Chapter 1: The Otaku and the Maids

It’s a standard summer’s day, around early July. Outside, children are playing at the local park, a businessman is sprinting to work late, briefcase rattling by his side, and away from it all is Akira, a bespectacled young man in his very early twenties. Akira is a NEET and an otaku, not working or going to college, instead choosing the easy life of staying home and playing video games or watching anime all day. Occasionally, he’ll work his way outside and to the nearby convenience store for food. This was one of those days.

Akira slipped on his favorite pale pink hoodie, which hung slightly over the waistband of his black sweatpants, put on a new pair of socks, slipped into his gray high tops, and headed over to the mirror. He wipes the lenses of his black rimmed eyeglasses, sweeps the brown bangs from his left eye, and calls it good. He never bothers to comb his hair, since it always ends up where it started. Before heading out the door, Akira grabs the key to his moderately sized apartment, checks the clock to see that it’s not too late in the day, and then proceeds to make his way to the convenience store a few blocks away.

At the convenience store, Akira loads up on the usual. He grabs four large bags of chips, two large bottles of his favorite soda, and a fresh, warm glazed donut from the baked goods section. He sets his items on the counter for the cashier, another young man just out of high school, to scan and bag.

“What’s up Akira? Same stuff as usual?” asked the cashier.

“Yeah, same as always. How’s life been going?” replied Akira.

“Ah, you know, getting ready to head off to college after summer ends. How about you, same uneventful life of doing absolutely nothing alone?”

The cashier had a grin on his face and let out a laugh. Akira was a regular here, and was prone to being teased by this particular cashier whom he’d gotten to know quite well.

“Haha, very funny. I’ll have you know I do plenty of-”

“Save it. We both know you don’t do anything but play games and watch anime all day. You don’t have any sort of a social life. You’re 21 and you don’t work, you haven’t gone to college, you barely have any friends, and you still can’t get a girlfriend. I mean seriously, you gotta get out there and do something, anything! You can’t keep relying on your grandma sending you rent and food money for your entire life.”

Akira was on the cusp of lashing out verbally at the cashier, but he quickly stopped himself because he knew that he had made a good argument that wasn’t easily combated. Akira really hadn’t done anything with his life yet. He was still relying on his grandma to send him money every month, and on top of that, he hadn’t been on a date since his final year of high school.

“Hey, I’m sorry man, but really, it’s the truth. If you ever need a job to make a bit of cash, I can always put in a word with my manager. I’m sure she’ll give you a job here if you want one.”

“I’ll think about it. It would be nice to have some extra spending money to buy more figures and manga.”

“Alright, whatever. Anyway, here’s your stuff. See you this time next week.”

The cashier handed the bag of what one would very loosely call groceries to Akira, who headed out the door and began his walk back home. Distracted by a game on his smartphone, Akira is stopped in his tracks when he bumps into the back of somebody. It’s a very pale woman with long white hair and a flowing white dress made of fine silk. She appears to have a heavenly glow about her. Upon impact, a faint noise can be heard, similar to that of someone dropping a marble onto the pavement.

“Oh, I’m so sorry, I wasn’t paying attention.”

The woman didn’t seem to notice, and headed around the corner. Akira notices something shiny that had fallen when he collided with the strange woman. On further inspection, it appeared to be an orb of some sort that had a sparkling purple appearance. Akira picked it up and began to call after the woman.

“Hey, excuse me miss. You dropped this.”

