The Tomb of Butlers
The Grand Duke was reading my plan with unnerving precision — the very one I had entertained at least once myself.
When I stared up at him in silence, he looked down at me and smiled faintly, as if my scheming were something pitiful to watch.
“Freya. Do you understand what it means that you know that name?”
"……"
Meaning? It's my name, and I know my own name. What exactly am I supposed to take from that?
More importantly — why does he talk as if knowing my name is significant?
I had vaguely gathered that the Grand Duke knew the identity of this body's original owner.
But why is he reacting so sharply to the name Freya?
There was no connection whatsoever between that name and the owner of this body.
There couldn't be. The owner of this body was from an enemy nation.
And yet the Grand Duke had reacted so sensitively to it. I studied him with puzzled eyes.
Could it be that the owner of this body was also named Freya?
Was such an absurd coincidence even possible?
At that impossible hypothesis, my heart began to pound hard. Maybe now was the right moment to ask. Whether he knew who the owner of this body was — and whether he knew the name Freya.
I looked at him and asked.
“There's something I'm curious about.”
"……"
“Do you, by any chance, know who I am?”
At that, a crack ran through the mockery that had been sitting on his face.
"……The question you asked me when I was drinking the sap, for one. And the way you keep circling around my name."
"……"
“Why does it seem that you know me better than I know myself, Your Grace?”
The Grand Duke's expression went cold again.
“Ah, right. You said you lost your memories. ……Not all of them, though.”
"……"
There it is.
The Grand Duke had just smoothly changed the subject, and the message was clear: he had no intention of answering whether he remembered the owner of this body.
Grand Duke. You think I'll just let things flow your way?
I opened my mouth quickly.
“Then if you told me what you know, it would help me recover my memories—”
Cutting me off mid-sentence, the Grand Duke spoke my name once more.
“Freya, who hasn't lost every memory.”
"……"
His voice had dropped dangerously low, and it carried the weight of a warning.
“Coaxing the truth out of you again would not be difficult. That sap is hardly the only thing with such an effect.”
His long-lashed eyes glinted with arrogance.
“Besides, I know how to make people tell the truth without resorting to any of that. Honestly, such things are nothing but a tedious bother.”
They have a usage limit, too, you know.
“The only reason I haven't pressed you further is not that I've decided to trust you.”
The Grand Duke stepped in close — close enough that his scent was vivid and the distance frankly embarrassing. I flinched and leaned back, but of all things, a wall was right at my back.
Oblivious, he continued.
“Until my doubts are resolved and my suspicions harden into certainty…… Freya, you are curious too.”
With the distance between us gone, his voice landed directly at my ear. Unusually deep and heavy, it had a weight that made the listener instinctively shrink.
“If you won't bare your secrets, then I have no intention of satisfying your curiosity either.”
The Grand Duke straightened his posture, spine drawing up tall.
“So learn well from Norbert. Who knows? If you grow excellent enough that I can't do without you, I might just find myself spilling that secret you're so desperate to know.”
"……"
Why, you little…
I shot the Grand Duke a needle-sharp glare.
— “……Just watch me for two years, Your Grace. Then who knows? I might grow into someone good enough to be a threat to you.”
He had flung my own words right back at me, then turned on his heel and walked away.
I watched his retreating back grow distant.
But why.
Why did he seem so angry just now?
Because he still had things he was hiding from me?
Because my name happened to be Freya?
Or was it—
Because the owner of this body couldn't remember him?
Knowing him, it was probably all of it.
Once the Grand Duke vanished from sight, I turned to the corridor window. The face reflected in the glass was still unfamiliar — but still beautiful, too.
Perhaps the original owner of this body…
…had been far more important to the Grand Duke than I'd assumed.
The next morning.
Before the sun had even risen, old Norbert came knocking at my door.
“……Why are you awake?”
He stared at me with a startled face.
“You did say you would begin training me today, didn't you?”
“……So? You were preparing in advance?”
“That's correct, sir.”
I tilted my head, not understanding what was so surprising about it.
In the Tenasis Empire, my mornings had begun before dawn as well. I rose before anyone else, ran the training grounds, and swung my sword. Because I had taken up the blade later than the other knights, I had to endure their petty bullying, and to crush them with sheer skill, I had to work several times harder than any of them.
Nothing's changed even now.
Compared to the maids of the Grand Duke's estate, I clearly knew nothing and my stamina was surely lacking. On top of that, the whole household already knew I was an employee of dubious, unverified origin.
Only the goal of my effort changed — from knight to maid.
All I had to do was repeat the same effort I'd always made. And the first step of that effort was waking before everyone else.
“So, what shall I start with?”
"……"
For some reason, the old man regarded me with a distinctly sour expression. His gaze lingered on my face for a moment before dropping to my necklace.
“Don't shatter it this time.”
"……Look, I keep telling you, that wasn't my fault."
The necklace that had broken during my aura awakening had been replaced with a brand-new one by the old man. Ever since, every time he laid eyes on me, the lecturing began.
“Do you have any idea what that thing cost? It's worth more than a full year of your wages.”
