Chapter 41: I See the Bearing of a Saintess in You

Not long ago, Peletti had naively believed that making money wasn’t particularly difficult. In her eyes, people who complained all day about how exhausting and hard work was were simply lazy.

How could there be a situation where someone wanted to make money but couldn’t?

There were so many job postings on the streets—it wasn’t like they were forbidden to just one person.

Besides, earning money wasn’t that hard anyway.

Only now did she realize just how naive her past self had been. Earning even a single gold coin really wasn’t easy.

I really want to die here…

“Mhm~ very good. To be able to recite the lines so smoothly on your very first day as a maid—Lele truly has a natural talent for being a maid,”
Josuna said with satisfaction, narrowing her eyes like a well-fed cat.

“The magic has been cast, so then—”

“Eh? In such a hurry to leave me… Miss Peletti, could it be that you’re hiding some unspeakable secret, afraid I might discover it?”

After Peletti tried several times to leave, Josuna’s voice suddenly turned cold. In an instant, all warmth vanished from her gaze. The cozy café seemed to be coated in an invisible layer of ice, sending a chill straight through Peletti.

“No, I don’t have any secrets at all. Master really knows how to joke, haha… haha…”
Out of sheer psychological fear, Peletti instinctively gave in, not even caring about the other customers in the shop.

“Sit across from me,” Josuna ordered.

Peletti obediently sat down opposite her, her posture stiff like a doll.

“These two… don’t tell me they have some kind of secret between them,”
Ailberna, who had witnessed the entire scene, felt that this was highly likely.

Peletti’s level of compliance with Josuna’s commands—especially her instinctive reaction the moment Josuna’s tone changed—was definitely not something that could form overnight. At the very least, she must have undergone severe “training,” suffering a major psychological blow for this kind of conditioned response to appear.

But Ailberna couldn’t recall Josuna having any particular connection with witches.

And Josuna’s strength shouldn’t have been enough to influence a witch at all—unless she was holding some kind of leverage over Peletti?

On the battlefield scented with milk and sugar, two unattended lunch boxes lay scattered on the floor. The delicacies that had once been inside now sat uneasily on soft, delicate plates.

“Hah, that feels much better. These boots are really suffocating,”
Josuna said as she leaned back against the cushion, stretching comfortably.

She’d already been quite irritated just thinking about how to keep Peletti here, and with Feiye in the picture, her plans were becoming even harder to carry out.

And under these circumstances, Peletti had repeatedly crossed her bottom line. How could Josuna possibly tolerate that?

Sure enough, giving her a scare made her behave much more obediently.

As for Peletti, sitting across from her—she could only say one thing:
She didn’t dare move. She absolutely didn’t dare move.

Even though the pair of slender feet resting on her lap shifted around restlessly, she didn’t dare complain in the slightest.

Are you kidding me? Was she afraid she wouldn’t be exposed fast enough?

“Feed me.”

“Huh? What?”

“I said, feed me!”

“O-Okay, okay, please don’t be angry.”

“Hmph, such a slow-witted little maid.”

The tables in the café weren’t very wide. If Peletti sat up straight and leaned forward slightly, she could just reach Josuna’s lips with the food.

“Master, please open your mouth…”

Peletti picked up the strawberry mousse from the table, scooped a small bite with the spoon, and brought it to Josuna’s mouth.

“Ah—”

Josuna bit down on the spoon with satisfaction, enjoying being fed by Peletti. Back in the basement, the one doing the feeding had been her—and the method had been quite different. For example…

Josuna had used her mouth.

Given the circumstances, she didn’t expect Peletti to treat her that way voluntarily. Being able to get this far was already more than enough.

Peletti tried to pull the spoon back, only to find that Josuna was biting down firmly on it, refusing to let go.

“M-Master, please be gentler… I can’t pull it out…”
Peletti said anxiously, her expression troubled.

“Mm-hmm~”
Watching Peletti struggle like this, Josuna was clearly enjoying herself.

Second by second, time passed. The sun climbed to the peak of the sky, dazzling light pouring through the glass into the café. Josuna, who was still teasing Peletti, suddenly froze.

She saw countless colorless points of light pass through the glass and enter the café, like tadpoles finding their mother, gathering around Peletti in excited celebration.

Of course, Peletti—focused intently on feeding Josuna—noticed none of this.

Only at this moment did Josuna recall a crucial fact.

Peletti was the only person in this world with light-element affinity.

Even though the Holy Light Church’s methods of testing light affinity were far from righteous, one thing was certain:
If tested, Peletti would definitely qualify as a candidate saintess.

Trying to stop Feiye on her own was indeed extremely difficult—but this was the human world!

It wasn’t just her alone. With war looming, every candidate saintess was an invaluable strategic resource. If those old geezers in the Church saw Peletti’s light-element affinity, there was no way they’d let her go.

At that point, even if Peletti wanted to leave with those witches, it would be impossible.

And Josuna could then, perfectly legitimately, use her status as a senior to guide and teach Peletti.

It was simply the perfect plan.

“Miss Peletti’s light-element affinity seems quite high,”
Josuna said suddenly.

After finally stuffing all the mousse pancakes on the table into Josuna’s stomach, Peletti hadn’t even had a moment to rest before those words came out of nowhere.

“Huh? I-Is it? Haha… no way, my light-element affinity isn’t that high, right?”

Peletti panicked. This was clearly leading toward taking her to the Church for a light-affinity test.

As a Witch of Light, how could she not know how high her own affinity was?

Even thinking optimistically—if she somehow entered a church without triggering alarms—the moment she went for testing, she’d probably be surrounded by a bunch of old men who wouldn’t let her leave.

She didn’t want to spend her whole life working as a maid here!!

And besides—how did the conversation suddenly take such a turn?!

“Really? Don’t you feel like the light around you is just a tiny bit stronger than elsewhere?”

“No, how could that be? You’re overthinking it—it’s just a visual illusion. Besides, I was tested for holy light affinity when I was a child, and like most people, I had none. That kind of thing is impossible.”

“Not necessarily.”

“Miss Peletti, you’re a commoner, right?”

“Yes… why?”

After receiving her confirmation, Josuna revealed a triumphant smile.

“Of course it matters. Tools for detecting light-element affinity are extremely difficult to make. Even with today’s level of production, the cost of testing remains very high. So when large-scale aptitude screenings are conducted—especially among commoners—the reagents or instruments used are often heavily diluted to reduce costs…”

“And the price of doing that is accuracy. Large-scale light-element screenings only have about a seventy-percent accuracy rate—sometimes even lower. Which means that during that screening back then, it’s very possible that Miss Peletti encountered a testing error.”