A Peaceful Time
I had sworn I would start working hard from tomorrow — and so, true to my word, I would start working hard from tomorrow!
Which meant today was for playing!
As always, I was tearing through games with the three maid sisters when a warm gaze at my back began to prick at my nerves.
"Head Maid, you should join us."
"I'm fine, thank you."
She declined with a gentle smile.
Well, I wasn't fine!
That warm gaze was turning me into garbage!
It made me feel like some worthless freeloader playing games on the eve of war!
...I was, in fact, garbage!
But there was a way out of being garbage. What is human trash, really?
A freeloader — a rice-worm living off the labor of others. A minority of parasites!
In other words: stop being a minority.
If everyone here played games together, no one could call me trash! Everyone would become freeloaders!
Wait. Something felt off about that...
I looked at the three sisters clutching their gamepads and arrived, belatedly, at enlightenment.
With four of us already trash, I was no longer a freeloader!
I was a bread-loaf freeloader!
I couldn't stand it! Hamburger! Bring me a hamburger!
I had to hurriedly stop the Head Maid, who had actually started to go fetch one.
Ahem. I had proven I was no freeloader — but feelings were feelings, so I decided to lure the Head Maid in.
"Don't say that. Come play with us. Standing there alone makes it look like we're freezing you out."
I grinned and patted the sofa. Come on! Right here! You can be trash too — I mean, a colleague!
"If Your Majesty wishes it."
The Head Maid sat beside me with a faint smile. Hahaha. With every last person in the playroom now gaming, I was no longer trash!
"...Head Maid, you're really good at this."
After several rounds of a fighting game against her, I was on a pure losing streak. This had been a massive title back on Earth-1!
"It isn't particularly difficult."
Smiling, the Head Maid pressed in close against my side — the better to obstruct my movements and pad her win rate!
What do you mean it isn't difficult?! I had put a full 1,321 hours into this game!
And I couldn't win a single match!
This was absurd!
...It had to be some underhanded trick! She was running some shady scheme!
I lit up my eyes and scanned the Head Maid from head to toe.
"...Ahem."
For some reason she thrust out her chest, struck a peculiar pose, and tilted her head at a forty-five-degree angle.
The three sisters clicked their tongues and glared at her through narrowed eyes.
!
Aha! I knew it!
I reached out and gently cupped the Head Maid's cheeks in both hands.
"P-perhaps somewhere a little more private, if I may ask..."
Realizing her ruse was about to be exposed, the Head Maid's face flushed red and she began to babble.
But it was already too late!
I tightened my grip and jerked her face sharply to the side!
"...Your Majesty?"
She stared at me in bewilderment. Beside her neat, composed face — there was nothing.
How strange!
"Where did you hide it?"
"Whatever do you mean?"
"You used some dirty cheat key in that match just now. There was a device you were operating, wasn't there?"
"..."
Struck dead center, the Head Maid fell silent.
She might have hidden it with her underhanded superhuman powers, but now that I'd caught her, it was over! Before the authority of this great Emperor, she would confess the truth!
"Wooow."
"Your Majesty's odd little corners are so cute."
"Um, Your Majesty? There wasn't anything like that."
The three sisters took their superior's side. Don't defend her just because she's your direct boss!
I am the Emperor — her boss's boss!
No one defies my commands!
"Tell me the truth! What trick did you use to beat me?!"
"...Your Majesty's skill was simply terrible."
The Head Maid delivered the barb with a sharp look. Soft! Did she think I would fall for that kind of gaslighting?
There was no way someone with a gleaming 1,321 hours of playtime got wrecked like a dog!
That was the equivalent of playing all day, every day, for fifty-five straight days!
I had put in that much effort!
Or, as some would say, wasted that much time.
Anyway!
"The three maid sisters all lost to me!"
I had gotten crushed at first, but after steeling myself and concentrating to the absolute limit, I had taken down all three of them!
I was proud of that!
"That was hospitality play."
The Head Maid stomped my pride flat...
She rose, dusting off her short skirt, let out a long sigh, and started walking away.
Something about that lonely retreating figure made her ponytail look droopy.
Hmm.
Normally she was always at my back, only stepping forward to report and act when something came up — but right now, even that wasn't happening.
My superior intellect cracked the mystery in an instant!
The reason was obvious!
She was afraid of losing to me!
...This liar!
Win and then run away, would she?!
I latched onto the Head Maid's leg. Like a koala!
"Your Majesty?!"
She flinched and shook her foot wildly, but a koala does not fall from its tree!
Thud.
I was not a koala, so I fell.
Come to think of it, koalas fall from trees too!
"Hwaaaaagh!"
I clutched my head and howled... so this was pain! It felt exactly as if my skull were completely intact!
"Are you all right?!"
The Head Maid rushed over and examined my head with great care. Foolish! I hadn't even hit my head!
She realized that soon enough and narrowed her eyes. Insolent Head Maid!
"The agony of defeat is tormenting me."
"Yes. So it seems."
As I clung to her leg again, she looked down at me with cold eyes. A strangely chilling feeling crept over me.
So I pressed my face into a warmer place!
Mmm... her thighs were wonderfully soft. After I nuzzled my cheek against them a few times, the Head Maid let out a short kyak!
"Your Majestyyyy..."
