She crawled through the long passage for almost ten minutes before reaching its end. But she didn't stop. Instead, she continued through, entering the 'rock.' It was a high-level illusion that fooled not only normal vision but also infrared and mana sense.
At the other side of the illusion, the space opened up, revealing a very nicely built room. It was all made out of tiles of hellrock and obsidian, with patterns designed to confuse the senses.
"I am Morielen Thal'Mor, Oracle of the Cycle of the Church of Ephemerys. Life is the shadow of death; death is the reflection of life. I am both and neither."
A loud 'click' sounded in the room as the several traps laid around disabled themselves.
The room was laden with chests, some of them very luxurious. She carefully checked the contents in those.
"Hmm… it seems that it's all there. Not a single item missing. Five hundred years and no trespassers? That's quite the win for my concealing abilities."
This room was a decoy. The idea behind it was that would-be robbers that could see through the illusion would think of it as the real thing. It had a fair share of treasures, and the way it was hidden and trapped was pretty convincing.
But the reality is that in a real-life situation, nobody would subject themselves to crawling for ten minutes into an underground hole in such a dangerous place unless they already knew exactly what they were looking for.
The room had a forever-torch on the wall that forced people to switch their sight to the normal light-based sight. That was also a trick.
She bypassed the chests, set the traps back up, and walked to a corner that was deliberately left in the shadows. It wasn't dark enough to make people suspicious, just enough to make it even harder to see things that were already hard to see in normal light.
She jumped with her arm raised above her head. The ceiling was five meters high, but she reached it easily, bumping her finger onto a specific tile, and it retreated into a nook.
By the time her feet hit back the floor, a part of the ceiling was already moving. It slid to one side, revealing an opening. It was a square hole with each side being about one meter wide.
She jumped again, easily going over the hole into another room. At the side of the hole was a button, which she pressed, closing the passage back again.
The room she was in was a large warehouse, with several containers. She ignored them and went straight to the door that was on the wall in front of her.
She hadn't even taken two steps when the door opened and a girl appeared. Well, a catgirl, to be more precise. Her appearance was almost completely human, except for her eyes, ears, and tail.
"MAAAAASTEEEEEEEEEEERRR!!!"
"Hello Mina, I'm back!"
"I MISSSEEED YOU SOOOO MUUUUUUUUCHHH!!!"
She jumped into Cecilia's arms, crying like a little child.
Cecilia wasn't expecting that reaction. When she created the NPC Mina, she had been watching some anime with dragon maids and thought it would be funny to have a maid herself.
She didn't put much thought into her personality, deciding to make her a teenager because it would be uncomfortable to have someone older serving her, and she made her loyal, submissive, and emotional, just because it was the trope.
Even the name was thoughtless and cringe. 'Mina' is just slang for 'girl' in the city she lived in.
((Wait, I did put the word 'clingy' somewhere in her description, didn't I?))
Right now, the maid was refusing to let her go, glued into Cecilia's embrace while Cecilia gently brushed her hair.
"It's okay, Mina… I'm sorry for being away for so long."
"I thought about you every day during all those five hundred years!"
Mina finally pulled off, looking up at Cecilia, teary-eyed.
"Please, are you back to stay? If you go away again, please take me with you. I don't want to be left behind again!"
"I won't disappear again, I swear. Though I'll go back to Drakehof. Do you want to come?"
"Of course!!! I want to serve you every single day of my life, from the moment I wake up to the moment I fall asleep."
((Ugh… when did she become such a bottom? Can I go back and rewrite her personality traits?))
Having lived so long in the hospital, she was used to being cared for. When she was still able to eat solid food, she still depended on other people to feed her.
Yet, despite that (or maybe exactly because of that), she didn't allow the maids at her house to serve her. Now that she had an able body, she wanted to do stuff like bathing and dressing by herself.
The maids resisted, but in the end they caved in to the words of the mother of the queen. Still, they felt that it was very wrong to let royals fend for themselves.
Somehow, she had a feeling that Mina wouldn't cave in no matter what.
"You don't need to be such a hard worker. You need to devote some time to yourself as well."
"I just had five centuries of myself, master. I've had enough of myself for the rest of my life."
((Ugh, I have no answer to that. Okay, it won't hurt to allow her to have it her way for some time. She deserves it for being such a good girl, waiting for me for so long.))
"And how have things been here in my absence, Mina?"
"Everything's in perfect condition! I've cleaned every single item every day and didn't allow even a speck of dust or rust to form over the belongings of my beloved master!!!"
Cecilia sighed and walked to the doorway, curious to see what changes the time had brought to her base.
To her surprise, everything was really in order and exactly the same way she left it five centuries ago. The cleaning was impeccable, and even the wear and tear of time seemed to have not affected the place.
It was all thanks to Mina's skills and techniques. She wasn't a maid just for show, her job came with some really useful tricks.
It was a highly specialized cosmetic job that was only available to NPCs and locked behind a paywall. And Cecilia obviously paid for it just because she wanted her maid to be as in-character as possible.
((I regret some decisions I made about her creation, but this job really came in handy. I was a bit afraid of how I would find things here.))
She went from room to room, checking everything from top to bottom, until she reached a door.
"Hehe. Isn't everything so very perfect, master?"
Asked Mina, standing in front of the door.
"Indeed. I'm very impressed. You did a pretty good job, Mina. Well done!"
"I knew that you would one day come back, so I wanted everything to be in the best condition."
"And I'm most grateful for it, my dear and loyal maid…"
All this conversation happened with Mina casually standing between Cecilia and the door.
"But… Would you please let me check this last room?"
"Eh? Why? Didn't you just see that everything is in order and well cared for?"
Cecilia squinted, looking at Mina. She knew what that room was;. It was a bedroom she had furnished for herself, and she had allowed Mina to stay in it while she lived in the base.
"If everything is in order and well cared for, it won't be a problem if I check this room, will it? Or are you hiding something from me?"
"Me? Hiding something? He he…"
Mina's shoulders slumped, and she stepped to the side, allowing Cecilia to open the door. Like a normally well-mannered child being caught misbehaving.
Cecilia's curiosity took hold, and she opened the door.
Contrary to her apprehension, the bedroom was neatly tidied and cleaned. Everything was in the most perfect order, except for…
"Why are pictures of me everywhere? How did you even get those???"
Some she recognized from the game, which she took herself when testing several cosmetic clothes and accessories. Some even in sensual outfits and poses, as she lived some teenager fantasies her real body wouldn't be able to experience.
That's when she remembered. There was an item in the game, an innocent item that every player would get just by doing a simple quest at the beginning of the game. An in-game camera to take pictures and post on social media.
She just didn't know that the memory of that camera would be accessible by her maid.
"I'm sorry. I shouldn't have intruded in your room."