The Hehe Slacker Princess Goes Book Shopping
Noir von Leonhart was a genius.
And not just any genius—she was the hardworking kind.
Exceptional talent in both swordsmanship and magic. Elegant black hair and beautiful blue eyes. A personality that refused to grow arrogant over her gifts, striving instead to set an example for everyone, all while projecting that cool, composed air.
Having gathered every popular trait imaginable, Noir ranked among the top five most beloved characters even in the original game. Beyond sheer popularity, she had long maintained performance close to a human right among SSR characters, so her fans' loyalty ran deep as well.
But that was only true of the Noir from the main story.
It had nothing to do with the Noir of the present moment.
"Hehe, hehehe..."
There was not a trace of the lofty noble lady from the main story in the Noir currently sprawled out in the middle of the night, reading entertainment novels. The way she lounged like that yet managed to eat the cookies she'd smuggled in without scattering so much as a single crumb bordered on the miraculous.
If the original fans had seen her like this, they would have split into two camps—one crying, "This hehe-slacker princess is not the Noir I know!" and the other cheering, "Oooh, I love this side of Noir so much too!"—and the gallery would have burned for a solid month.
"Ah, it's over."
[I Was Banished From My Adventurer Party and Entered the Academy Only to Be Discriminated Against for Being Incompetent, but My Stocks Skyrocketed and I Obtained a Fraudulent Skill, So My Former Comrades Regret It.]
This book, with a title so long it was hard to even memorize and whose content was anyone's guess, was the novel Noir had recently fallen for. It had zero literary value, nothing more than a cash-grab for the season—but what did that matter?
As long as it was fun, that was enough.
"Hmm, looks like I'm out of novels now, too?"
Normally unable to leave her post for long, Noir preferred to buy books in bulk whenever she did go shopping. And since the novel she'd just finished had wiped out her last reserves, she now had no choice but to buy new ones.
"Hmm... Well, I definitely need the next volume of the one I just finished, and I should also pick up the next volumes of I Became the Academy Director's Mom and After Returning to the Novel, I Became the Theater Troupe's Superstar..."
Finishing the novels was a shame, but at the thought of enjoying a long-overdue shopping trip, Noir beamed as she jotted down the list of novels she needed to buy in her notepad. In an instant, more than twenty titles filled the page, and with eager anticipation for tomorrow, she sank into bed.
But Noir had no idea.
That of those twenty-plus novels, only a mere three would ever get a next volume. That "cash-grab for the season" meant a den of people who sucked up money and vanished the moment the fad passed. Having only just opened her eyes to entertainment novels, Noir had yet to experience abandonment.
The Golden Festival had begun.
The heat of the celebration blanketed the streets of Preas.
There was a world of difference, of course, between watching a festival in a game and actually enjoying one. The atmosphere on the ground. The region's character and culture. The temperament of the local people. None of those were things you could feel in a game that only showed a city through background CGs.
I had spent a year taking on all sorts of missions and visiting many cities, but nothing was quite as fun as setting foot in a city that had appeared in the game. Hunting down the real locations that served as the CG backdrops and comparing them to their in-game versions, tasting the foods the characters had eaten—each little thing brought its own quiet pleasure.
"Hmm, that's odd. You claimed this was Eastern-style fabric, yet the flowers embroidered into the silk don't grow in the East."
"Haha, miss. Eastern-style stuff all comes out like that these days."
"And I said I was looking for fabric to use in a maid uniform. How am I supposed to put fabric this flashy into a maid uniform?"
But wandering a game city in real life also brought plenty of mishaps. With railways only just starting to be laid, the cities' public order was naturally a mess, and it was truly a shame how many merchants there were who tried to scam outsiders like this. In the game, they would run limited-time sales and discount a portion of the shop's goods at regular intervals—yet here it was nothing but people looking to rip customers off. In that respect, it was needlessly realistic.
"On top of that, the scuff marks are quite severe. Do you truly believe this fabric is worth the price you're asking?"
"Hey, damn it, so are you buying it or not? And those scuff marks—didn't you make them, miss? Looks like you'll just have to buy it now."
I might have miscalculated. With the Golden Festival underway, merchants were pouring in from everywhere, so I'd thought I could find some quality fabric—but all I was seeing were unscrupulous merchants who had sold off their consciences and were fleecing outsiders dry.