"Yes. That's me."
For some reason the Head Maid's face had gone red more times today than I could count. She scrubbed her dry hands over her face a few times, then scooped me up in one motion.
She looked a little flustered and yet somehow pleased, so I decided to fluster her a little more.
"One more round."
"...Yes. As many as you like."
"Once you've lost to me, you won't be able to talk like that!"
"Heh. If that day ever comes, it should be rather fun."
Her usual slightly stiff speech had softened into a gentler tone. It felt as if we had grown quite close.
I sat her back down on my right and threw myself into the game — at which point the three sisters' grievances boiled over.
"Boo~. Shouldn't the Head Maid be working?"
Third Sister puffed out her cheeks and grumbled.
"We were supposed to be Your Majesty's play partners."
Second Sister clicked her tongue and stuck out her lip.
"You two! Don't be rude to the Head Maid!"
First Sister scolded them both and, quite naturally, claimed the seat on my left.
"...Unni?"
"You sneaky—!"
Second and Third Sister stared in outrage, but First Sister didn't so much as flinch. Behold the power of seniority!
"Ufufu. Your Majesty isn't thinking anything strange, is he?"
"No. I was just thinking you were cute."
I executed a rapid evasive maneuver. It was common knowledge among humanity that if you mentioned a woman's age, she ceased to be a woman and became a gorilla!
Dig a little deeper and every human is a potential gorilla. Humanity has more than enough raw material to become gorillas!
Glory in it!
Though lately, unfortunately, humans no longer seemed to possess the qualifications to become gorillas!
"...My. Your Majesty is truly charming."
First Sister lightly covered her mouth with her hand, eyes curving into crescents as she whispered by my ear.
"Have you fallen for my great authority?"
"Hehe. How adorable."
Having submitted to the Emperor's authority, First Sister drew back from my ear.
I am the Emperor! Just be born well and the job is yours!
But I hadn't obtained this position by being born well — I had seized it through foresight!
Specifically, by installing an excellent mod into a game!
I had foreseen that one day I would be isekai'd into a game! Past me had truly been imperial timber!
Even if I had become the Emperor of Korea-1, I would have led the nation well!
Because there was nothing left to ruin.
I would have thrown every embezzler but myself into prison, then embezzled alone, and the country would have prospered!
I could have made a great Korea-1...
But one must not dwell in the past! I would now lead Korea-3 to greatness!
And the battles of this fighting game would open that curtain!
Here I go!
K.O.
Defeat.
"Khrrrk."
The Head Maid's character battered mine with mystical, impossible movement. My character died!
Korea-3's future had grown a little darker.
All because of the Head Maid!
"Shall I go a little easier on you?"
The detestable Head Maid looked down at me, her face full of smiles. She seemed to be enjoying a victory she had only won because I let her!
...She had only won because I went easy on her!
"An Emperor never begs! Even if he loses a hundred times!"
In truth I had gone all-out and gotten utterly demolished. But a tree that is struck ten times will fall! Someday, victory would be mine!
"A splendid sentiment."
"Your Majesty! I'll win for you instead!"
Second and Third Sister clung to my back and murmured. Why did these three sisters always whisper right in my ear?
Ugh, lost again.
Not my fault!
"This defeat is Second and Third Sister's fault."
"Ehk?"
"Pardon?"
They blinked at me, playing cute, but I was not falling for it.
"This is all your fault!"
I sternly rebuked the two maids! I had practically already won that last round — and lost because of these two!
The fact that the Head Maid's character still looked like it had 100% HP was just my imagination.
"Heeh."
"I will atone for this sin tonight."
A mischievous glint danced across Third Sister's giggling face, while Second Sister whispered something that looked erotic from every possible angle.
"...It was just my imagination!"
I hastily reeled my words back in — to avoid being ambushed tonight.
"No. I will most certainly atone."
Second Sister would not retreat.
"How about a little fire play tonight?"
Third Sister joined in with a bewitching smile. First Sister watched us all with a benevolent face. A complete maman, that one.
"I'm glad Your Majesty seems to be enjoying himself."
The Head Maid said it in a voice that did not sound glad at all. After my unbroken string of losses, I wasn't particularly enjoying myself either!
"Fine. I won't let any of you sleep tonight."
"Kyaa!"
"Ufufu."
"At last."
"Kh..."
Under the maids' variously colored gazes, I made my declaration!
"I will not sleep until I win!"
"...Yes. I suppose you will."
"Sleep is important, you know."
"Tch."
"I have no intention of throwing a match on purpose."
Under those lukewarm stares, I fought with ferocious intensity!
And without winning a single match, I met the morning.
Facing the sunlight pouring through the window, I spoke faintly.
"...Head Maid, you really are strong."
"That isn't wrong, but it does leave me with a rather strange feeling."
In place of the three sisters, who lay sprawled asleep all around us, the Head Maid — who had kept playing with me the whole time — laid my nodding self down on the bed.
"Sweet dreams."
At her soft voice and the cool fingers that covered my eyes, I slipped quickly into sleep.
...Nothing could ever be as fun as this.
Even though I had murmured it so quietly, the Head Maid seemed to have heard it clearly.
"That makes me happy."
A gentle voice.
Surely I would have good dreams.
I hoped days like this would go on forever.