The World—Key of the Gate
Shade tried hard to control his hand, stopping it from doing anything out of curiosity. It was actually quite difficult:
"Come to think of it, I never had time to apologize to you back then. At Whisper Hills, I think I forcibly kissed you several times."
Winnie's smile grew even brighter:
"So now you want to apologize for something that happened thousands of years ago?"
"I don't think that's necessary."
"Then do you want to apologize for something that will happen in a few seconds?"
Winnie asked again. Shade thought for a moment:
"Maybe I can apologize a few dozen seconds later."
"Only a few dozen seconds?"
"Fine, then we'll talk about it afterward."
He wrapped his arms around the icy-cold maid and kissed her just as he had seven thousand years ago. The cold yet gentle feeling had not changed at all despite the passage of so much time. The difference from the previous times was that this time, Shade received a response.
Even a girl made of ice could have a very passionate heart.
(Little Mia was running.)
It was exactly an hour later than Dorothy's return. Subtracting the time it took you to travel from the Radiance Messenger to that castle, you stayed in the castle for around half an hour."
This was Galina's "welcome" when Shade returned home at ten that evening. She wore a nightgown and looked as though she had just finished bathing. There was still the sound of bathing from the washroom, so Dorothy was presumably washing up.
The Duchess teased him:
"Before you came back, Dorothy and I were talking about what you might do to that nonhuman maid. Judging by the time, it was probably only kissing and the like. Shade, didn't you get right to