Nobody was there. Akira looked all around, with no sign of the woman anywhere. There were no alleyways she could have turned down, no shop doors swinging closed, nothing. It was as if she had just vanished into thin air. He looked at the strange orb and decided to just stick it in the large pocket of his hoodie, planning to return it if the woman was spotted. Akira made it all the way back to his apartment complex, and there were still no signs of the woman anywhere. After removing his shoes at the door, Akira set his bag of groceries on his kitchen table and headed into his bedroom. He had accidentally left his TV on with the pause screen of a new game he purchased recently showing on its display. The orb rolled onto the floor next to the console that was plugged into the TV, as if it had a mind of its own. Akira thought nothing of it and instead decided to sit down and continue playing where he had left off. Only a few seconds later, he got up and headed for the bathroom for a short break. Upon exiting the bathroom, Akira heard a strange noise coming from his room. It was the sound of a sword being swung in the game he had left on. He was sure he didn’t leave it unpaused in the middle of a battle, and the game didn’t have an auto battle feature. Curious, Akira entered the room, only to find a girl in a maid dress sitting on the floor, controller in hand, hacking away at enemies. She wasn’t the only person in the room however. There were six girls in the room total, all sporting a maid dress. A few of them were rubbing the tops of their heads, as if they had hit them on something, one was in the corner seemingly wrestling with something, and of course there was the one playing his video game.

“What is going on here? Who are you people?” Akira asked in both panic and curiosity.

“Oh, I- I’m so sorry, I didn’t know what this fancy box did, so I, uh...” replied the girl who had been playing the game. She had long brown hair that came into a braid that rested on either shoulder, and a pair of black rimmed glasses, not too unsimilar to those that Akira wore.

“Stay still, they can’t see you or they’ll take you from me!” whispered the girl in the corner. She had medium length orange hair that was pulled into short twintails in the back. She also appeared to be the youngest girl there, even younger than the girl playing the game, who now seemed to be completely gone.

“Ok, does somebody wanna explain to me where in the heck that other girl disappeared off to?” asked Akira, slightly calming himself.

“Oh,” an older woman with long green hair and a large chest replied, “she tends to do that from time to time, usually when she’s frightened or shy. Amari, please stop hiding from us.”

In an instant, the girl had faded back into vision, in the exact same place she was before, now blushing and visibly shaking in either nervousness or fear. Perhaps a mix of both.

“D-did she really just-” Akira stuttered before being cut off by the green haired woman.

“Yes, she just became visible again. Dear Amari, she has the power of invisibility, though as I said, she only really uses it when she’s afraid or shy. Oh my, I almost forgot to introduce myself. I am Willow, the oldest of us maids. Pleasure to meet you. Over there on the bed just coming to her senses is our leader, Sakura.”

A cute young woman, about the same age as Akira was rubbing the top of her pink haired head. Her hair was roughly shoulder length, but flared out at the end into almost a W shape. She also had a bit of hair that seemed to stick up into a curve right in the middle of the top of her head. Some would call this bit of hair ‘stupid,’ but others may think it to be a cute trait. The pink haired girl finally spoke up.

“Oh, yes, sorry, I’m Sakura, the leader of this group of maids. I guess I should introduce everyone else. You’ve already met Willow, who’s the motherly figure of the group, and Amari, the shy one over there who, as you noticed, can turn invisible. Over in the corner there is little Lysia, the youngest of our group and- Lysia! What are you doing over there?”

The orange haired girl jumped at the sound and knew she couldn’t keep her secret any longer.

“I was just trying to calm down BunBun… that’s all.” replied the young girl, now standing and holding what appeared to be a slime straight out of an RPG, but with the tail, ears, nose, and whiskers of a bunny rabbit.

“You what?! Where did this Usa-Slime come from, young lady?” Sakura replied in a loud voice. The orange haired girl, Lysia, appeared as if she was about to cry.

“I… I saw him when we were going to town, and he hopped towards me, and he seemed cute, and I wanted him to be my friend, so I picked him up and he looked happy.” sniffled Lysia, obviously holding back tears from being scolded. “Please Miss Sakura, please don’t take BunBun away from me. I’ll do anything you want me to if you let me keep him.”

The so-called Usa-Slime BunBun appeared to also share in Lysia’s sadness. Sakura takes notice of this, as well as Willow.

“Ma’am, if I may interject, I believe having a pet would be a good learning experience for Lysia, and it may even lead to her finally awakening her power.” commented Willow.

