“Lady Champion? Are you awake?” said the maid on duty through the door.

Olivia was, however, not awake despite the late hour of the morning. She had never been a morning person, and that lifestyle was not about to change simply because she was now in another world. Besides, now that she was hailed as the Champion of the Goddess, it was not like the people would question her choices. If anything, it was probably even a better position now than before her summoning. Anything she wanted or needed was provided at no charge to her, and that was even better than her father’s open wallet.

“Lady Champion?” the maid repeated with a knock, “I am coming in.”

The maid carefully opened the door and stepped inside the bedchamber. This suite of rooms at the royal palace had been given to Olivia to utilize as she saw fit. With the curtains drawn shut, it was practically dark inside the room as the maid shut the door behind her.

With both care and speed, she approached the window and cracked open the curtains a bit to allow some adequate light into the room. Then she approached the canopy bed, carefully pulling open the curtains to see the mess that was within. However, like the professional she was, she saved any comments on the view for behind closed doors. Olivia was sprawled out, with her hair a disheveled mess.

“Lady Champion?” the maid said once more.

With no response from her, the maid was a little more forceful.

“Lady Champion!” she said with authority.

The brusk nature of the attempt broke through the haze of sleep. Olivia bolted upright and jerked around looking for what had woken her. Seeing the maid standing there, she stared as her sleepy brain processed what she was seeing.

“What?” Olivia finally snapped out, “Can’t you see I was asleep?”

“My apologies, Lady Champion. The prince has asked that you join him.”

Olivia groaned with annoyance. The prince was her ticket to the continued high life here in this world. It helped that her Deception skill, paired beautifully with her innate ability to weave a web of lies, played so well against his apparently good-natured heart. He was just a gullible idiot to Olivia, but a needed idiot.

Olivia reached over and grabbed the open wine bottle sitting on the bedside table. The maid gently placed her own hand atop the bottle, causing a pause.

“Perhaps this might wait until after meeting His Highness?”

Olivia stared at her, then pulled the bottle out from underneath the woman’s hand. She kept eye contact as she took a swig, emptying the remaining bit within, then slamming the bottle back onto the table.

“Perhaps you mind your own damn business,” Olivia retorted after.

“Of course, Lady Champion.”

Her unwanted wake up call complete, Olivia reluctantly endured the process of getting dressed for a meeting with the prince. It was a bit stifling, having little say in her wardrobe, but she had pitched such a fit the first time they had tried to put her in a corset that no one dared argue the point now. She endured the process though, as she could just change the gaudy, outdated garbage they put her in into something more liberating using Appearance. The first time she did that, the maids had fainted at the sight of so much exposed skin. How else was she supposed to seduce the prince if she hid her generous assets?

Once the maids were done, and after she had tweaked the look to her own satisfaction, Olivia was escorted to the prince’s location in one of the palace gardens. It was always in the gardens, much to Olivia’s chagrin. She also hated being outdoors for the most part. It was always too hot or too cold. Here in this world without temperature controlled indoors, it was even worse, as she was already sweltering in the heat. Olivia hid her detest under a charming smile, something she knew how to do all too well.

“You called for me, Your Highness?”

The prince had been watching as she approached. She pretended not to notice the handkerchief he currently had stuffed against his nose, trying to hide the nosebleed he currently had, like so many of the men around here had when they spied her. She sat at the table arranged in the garden, sporting little sweets and cups of tea, before the prince responded. She spotted the wince as she broke ‘etiquette’ from a nearby servant, which only broadened her smile. These foolish, backwards people needed to know that ladies go first and are superior to any man, no matter his supposed position.

“Ah, yes, Olivia. Thank you for coming,” the prince said, taking his own seat across from her.

He was a tall young man, with an athletic figure from his training with the sword. His wavy blond hair was drawn back and tied into a disgusting rat tail. His blue eyes were dreamy to look into, but showed no sign of intelligence at all, at least to her. Everyone around seemed to laud the prince as a worthy successor to his father, and Olivia intended to hitch a ride to the top. Though she really did not want to marry him, it was going to be the only way to get where she wanted. She had tried already to seduce some of the other good looking knights, but they babbled about ‘honor’, ‘dignity’, and ‘the prince’s domain’, like she cared about any of that. She was not the prince’s property.

“I see you have made another bold choice in your attire.”

Olivia leaned forward, giving him a better view as she held out a bite of cake towards him. She poured it on thick as she had every other time they had met since her arrival.

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“You think so?” she asked with false ignorance.

The prince swallowed as he leaned forward and accepted the offered cake. She made extra sure not to shove it in too far as his mouth closed around the fork. She then used the same fork to take a bite of the cake herself. She took a little longer to lick that fork as she stared into his eyes.

“I… I, uh… I mean… Yes! The word of your dress is surely going to start a new trend among the nobility,” he stammered.

Olivia really did not care at all what anyone else was going to do because of what she did. She had made things happen so far to satisfy her, using Deception liberally as needed.

“I see. Maybe I won’t have to make my own things soon?” she asked.

“You… make this yourself?”

“Well, sort of. The maids always bring me these dresses that are just too much. So I use one of my skills to edit them after.”

