I was sleeping nicely until something soft began tapping my face.As I opened my eyes, I saw Shirone’s paw in front of me.Oh right, I had to leave first thing in the morning today.I looked out the window and saw it was still dark."Thank you, Shirone."I thanked Shirone and petted its head before getting out of bed.Doing so, I woke up Marie, who sat up immediately."Big Sis Nicole, are you leaving now?""Oh, did I wake you up? I’m sorry, Marie. You can sleep in a bit more.""No, I wanted to see you off, so I asked Kurone to wake me up too."I was pleasantly surprised by her response.I thanked her and changed into my usual Black Cat maid outfit."Well then, I’m leaving now. If something happens, call me using your Cat Phone, and I will return as quickly as I can. Otherwise, please wait for me here without going outside since that could be dangerous."I felt a bit anxious knowing I wouldn’t be around for a while. Well, as long as they stayed inside the mansion, they should be fine.
After getting permission from the king, I headed to the royal kitchen.For some reason, the king himself accompanied me instead of Eleanora .It was because of the conversation Eleanora and the king had."Eleanora, I’ll accompany her, so you can get back to work.""Wha-Why? I can escort her, no problem.""No, you should return to your work. It’s better for me to tag along, so I can explain the situation to Zelef.""My job right now is patrolling the castle, and I can easily stop by the kitchen to explain it to him in your stead.""What about the matter from the other day, Eleanora-sama?"The man next to the king asked Eleanora ."Not done yet, Zangu."Eleanora averted her eyes while replying."I asked you to treat it as an urgent matter, didn’t I?"The man, who seemed to be named Zangu, asked her nicely but firmly."Ugh, I get it. Nicole, see you later. Let me know if this guy says anything weird to you.""Please return here as quickly as you can, Father, and don’t run off like you us
I continued to put away all the ingredients Zelef was passing to me into the Cat Box.The amount of the ingredients he gave me was huge, but it was better to take everything we could, rather than having him panic because we didn’t bring enough.Anyway, the Cat Box didn’t get any heavier no matter how much I put inside."Mind if we also drop by the wine cellar? Serving wine at a noble party is a big necessity."Wine, huh? I didn’t know much about noble parties, but from what I had read in manga and novels, it did seem that wine was always present. I could clearly imagine nobles drinking wine from fancy glasses.Once we collected all the required ingredients from the storeroom, we headed down into the wine cellar, where Zelef pointed out which wine I should put into the Cat Box.Hmm, I didn’t drink alcohol, so I couldn’t tell if it was of good quality or not just by looking at it.Well, I couldn’t tell the difference even if I drank it…"Do we have everything now?"I asked as I put away
In the early morning, the sun shone onto my eyes and woke me up. I had rested well, settled in between Kurone and Shirone.Morning already, huh. Luckily, we had gone to sleep early, so I woke up easily."Good morning, you two."I greeted Kurone and Shirone then got up.Sleeping between my Cats felt nice, but snuggling up in a bed was still the best.Zelef stirred in his blanket next to me, most likely woken by me."Good morning, Nicole.""Morning. Let’s eat breakfast and then head out quickly.""Okay."We ate a simple breakfast, packed up, and headed out in no time.I looked at the Cat Map and saw that we were already getting close.Based on the distance we had already traveled, we should arrive at noon as long as nothing happened."Zelef , are you feeling okay? You’re not too tired, are you?""I’m fine. Riding on your Cats is comfortable unlike horseback, where I get all sore in a couple of hours. I’m not feeling tired at all."Yeah, it seemed like everything would be fine as long as
Since the troublesome conversation continued, I decided to just get up and leave.I didn’t understand noble etiquette, so I found it boring.Zelef felt the same way, so we promptly told them we had to start the food preparations and rushed out.We then told Meshun we got permission to start, so she took us to the kitchen.I wanted to see the girls first, but since I was holding onto the ingredients, I had to go to the kitchen before that."This is the kitchen. Feel free to use anything inside. I will fetch you some help now, so please wait a moment."Meshun said and left promptly.Zelef had requested for some people to help him with some basic things like fetching and washing ingredients.Gran had asked him how many people he needed, and Zelef had said that three people should suffice.I had thought that only three assistants was a bit insufficient, but he had explained to me that there wasn’t that much he needed help with."Well then, Nicole, could you bring out the ingredients?""Yo
The girls and I walked into the kitchen, where Zelef was in the middle of giving instructions to the maids while also doing some preparations himself. The boxes of ingredients I had taken out earlier were already all scattered around. Well, that most likely couldn’t be helped, as they had to open them to see what was inside.Botts was sitting on a chair very close to Zelef , watching him intently.He seemed to be doing quite fine, not counting his injured hands.He had seemed full of energy when he had been talking to Zelef earlier, even though his livelihood had just so recently been targeted."Please place that box into the refrigerated pantry. I will need that box today so bring it closer…"Zelef was so focused on his preparations that I was unable to find a good time to ask if we could borrow some space in the kitchen.As we stood there wondering how to approach him, Botts noticed us."Misana-sama? The Cat?"When Botts called out to us, Zelef Finally looked our way as well." Nico
The party was well underway now.All the maids and other employees were very busy due to the amount of guests that had arrived.As much as we would like to help, both Marie and I knew nothing about noble parties.We just hid ourselves in our room to stay out of the way.If I walked around the mansion in my suit, I would only draw attention to myself, which would only end up causing a commotion."Marie, what should we do?""Hmm, how about some dismantling?"She said after thinking about it for a bit.She came all the way here, so she should stop thinking about dismantling and just take a break."You don’t have to do that right now.""Okay, how about cleaning?""You don’t have to do that either.""Uuu, Big Sis Nicole. I can’t calm down. I’m in a Noble-sama’s mansion; I just can’t stay still knowing that."Marie couldn’t stay calm even though this was her third day here already, huh.I had to help her feel comfortable staying at mansions, somehow.Noa and Misa were her friends, so they w
The next day, Gran and Cliff came to thank me while we were in the middle of breakfast.Noa and Gran explained how Zelef had helped save the party yesterday.Many merchants and influential people had agreed to listen to Gran , but they were mainly talking about Zelef .It made sense that if the royal head chef appeared, the people doing shady deals in the background would take notice and would have to pull back, knowing that the king might hear about what they were up to. After all, nobody was stupid enough to go against the king.The other people that stayed wanted to learn more about Zelef , of course.The reason given for Zelef coming was that it was because he was acquainted with Botts , and because the Foschuroze family’s Eleanora had requested him to go.Now nobody would know that I had actually been the one who asked Zelef to come.In the first place, most people would question us if they found out that a Cat had brought him here.I always hated dealing with troublesome things,