“Which is exactly why I'm saying I didn't break—”
Without another word, the sour-faced old man turned and walked out the door.
“Follow me.”
Crunch. My fist clenched before I could stop it.
Hold it in. Hold it in.
Yes, well — at least he wasn't demanding I pay for the necklace.
I quietly fell in step behind him.
The old man immediately dragged me to every corner of the Grand Duke's estate.
“Today is only for learning the layout. From tomorrow, you'll be learning the work done at each location, so keep that in mind.”
“Yes, sir.”
The five-story main hall of the estate, four annex buildings connected to the back courtyard, and over a hundred storehouses besides. The old man marched me thoroughly through them all before returning to the main hall.
“Wait here a moment.”
"……Yes, sir."
Gripping the banister, I forced strength into my trembling legs and barely kept myself upright.
My stamina can't keep up, so I can't even use my aura freely…
It was fortunate I'd been trickling aura into my legs whenever I could — otherwise I never would have kept up with him this long.
This won't do. I need physical conditioning too.
If things went on like this, I might actually faint in front of the old man. That was one humiliation I intended to avoid.
I'll cut back on sleep even more.
I was busy reworking tomorrow's schedule in my head when a middle-aged woman approached the old man and me. Standing at the foot of the central staircase, he introduced me to the newcomer.
“Barisol, this is Freya. She begins work today as an apprentice of the estate.”
At his words, the woman turned to me with a genuinely warm face.
“Oh my. A pleasure to meet you. I'm Barisol. By the grace of fortune, I serve as head maid of this estate.”
Ah, the head maid. I know exactly how heavy that mantle is.
Forcing a composed expression, I offered her a bow.
“It's an honor to meet you, Head Maid. My name is Freya.”
“Please, just call me Barisol.”
“That's… perhaps once some more time has passed.”
“Of course. If that's more comfortable for you, then so be it.”
Even in the face of my carefully drawn line, Barisol's expression stayed gentle. A benevolence that seemed capable of embracing everything radiated from her.
She took my hand and clasped it firmly.
“Let's get along well, Freya.”
“Yes, please take good care of me.”
The old man spoke to Barisol then.
“I'll be handling Freya's training myself.”
Oh my. Barisol's eyes went wide. Something in the air turned odd.
Again. It happened again.
Every time word spread that the old man would be training me, the entire staff reacted the same way — a mixture of astonishment and, rather than envy, something closer to pity. I couldn't tell exactly what that emotion meant, but following the old man around had taught me a few things.
First: the Grand Duke's estate currently had no butler.
Given how spectacularly the Grand Duke had squandered his life, he'd accumulated enemies beyond counting both inside and outside the empire — and those enemies' assassins had claimed butler after butler as their victims.
Which was why, I was told, the place had earned the nickname the tomb of butlers.
So it's only the poor innocent butlers who keep dying.
Well, fair enough — assassins skilled enough to actually kill the Grand Duke weren't exactly common. They'd naturally gone after the easiest targets, and among those, someone whose position would carry the weight of a warning.
Though if the Grand Duke, whom even I couldn't kill, were done in by some ordinary assassin, that would be its own kind of nonsense.
The second thing I learned was that old Norbert enjoyed enormous renown throughout the Cadea Empire.
Count Norbert Millard. A fiercely loyal vassal of the Ballot Grand Duchy — and, by some accounts, the most revered legend of the entire butler profession. I'd heard in passing that he was the founder of Leonhardt, the empire's only butler academy.
And a man like that is going to train me…
Going by the staff's reactions, he was clearly famous for his impossible temperament as well.
I stared at the back of the old man's head for a good long while — and then a sudden thought flashed through my mind, and my eyes went round.
Wait a moment.
The estate conveniently had no butler, and no new hire would be brought in to fill the post for quite some time. Which meant the butler position would sit vacant…
To learn about this body's owner from the Grand Duke, I need to get closer to him.
Closer, in this case, didn't mean physical distance. It meant trust earned through the heart — a relationship built by showing devotion and having one's abilities recognized, layer by layer.
And there's no position better suited to that than butler.
Because the butler's office was trust itself, made flesh.
Which means the danger of the post is, ironically, a gift to me.
Rescuing the Grand Duke from an assassin's blade would be the fastest possible route to his trust. And as time passed, my aura and stamina would only grow stronger. The moment I recovered even a fraction of my former peak, assassins would be nothing.
The real problem is getting my competence as a butler recognized.
And the answer to that problem was standing right in front of me.
Like a thirsty deer finding an oasis, I gazed rapturously at the back of the old man's head. Sensing my stare, he turned around.
One of his eyebrows twitched.
"……What?"
"……"
“What on earth are you thinking, to look at me with those eyes…”
I gave him my most earnest look, as if I'd been waiting for exactly that question. The way I had when my aura first awakened — delicate and careful, like soothing a child; reverent and solemn, as if welcoming a most exalted being.
Pouring every ounce of heartbreak I could muster into my voice, I spoke.
“Master…”
"……What? M-, Master…?"
The wrinkles at the corners of the old man's eyes began to tremble.
What is wrong with this absolute lunatic…
That, at least, was exactly what the look he gave me seemed to say.