I Wanted It to End With "The Emperor's Useless Little Brother"
The Emperor Only Listens to Me.
That was the title, more or less.
Some all-powerful Emperor develops some all-powerful obsession with some all-powerful protagonist, love blooms, yada yada.
Then the two of them lock eyes, get together, and live happily ever after. You know the type — the genre's full of them.
I was The Emperor Only Listens to Me's very first reader, and the loyal soul who stuck with it to the very end.
Not because I liked romance fantasy, mind you.
My older sister wrote the damn thing, so I read it all the way through.
To mock her.
"She blows the royal treasury just to win the heroine's heart? All-in on bonds with a zero percent return rate? That's the biggest sucker in recorded history."
"Go to hell. Stop picking fights."
"And when monsters invaded the border? The situation called for reinforcements, and he sends the knight order to babysit the heroine instead? Is this an Emperor or a spy for the enemy nation?"
"...I told you to stop."
"One teardrop from the heroine and the verdict changes? I'll grant you it's cost-effective, but even the Dark Ages had more of a system than this."
"Ugh, I SAID STOP!"
"Ugh, I won't stooop~"
Damn it. I should have stopped.
Then I wouldn't have ended up in this absurd excuse for a world.
"A mere viscount dares hurl insults at me, a Count? Are you not afraid of a duel!"
"Our Viscount Parnean does not cross the line into rudeness! If you want blood, I'll spill as much of it as you like!"
The nobles' roaring voices ring in my ears. The viscount throws down his gauntlet, the count picks it up, and the Imperial Knights come swarming in to quell the commotion.
A duel — in the Imperial Palace, of all places.
The country's running just great, I click my tongue.
The great Lugnica Empire. Overflowing with rich underground resources and people. A self-proclaimed strongest nation that treats even disaster-class monsters as raw material, tossing them into the grinder the moment they show up.
When even the food that symbolizes poverty is Meatloaf — cheap minced meat mixed with eggs, vegetables, and flour — the place has, in effect, never known scarcity.
But the reality is exactly that, isn't it.
The etiquette-obsessed nobles can't keep a single tradition intact.
Well, of course — the idiot Emperor is too busy fooling around with the daughter of a cloth-merchant house to do anything else.
When the Emperor's absence from the palace is basically a passive trait, how could the underlings be expected to mind the lines?
If I were a noble, I'd have burned down a building just to see if anyone bothered to arrest me.
"Is the fight already over?"
When the noise outside died down, the woman in my room reacted.
"The knights just came and shut it down. Surely they wouldn't actually draw blades over this."
"What a shame. Nothing is more entertaining than watching a fight."
"I wouldn't say that. Watching a maid sprawled on her master's sofa, eating a baked potato and reading a romance novel — that's pretty entertaining too."
At my jab, she blinked and turned to look at me.
"I am delighted to serve as Your Master's eye candy. So true devotion is rewarded after all."
"Huh?"
"I believed it would come. You, my Master, are a grown man of nineteen this year. And I, Elis Troyd, your personal maid, am ab. so. lute. ly. gor. geous. It would have been stranger if this day never came."
This was the first time, so I'd had to talk her out of turning the lights off.
With that expressionless face, smoothly peeling off her clothes — I genuinely couldn't tell whether she meant it or was just being a sly fox.
Light-reflecting platinum blonde hair and sky-blue eyes. Skin so pale it went beyond white into translucence, and a figure so sensual it was hard to believe she hadn't yet had her coming-of-age ceremony.
Countless nobles had tried to steal her away — no surprise there.
"So this time, have you been toying with a girl's innocent heart?"
"Don't say things people might actually misunderstand. You sound like some clueless oaf who doesn't know the first thing about a woman's heart."
"...Tsk."
Watching her flop back onto the sofa and brush potato crumbs off her chest, all I saw was a pretty girl cosplaying as a maid.
How had she become like this?
In the beginning, she'd stared at me with murder in her eyes, twin flames burning.
Well, of course. I was the mad Emperor's little brother and a villain slated for an early exit.
Dante de Lawrence — second son of the Lawrence Imperial Family.
"Be my personal maid, and I'll ask nicely... was it?"
"...I am not yet of age. Therefore I cannot offer you my body—"
"Let's just pretend that never happened. See ya~"
"...!?!"
In the original story, Elis becomes the heroine's little sister and a dependable maid.
Ordering a girl like that to purge someone — of course she'd have to die.
I'd tried to keep my distance to cut the flag cleanly, but somehow we ended up getting along, and somehow this became our daily routine.
"This novel is more entertaining than I expected. Ah, Master? Could you hand me Volume 2 over there?"
That's what I'm asking — how did it come to this?
In front of others she always introduces herself as, I am the perfect maid befitting Lord Dante~ — and yet she has no qualms about sending that very Lord Dante on errands.
Should I start keeping an eye on her?
