The New Job (3)
The Hero, Leopard.
The sudden appearance of the person she least expected made Yulia's whole body freeze.
The bastard—no, that woman—appeared to be on her way back from the market, toting a shopping basket in rumpled clothes.
Even so, her expression had twisted viciously, and she was baring her teeth at the Marquis.
"Leopard. Fancy meeting you here. What a pleas—"
"What is Yulia doing here right now? No—what are you doing here with Yulia?"
"You can see for yourself. I'm breaking in that maid you recommended."
"······."
Breaking in?
Her fist clenched in an instant.
So that's why you were talking about attending your schedule.
A murderous urge welled up uncontrollably.
"You didn't even entrust her training to the Butler?"
"I prefer taming things with my own two hands. Does that answer your question?"
"······."
The corners of the Hero's eyes trembled.
It was the look of someone who absolutely, positively did not buy it.
"Why are you still staying in the Imperial Capital?"
"After so long, I came down to the warm south and it's just lovely. Is there some law forbidding a Marquis from lingering in the Capital? It's not as if I dragged my personal troops down here with me."
"Weren't you supposed to have no interest in the human world?"
"Well, I came here for a holiday, so there you have it."
"From where I stand, it looks as though you're enjoying outings with a human woman."
"A misunderstanding. The maid merely attends to me. I came out on my own."
"······."
Every word exchanged between the two was barbed.
On the surface, they both wore faint smiles, but their expressions were strained enough that it wouldn't have been strange for them to come to blows at any moment.
Yulia had heard that Dragonia was clearly the Hero's sponsor.
Was it really acceptable to mouth off like that to one's own patron?
"I never heard anything about using her as a maid."
"And I never heard anything forbidding it."
"Return her to being an ordinary maid. I ask this of you most earnestly."
"Too late for that. With a commoner hired as a personal maid, the other maids' resentment has reached its peak—if I return Yulia to the rank of ordinary maid, the harassment would begin the moment she's out of my sight—"
"I don't care. Return her."
"Then we'll have to hear what Yulia herself wants."
That was the most welcome thing she'd heard the entire time.
These two have been talking about me this whole time while completely leaving me out of it.
But the moment she caught the Marquis's languid, oily smile, she realized he wasn't considering her at all.
He was only asking her opinion because it would add weight to his own argument.
If it seemed like she might object, he'd have found some way to shut her mouth.
The Marquis was that kind of man, through and through.
"There's no need to ask. I'm the one who found Yulia, and I'm the one who introduced her to you."
"And does that make Yulia your property?"
"If not yours, then whose property is she?"
"······."
A sigh escaped Yulia at Leopard's shameless reply.
She had tried her best not to get involved in their fight.
She was, after all, technically performing her duties as the Marquis's maid, so she'd meant to stay quiet no matter what sort of bickering they got up to in front of her.
"Hey. The more I listen, the more it sounds like you're taking me for a pushover. Or do I look like your slave? Who's whose property here!"
"······."
Coming to her senses, she found she had somehow risen on tiptoe, wedged herself between the two of them, and was shouting.
Even as she yelled, a nagging sense of alarm told her she was doing something very wrong—but she couldn't help herself. Having already stepped in, she decided to say everything she had to say and be done with it.
"No—I'm just saying, that's not how it works. Actual ownership means······."
"Then what is it, huh? You think just because you're holding my weakness, you can make me dance to your tune? If it bothers you so much, go ahead and spill it. I couldn't care less."
"Wh-what the······. What······!"
Leopard's face flushed red and she couldn't string her words together properly.
If the fact that Yulia was a Saintess came to light, the one who'd be in trouble wouldn't be Yulia.
She could simply drink Tia's poison and escape this world before the Church came swarming to take her away.
But Leopard—the Hero who had loved Saintess Ariel—could she really bring herself to hand Yulia over to the Church?
If she were going to, she'd have done it long ago.
A conviction took root: her weakness would never actually function as a weakness.
"See? Yulia doesn't need your help anymore. So could you stop interrupting our date—ahem, our schedule—and leave now?"
"Yulia! Did you just hear that? The Marquis just said date—!"
"I heard. So what of it? If you're done with your business, will you get lost?"
"······."
She had no particular desire to take the Marquis's side.
It's just that the sheer audacity spewing out of that Hero’s mouth was beyond tolerance—beyond anything. Once she started pushing back against one of them, she'd ended up shielding the other.
Never in her wildest dreams had she imagined the day would come when she defended the man who had violated her.
"So that's how it is······. I've done my part, so now it's time for the matchmaker to bow out······."
"Glad you finally understand. Now get los—"
"Come to think of it, I haven't seen the villa yet. I'd like to visit now, if that's acceptable."
"Of course. We've finished our meal, so let's return to the villa."
"Uh, huh?"
Yulia couldn't hide her bewilderment at the two men's abrupt change in attitude.
They'd been growling at each other until just moments ago, and now suddenly they were going to give her a tour of the villa?
Come to think of it, she hadn't harbored a shred of suspicion about their relationship.
She had simply assumed it was an ordinary arrangement between patron and beneficiary.
But the way the beneficiary spoke to the patron so rudely was strange in itself.
The fact that the sponsorship hadn't been severed despite it all was even stranger.
If the two of them had actually been old friends for a very long time, the whole situation explained itself perfectly.
