Seiji remained silent for a few moments.

"She definitely shouldn’t stay like this. We need to help her recover her memory. It can’t be helped if we need to take some risks for this… but even so, I still hope that we won’t end up hurting her."

Natsuya nodded in understanding.

"I’ll try my best."

There was yet another period of silence.

Finally, Natsuya came up with an unexpected yet reasonable suggestion.

The next morning.

Mika had a strange premonition as she received Seiji’s phone call.

"Hey, Seiji, what’s the matter?

"Eh!? Staying… somewhere else overnight!?"

The pigtailed girl was shocked.

That was because he told her over the phone that due to some circ.u.mstances, he slept over at a friend’s house last night, and he planned to stay there for an extended period of time! He would be unable to go to school or walk home together with her.

What was going on? What happened!?

"Well… just think of it as… me working on a project together with a friend… Yep."

In the dining room, Seiji was sitting on a soft chair as he watched a maid lay down breakfast on the table in front of him.

That’s right—a real maid!

She was wearing a black one-piece dress with a white ap.r.o.n and a black hair tie. A white ribbon was tied around her neck—in short, she was wearing stereotypical maid attire.

She had dark grey long hair which cascaded down to the middle of her back. Her face was white and her features exquisite and delicate. Her dark brown eyes had a gentle look to them, and there was a faint smile displayed on her face.

Just about perfect… full marks for being a maid!

When Seiji woke up this morning and saw this beautiful girl in maid attire, he was stunned for several seconds.

As an otaku, it was only natural for him to have various fantasies about the perfect appearance for a maid. Now that he’d met his maid in real life, all his fantasies were replaced with the single thought of ‘this is what a maid should really be like!’

Her entire person, appearance, atmosphere, and att.i.tude was perfect. Everything about her was perfect!

After a while, Seiji finally managed to calm down.

When he regained his normal state of mind, he chatted a bit with her.

He discovered the maid was called Mai Houjou.

She was currently a third-year student at Genhana High School… which meant that she was his Senpai!

"As for the truth… I’ll let you know when it’s time. For now… you don’t need to worry about me. After everything is over, I’ll come back to the apartment. See you at school. I’m hanging up."

When Seiji had ended his call with Mika, the maid… or Houjou-senpai, just finished setting breakfast in front of him.

"Please enjoy, Milady, Shuho-sama, Kirin-sama, and Harano-san."

The dark grey-haired beauty backed up one step and bowed to everyone seated at the table.

Natsuya and Hitaka nodded slightly at her.

The cat girl, Rana, who was still in her middle school uniform, seemed to be half asleep, as she seemed to unconsciously stuff a dried sardine into her mouth.

Seiji watched Houjou-senpai leaving the room while pus.h.i.+ng the food cart.

"Are you feeling that it’s strange how I’ve hired an uppercla.s.sman to become my maid?" Natsuya spoke up.

"A little…" Seiji nodded.

"The Houjou family has a deep relations.h.i.+p with my family and has always been in our employ." Natsuya also took a dried sardine and placed it into her bowl.

"Houjou-san’s father is one of my father’s most skilled subordinates. That’s how I got to meet Houjou-san when I was little."

"I regard her as a gentle big sister and treat her as a close friend of mine, not a subordinate. However, she herself insists on maintaining a proper relations.h.i.+p."

"She doesn’t have to be my maid, but when I, Hitaka, and Rana moved here for school and needed to hire someone for the housework, she… volunteered to come here and even resigned from her job as the student council president."

‘What!?’ Seiji’s eyes bulged in surprise.

"Wait, wait… student council president?"

Natsuya placed the dried sardine into her mouth.

"Yep, Houjou-san is the former student council president before me. She’s my predecessor."

The current student council president’s maid was the ex-student council president!?

Seiji’s mind was thrown into chaos.

Was this a real-life version of Maid Sama!? Or was it Hayate the Combat Butler?

It seemed like them… but it was also somewhat different.

‘Forget it; I should stop thinking about it.’

Anyway, for such a thing to happen at Genhana High School… This must count as a huge piece of news, right? If it was publicized, it would probably shock many students.

But even if they were shocked, it didn’t seem like it would be difficult for them to accept it.

Everyone knew already that Natsuya Yoruhana was the scion of a rich and powerful family, so hiring a former student council president as a maid seemed reasonable enough, right?

Although some people might suspect that there was something dark behind the office of the student council president, hmm…

Random thoughts flitted past Seiji’s mind as he enjoyed the abundant breakfast.

After eating.

"Hitaka and I are going back to my main home in order to investigate a method which will allow s.h.i.+ka Kagura to recover her memory. Rana will be staying behind to guard the school."

"Haruta-kun, I’d like you to take good care of s.h.i.+ka in the meantime. I’ll let the school know you have some circ.u.mstances, so you can choose whether or not you want to attend cla.s.s."

Seiji nodded after hearing Natsuya’s words.

He definitely still had to go to school, since he told Mika he would meet her there. Although he wouldn’t be able to tell her or Chiaki the details, he still needed to explain the situation briefly.

‘Before that, I should take another look at s.h.i.+ka.’

After Natsuya and Hitaka left, Seiji went to s.h.i.+ka’s room again.

She was still sleeping.

Seiji pulled up a chair and sat by the bed, quietly observing her in peaceful slumber.

Currently, the problem facing Natsuya and him was discovering a method which would allow her to recover her memory.

But this wasn’t the only problem.

Presuming that they were able to successfully help her recover her memory without harming her, what would they do afterwards?

Ask her for information… then imprison her until the duel was over?

Would they be able to extract the information out of her successfully? The enemy was a b.a.s.t.a.r.d who didn’t even care about her life, so wouldn’t it be possible for him to leave some sort of secret spell on her in order to prevent her from leaking information?

Besides, as for imprisonment… this wasn’t too much of a concern, since Natsuya wasn’t the type to do anything to s.h.i.+ka as long as she got the information she wanted.

But they couldn’t forget that s.h.i.+ka was the ‘Reaper’s Curse.’

Imprisoning the ‘Reaper’s Curse…’ Even before that, Hitaka had fought with her, and Seiji himself had so much contact with her. Natsuya had helped treat her injuries and sealed her powers as a Spirit-branded Retainer…

All three of them had "approached" her in different ways and still needed to have various dealings with her, so what would befall them?

Natsuya didn’t mention this at all.

Nor did Seiji.

Was it because there was no point in saying it out loud? They already did what they did, so they had to continue along their current course.

Or was it because of… their unconscious fear?

Seiji wrung his hands thoughtfully.

He didn’t know if the president had fear deep within her, but as for him… while he was worried, he wasn’t afraid at all.

That was because he possessed a powerful cheat.

‘As long as it’s not something like a lightning strike instantly killing me, I should be able to load. As long as I’m able to retain consciousness, I can deal with anything by loading.’

Seiji comforted himself as he untwisted his hands and reached out to gently brush s.h.i.+ka’s hair.

‘Reaper’s Curse…’ so what?

Even if he met with 100 catastrophes due to her ability, he would be able to escape 101 times.

That’s why he had no fear.

The morning sun after last night’s rain was s.h.i.+ning into the room.

It granted the handsome boy an aura of light.

His large hand was gently stroking the beautiful girl’s face, which was still slightly shadowed.

This scene appeared almost holy.