Chapter 13: My Grandfather’s Dungeon Was Full of Dresses

The thing exhaled again.

Warm air washed over us, carrying the scent of old leather and stone dust. Rin’s claws dug deeper into my wrist. Her honey-colored eyes shone in the darkness, small and bright like lanterns.

I did not move.

I did not breathe.

I tried my best to blend in with the stone.

“Alfred.”

“Rin, please do not speak.”

“Alfred.”

“Rin.”

“It is not alive.”

“…what?”

“The breathing. It is not breathing. It is wind.”

I listened.

The sound returned—long, low, and steady. It never changed or sped up. It didn’t pause like a living creature would between breaths. It was just wind slipping through a gap deep in the stone, and my heart had been racing over nothing but a draft.

“…oh.”

“Yes.”

“I hate this place.”

“I know, Alfred.”

She stood up. I did too, since her grip on my wrist stayed tight. She gave a gentle tug, and I followed her. The only other choice was to stand alone in the dark.

“Can you see?”

“Yes.”

“All of it?”

“Stone walls. Smooth floor. A tunnel ahead.”

“Smooth?”

“Cut. Someone made this.”

That was worse.

If this were a natural cave, I could blame nature. But a carved tunnel meant someone had planned it. Planning something like this under a forest meant it was built on purpose, and I already knew who that was.

Rin pulled me forward.

The floor was flat, and my boots landed on smooth stone with every step. There were no roots or cracks. As we walked, the air grew cooler. Up ahead, a faint blue light appeared, soft and steady—not firelight.

Mage lamps.

Naturally, there were mage lamps.

“Alfred.”

“Yeah.”

“The light turned on when we moved.”

“Of course it did.”

The tunnel opened into a chamber.

The chamber was round. The ceiling was high. The walls were pale cut stone, polished to a dull shine. Set into the walls at even spaces were the soft blue orbs of old mage lamps, casting clean light across the whole room.

The room was full of mannequins.

Rows of them. Dozens of them.

Every mannequin wore a maid’s dress.

“…”

“Alfred.”

“Rin.”

“Why?”

“I do not know.”

“Why are there so many?”

“I do not know, Rin.”

“Why are they all the same?”

“I do not know, Rin.”

I walked farther into the chamber. The lamps grew brighter as I moved beneath them, almost as if they were following me. Each mannequin stood on a small round base. Every dress was black, every apron white, and each frilled headband was perfectly pinned in place.

Some dresses had lace at the collar, others had ribbons at the waist. There were long sleeves and short sleeves. One even had a small silver bell sewn at the hip, and I didn’t want to know why.

They were all the same warrior’s garment Garreth von Stahl had worn aboveground.

My grandfather.

My grandfather had built an underground vault.

For dresses.

“Rin.”

“Yes.”

“My grandfather was not a normal man.”

“I am beginning to understand this.”

“He killed the Demon Lord.”

“Yes.”

“He saved three kingdoms.”

“Yes.”

“He also built a secret stone vault under a forest to store maid outfits.”

“Yes.”

“These are the same men.”

“Yes, Alfred.”

“I am going to sit down.”

I stayed standing. Rin’s grip on my wrist kept me from sitting. She led me farther into the room, past the rows of mannequins, and her eyes were bright and narrowed in a way that made me uneasy.

“Rin.”

“Hm.”

“Why are you pulling me?”

“Something is calling.”

“Calling what?”

“Me.”

I stopped walking.

She stopped too. Her ears pointed forward and her tail stuck straight out. She listened to something I couldn’t hear, just like she did in the forest above. But this time, she didn’t look like a hunter.

She looked more like someone who just heard their name called from across a crowded room.

“Rin.”

“The one at the end.”

“What about it?”

“It is looking at me.”

“Mannequins do not look at people.”

“This one does.”

I looked.

At the far end of the chamber, alone on a raised platform, stood a single mannequin. The lamps above it burned brighter than the others. The dress was not like the others. The fabric absorbed the blue light instead of reflecting it. The apron was the clean white of fresh snow. The headband had a small silver chain hanging from one side.

The stitching caught the light in thin silver lines. The lines moved slowly and slightly, almost as if something was breathing under the fabric.

It was, objectively, beautiful.

It was also, objectively, a maid outfit.

I felt torn between these two facts.

A scroll appeared in front of me.

It didn’t appear with a flash or sparks. It was just there, unrolled and floating at eye level, as if held by invisible hands. The paper was thick and old, and the handwriting was familiar.

My heart dropped.

“No.”

“Alfred.”

“No, Rin.”

“The scroll.”

“I see the scroll. I am refusing the scroll.”

“It is your grandfather.”

“YES. THAT IS WHY I AM REFUSING IT.”

The scroll ignored my refusal. The lamps grew brighter, the ink became clearer, and I found myself reading it whether I wanted to or not.