Sakura let out a sigh and walked over to Lysia, who quickly moved BunBun away, as if she were a child who didn’t want her precious toy taken by her parent. Sakura gently placed her hand on Lysia’s head.

“Alright, fine. You can keep him. But ONLY if you promise to look after him and feed him. Got that young lady?”

“Yes Miss Sakura. Hear that BunBun, we get to be friends forever now!” beamed the young girl. Her face lit up with pure joy as she spun around, lifting BunBun over her head playfully.

“This is great and all, but can we get back to the introductions please?” questioned Akira, who now had more questions than answers.

“Oh, I’m terribly sorry. Let’s see, where were we? Ah, I remember now. Over there sprawled out over what I presume is your bed is Yuri. She’s a bit of a klutz, so she might get dinged up a bit, but don’t worry, she has healing powers to fix herself right up.” This was being said as Sakura pointed to a blonde young woman, who appeared to have just become an adult, and also who wore a bandage over her nose. Whether or not this was due to an injury or simply a fashion choice, who can really say but her. “Finally, over… wait, where is-” Sakura is cut off by the sound of yelling in another room.

“What, is, THIS?! This place is a MESS! Ugh, it makes me SICK!” yelled a girl from what sounded like the kitchen.

“That would be Rose. She’s a bit hotheaded, but she’s a great gal once you get to know her. I promise.” Just then, a girl with fiery red hair that appeared slightly jagged burst through the door.

“What was that? I am NOT hotheaded, you all just clearly do not see things the way that I see them.” snarked the redhead.

“So, you’re Rose then?” asked Akira, who was over it by this point.

“Yeah, why does it matter to you, huh? You got a problem with that or something?” Her eyes seemed as if they had a raging inferno burning within them. Her hands started glowing a bright orangey-red color, and sparks began erupting from them.

“What, no. I was just asking if that was your name. Jeez, what’s your problem?”

The girl reached up and delivered a clean *slap* to Akira’s face, which now stung with a searing pain.

“Idiot! You don’t just go around acting like a girl you just met is problematic because YOU don’t like the way she acts or whatever. Stupid.”

“Now, let’s all calm down please. There’s to be no more fighting, got that Rose? No burning people either. You’d be in much more trouble if we didn’t have Yuri with us.” intervened Willow, doing her best to calm Rose down.

“Yeah, whatever, but I’m not apologizing to him. He started it.”

“Dear, you may be an adult, but you sure don’t act like one sometimes. Sorry about her, she has a short fuse. Yuri, sweetheart, could you come heal up this fine young man for me please?”

“Yup! Right away! C’mere, lemme heal up that handprint burned into your face.” Yuri placed her hand upon Akira’s cheek, her palm glowing a bright blue color. The burn mark faded away as if it had never even happened, though the emotional pain couldn’t be healed. “Oooh, stubbly. Someone shaved recently.”

“Uh, yeah, I actually did. This morning to be exact. Well, not exactly what you’d call morning. It was sometime around two or three in the afternoon, which is around the time I usually wake up.”

“Ew, you sleep all day? What ARE you, some kind of idiot with no life or something?” barked Rose.

“Rose! What did I tell you about FIGHTING!” yelled Willow, louder than anyone else in the room had been up to this point. The entire room fell silent for a few seconds, everyone in shock at what had just occurred. “Oh, dear me, I didn’t mean to lash out so loudly and unexpectedly. Terribly sorry everyone. Ah, but wait, we haven’t even asked for the name of the lovely gentleman who has been so kindly putting up with us this entire time since we so rudely crashed into his room. What might your name be?” Willow asked, now back to her regular, soft-spoken and motherly voice.

“Akira. My name is Akira. Akira Kasshoku. It’s nice to meet you, I guess. Well, most of you that is.” Akira smirked while looking in the direction of Rose, who let out a low growl at him.

In the midst of the chaos, Akira hadn’t noticed that the mysterious orb he found earlier had gone completely missing. Today really seemed to be a strange day for the young man. He began to look around where he had last seen the orb, but couldn’t find it anywhere.