“So it is a skill? That seems an odd skill to have?”

“Oh, yeah. But it is useful for situations like this,” Olivia remarked.

While she had not enjoyed the experience one bit, Olivia had to admit that the Tutorial had been useful. The bitch who had been stuck there even had some useful information about surviving here. The greatest benefit that she had gotten though was the Deception skill without Tess being involved. It became the cornerstone of blindsiding her, as it made it easy to pry other useful skills out of her while she had been distracted by the prospect of leaving. Then had come the moment that Olivia struck.

Olivia had actually been unsure if grabbing Tess at the last second would drag her along to the same world, but it did. Then she appeared in front of the goddess Oena. In an instant, Olivia had considered converting her beliefs. As she began to formulate her proclamations, she felt Deception kick in, which threw off her prior considerations. She was going to get what she wanted out of this self-proclaimed goddess, Tess be damned. Why did Deception work against Oena? Olivia did not care, just that it did.

Before she knew it, Olivia was arriving in a temple, being hailed as the incarnation of the goddess. Perhaps she was too cautious at first, not knowing the extent of Oena’s power, let alone the power she had granted to Olivia. She talked down the incarnation element, going with a champion title instead. In hindsight, she should have just gone with an incarnation of Oena, since the goddess seemed to have no ability to directly influence anything.

Then she had been whisked off to meet the royal family, at her own request. She had originally intended to target the king, until finding an aging man sitting there. Pivoting to the prince was a given for her, as Olivia had no desire to see through the apparent expectations that Oena, or these people, might have wanted. She was going to do her thing, which involved doing nothing of any true significance. She just needed to secure the prince’s loyalty to herself, which she figured likely meant a stupid marriage. It was why she had taken the path to seduce the prince, leading to situations like the current moment.

Small talk continued with the prince for a little while about other unimportant matters, making Olivia irritated at the lack of apparent objective for this specific meeting. This conversation was clearly meant to have a purpose, as he had summoned her. It was time to cut to the chase.

“So what did you need, Your Highness?”

“What did I need? Oh, yes. I have some good news. We are preparing to have an expedition put together.”

Olivia stared at him blankly, not knowing what he was talking about. After a moment of silence, he finally understood that she did not understand. He cleared his throat.

“Yes, an expedition to eliminate the demon lord. Now that you are here to defeat them, we can make an advance to do just that. So we are gathering up from the army those that have not yet been deployed to the front lines to form a spearhead that will target the heart of the demon’s territory and help you in the fight.”

Olivia started to panic internally. This was not how this was supposed to work. She had no intention of fighting any demon lord unless they were right in front of her. And there was no way she was leaving this palace. Who cared about the world outside? A bunch of lowlifes could die for all she cared. Especially that stupid bitch Tess, if she had somehow survived being cast out by Oena. Her own mind raced, aided by Deception.

“Oh. That’s… that’s a grand thing to do,” Olivia started, “But I think that I’m going to need time to understand what I can do here. I never had skills before coming here.”

“Ah, yes. I think you did mention that once before. I wonder what that must be like? We have histories from the time before the goddess’s system granted us skills and stats, but they seem so made up. Anybody just did whatever?” the prince laughed.

Olivia hid her true feelings behind her mask. Admittedly, having skills and such was useful. The expectations that came with her having them though were, again, just ridiculous to her. Now she had to convince the prince that she needed time.

“Yes, something like that,” Olivia laughed along, “But I still do not fully understand my own capabilities now, so I will need time.”

The prince rubbed his chin in thought.

“Understandable. However, the expedition will not be ready for some time. You should take the time to get familiar with your abilities until then.”

Some success, but nothing that she was not already going to have apparently. She needed more reasons not to start getting familiar with her abilities. Olivia turned on the waterworks. As tears, fake to her but apparently genuine, started flowing she hid her face in mock pain.

“I would. It’s just so hard though,” she cried, “I’ve lost everyone I loved and cared about.”

The show worked. The prince had scrambled around from his seat and was on one knee in front of her. What a idiotic tool he was to come running to her side like this.

“I apologize, Olivia. I cannot imagine what you must be feeling. If there is anything I can do, please let me know. And do not rush yourself about learning your new state.”

He gently took her hand and held it reassuringly. She looked up through the charade she was showing and smiled. The full blast of her tearful gaze and smile hit him and she knew that the hook was even deeper. She dramatically fell forward into him, causing him to have to catch her. She continued her fake sobbing with her head buried against his chest as she pressed close and rubbed up against him. She heard his heartbeat skyrocket, and allowed herself a small smile of satisfaction. After a few moments, she pulled away and sat down.

“Thank you, Your Highness,” she said, “I think I need to rest though. If you’ll excuse me?”

She again did not wait for his reply before she stood and started walking away. A servant quickly fell in step with her and escorted her back to her chambers. Once alone again, Olivia stripped off the dress and dove right back into the bed. She took one glance to the side and saw a fresh bottle of wine had been placed there. With a flick of her hand, she magically popped the cork and took several pulls straight from the bottle.

“This is not such a bad life. Needs a bit more work though.”