【Dear grandson.

Hello again.

If you are reading this, you have fallen into my dungeon. Congratulations. The trap-scroll under the Thornwood still works. Your father said it would rot in fifty years. Your father was wrong. Tell him I said so.

I built this vault. I built it myself. Your grandmother, may she be in good health as you read this, would not let me keep them in the house.

There were arguments, grandson. There were many arguments. There was one argument in the royal throne room, in front of His Majesty, who did not know where to look.

She burned the first three.

I rebuilt.

She burned the next five.

I rebuilt.

After that, we reached what your father calls a compromise and what I call a strategic retreat. The dresses came here. Underground. Out of her sight. The kingdom continued to function. The marriage continued to function.

You are reading this now because the vault has recognized a worthy wearer.

The vault does not recognize just anyone.

The vault has standards.】

I looked up from the scroll.

Rin was not beside me anymore.

She was walking. Slow, even steps. Toward the raised platform. Her hand had slipped out of mine, and I had not felt it go. Her eyes were fixed on the dark dress, and the silver stitching was glowing faintly, pulsing in time with her steps.

“Rin.”

She did not stop.

“Rin, wait.”

She did not stop.

I looked back at the scroll. New lines had appeared below, and the handwriting somehow looked even smugger than before.

【The one you are seeing, grandson, is the Supreme Maid Dress.

I commissioned it. I paid for it. I enchanted it myself over three summers.

I wanted your grandmother to wear it. Once. Only once. In the privacy of our home, where nobody would see.

She would not.

She told me, and I quote, that she would sooner throw herself off the Tower.

I believed her. Your grandmother was a woman of her word.

So the dress sat. Unworn. Year after year.

It is the finest thing I have ever made, grandson. No blade will defeat it. It will move with its wearer. It will not tear. It will not stain. It will not burn. Garreth von Stahl’s little cotton outfit is a napkin next to this dress.

It was made for a warrior of grace and beauty.

Your cat girl qualifies.

You are welcome.

With love and deep, deep satisfaction,

Grandpa】

“…”

The dress lifted off the mannequin.

It didn’t fall or slide. Instead, it rose smoothly and slowly, the fabric unfolding in the blue light. The apron floated, crisp and white, and the headband hovered above it. The silver stitching glowed even brighter.

The small chain on the headband chimed once—a clear, bright note in the still air.

“Rin.”

“Alfred.”

“Rin, step back.”

“I cannot.”

“Rin.”

“My feet.”

“RIN.”

The dress moved.

It swept through the air from the platform to Rin in one long, graceful motion. It never touched the ground. It moved like water that knows exactly where it’s going. Rin stood perfectly still in the center of the chamber, arms at her sides and eyes wide and bright.

The dress reached her.

It did not land on her.

It folded around her.

Her green cloak slid off her shoulders and floated to the floor like a leaf. Her simple shift followed. I spun around so quickly I almost hurt my neck. I focused on the wall, which had a crack shaped a bit like a worm, and I put all my attention into studying it.

Behind me, fabric rustled.

The silver chain chimed again.

Rin made a small sound. Not a yelp. A soft, surprised sound, the kind a person makes when warm water is poured over cold hands.

Then silence.

Then a quiet, awed breath.

“Alfred.”

“Are you dressed?”

“Yes.”

“Fully?”

“Yes, Alfred.”

“Fully fully?”

“I am wearing more clothing than I have ever worn in my life.”

I turned around.

I should not have turned around.

Rin stood in the center of the chamber, and my grandfather, wherever he was, was laughing at me.

The dress fit her perfectly, as if it had been made just for her—because it had. A dead hero with questionable taste but great skill had spent three summers enchanting a dress for someone he’d never meet.

The black fabric moved with her breath. The white apron was crisp at her waist. The headband sat on her cinnamon hair with the silver chain resting against her temple.

Her tail fit neatly through a small slit in the back of the skirt, and I tried not to think about it.

Her ears twitched.

She looked down at herself. She turned her wrist. The sleeve moved with her. She took a careful step. The skirt swirled, light and soft, and the silver stitching pulsed once and settled.

She looked up.

“Alfred.”

“Yes.”

“I like it.”

“…”

“It is warm.”

“…”

“It smells like sun on grass.”

“Rin.”

“Yes.”

“We are not telling anyone about this.”

“Alfred.”

“Not one person.”

“Alfred, look.”

She pointed past my shoulder.

The scroll had moved again. A new line sat at the very bottom, the ink still wet.

【P.S. The dress cannot be removed by anyone except the wearer. Good luck, grandson.】

The silver chain on Rin’s headband chimed once more.

The lamps dimmed.

A door opened in the far wall that had not been there a breath ago.

Far above us, beyond four miles of forest and a swordsman in a maid’s dress with a real blade, a girl in a white tower dipped her pen into fresh ink.