"Have you no conscience as a merchant?"
"Conscience my ass. I was going to let it go if you just bought the fabric, but this won't do. You'll be leaving all the money you've got on you."
Haa. Looks like I've run into a proper idiot. Even if people were flooding in and it was hard to keep order, did he not realize that forcing a sale this blatantly would get him caught by the Leonhart family in no time? The other merchants at least stuck to inflating prices or passing off defective goods as normal stock—this fool didn't even respect those lines.
The bald man in front of me, whom I was now embarrassed to even call a merchant, jerked his chin, and the rough-looking bodyguards behind him blocked my retreat. I'd thought he was only missing hair, but to think the inside of his head was empty too. A reasonable suspicion arose that the hair on this man's head, unable to endure his ignorance, had cried out in agony and fled.
"Just hand over the money you've got on you and we'll let you go unharmed."
That was a lie. The eyes of the big men cutting me off from behind were thick with lust—I could tell at a glance. In real history the concept of minors' rights had been blurry, and even a twelve-year-old child was treated as an adult, but this was not a world from real history. It was a world from a game. Awareness of human rights lagged behind reality, yet the treatment of minors was roughly similar to the real world. If a man in his twenties married a fifteen-year-old girl the way they did in actual history, just because this was "a game," that would have been grounds for every curse imaginable and legal sanctions. Even American games that loved extreme content tended to be careful with the treatment of minors—so of course a Korean game overflowing with every kind of regulation would be even more careful. Which meant the two men blocking me right now weren't just guys with excess sexual desire. They were bastards crazy for minors. Leaving the "minor" part aside, acting like this already made them bastards pure and simple.
"Aren't you afraid of the Leonhart knights?"
"Heh. You think knights are going to come all the way out to a place this remote during the Golden Festival? We didn't pick this spot for nothing."
"Oh-ho."
Is that so?
To become a maid, there were far too many basic accomplishments one had to master in advance. Mastering cuisine from every corner of the world, of course, plus massage techniques for one's master, medical knowledge for when the master fell ill, paperwork skills to assist with the master's duties, and so on. And among those basics was the negotiation ability needed when dealing with merchants. Buying the best goods at the lowest possible price and extracting the maximum profit. That was basic among basics not only for maids but for any housewife. There was a reason I had taken the accountant and financial planner exams. I had failed them, sadly, but my previous boss had comforted me, saying I didn't need to go that far. To think she had accepted as a maid someone who barely had a hundred certifications—my former boss had truly been a kind person. Though I still couldn't forgive her for turning the café's maids into perverts before I arrived.
"So, is this everything you have?"
"Y-yes! That's everything! It really is, ma'am!"
And by using the negotiation techniques I'd honed in my previous life, I was able to strike a fine deal with the bald man in front of me. The quality might not have been great, but to get my hands on this many goods and obtain money for free... Looking at him now, this bald man wasn't a vicious merchant at all. He was a true merchant who did business at a loss.
Yep! A maid who can negotiate with merchants like this is really cool too ♥
"Hmm, so that really is the end. It's not easy finding such a good trading partner—what a shame."
"Ah, ahaha. I-is that so...?"
"By the way, there's quite a lot of it."
The goods the bald man handed over truly came in every variety. A maid was not allowed extravagance, so I planned to discard most of it—but even so, there was a great deal I still needed to take with me.
"Bokja, swallow it."
"Hiiiek!"
I couldn't carry all of that by hand. I summoned my shadow, Bokja, and ordered it to swallow the goods. Yet Bokja seemed troubled somehow; it clamped both hands over its mouth and shook its head vigorously from side to side.
What's wrong with it? It's usually such a good, obedient child.
"Ah, is there a cucumber in there by any chance?"
"Huh? Ah, yes... There was cucumber in the sandwich I packed for lunch..."
"Take it out right now."
At the command, the bald man shuffled over to the bag and pulled out a cute lunch box with a rabbit drawn on it.
"There. Bokja, swallow it."
Once I confirmed the bald man had removed the lunch box and ordered Bokja again to swallow the goods, only then could Bokja gulp down the bald man's luggage.
Jjuuung~! Jjing-jjing!
After swallowing everything, Bokja beamed and fawned all over me—it was truly adorable. If only it would cut back on the cucumber pickiness, it would be perfect.