Because the laundry room is located on the first floor, I need to take this pile high laundry down the stairs.
This laundry trolley is quite large, with enough space for one adult to fit in it if they wanted to. If you fill it up with laundry, it weighs quite a bit.
At my house, it took several maids to bring it down to the lower floor. I decided to do the same here and asked the maids cleaning nearby to help me.
“I’m busy right now.”
She had zero intention to cooperate.
I took a closer look and saw that it was one of the three mean-looking girls from earlier. I might be convinced she’s busy since she’s just hanging the cleaning tools; if only I didn’t look closely at her face and saw her faint smile, it’s subtle, but I catch that.
I don’t have time to waste on her, so I decided to take care of it on my own.
With magic I learned directly from Hayato, I tamper the laundry trolley’s gravity. Now it only weighs as much as one loaf of bread. And when I lifted with one hand, a voice could be heard from my behind.
“What!?”
Ignoring it, I walked lightly down the stairs. When I reached the first floor, I lifted the spell and walked to the laundry room, pushing it as if nothing had happened.
In the laundry room, there was a maid who had been there before me. It was one of the trios again. She is in charge of passing magic power to the laundry equipment.
Yes, one of the drawbacks of our magic tools is that you can’t leave them alone when using them. It is necessary to keep the magic power flowing.
Should we have a magic stone that could act as a battery, it might be possible, but unfortunately, magic stones disappear along with monsters in this world.
This is the reason why we have magic and mechanization to some extent, but we still have wood burning in fireplaces, and our society still in a half-heartedly traditional lifestyle.
I think the one that had it the hardest is the ice cream shops. They have to keep it cold all the time.
Whether it’s the wind magic in the vacuum cleaner, the water magic in the washing machine, or the ice magic in the freezer, it’s hard to do that with magic only. There is the problem of concentration, and more importantly, people’s magic power usually doesn’t last. You’ll run out of magic power in no time.
Thus magic tools are born to solve that problem, but I wonder if it would be possible to apply the same magic formula that can amplify one magic power to ten or twenty depending on the material and tune it for the duration.
If we can do that, I think it will bring new innovation to our lives.
As I was thinking about this while looking at the maid sitting next to the laundry equipment, she turned her head to me and smiled wickedly.
I’m sorry. I’m using the magic tools for laundry now. It’s going to take a while for it to dry, so I was wondering if you could use that one.
She then pointed to an old-fashioned washing machine and a washing board.
Cursing in my heart, I did as I was told and set the tray on the floor.
“The well is just outside here. You’re lucky it’s nearby.”
“No need.”
“e?”
“I don’t need to go to the well. I can use water magic.”
In an instant, I fill the trays with water and turn them into lukewarm water with fire magic. I like to wash with lukewarm water, and shame on her, I like to wash my clothes by hand with a washboard.
Washing boards are very good at removing dirt.
I can say that I like it so much that in a previous life, I had a mysterious bliss when I washed clothes that had cosmetics on them with a mini washboard.
But as expected, this amount of washing is a bit much, so first, I removed socks and clothes with mud on them and threw the relatively clean ones into the lukewarm water with soap powder dissolved in it.
Then, using magic power, create a water flow to simulate the movement of a washing machine.
“Hey, what’s that…?”
“What? It’s a washing machine. You don’t need a magic tool to do it.”
“i-is that so…?”
And look, see how the laundry is rubbed and washed in the bubbles and water flow, and how the dirt is removed.
Doesn’t it feel so satisfying!
I immediately felt a mysterious catharsis as I crouched down next to the tub to study the flow of water that would remove the dirt more effectively.
As I played with the water flow, I tried slapping the water from above, and I wonder if I could add some vibration to it, let’s try to add some small vibrations, and before I knew it, I heard a chuckle escaped from my mouth, “Ufufufu…”.
She looked at me with a shocked expression, and when our eyes met, she quickly turned away.
Then I changed the water, rinsed twice, and put it through the manual dehydrator, and the first round was complete.
Next, I went out to the backyard and hung the sheets on the clothesline since the laundry equipment with a drying function was currently in use.
The dryer is nice, but it’s also nice to expose them to the sun.
