”…Phew, that was close,” Shiron muttered to herself, checking that nobody was around.
After seeing Arses off to the stables for his riding practice, Shiron checked that nobody was around, then muttered quietly to herself.
Her night with Arses had run long, and she’d ended up waking up pretty late. A servant should never get up later than their lord.
She’d jumped out of bed and rushed to clean up after the night before, but honestly, that was another screw-up on Shiron’s part.
Normally, she should have finished cleaning up the moment their night together ended and quietly left the bedroom. Getting lost in the moment and falling asleep next to her lord until morning? That was just careless.
Arses had woken up right after Shiron finished cleaning and left the room. When Arses came out of the bedroom, Shiron greeted him with a calm face, but inside she was breaking into a cold sweat.
Haah, Shiron let out a sigh.
Shiron let out a sigh. “His Majesty is only eleven, but he’s way too into bedroom talk. I mean, it’s a good thing for the royal family that His Majesty is so eager about that kind of thing, but…”
In the Empire, which had lost three princes in the recent civil war, the only royal left who could carry on the founding emperor’s blood to the next generation was Arses-apart from the former emperor, who was bedridden.
Some royals in the past had no interest in bedroom matters, or went for other men instead. Thinking about that, it was something to celebrate that Arses, still just a boy, had taken an interest in those things so early.
Most of the court felt that way, and Shiron was one of them. That’s why she accepted being with Arses in the first place.
She just wished he’d go a little easier on her. At this rate, she felt like she’d get swept up in the pleasure of it all and stop being able to do her job as a servant.
Thinking back on the intense night they’d shared, Shiron’s cheeks turned a little red.
-But her face tightened right up again.
Shiron shook the messy thoughts out of her head and started walking quickly down the palace hallway. Her destination was the Empire Chancellor’s office.
The current Chancellor was a man named Marquis Gregor Gram2.
From being the tutor of the fourth prince-the most overlooked of the four princes-Gram had shot up to become Chancellor, and now he’d become the most powerful man in the palace.
The common folk praised Gram as the “Commoner Chancellor.”
Just like that nickname suggested, Gram had originally been a commoner with no title at all.
He’d served the Empire as a bureaucrat during the reign of the emperor before last, the great Emperor Cassius, and his outstanding skill at handling government affairs got him noticed. He rose through the ranks quickly at a young age. His fast climb made some people jealous, and rumors spread that he must be “His Majesty the Great Emperor’s boy toy.”
Those rumors were completely false, but even now, past sixty, you could still see traces of the beauty that once got him suspected of being a royal favorite.
His straight-backed posture showed no sign of age, and his stride through the palace halls was firm and unshakable-like it was showing off his power.
His hair and beard, still thick in old age, had a strange luster to them, and his face-bursting with a raw kind of vitality-carried the dignity and force of a man who ran the Empire.
People who wanted an audience with Gram-noble or commoner-were everywhere, so many you could sweep them away and still have more. Even nobles often had to wait days after requesting a meeting.
But when Shiron visited his office, the Chancellor welcomed her in right away. Even considering that Shiron was the Emperor’s personal maid, this was exceptional treatment.
Shiron stepped into the office. “…Excuse me, Chancellor, sir.”
”Mm,” the Chancellor replied.
As Shiron stepped in with nervous feet, Gram ordered his subordinates in the room to leave.
The subordinates left right away, like they knew the drill. Some of the newer ones looked confused by the Chancellor acting so unlike himself, but the others nudged them and they hurried out too.
After watching every last subordinate leave the room, the Chancellor turned to Shiron-who was standing stiff with tension-and gave a heavy order.
”Report,” the Chancellor ordered.
”Y-yes, sir! About His Majesty’s night last night-“
And with that, Shiron began explaining her night with Arses.
How she’d been fondled, how many times she’d taken his seed-Shiron described the night with a precision that dug into every tiny detail.
To young Shiron, Gram was old enough to be her grandfather-even her great-grandfather. Talking about bedroom matters with someone like that never got easier no matter how many times she did it, but Shiron pushed down her shame and kept reporting.
Meanwhile, the Chancellor listened to the raw, explicit details of a boy and girl’s lovemaking without moving a single eyebrow. There was no hint of him mocking Shiron in his face-it was clear the Chancellor genuinely wanted to know what happened that night.
After a while, when Shiron finished her report, the Chancellor tapped his desk with his fingertip and spoke.
The Chancellor tapped his desk. “…It’s been half a month since the Treant (Silku)1 was brought into the bedroom. I thought His Majesty’s favor might shift to her, but it seems that’s not the case.”
”Yes. Even after welcoming Lady Ney, His Majesty still dotes on me just the same.”
”Calling a different species into his bed-that’s lustful. But he’s not so cold-hearted that he’d throw away whoever he’d been favoring before, huh.”
Saying that, the Chancellor stroked his thick mustache and asked Shiron a question.
”There still aren’t any other maids who’ve received His Majesty’s favor besides you, correct?”
”Yes, that’s right.”
”Hmm. As I thought, His Majesty seems to be the type who deeply loves a limited number of women-just like the former emperor. It’s easier to manage than if he were sticking his hands everywhere, but it’d be a problem if he started favoring daughters of the noble clans.”
