Time came to the thirtieth year since the hero was captured~.
Within the Nether Demon Domain, inside the mysterious ancient castle with its towering spires reaching into the clouds, dark and eerie.
A young woman dressed in a cow-print maid outfit, tall and slender but with a curvaceous figure, was now carrying a basket in her left hand and a bucket in her right.
She moved lightly and nimbly from the first floor of the castle all the way up to the twelfth-floor corridor.
Inside the basket were soft bath towels, blood-activating ointment for massages, and a light floral-scented essential oil.
As for the wooden bucket, it was the regular kind used for foot baths~.
This outfit and these tools—it went without saying—were clearly a classic massage service package.
But worth mentioning, the young woman was also wearing a pair of silver-gray high-heeled leather boots.
With such high heels, she could still handle them so deftly.
It was either talent or she was already used to wearing them, so she could walk on level ground with ease.
The answer was naturally the latter.
After all, she had been practicing for decades—there was no way she wasn’t skilled.
Though there was an element of coercion involved, to be fair~.
From the first floor to the twelfth, this seemingly long distance was but a snap of the fingers for the young woman.
In no time at all, she had brought all the serving tools and arrived at her destination.
It was the room on the twelfth floor with a black doorplate reading ’12’.
Strange to say, the vast corridor had only this one room.
The dim lighting, coupled with the eerie atmosphere and a faint smell of blood in the air, made one feel as if they had stepped into a haunted house—very unsettling.
But the young woman was already used to it.
Without any hesitation, she set down the bucket and, after a brief wait, precisely at the moment the midnight bell tolled, knocked on the thick, solid wooden door.
And she was not in a hurry to announce herself, because the Demon Queen had a peculiar obsession—she was very fond of the number twelve.
So the knock had to be done the right number of times as well~.
Knock, knock, knock… Knock, knock, knock… Knock, knock, knock… Knock, knock, knock~.
“Master, are you there? Technician No. 12, Fei’ouna, sincerely at your service!”
If it were usual times, this would just be going through the motions.
Her doting Demon Queen master would normally open the door right away, first steal a kiss, then move on to the next topic.
However, the atmosphere today was a bit different.
After waiting about a minute, a deep, displeased response finally came from inside the room.
“Come in, you maid who always likes to defy her master’s orders.”
‘Defy?’
‘Indeed…’
The master had indeed said that in the past few nights, she should spend more time with the children at home and not come up to the twelfth floor without reason.
But Fei’ouna also had her own reasonable excuse, so after entering, she showed no fear.
Instead, she stepped onto the deep black carpet, carrying the flower basket and bucket, and walked straight up to the other person.
Then she skillfully knelt on one knee, removed her master’s shoes and socks, and slowly immersed those delicate feet that had once trampled her into the warm spring water.
At this point, Fei’ouna spoke with a slightly plaintive tone to explain her purpose.
“Because today is December 12th.”
“It’s our wedding anniversary, and also the day I came to your side.”
“Shouldn’t we at least see each other?”
“And we haven’t seen each other for several days…”
As for this reason, it was indeed authoritative.
After all, on a wedding anniversary, it wouldn’t be right not to spend time with one’s cute maid wife.
So as one of the many kings of the demon realm, Queen Yilisi, who ruled countless hellish undead, also let go of her stern expression at that moment.
Instead, she reached out and gently stroked Fei’ouna’s fluffy-haired little head~
“Sorry, there’s been a lot going on lately. I actually forgot our anniversary.”
“But don’t worry, there’s definitely a gift. Once those problems are handled, I’ll make it up to you with an even grander date~”
The head pat from her master was so soothing that it even made the young woman’s large tail wag unconsciously.
But gifts and dates—that was clearly not the main reason for Fei’ouna’s visit.
Because from a few months ago, she had already sensed something wrong in the demon realm.
First, Yilisi was spending less and less time with her.
Second, there was an abnormal migration of demons.
All of this indicated that something bad had happened.
Unfortunately, no one explained it to Fei’ouna.
The guards and her eldest daughter, who had briefly come home recently only to leave quickly, seemed to be deliberately hiding things from her, making up excuses to brush her off.
That was when she figured it out—this must be Yilisi’s orders, not wanting her to know anything about what’s been happening in the demon realm.
So tonight, using this anniversary as an opportunity, she was determined to get to the bottom of it.
“A gift?”
“Rather than that, I’m actually more concerned about the things you’ve been hiding from me.”
“I can’t understand—why even the guards might know, but you won’t let me know.”
“Could it be that, in my current form, I still can’t blend into the demon realm and the demon race?”
With horns on her head and a dragon tail behind her—that was Fei’ouna’s current appearance, classic features of the Demon Dragon Clan.
Of course, she wasn’t born a demon~
Rather, she was infected by injecting Yilisi’s origin demon energy.
So strictly speaking, she was actually a human traitor who defected.
There were many similar cases.
The most common were those fools who wandered into the demon realm and couldn’t resist its aura, becoming undead corpses that were neither human nor ghost.
Usually, these were the lowest level, even inferior to small fry.
Also, for the sake of immortality, many humans would risk seeking infection voluntarily.
But most of them were not accepted by the demons, existing in a pitiful marginal state—unable to return to human identity, and unable to live normally in the demon realm~
However, Fei’ouna’s case was different, because she was infected by Yilisi’s origin demon energy.
And in the Demon Dragon court, the core of the queen’s wedding ceremony was that the other party had to be infected and assimilated by the queen, in order to bear more perfect offspring.
Moreover, the chance for infection was only once.
So Fei’ouna was the legitimate sole queen consort of the Demon Dragon court~
Plus, she had also been extremely successful in bearing children!
Because the reproduction situation of Demon Dragons was basically one egg per couple, and the hatching failure rate was high.
For instance, Queen Yilisi had no sisters whatsoever.
In contrast, Fei’ouna had already experienced egg-laying twice in just thirty years!
This was an unprecedented breaking of the Demon Dragon Clan’s curse of scarce offspring!
At this rate, the problem of sparse royal bloodline that had plagued the Demon Dragon court for tens of thousands of years might finally see a historic improvement.
So her status in the court was really not low at all.
If it weren’t for the fact that laying too many eggs had reduced her combat power, making it impossible to freely leave the castle, she would also be able to regularly meet the clansmen who respected her.
Similarly, Yilisi also respected her a lot~
Therefore, the queen, who usually never changed her mind easily, chose not to avoid the issue this time but instead faced Fei’ouna’s question squarely.
“What nonsense are you talking about? It’s just that some old acquaintances of ours have come to visit without permission.”
“I was afraid it would upset you, so I originally didn’t want you to know.”