"Princess! Princess! Open the door! Come play a thrilling, action-packed card duel with me! The kind with only a thousand life points!"
Outside the dorm room, Lena, dressed in a black-and-white maid uniform with her hair in a jaunty high ponytail, was knocking bang, bang, bang on Lilith's firmly shut door, her voice brimming with eager energy.
"No! What's so thrilling about that? All it does is make the match end faster!"
Lilith's voice came from inside, plainly impatient and flustered.
Lena blinked, tilted her head, and thought for a moment.
"If ordinary card duels are boring, Princess, then... how about a legendary shadow duel? If I lose, I'll keep being your maid, but if you lose, you'll have to become my maid from now on! What do you think? That's exciting enough, right?"
There were two seconds of silence inside the room before Lilith burst into an even more exasperated shout.
"You're just a complete idiot, aren't you?! Stop standing outside my door saying stupid things! I'm going to rest!"
"Huh... that's no fair..."
Lena wilted like a frostbitten plant.
Her shoulders drooping, she trudged back to her two older sisters, who had been waiting quietly a little farther down the corridor.
"I knew it wouldn't work..."
Lena gave her sisters a disappointed look and muttered,
"My perfect scheme still couldn't fool our clever princess. She still won't come out of her room."
Laila: "..."
Renee: "..."
What exactly do you mean by your scheme?
Trying to turn the tables on your mistress by winning a card duel?
Renee, whose short hair reached her ears, sighed helplessly. More concerned with practical matters, she looked worriedly toward the closed door.
"Ever since the princess came back this morning, she's been shut up in her room. She hasn't eaten or drunk