“Looking for something? We may be able to help.”

“Yeah, Sakura was it? I’m looking for this orb, about the size of an orange. It was a sparkly purple looking thing, and it was right around here when I had left the room earlier.”

“Oh, well, I believe I may know what happened to this orb you speak of. Just before we appeared in this room, we all fell into a large sparkling purple portal-like thing that, when we came to, had left us here. I believe that this orb was what transported us here, and as such, it disappeared along with the portal.”

“Ah, ok, yeah. That all makes perfect sense and I accept it entirely. Except I don’t. Come on, who would really believe that sort of thing happening? This isn’t some fantasy world, this is real life. The real world, Earth. The only magical thing that’s happened to me is having some random cosplayers break into my room.”

“Cos… play? I’m sorry, I don’t know what that means. Although, you shouldn’t be too quick to rule out magic as a real occurrence. You DID have your face burned by Rose, and then immediately healed up by Yuri. Though, I don’t know if you would really call that magic. Perhaps something along the lines of a superpower or special ability would be better, since you can’t exactly learn how to use these abilities. They’re given at birth to those deemed worthy by the great Goddess. I guess I should explain our powers then. As you already know, Rose can control fire using her hands and Yuri can heal the wounds of anybody who has been injured, although she can’t reattach severed limbs or bring people back to life. Healing large wounds makes her more tired too, and healing too much without rest can cause her to faint. Amari, again, as you’ve seen, can turn herself and anything she’s holding or wearing invisible, though if she were to pick something else up after doing so, it would appear to just be floating. Willow here can create a barrier of energy to protect anything from physical harm, though elemental attacks like fire can destroy it. Finally, I can shapeshift into other humans that I’ve seen the faces of, though I can’t replicate their voice, and if my face were to get wet, my disguise would disappear.”

“How about Lysia? What’s her special power?”

“Well… we don’t exactly know yet. She’s still young, but she’s right around the age where her power should be fully developed. We just don't know what it is or how to activate it yet.”

“I see. Well then, it’s about time you girls get going, isn’t it?”

The girls all looked around at each other, not sure of what to say.

“Um, we don’t exactly have anywhere to go. We were hoping we could all stay here, if that’s ok with you.” Sakura said.

Akira wasn’t exactly sure what was happening. A group of girls in maid dresses who had some sort of superpowers randomly show up inside his room, and now say they want to stay with him? He didn’t see them as a threat, well, all except maybe Rose. Considering the fact that they had clearly demonstrated that they did indeed have powers and weren’t just some crazy cosplayers who broke in, he made his decision.

“Well,” Akira let out a sigh, “you girls can stay here for a while until you find a place to live. There isn’t really much room for you girls to sleep anywhere comfortably, but I guess I can sleep in the living room, and some of you can use the bed and the couch. Don’t expect much in the way of food either. Not like I don’t want to give you all a decent meal, I just don’t have a lot of food at the moment.”

“Yay! BunBun is gonna sleep next to me so I can keep an eye on him. Hehe!” cheered Lysia enthusiastically.

“I-I’m okay sleeping on the floor. We’re all used to it anyway.” mumbled Amari.

“What? You’re all used to it? Why’s that?”

“It’s a bit of a long story, but to summarize it, our previous master wasn’t very accommodating. He didn’t harm us or anything, but our meals were small and our beds were just blankets on the floor. Not the greatest of conditions, but we are just maids after all.” reminisced Sakura. She didn’t seem too happy to remember these things. Akira let out another sigh.

“Alright, I’ll see what I can do then.” Akira grabbed his wallet and keys, and slipped on his shoes. “I’m headed out for a bit then. Don’t make a mess of the place please. Oh, and whatever you do, do NOT open the closet in my bedroom. You don’t need to see what’s in there.”

“Oh please. It isn’t as if WE could make things look much worse than they already are around here.” growled Rose.