The noble clans3 were the high-ranking nobles who held onto high positions through inheritance.
Even though they were all courtiers of the same Urgalia Empire, to Gram-who had climbed to Chancellor through his own talent and achievements-the noble clans who tried to control the Empire through bloodline were potential rivals.
This hostility wasn’t one-sided, either. The noble clans also saw the upstart commoner Chancellor as an enemy. It was entirely possible they’d send a woman loyal to them to the Emperor, win him over, and scheme to bring down the Chancellor.
Most nobles who had tried to offer their wives or daughters to the Emperor so far had been low-ranking nobles, but some of them might have been tied to the noble clans.
The Chancellor nodded once, then fixed Shiron with a cold, stern look.
The Chancellor fixed her with a cold stare. “You will continue to serve at His Majesty’s side as before, and report His Majesty’s condition to me-leaving out nothing, no matter how small. Needless to say, keep strict watch on any women who try to get close to His Majesty without going through me.”
”Understood, sir.”
”You may go.”
The Chancellor gave a light wave of his hand and immediately turned his eyes back to the reports on his desk. Seeing him stare at the pages with such a serious face, it was obvious that Shiron had already vanished from his mind.
Shiron bowed deeply, then left the office quietly, careful not to disturb the Chancellor’s thoughts.
Once outside, freed from the Marquis’s heavy pressure, Shiron couldn’t help but let out a sigh of relief. But she quickly snapped back to her senses, hurriedly straightened her face, and walked quickly away from the Chancellor’s office.
Walking down the long palace hallway, Shiron looked back on what had just happened.
As you could tell from the conversation in that room, Shiron had orders from the Chancellor, Marquis Gram, to watch the Emperor’s movements and report on them. These orders weren’t given yesterday or today. Since she first served Arses as his personal maid seven years ago, Shiron had always been the Chancellor’s personal spy.
Well, “spy” didn’t mean she was some kind of trained secret agent. Shiron came from an orphanage the Marquis had set up in his own territory, and she’d been picked to be young Arses’s maid because she was smart.
Since then, she’d been gathering information on Arses under the Chancellor’s orders.
What Arses liked, what he hated. What made him happy, what made him angry, what made him sad, what he enjoyed. She reported everything she learned as his personal maid to the Chancellor, hiding nothing-and sometimes Shiron would even take the initiative to probe Arses’s values herself.
And the information Shiron brought back was used by the Chancellor to control the young Emperor.
”…Haah.”
Shiron let out a sigh without realizing it.
Shiron had lost her parents to disease. Without the Chancellor’s help, she would’ve died somewhere in the back alleys. In that sense, Shiron owed the Chancellor a debt.
The fact that Shiron-with no education and no status-could work as the Emperor’s maid was only possible because of the Chancellor’s backing. Shiron understood that, and she had no hesitation about following his orders.
Even so, she couldn’t say she felt nothing about playing spy and leaking information on Arses.
After all, this was someone she’d served for over seven years, since she was nine. She had loyalty, of course, and she also had affection for Arses, who looked up to her like a big sister. And to say even more-she felt love for the boy emperor whose body she’d guided into adulthood with her own hands, and who still doted on her after that.
Leaking information on someone like that-of course it hurt her heart.
The one saving grace was that the Chancellor wasn’t trying to harm Arses. For the Chancellor, who wielded power by using Arses as a puppet, keeping Arses in a good mood was more important than any clumsy political move. And as long as Arses obediently followed the Chancellor, no danger would come to the Emperor.
Her information was being used for that-by thinking that way, Shiron fooled herself out of her guilt.
Still, she had worries.
Right now, Arses had no work as Emperor besides the bare minimum of government duties and audiences. Most of the work the Emperor should be doing was being handled by the Chancellor instead.
Not putting too much burden on a very young Emperor-in that sense, what the Chancellor was doing probably wasn’t wrong.
But if this warm bath of a situation went on too long, Arses would surely get used to it. He might end up leaving all government work to the Chancellor and becoming a lazy Emperor who fooled around with women in broad daylight.
In fact, the signs were already starting to show. Thinking back on what Arses said and did yesterday, Shiron couldn’t help but sigh.
For now, it was fine because he wasn’t an adult yet. Like she said before, the royal family’s situation meant that fooling around with women was even welcomed.
But if things stayed the same after Arses became an adult, eventually the people of Urgalia would give up on him, and they’d want someone with real achievements and popularity to become Emperor. If that happened, Arses would be dragged off the throne-exiled, imprisoned, or executed. Either way, it wouldn’t end well.
”…I hope I’m just overthinking it,” she muttered to no one.
Shiron muttered to no one, and in the empty hallway, she shivered a little, like she was cold. Then, as if shaking something off, she hurried toward Arses.
Translation Notes:
1 ↩ A race believed to be tree spirits, known for their long lifespans. Ney, a Silku girl, has been brought into Arses’ bedroom, adding complexity to his relationships and Shiron’s duties.
2 ↩ The highest-ranking official in the Empire, currently held by Gregor Gram, who wields significant power and influence over the emperor. He uses Arses as a puppet to maintain control.
3 ↩ High-ranking nobles who maintain their positions through inheritance, often seen as rivals by the Chancellor due to their attempts to control the Empire through bloodline.