10 days since Lapis was picked up.
With her wounds and stamina fully recovered, Lapis worked vigorously as a maid.
No matter how she tries to hide it, the hut"s owner, Lily, can"t clean, do laundry, cook, sew, or other household ch.o.r.es.
While Lapis lay in bed sleeping, all of the food Lily brought out was ready-made food, and Lapis watched as the clean room became disarrayed before her eyes.
Why was the room clean at the start? When Lapis asked, once a month, Lily"s witch friends come and clean up. And that day was the next day after the cleaning, as is the reason.
Lapis who became able to move soon began to clean. With experienced actions, Lapis cleaned the entire hut in the blink of an eye.
She still didn"t have any memories, but her body seemed to remember how to do it.
Next was laundry.
Because she was doing it purposefully, she divided the clothes into piles of colored and whites. Lapis couldn"t find the washboard, and when she asked Lily, "These is no such thing, with a movement of my fingertip, a magic device washes the clothes".
If there"s such a useful item, why doesn"t Lily diligently do the laundry!? And Lapis raised her voice for the first time, Lily responded 「It"s a pain」. At that time, Lapis stopped calling Lily with honorifics.
When the laundry was done, next was cooking.
Even the tableware was insufficient, but because there was at least a frying pan, with the remaining edible-looking vegetables and meat, she made stir-fry. With the rotten ingredients, Lapis bundled them and threw them away outside.
Having completed a simple stir-fry and soup, Lily returned from shopping with bread, completing the simple dinner — for lunch they finished the leftover vegetables and bread — Even so, Lily was satisfied.
「Lapis-chan, why don"t you marry me and stay here forever?」Lily said as a joke, but without getting mad, Lapis turned bright red and looked away.
Afterward, somehow, for some reason, they took a bath and slept together, just as when Lapis had been injured, causing Lapis"s heart to flutter as the day ended.
The next morning.
「There aren"t any ingredients.」
Lapis put on a newly bought maid uniform (of 3 pairs) and went looking for Lily.
「Geez. What kind of eating habits does Lily-san have? There aren"t any ingredients or condiments, isn"t that considerable? Really, she"s lived for over 6000 years and her food is insecure」
「I-I"m ashamed of myself.」
「You can"t clean or do laundry, why don"t you make effective use of your free time? You"re into researching, right?」
「…it is as you say.」
「Even if you have friends helping you, there are limits. From now on, start practicing, got it?」
「…yes, I shall do as you have said」
Depressed and huddled in a ball, compared to the usual Lily, she seemed small.
Having said what she wanted, Lapis returned to the original topic.
「With that said, we have no ingredients so I"d like to go shopping, but, Lily-san, are you good for money?」
「Y-yeah. I"m not bragging, but I"m not in discomfort for money. Being a witch is quite profitable.」
「…sounds cheap and bad.」
「I don"t have a choice. Humans can"t live without money.」
「Yeah, I understand, but… Well, whatever. Let"s go shopping.」
「Okay then, Lapis-chan, yesterday I arranged lots of street clothes, so go change.」
「Got it, just wait a moment.」
The next room over - or rather she went to a completely transformed storage room and looked at the personal s.p.a.ce. In there, were a bunch of maid clothes and cute-looking western clothes, hanging on hangers, lined up side by side.
Estimated, there were 30 different sets of clothing.
Lapis was at a loss of words.
No matter how you looked it, it was too much. Thinking about how much it cost, Lapis began to feel dizzy.
At first, with Lapis"s bluish, gray hair, she thought about the harmony in Lily"s black clothing, and chose a navy-blue one-piece dress, then returned to Lily.
「Wah, Lapis-chan, that"s really cute! It looks great on you. Can I hug you?」
「You"re already doing that…」
Bringing her face closer, Lily embraced Lapis. This witch is too free and uncontrolled.
In addition, being hugged, Lapis"s face became the color of autumn leaves.
「Rrather than that! What"s with that? That amount of clothing!」
While escaping the hug, Lapis asked a question, her face still red.
「Huh? You need at least 30 pairs to rotate between for one month, right? Also, to let Lapis-chan choose whatever would look good, it"d become at least 40, but」
「Do the laundry everyday! For a normal person, 5~6 pairs is enough!」
「Isn"t it fine? It won"t become rotten」
「Ugh, but, I can"t repay that much money」
「What are you talking about, I don"t need money.」
「But, these clothes, they"re really expensive…」
「It"s fine. Lapis-chan is doing the house ch.o.r.es. I bought it because I wanted to. I won"t accept anymore complaints. Please accept the clothes.」
「Nn… I understand. Thank you, Lily-san. I"ll do my best with cooking.」
「Fufu, I"ll be looking forward to it.」
Having reached a conclusion, the two of them gathered and left the hut.
(TN note: sorry for the late release, since the chapter was a bit longer than I had antic.i.p.ated. For future releases, I"ll try to get them out every other day, but that"ll all depend on life circ.u.mstances. Hope you all enjoyed (even though I didn"t proofread))