“Um… excuse me Mister Akira SIr, d-do you have any books? I quite enjoy reading, but didn’t bring any with me.” stuttered Amari.

“Huh? Books?” Akira thought for a second. Was it really a good idea? Well, it couldn't hurt to try. “Yeah, give me a second.” Akira went off into his bedroom and came back with a few books in hand. He handed them to Amari, who was shy, but joyed to see some books she had never read before. “These are manga. They read from right to left, so it might take a bit to get used to. Feel free to read them all if you want, just don’t bend them too much.”

“Yay! I-I mean, thank you kindly Mister Akira.”

“Don’t mention it. I’m headed out now. I won’t be gone too long. I hope.”

Akira left his apartment and stood outside for a bit. What the heck was going on? Were these girls even real? Was he hallucinating or something? He didn’t think much more about it, and made his way down to a nearby supermarket.

Returning home he thought, “what if the girls aren’t there when I get back?” Only one way to find out. He put the key into the keyhole, turned it to unlock the door, grabbed the doorknob, turned it ever so gently, and pushed the door open. When he looked inside, he saw something he couldn’t believe. The girls were… still there! They hadn’t been imaginary people he thought up. They were real human girls.

“I’m back.” announced Akira. “I bought some groceries for dinner.” Akira went to the kitchen to set the bag down and was shocked at what he saw. The floors, the countertops, the sink, all of it. They were all cleaner than the day he first moved in.

“Welcome home new master. We took the time to tidy up the place a bit in anticipation of your return. We sincerely hope you don’t mind.” said Sakura in a calm voice while bowing.

“New… master? What’s that all about?”

“Well, we were all wishing for a new master who would treat us better, and then we ended up here. We all talked it over while you were gone, and decided you should be our new master.”

“Yes, she’s correct. All of us believe it to be for the betterment of everyone here, including you. Do you accept our proposal?” asked Willow

Everything had happened so suddenly. First these strange girls show up in his room, then he’s going out to buy proper food for them, and now they want him to be their new master! Akira isn’t quite sure what to think, but he accepts their offer anyway. It’d be nice to not have to cook or clean, he thought.

“Well, I don’t exactly have the best sleeping arrangements for you all, and I don’t want you all to be worried about working. If you’re really going to stay here, just remember to not overwork yourselves, and to take time off to relax whenever you need it.”

“Of course! Thank you master!”

“Please, enough of that. Just call me Akira. Now, don’t you girls have anything else to wear other than those maid outfits?”

“Oh dear, we don’t. We weren’t exactly planning on going anywhere, so these are all we have.” said Willow.

“Alright then. Tomorrow, we all head into the heart of the city to buy you all some new clothes. Actually, on second thought, maybe I should only take one of you. People would think strange things if they saw a group of girls in maid dresses following around a guy like me. Sakura, would you be willing to go with me tomorrow?”

“Yes! Of course I would mas- I mean, Akira. Sorry, force of habit.”

“Dinner is ready everyone! Hurry up and eat before it gets cold.” yelled Rose from the kitchen.

“Wow, you’re the one who cooked dinner? I’m impressed.”

“S-shut up! I didn’t WANT to make dinner or anything, Willow was just too busy watching Lysia. That’s all. Idiot.” Rose’s face was bright red in embarrassment.

“Well, everyone is here except for one. Where’s Amari?”

“H-here, sorry sorry. I was busy reading this manga Akira gave me to read. I really like it a lot. Thank you for showing it to me.”

“I know a really nice bookstore that sells manga. I’ll take you some time.”

“Ow, hot hot hot!” stammered Yuri, who had seemingly burned herself on the hot food.

“Ok BunBun, here comes the food!” said Lysia, bringing a spoonful of soup to the Usa-Slime. BunBun seemed to hop up and down in enjoyment. How this creature eats is a mystery.