It doesn't matter to me, but someday she'll have to stand before the heroine she's meant to follow, and this would be a problem.
What I want is to avoid death — not to derail the original story.
"Elis? I told you to make yourself comfortable around me, but don't you think you're a little too comfortable?"
"Do you think so? I believe I am handling my duties perfectly as Lord Dante's perfect maid."
"Where, and how, exactly."
"There are three criteria for evaluating a maid. The first is housework. From cooking to cleaning, assistance, and paperwork — I pride myself on a level higher than anyone else's."
Fine, I'll grant that one.
She's only like this about herself; the food's delicious, the cleaning's spotless, and anything I ask gets handled with lightning speed.
"The second is my role as a bodyguard. Even against Commander Rhine, the strongest in the Empire, I am confident I would win if I fought with everything I had."
Granted that too.
Saying it around a mouthful of potato rather kills the cool factor, but she does carry the Bloodline of the Sword Saint, after all.
"The third is how faithfully one imitates a master worthy of respect. Honestly, I believe I've followed your example quite a lot."
"There it is. Caught you."
Imitating me?
You? Imitating me?
You're telling me the sprawled-on-the-sofa-reading-until-I-pass-out act is because of me?
"Was there something I did wrong?"
"Very wrong. What part of me did you imitate to end up that lazy? I exercise hard, I read, I live a busy life."
"And yet you take no part whatsoever in the affairs of the state, do you not."
"..."
"Devoting oneself to Lugnica. As the second son you may be, I understand that bearing the name of the Imperial Family carries that responsibility."
She glances away, just slightly.
"What power do I even have? I'm the useless second son they all dismiss."
"The mere fact that you possess a unique magic makes you a very special person, I believe."
"..."
"Sabangshineong, was it? Your own special magic that lets you split yourself into four."
Apparently I've known her far too long.
There's nothing she doesn't know.
Trying to cut the flow, I cleared my throat with a khem! — but Lord Dante's perfect whatever-the-hell brushed it aside with ease.
"You know as well as I do that today's Lugnica has many problems. And yet, refusing the throne purely because you don't want it, while doing absolutely nothing — I believe that is, perhaps, somewhat lazy of you."
So what, should I stage a coup or something?
It's not like I have a choice.
Cain already dumped every last piece of shit there was to dump.
If I take the throne, all of it lands on me.
Not only that — every disaster this country has coming down the road would be mine to solve as well.
Why me?
Getting transmigrated into this garbage world was unfair enough. Why should I clean up the rest too?
"Hmm..."
But there was no way to explain that to her.
Actually this is all inside a novel and I'm a transmigrator~ — say that, and she'd think I'd lost my mind.
As I racked my brain for a way to dodge the question, Elis let out an utterly ticklish little laugh.
"Fufut."
"...?"
"Did you know? Whenever you find yourself in a bind, Master, you stare intently at something and furrow your brow."
Did I?
Hard to say — you don't exactly get to look at your own face unless there's a mirror around.
"To think you know even that... perhaps calling myself a perfect maid was somewhat arrogant of me."
"What's gotten into you? Admitting that out loud."
"I am a woman who knows when to concede what must be conceded."
Her cheeks flushing prettily, she continued in a voice tinged with a little shyness.
"Because what I feel for you, Lord Dante, is not mere 'respect' or 'loyalty' — or anything of that 'sort.'"
"? What's that supposed to—"
Baaaam—
Just then, the trumpet announcing the Emperor's return rang out.
I heaved a sigh full of annoyance and rose from my seat.
She asked, her voice carrying a trace of disappointment.
"Are you going to attend His Majesty?"
"Have to. However much you look at me like a stray dog, the fact that I get to live this comfortably is all thanks to my big brother."
"I shall attend you."
Elis smoothed her attire into perfect order and fell in behind me.
Name aside — work mode.
Back straight, head slightly bowed — she was, in that moment, the very textbook definition of a maid.
Which is exactly why it's so hard to call her out on anything.
I walked down the corridor with a wry smile.
"...Hm?"
This was routine.
Cain returned, I went out to greet him, we exchanged nothing of note, and I saw him off. Small details varied, but the broad strokes never changed.
Which is why it was said to be an extremely rare sight — Cain's ever-composed butler, Alfred, sprinting toward me in a panic.
"D-Dante, my young lord!!"
"Hey there, Alfred. Did your first love finally show up? You old fossils have plenty of energy left, huh."
"It's — it's terrible... something terrible has happened...!"
Alfred's voice was trembling.
This was the butler who hadn't wavered once, even when war broke out.
His eyes were bloodshot, and he looked utterly at a loss — like nothing so much as a dog desperate to relieve itself.
"His — His Majesty the Emperor..."
"Cain? What about Cain. What happened?"
This was no time for jokes, so I asked, dead serious — and he told me something unbelievable. Something that had never happened in the original story.
"His Majesty... has passed away."
...I'm sorry, what?