Chapter 62: The Maid

When Olivia Hill confessed so earnestly, Finn—a young man who had already lived for six hundred years—had no idea how to answer.

He had roamed the Endless Worlds and wandered through countless realms. He had more combat experience than anyone could count.

He had once clashed with countless powerful enemies, punching through the nursing home of the Star Cosmos Empire and kicking over the kindergarten of the Celestial Profound Dynasty. No matter how dangerous the situation, he could always handle it with ease. Yet now, faced with Olivia, he was stuck.

Olivia’s face was flushed red, but she stubbornly kept her head raised, waiting for his reply.

The silence dragged on for a long while before Finn finally spoke, choosing his words with care. “If you stay with me, I’ll take you to a place very, very far away. You might never be able to come back.”

“The other side of the sea?” Olivia asked quickly. Without waiting for an answer, she nodded hard. “It doesn’t matter. As long as I can be with you, that’s enough.”

Before she finished speaking, the blush on her cheeks deepened, turning her face as red as a ripe apple—charming and adorable.

“Farther than the other side of the sea.” Another world entirely, Finn thought.

“As long as I can stay by your side, I’ll go anywhere.” Olivia twisted her hands together, fidgeting nervously.

She said softly, “Then… you’re willing to marry me? In the future, we can live somewhere peaceful, build a big house, and have two little babies—one boy and one girl. The boy will be named Alexander, and the girl…”

Hold on! Finn was shocked. How had she already come up with names for the kids?!

“Stop. I haven’t agreed to anything yet!” Finn raised a hand and cut off Olivia’s wild imagination. “I think we should slow down first. Get to know each other better. Talk more deeply. I mean—talk properly.”

“You don’t agree?” Olivia’s face fell at once.

Finn cleared his throat. “Actually, I was planning to hire a maid. So… would you be willing to be my maid?”

Olivia pressed her index finger to her rosy lips. She tilted her head and thought for a long moment before asking seriously, “A maid… what is that?”

That caught Finn off guard. Then again, it made sense. Olivia had grown up in the nuclear war ruins; it was perfectly normal for her not to know about something as specific as a maid from before the Cataclysm.

Finn had read a bit about the pre-Cataclysm Columbian Imperium. It had been a modern nation.

Olivia waited anxiously for his answer. Finn thought it over. Explaining what a maid was might be tricky, so he took out his phone, pulled up the definition of “maid” from the encyclopedia, and showed it to her.

Olivia carefully cradled the titanium alloy smartphone in both hands, as if it were a precious treasure, and read the text on the screen.

After a long moment, she lightly bit her lip and pushed the phone back toward Finn.

The blush on her face had completely faded. Plop! A single crystal teardrop fell, splashing a tiny patch of dust on the ground.

Olivia was crying.

Finn froze. What happened? They had been talking just fine a second ago. How had she suddenly started crying? A girl’s heart really was impossible to figure out. Even the late physicist Hawking, had once said that compared to the universe, women were a complete mystery.

Tears welled in Olivia’s eyes. Her long lashes trembled as drop after drop slid down her fair cheeks.

“So you’re rejecting me, just in a roundabout way?” Olivia tried hard to keep her voice steady, but Finn could still hear the hurt in it.

“No… I’m not…” Finn’s lack of romantic sense showed itself at once. He could not think of anything comforting to say.

Olivia wiped the tears from the corners of her eyes and continued, “You want me to live in a big house, spend my whole life cleaning and doing housework, and have no freedom at all!

“I’m not even asking to be your lover. I only want to stay by your side. But you just want to make me a slave! And send me off to some faraway place! If that isn’t rejection, then what is it?”

“Huh? I didn’t…” Finn looked completely stunned.

Olivia covered her tear-streaked face, sobs shaking her shoulders. She turned and ran off crying, tears streaming behind her, leaving Finn with nothing but a dark, lonely silhouette and the sight of her flashy red four-cylinder motorcycle.

Finn picked up the phone and checked the encyclopedia entry. Only then did he realize the data hadn’t been updated in ages—the information was outdated.

The screen read: “A maid refers to the staff employed in ancient noble households, wealthy families, or the homes of the rich. Their primary duty is to manage housework for their employers. Titles have changed across different eras, but the fundamental nature of the work remains consistent.

“The concept of the maid can be traced back to the ancient Roman Empire, when female servants were treated as slaves with no personal freedom. It is generally accepted that maids in the modern sense first originated from the female servants working in the households of British feudal nobility.”

Finn slapped his forehead and let out a heavy sigh. What a blunder. Olivia had mistaken him for a slave trader. She had completely misunderstood what “maid” meant—especially the version Finn actually had in mind.

There would be no cleaning or housework. All those dirty, exhausting chores were handled by automated machines. Sweeping robots took care of the floors, automatic dishwashers handled the dishes, and for cooking there was takeout… no, fully automatic cookers.

As for Finn’s residence—oh, right. Finn only just remembered. The house he used to live in had been bombed by the Star Cosmos Empire’s forces.

It seemed the Star Cosmos Empire had been clearing out the remnants of the demonic path. They launched a wave of orbital bombardment, and countless antimatter missiles rained down, reducing Finn’s standalone villa—built on the edge of a steep cliff, with the sea to the east and a mountain stream to the west—to ashes.

Fortunately, Finn hadn’t been inside the villa at the time. He rarely stayed there anyway, spending most of his days out on missions or in combat, so the loss wasn’t significant.

The Star Cosmos Empire, as a cross-world super empire, operated on a simple principle: if they destroyed you, it was none of their concern. Arrogant and overwhelmingly powerful, they naturally offered no compensation. Still, Finn knew he would settle the score with them one day.

In short, lifelike robots and automated household appliances handled nearly all the work. But Finn could never bring himself to let a cold steel machine warm his bed. And every time he returned to “home”—well, it could not really be called a home. It was just a place to stay.

The moment he stepped inside that residence, the enormous house had no human warmth at all. It was empty and desolate, filled only with the sound of robots moving about and the cold electronic voice welcoming him back. The loneliness always hit especially hard.

That was why Finn wanted to recruit a few maids—especially battle maids. Ideally ones with unique temperaments and strong combat abilities, who could both fight and handle things around the place, to bring a little life to the atmosphere.

Of course, he also needed to find a reliable, peaceful new residence—one that wouldn’t attract warmongers or old enemies.

…

As the sky gradually darkened and the sun began to set, Olivia had long since run off in tears. Finn felt helpless about it.

But her four-cylinder motorcycle was still parked nearby. She hadn’t taken it, and it wasn’t locked. In this era, anything left unattended by the roadside was tacitly treated as ownerless salvage—whoever picked it up could keep it.

Finn thought for a moment. Seeing no one around, he stored the motorcycle away in his storage space. He’d find a chance to return it to Olivia and explain things properly. Being his maid definitely wasn’t the same as becoming a slave or some kind of drudge.