Everyone sat around eating their meal, chatting about what kinds of clothes they’d like to wear. Yuri kept burning herself on her food, Lysia fed half of hers to BunBun, and Amari had to remember to pull herself away from the manga to eat some more. Willow smiled as she watched over the other girls, and Sakura smiled as she looked at Akira. Akira was happy to have such cute company, but what he really wanted was to get back to watching anime. The newest episode was airing that day, and he didn’t want to miss it, or else his friend would spoil it for him. Akira went back to his room and sat in front of the monitor to his computer. He tapped his keyboard and the screen lit up. He went to his favorite website to watch anime and clicked on the newest episode. Roughly twenty or so minutes later, he hears a noise coming from his bed, as if someone was shifting their weight to a different side after having sat still for a while. Looking over at the bed, a short “eep!” is heard.

“Who’s there?” asked Akira to the seemingly empty bed. Just then, Amari fades into view, looking down at the floor. “What are you doing in my room?”

“I-I just wanted to see what you were doing. I’m so sorry for intruding, but that thing you were watching looked really cool.”

“That’s called anime. It’s like manga, but with color and movement to it. It’s really impressive how much time and effort people put into making an anime adaptation of something. Here, wanna watch the episode for that manga you read earlier? The one with the big robots in it.”

Amari’s eyes lit up in pure joy, which was a rare thing for her to do since she was usually so shy.

“Yeah! Let’s watch it together! I can’t wait to see what it’s really supposed to look like.”

The two sat and watched anime together until it was late at night. Willow knocked on the door and opened it. She saw Amari smiling and couldn’t help but smile herself.

“My, don’t you know how late it is Amari? You should really be getting to bed now. You can continue tomorrow.”

“Y-yes Miss Willow. Goodnight Akira. Thanks for letting me watch anime with you.”

“No problem. Night. Goodnight to you too Willow.”

“Goodnight Akira.”

After watching a bit more anime, Akira was finally about to make his way to bed when he heard another knock at his bedroom door. This time was a lot quieter. It was Sakura, who then proceeded to step inside the room and close the door.

“What’s up? Can’t sleep?”

“Not really. This dress is too uncomfortable. Do you happen to have a spare shirt or something I can wear?”

This wasn’t the first time Akira had to give a girl one of his shirts, but it was strange that it happened twice. He looked in his closet and pulled out a long black shirt with short sleeves.

“Here, this might be a bit too big for you, but I’m sure it’s more comfortable than that dress.”

Sakura grabbed the shirt and began to slide the sleeves of her dress off.

“Not in here! Go change in the bathroom or something!”

Sakura exited the room and came back shortly after with Akira’s long black shirt on. She had also tied her long pink hair into a ponytail. Akira looked at her in awe of how cute she was. Sakura quickly took notice of this and smiled while laughing quietly to herself.

“Ahem, well then, you got what you wanted, now I’m going to bed. I’ll loan you some normal clothes tomorrow so we can go shopping together. Night Sakura.”

Sakura walked up to Akira and hugged him tightly. He was taken aback by this, but hugged her back anyway.

“Thanks for everything you’ve done for us so far. I really appreciate you being willing to take us in and give us a cozy new home. See you in the morning. Night!”

This was the first time in a few years that Akira had been hugged by a woman. She felt warm and comforting to him, as if he was wrapped in a nice blanket. It was a feeling he had forgotten about long ago. Akira slipped into bed and drifted off to sleep. For Akira, everything had gone dark. Then it all went bright. When the blinding white light had faded, he found himself standing in a seemingly endless field of flowers, staring at the back of a mysterious woman. He felt as though he had seen this woman before. The pale glowing skin, the long white hair, it was the woman he bumped into earlier that day. Although this time, she had a pair of wings on her back, as if she were some sort of heavenly entity.

“Ah, so we finally meet again, Akira Kasshoku.”

Akira was shocked to hear his name spoken by the woman, but had one more question on his mind. Where the heck was he?

“Oh, pardon my rudeness. Allow me to formally introduce myself. I am Terra” the winged woman said, turning to reveal her face, which had a pair of glowing red eyes. “Pleasure to meet you.”