Old friends could squabble over trivial things without their relationship ever cracking because of it.
"Get in. The carriage is a bit cramped."
"You said you expanded on the villa you originally purchased. Then just how enormous is it?"
"Never seen it?"
"No. I had no interest in it."
"······."
The carriage was definitely cramped.
She had no idea how things had come to this, but somehow she ended up wedged between the two of them, seated side by side.
Leopard kept shooting her glances and taking deep, heavy breaths as if in a foul mood, which made Yulia anxious beyond words.
Before she knew it, she'd squeezed her eyes shut.
Oh no. I chose the wrong side.
She'd thought that sticking with the Marquis would let her shake off that deranged psycho lesbian.
But it turned out this line was that line, and that line was this line.
She had become a foolish little fox who'd tried to sow discord between two old friends.
She was terrified of Leopard's retaliation.
Would the Marquis actually try to protect me then?
What if he resented her for unleashing a torrent of abuse telling his closest friend to get lost?
Her heart pounded wildly with tension.
"······."
"······."
"······."
At some point, the inside of the carriage had filled to the brim with silence.
The three of them avoided one another's eyes, staring intently at the walls as an excruciating stretch of time crawled by.
When the carriage finally stopped, it felt like she could breathe again for the first time in ages.
Leopard got out first, and Yulia, moving on instinct to offer her a hand, drew it back.
Leopard was pointedly ignoring her, back turned.
She was thoroughly sulking, it seemed.
In the end, Yulia had to place a hand on her chest, peer down at the footboard, and groan her way out of the carriage.
Now that we've arrived at the villa, I should excuse myself—whether it's to use the privy or whatever—and slip away for a bit to catch my breath.
She was in the middle of that very thought.
"Moooommm!"
"Miss! Miss! In front of the Marquis—!"
"Ah."
Into her view came Tia, running toward her with a wail.
The maids chasing after Tia, faces drained white, were just the garnish.
The breath that had been easing caught in her throat all over again.
She had completely forgotten that her greatest weakness was at the villa······.
"Mom! Those big sisters are bullying Tia!"
"Tia."
"Punish them! Okay? Okay?!"
"I'm begging you······."
She had clearly told the girl to stay in their lodgings, so what on earth was she doing here?
A headache throbbed behind her eyes.
.
.
.
"Woooow! The room's so biiiig!"
"Tia, you can't run around like that. Let's go back to the lodgings."
"But that mister said it was fine."
"Are you going to listen to Mommy, or to the Marquis?"
"I'll listen to the Marquis, 'cause the Marquis looks higher up."
"This little······."
The drawing room of the villa.
Marquis Dragonia stared at Tia as she clattered and stomped about.
The girl was meticulously inspecting every single painting hung on the wall, working her way toward the far wall with the determination to examine them all.
If he let his gaze wander to Yulia chasing after Tia and scolding her, even by accident, a reaction would rise below—and so the Marquis had to keep his attention very carefully disciplined.
"You have a smile on your face."
"I do? Hah. So I do."
"I was under the impression you had no interest in humans."
"So was I. But perhaps because that child has dragon blood mixed halfway through her, watching her makes me feel... warm."
"A dragon's child······. You noticed."
"Of course. I'm a dragon myself—did you think I wouldn't recognize it?"
The Marquis snorted and took a sip of his tea.
It was cloyingly sweet—he'd evidently dumped far too much sugar in.
Apparently, Yulia had no gift for brewing tea after all.
"So then— entrusting Yulia to the Dragonia estate wasn't about Yulia herself, but because of her daughter?"
"······."
Leopard pretended to sip her tea and let a pause hang in the air.
Judging from the Marquis's reactions, he had apparently not yet realized that Yulia was the Saintess.
She hesitated a moment, wondering whether she should tell him.
"You could say that."
"Aha. And here I thought you'd fallen for Yulia."
"I won't deny it."
"Kehk! Cough!"
"Are you alright?"
"Hahh—I'm fine. The tea went down the wrong pipe."
Startled, the Marquis choked on his tea and was forced into a fit of coughing.
To think she was truly a woman the Hero desired.
And he—a being who should have known better—had been unable to master his lust and assaulted her. The guilt of it made him feel as though he might go mad with anguish.
Just as the Marquis, unable to meet Leopard's eyes, was keeping his head lowered, Leopard—having finished her deliberation—made a small gesture.
At once, a barrier just large enough to enclose the two of them unfolded into place.
A barrier invisible to the naked eye.
"A Divine Oracle was issued."
"An oracle?"
"Yes. An oracle declaring that the Saintess's firstborn child would become the Seed of Calamity."
"Why are we suddenly talking about a Saintess······. Ah. Don't tell me."
The Marquis's eyes widened as he pieced together the whole truth in an instant.
The words to follow were, without a doubt, that Yulia was in fact that very Saintess.
Far more than the contents of the oracle, Yulia's true identity was the far greater shock to the Marquis.
Should I dare ask deeper?
He was hesitating, lips twitching, when—
"What does the oracle say? What's it about? What's it going to do?"
"Wh—"
"Ah."
Whump.
Feeling the sofa behind them sink sharply under a sudden weight, the two turned around—and could not suppress their groans.
Yulia, who should have been with Tia, was leaning her arms over the back of the sofa, her face scrunched into a ferocious scowl.