The drying area of the Kastian manor.
A gentle breeze blew, and the sunlight sparkled off the dew on the lawn.
Ailiya stood between two tall wooden drying racks, holding a heavy bedsheet that had just been washed and still smelled of soap.
Splash—
She used her arms to fling the wide bedsheet open in the air, then rose on her tiptoes, trying to hang it on the high clothesline.
Just as she stretched her arms upward as far as they would go, a distinct feeling of tightness came from her chest.
Ailiya frowned almost imperceptibly, pausing for a moment.
She lowered her head, her gaze sweeping over the area below her collar.
These days, she felt like her chest had grown a bit more.
Her originally well-tailored, perfectly fitting black-and-white maid uniform now had the fabric across her chest stretched taut.
Especially when making large movements like this, the edges of the buttons were pulled into fine wrinkles, the cloth clinging tightly to her skin, giving her an indescribable feeling of pressure and slight discomfort.
This young body was clearly in a stage of development.
Ailiya let out a silent sigh in her heart.
In her previous life as a player, she had completed this game countless times and created many female characters.
But back then, so-called female characters were just a pile of data.
No matter how nice the clothes or how exaggerated the figure, it was just eye candy to him.
But now, it was different.
Every breath, every movement, even this real and cumbersome feeling of fullness in her chest—all of it constantly reminded her that she was now truly living inside this female shell.
If her body was becoming more mature, then what about her mind?
Perhaps as time went on, she really would slowly get used to all of this.
But when that day came, would her psyche also be completely assimilated into that of a real woman, just like her body?
Thinking of this, Ailiya felt an inexplicable restlessness.
“Ailiya! Ailiya!”
That familiar voice came from behind.
Ailiya closed her eyes and took a deep breath.
She didn’t need to turn around to know who it was.
Leo, holding a long wooden stick he had picked up somewhere, rushed excitedly into the drying area.
“I stayed up all night thinking! I’ve already figured out your ‘Mop Thrust’ move!”
Leo stopped less than two meters behind Ailiya and solemnly struck a defensive pose he thought looked cool, swinging the stick with a whoosh—“Come on! The young master is ready today! Let’s do a real sparring session!”
Ailiya opened her ice-blue eyes, not even turning her head, and continued focusing on the bedsheet in front of her.
“Young Master, I don’t have a mop in my hands right now. Only a freshly washed bedsheet.”
Her tone was flat, without a hint of emotion. “If you want to experience what it’s like to be smothered by wet fabric, I can oblige.”
“Don’t underestimate me! I’ve already remembered the ‘First Lesson’ you taught me! I’m keeping a safe distance!” Leo hopped around behind her relentlessly, waving his stick and shouting, “Just teach me one more technique to break the situation! Just one!”
Ailiya pretended not to hear.
She picked up the bamboo drying pole, holding it with both hands, and once again rose on her tiptoes, pushing the heavy bedsheet hanging on the line upward, trying to spread it fully.
Because this movement required raising her arms high and leaning back, her slender waist, wrapped in the maid uniform, traced a breathtaking perfect arc.
And the already tight fabric across her chest was stretched to its limit.
Pop—
A very faint sound.
The top button on her chest, finally unable to bear the expansion force from within, snapped its thread. The button quietly popped open a corner.
The collar opened slightly.
Sunlight poured through the gap, illuminating the skin hidden beneath the clothes—fair and delicate as suet—along with a faint, alluring cleavage that rose and fell with her breath.
A tiny bead of sweat slid down her long, swan-like neck and disappeared into that mysterious shadow.
Ailiya’s full attention was on wrestling with the heavy bedsheet; she only felt a slight relief in her chest and was completely unaware that she was exposed.
But Leo, standing behind her, froze in place as if hit by an Advanced Paralyze spell.
His hands, which had been waving the stick, stopped mid-air. His mouth hung slightly open.
His gaze uncontrollably crossed Ailiya’s shoulder and locked onto the breathtakingly tight curve of her chest and the dazzling whiteness at the opening of her collar.
Gulp.
Leo swallowed his saliva very clearly.
He felt a rush of blood surge to his head, his cheeks instantly turning as red as a ripe tomato, and his breathing became rapid.
His heart pounded like a drum in his chest.
“…How long are you going to stand back there like an idiot?”
Finally done hanging the bedsheet, Ailiya turned around, breathing slightly heavily, and coldly stared at Leo, who was dumbfounded.
She keenly noticed his evasive, shifting gaze. Frowning, she followed his line of sight and looked down at herself.
The open collar. The popped button.
Ailiya’s gaze dropped to absolute zero.
She didn’t scream or cover her chest like some lovestruck girl. Instead, expressionless, she raised a hand in its white glove and calmly pulled the fabric of her collar together, her eyes showing the same coldness as looking at trash.
“What are you looking at?”
“I—I—I—I wasn’t looking at anything!”
Leo jumped back two steps like a cat whose tail had been stepped on, frantically hiding the stick behind him. His eyes darted everywhere but refused to meet Ailiya’s. His tongue was tied. “I swear! I absolutely did not see your… that… that…”
“That what?” Ailiya took a step forward, simultaneously picking up the long bamboo drying pole.
“N-Nothing!”
Leo’s face flushed red as he shook his head desperately.
“It seems that, besides your magical talent, your brain capacity, Young Master, only reaches the average level of a goblin.”
Ailiya held the drying pole with one hand, tapping her slender fingers lightly against the bamboo. “I didn’t expect your head to be filled entirely with slime mucus.”
“Hey! I just accidentally—”
Swish!
Before Leo could finish, the drying pole in Ailiya’s hand turned into a blur, cutting through the air with a sharp whistle, and at an extremely tricky angle, directly struck Leo’s knee.
Thud!
Ow!
Leo’s legs gave out, and he fell flat on the lawn.
Without giving him a second glance, Ailiya grabbed a wet towel that hadn’t been hung yet from the nearby washbasin and slapped it onto his face with a smack, covering half his head precisely.
“Fourth Lesson: Any unnecessary distraction becomes the flaw that allows your enemy to kill you in a single blow.”
Ailiya coldly tossed out these words, turned around, picked up the empty washbasin, and walked gracefully back toward the manor.
“Now, take that garbage-filled brain of yours and get back to your room.”
On the lawn.
Leo lay on the ground with a wet towel on his head.
He pulled the towel off and watched Ailiya’s tall, indifferent figure disappear around the corner of the corridor.
His knees hurt, and his face stung from the wet towel.
But for some reason, he swallowed again, and his mind couldn’t shake the brief glimpse of that dazzling whiteness and the bone-chilling “Fourth Lesson.”
‘Her strikes are still that painful.’