

 

For some reason, she was out of her dormitory before four in the morning, wandering the halls of the mansion.

 

‘Something’s wrong….’

 

The new maid, who had been assigned to the same position as them two days ago, had started working with them.

Catherine sensed something was wrong with her, as she was finishing all her work and left before she and her coworkers had even gotten to work.

Her coworkers, Ariana and Alicia, were more laid back, saying that they just had a new junior who was good at her job.

For Catherine, who had spent the past year doing all of her coworkers’ work and doing the actual work, this situation didn’t feel relaxing at all.

 

‘To cut all those vegetables in just an hour or two, it just doesn’t make sense….’

 

Back in her day, when she was doing the same job, she would have had to move her arms all day long without resting.

No matter how fast your hands are, the idea of getting all that work done in just a couple of hours is unrealistic, no matter how many times you think about it.

What is also unfathomable is the stamina to do that much work for two days in a row without collapsing.

Even she, who already had two years of experience as a maid, would usually collapse after the work was done if she took on that much work alone.

Her successor, Lilith, didn’t even show any signs of fatigue.

She somewhat looked a little dazed just before she left in the morning, but after a break, she was back to her old self by the afternoon.

In Catherine’s eyes and her practical, hands-on experience, Lilith’s behavior was not without its oddities.

 

‘Is she bringing someone else into the kitchen to work with her without our knowledge…?’

 

It was hard to imagine that Lilith, a junior maid, would have such authority, but it was the most reasonable hypothesis at the moment.

Anything else was too much for a mere maid’s mind to imagine.

Catherine had been lurking outside the lower maids’ quarters, where Lilith and Isabel stayed since three in the morning, waiting for her.

 

Creak.

 

Around 4 a.m., she silently followed Lilith as she walked out the door.

 

Rustle.

 

“Huh?”

“…….”

 

There were a few moments along the way when she was almost spotted, but fortunately, the darkness of the mansion at dawn had hidden her small frame.

She followed Lilith into the dining room of Blackwood Manor.

 

‘I don’t think anyone else came into the kitchen….’

 

Perhaps she’d arranged to meet her new partner in the dining room.

Catherine waited at the entrance of the dining room for a few more people to arrive to see if her guess was correct.

When she saw that no one else was coming, she carefully followed Lilith into the dining room.

 

“I want … watch ……!”

“……please…sit down and wait…….”

“No! I want to watch … cook……!”

 

The sound of two people talking could be heard from the kitchen as soon as she entered the dining room.

Realizing it belonged to Lilith and someone else, Catherine quietly put her ear to the inner door of the prep room.

It wasn’t hard to figure out who was talking to Lilith.

It was the voice of Master Ethan, the man who had been causing a stir in the manor since his curse had been broken.

 

“Eh, why is Master Ethan here?!”

 

Catherine felt a chill run down her spine as she realized that the voice belonged to one of the most important people in the manor.

Why he would be in the manor’s kitchen at this hour was beyond her.

The conversation she had just overheard between the two of them reveals the truth of what has happened.

Ethan Richard Blackwood was born into a noble family.

It was common knowledge in this world that noblemen were born with the ability to use magic, so it was only natural that Ethan would be able to use it.

She didn’t know why, but assuming he had helped Lilith in the kitchen two days earlier, chopping vegetables, it would all make sense.

If Ethan was using magic to prep instead of Lilith using her hands, it would explain her unusually fast turnaround time…

…and therein lies the problem.

Although Catherine claims it was not her intention, the end result of her actions is that she has put a nobleman, Master Ethan, in charge of the kitchen.

There would be no public punishment for now, as there were guests in the manor, but once the guests left and their kitchen duties were complete, punishment would surely follow.

She’d be punished along with her seniors for forgetting their duties as servants and allowing the junior maids to do all of their work, and for daring to dirty a nobleman’s hands with meal preparation.

Catherine, who had already been accused of stealing from Ethan, would be punished severely.

All the complications that would ensue swirled chaotically through the fragile girl’s mind.

 

‘Oh no, what am I gonna do? What am I gonna do?!’

‘I never meant for this to happen!’

‘I’ve always been the one to take on the work of my peers, and I never had any intention of passing on the work to the next maid!’

‘I wasn’t even the one who stole and hid Master Ethan’s belongings in the first place!‘

 

The Duke of Blackwood’s family was not generous enough to let her vent her frustrations.

As Catherine stood in the kitchen doorway, her head in her hands, she heard Ethan’s voice was getting closer to the door.

 

“…Why don’t you just show me? I wanted to see you cook.”

 

Muttering something to himself, Master Ethan’s voice moved through the kitchen prep room and into the dining room.

Catherine’s heart was already pounding, and she had no mental strength left to face the nobleman.

In a panic, she hastily searched for a place to hide, crawling under the tablecloth at the nearest table in sight.

 

‘What should I do? What should I do? What should I do?!?!?!…’

 

She’d have to hide until Ethan, after eating Lilith’s cooking, retreated to his bedroom, and after Lilith returned to the kitchen after cleaning up the dining room.

Catherine spent the next half hour hiding under the tablecloth, trying to think of a way out of this situation.

Perhaps, in this situation, she may have put her own life at risk.

Somehow, in some way, she had to cleanse herself of her sins and find a way to survive.