"So you were at that fight." Isdis sighed. "Let’s call the first stage done. A skilled maid who can also fight if necessary is something you don’t see every day." Isdis then leaned back and stared at the two maids who came with Camilla.

Her deep blue eyes shone, her skin glowed, and the golden threads of her hair started to move on their own as droplets of water fell from the ceiling, turning into snowflakes as they descended.

Seeing their hot tea freeze, and the plants at the window shrinking from the cold, the three maids didn’t need to feel the cold to understand what was going on. This was their Ice Empress, the woman once known as the ice princess who spent most of her time traveling with a private army and killing monsters.

Camilla had never gotten so close to Isdis, but now that she did, she found out just how much of a monster she really is. If she were present at Vlad’s incident with her current power, she could’ve frozen all of the blood in the city, and stood to bloody lord himself.

What is Emperor Arad thinking by assigning regular men and women to serve and protect such a woman? She is not a weak and sheltered princess or queen; she is a soldier, a general, and a bard of a hundred ballads dancing through a battlefield of frozen blood and calcified gasps as her sword plays a tune on an ice violin.

"Now, she passed the first test. What about you two?" As she asked, the two maids flinched, feeling the sharp cold eating at their flesh. If they take too long to answer her question, frostbite would settle on their skin and bones, turning them into preserved corpses frozen forever beneath layers of frigid ice.

The maids who came with Isdis also looked a bit surprised. They weren’t affected by the cold, but still, seeing Isdis spreading a nascent expansion through the room like this just to intimidate three girls was strange. Even if they were assassins, isn’t this going a bit overboard? The last assassin who pretended to be a maid ended up freezing into a statue of ice the moment she tried to attack Isdis.

The poor assassin didn’t even get to lift her ass off the couch.

"Lady Isdis, those two are her personal maids. A simple contract bound with magic would work." One of Isdis’s maids spoke, trying to press an answer from her. Here, they had to act professionally and keep an image, but if they were in a private situation, one of them would’ve already sighed and nagged her for using such power inside the castle.

Isdis giggled. "Yeah, you two didn’t read all the papers for all the applicants. Those aren’t her personal maids. They took the regular test as noble girls, weren’t in her story, and most importantly, the daughter of a knight won’t be able to afford a regular maid, let alone two noble daughters."

When Isdis’s giggle died, her blue eyes glared at the two maids. "So? If you are assassins, then bring it on. I just hope you two are disguised dragons so this won’t be a boring fight."

She had spent the past weeks stuck here doing paperwork, and even when Plum called her to fight, she didn’t get that much exercise.

As the two maids were about to start shitting bricks, Isdis smiled and waved her hand to calm them down. "Don’t worry, I don’t care that much about you two trying to cheat the system. No one is hurt after all." She leaned forward, rested her chin on her hands, and gave the two a stare coupled with a smile.

The problem is, they weren’t afraid of her catching them sneaking in, but of her possibly mistaking them for assassins. What was just a fine, prison time, or a regular execution could turn into a public beatdown and humiliation, followed by a frigid purge.

"I would’ve been angry if you were going to take the possible spots of someone else, but since the selection is over, I don’t see a reason to mind your bold tactic." She then pointed at one of them.

That gesture alone almost caused the poor girl to faint, for a moment, she imagined a titanic spear of ice piercing her chest, dragging her corpse through the walls, and impaling her on one of the city’s great towers for all people to see.

"You are Alicia of the house of Ramon, a lesser noble family from the capital’s outskirts. Your main job was the management of farmlands, and you have a lot of commoner farmers working for your family." She then shifted her gaze to the other maid. "And, Roana of the house of Hardfore. You’re the third daughter and have probably never touched a carpentry table in your life. From the regular maid test, I was told your hands are too soft for your job."

Was this a threat? Was this her telling them she knew who they were, taking their families hostage? Does she even need to do that? With her power right now, with just this cold and intimidating aura, no one could mistake her for anything less than an S-rank, maybe even above it.

As the two of them started shaking, Isdis signaled for them to sit down. "I won’t kick you out, so relax a bit. I’ll test all three of you together and see how far you can go. Let’s start with you, Alicia."

Alicia gulped, waiting and feeling like every second had become an eternity. She came prepared for the worst, but no one could ready for a surprise test by the Ice Queen herself. What’s more, she had never thought the gentle and valiant-looking queen would be this strong.

It almost didn’t make sense. She understood that people in this world often prefer strength over beauty due to the existence of monsters and the constant danger lurking behind every corner. But when someone like the Emperor, a person who stands at the top of the food chain, looks for someone, does he really need to consider strength?

But then, Isdis’s words cut her thoughts in half and pulled her back to the reality of their meeting. Alicia didn’t need to wrestle with her thoughts or try to figure anything out; she only had to make sure she got out of this place alive, and everything else would solve itself in due time.

"Then, let’s say you’re in a city in the middle of the desert. How would you feed its people?" As Isdis asked, Alicia smiled. The question in itself wasn’t easy, but the answer was simple, as many people have attempted to do such a thing before.

"The easiest answer would be to focus on local produce, if any, then import what’s needed. But you aren’t looking for that, right?" Alicia was right; she was asking if Alicia could come up with a plan to grow food in the desert.

Desert land made almost 30% of the Empire’s landmass, and all of that space was now wasted with only a few cities near the edges of the sea of sand. Due to the heat and long distances, most food would rot before reaching those cities, let alone getting deeper into the desert where Arad once rested.

Isdis wanted a solution that didn’t include expensive teleportation magic and didn’t include using Arad as a mule. Even though he can teleport everything through his stomach, people shouldn’t count on it.

"We can build a controlled building where we’ll grow crops, and magic would help. On a larger scale, I would look to hire a wizard capable of using weather magic. For the dirt, or in our case, sand, some plants would grow in it without a problem, but some won’t. For that, we’ll have to either import dirt, get a wizard that can make it, or make it ourselves by composting leaves, plant scraps, and animal waste."

Isdis smiled, "Ho? Surprisingly, you got a decent plan." They already have people working on reforming the edges of the desert that Arad irradiated, and she really didn’t expect Alicia to come with something so close to what they were already doing.

"I won’t call it decent; this is just in theory. We need to try things, test, and change our approach on the go. For example, weather mages are rare, not all deserts are the same, and heat can be a pain to deal with." She added. "So what I came up with is nothing but a framework, nothing more or less."

Isdis laughed, "I was to tell you that we’ll need to test it first to really know, but you seem to have even gone that far. You’re good, you pass the first test." She then shifted her gaze toward Roana.

"Your turn, lady soft hands." Just looking at Isdis’s smug face, Roana knew that she would fail. Isdis called her a soft hand, and her hands were indeed soft. But that wasn’t because she didn’t work as a carpenter, but it was because she always used gloves and had herbs to use that kept her skin nice and smooth.