As I look up at the sky, Hayato, who was climbing on the roof, notices me and waves at me. As I waved back, I channeled my magic into my ear cuff and called out for communication.
His voice could be heard in my ear.
“Are you doing fine over there?”
“all good here. How about you?”
“Well, look at this.”
As soon as he said that, he put his hand into the chimney and pulled out something small from inside. No, he didn’t take it out. He put it on his finger.
At his fingertips, a small object was fluttering around.
Could that be…?
“Is it a bird?”
“Yes. There’s a sparrow’s nest here. It looks like the person who cleaned it last time forgot to put up the bird netting.”
“I want to see it! Can I come over there for a minute?”
“Oh, you’re sure?”
“Just for a minute.”
I cut the communication and put my feet on the ladder against the wall.
I’ve never had the chance to see a bird’s nest with chicks. Especially from up there!
Excitedly, I climbed up to the roof, and with Hayato’s help and careful footing on the steep slope, I moved closer to the chimney.
Gently peeking into the chimney, I saw that it was filled with branches and straw, and on top of them were three small sparrow chicks chirping happily.
“Cute!”
“right?”
Hayato pulled down his face cloth and goggles and narrowed his eyes at the chicks.
“But I have to get rid of them, don’t I? What should I do? If we move the place, the parent birds won’t be able to come to find them… I wonder if they’ll get mad if I build a birdhouse and tie it to the side of the chimney.”
“You’ll need permission. But I don’t think there are many nobles who would refuse. Birds are sacred creatures. Shall I speak to the Grand Wife and the Wife about it?”
“Yes, please. I’ll build a birdhouse after I finish cleaning.”
“Understood, sir! Do you want me to move this nest?”
“I feel sorry for it. Alice, can you give me a hand?”
“Okay.”
I offered my hand, and he pulls one bird from the nest into the palm of his hand and places it on my hand.
Three birds in all. I wrapped my hands around them and held them carefully.
Hayato pulls the nest out of the chimney and places it in the gap between the sloping roof and the chimney. After making sure it was stable, he placed the chicks on it.
“Don’t fall, everyone.”
I wanted to keep looking at it. But I was still in the middle of washing. I’d better get this over with and get to the Grand Wife.
Probably the time she’ll start bullying her daughter-in-law will be at lunchtime. I want to be able to exchange a few words with her before then.
“I’d better get back to work. Sorry to bother you.”
“Don’t worry about it. Oh, wait… Alice, give me five seconds.”
“What is it?”
“The view of the city is nice from here.”
I looked down at the city for the first time and saw an unobstructed world in front of me.
Of course, there are taller buildings, but the amount of information your senses can receive is completely different from what you can see from a window or a roof.
“It’s true! It feels so good.”
“Right? All the chimney sweepers love this view.”
For some reason, Hayato was proud of himself.
But I think I understand.
The pompous aristocratic gentlemen, the elegant ladies, and the servants who work for them…
From this view, they are all the same.
Whether they are great or not is just a value that people put on them.
I wonder if the Goddess always looks at us this way.
“Well, I wonder…”
He laughed a little.
After a few moments of admiring the view, I climbed down the ladder alone and returned to the mundane world.
TL note:
Okay, sorry for a bit late update, but here 8 chapter as apology.
Here is why I’m late:
I was confused… yeah, to put simply I was confused, with this recent chapter, the terms of Grand Wife is not wrong by itself, but feels so odd, I want to replace that word with “grandmother” but it made the translation even weirder, you will know what I mean if you finished reading this 8 chapter.
So, I decided to leave it as it is.
Also………
My house is fully repaired now, hopefully I can go back to my usual schedule, no more dust, no more loud bangin’, yay for new roof. Tbh I also late because I was playing Valheim (lol sorry, but that game is just too good when you have friend to play with), we downed Moder yesterday, so yeah, I almost done with that too.
Thanks for the update!!!
chim-chimney chim-chimney chim chim chereeee
In Chinese novels, this situation of mother-in-law and daughter-in-law are differentiated as Old Madam and Madam, I don’t know if that can help as a substitute although maybe it can be seen too rude idk.