Herald of Steel

The playgirls who were lucky enough to survive their employment at the Palace or noble houses when they turned thirty would usually have a good life.

They would know how things worked around the house, down to the last detail, and thus, most of them would be put in charge of the various slaves and servants, overseeing their work as head, senior maids.

They would be the 'bureaucrats' of the manor.

The more beautiful and competent would even be tasked with hosting any visiting noble guests, making sure there was not the slightest fall in hospitality.

Be it food, drinks, accommodation, and even pleasure, these experienced maids would see to it all, even accompanying the guest if he should desire, although in most cases, these nobles preferred far younger and fresher dishes.

These highly experienced maids would also be sought after for their hand in marriage by other high level servants such as stewards, stable masters, butlers, and even rich merchants who saw this as a way to enter into a lord's inner circle, making their subsequent children far above in status than the common folk.

Many nobility would even marry their own loyal servants to each other as a way to strengthen the bond between the households.

As for the truly lucky maids, the ones possessing the true favor of the master of the house, they could even be made into mistresses or concubines, and even have the chance to compete with the main wife for her husband's affection.

Her children might not be equal to the main line, but they would still get to live decent lives, the boys becoming military officers, priests, stewards, stable masters, and butlers while the girls turned into priestesses, high level maids, ladies in waiting and even concubines of other nobility.

And if the lord did not want to have children with her, due to political or social reasons, well then many such concubines were even allowed to covertly have children later on with other men, such as an illegitimate noble boy of another friendly house, a rich merchant who lent the lord a large sum of money or a military official who contributed heavily to a war effort, if she should wish.

The only caveat was that she could not explicitly reveal who the father was and had to pretend it was from the lord.

Although in such cases, the baby's identity would usually be an open secret, as would the father's involvement. Many times, the lord would then directly gift the pregnant maid to the other man as a reward for his services.

This was a very strange practice, one that mostly came about due to the presence of the unnatural contraceptive- legummum- the perfect method of preventing pregnancy let the lord use these maids almost as political pieces.n/ô/vel/b//jn dot c//om

Maybe a lord would promise to take care of a retainer's son as his own as a favor in this way, or even vice versa.

As for the worst case scenario of the concubine falling out of her master's favor and having no children of her own to take care of her at her old age, well even then, unless she committed some grievous crime, it was customary for the noble lord to arrange a decent enough stipend for life before he passed on, gifting a comfortable old life.

Many such concubines were even allowed to become priestesses in their twilight years, with the hope they would be able to reach the heavens using this status.

So as it could be seen these maids would be far above in status than any common folk, with their children being even considered half nobility. The boys even had the chance to become nobles themselves by taking part in military campaigns.

….

The maids who managed to come this far would be considered the true winners in life by the rest of the common folk.

Another type of lucky maids were those who managed to attach themselves to a brothel before they became unemployed, primarily tasked with managing and training new girls for the nobility.

While much more savvy business minded women even opened up businesses of their own, and they did not necessarily have to be adult themed.

Food stalls, restaurants, wine breweries, dress shops, clothing businesses, and many more were known to be owned by these high class pleasure women.

They would leverage the coin they earned in tips and gifts as well as the connection formed with other servants, rich merchants and even the nobles to do this.

It was just that the day to day operations of these businesses would usually be run by male slaves and servants because women were highly prejudiced against in Adhania.

It would be extremely hard for them to be the face of the business for the common people would freak out.

…..

Now this cheery, fluffy ending was predictably not the norm.

It made up for at most a fifth of the women, consisting mostly of the maids who got to enter the lord's house as a maid, not a pleasure girl.

This let them always have a post and something to fall back on if and when the lord eventually lost interest in them.

In fact, sometimes these maids could even ask their master to free them, wanting to work in brothels for much higher pay or even just take care of their own families.

Most noblemen would grant this request if the maid was liked and loyal enough and he thought she had served him enough.

Hence unless their nobleman was a sadistic who liked to beat or kill his maids or he faced some financial difficulties forcing him to down size, the manor maids rarely lost their jobs.

At most, they might be transferred to their smaller, country houses or pleasure homes as a punishment.

…

The rest of the women taken by the slavers from their fathers however would have a variety of endings depending on their exact context.

If they belonged to a brothel and had some accomplishments, they could be made managers.

The same thing went if they had a distant fling with some noble, they could live as posh servants and experienced trainers.

But in a country overflowing with new and young girls, few such old flowers got to enjoy this luxury.

Many were just demoted to menial servants, condemned to work until their bodies gave out.

Or if there were already enough servants, simply thrown out like thrash, perhaps with a token sum as some kind of competition if they were lucky.

These girls of twenty five to thirty would then suddenly find their paradise turning into hell in the blink of an eye.

Out of house, clothes, food, and medicine, and with very little savings, these women would struggle desperately to find any kind of living to meet their necessities.

But as already said earlier, Adhania had few opportunities for women, and most of it was the adult kind.

They were already too old for that.

Some still tried and there was even a subcategory of prostitution literally called, 'Widow Prostitution,' which originally referred to women who took up this job to support their family after losing their husbands, but now referred to any mature woman looking for a bit of side income.

But as could be imagined, the market for this niche desire was very small and hence competition very fierce.

Few managed to make it there.

As for breaking the mold and becoming an independent businesswoman, well the women had to be both sufficiently smart and lucky, entering the market at the perfect time and catering to a previously unknown niche.

Most did not have such a perfect board set up for them.

So for many of these women, the first instinct would be to try to seek a husband and have him support her.

But once again, their age would play against them. By that point, they would be far beyond any marriable age.

Most commoners tended to get married by thirteen to fourteen, and even as low as seven or eight in some cases, so to them, a woman of thirty was closer to a being grandmother than a wife.

These women also would not prefer these common folk because by then their tastes would have changed. They dressed, ate, and even talked differently than them.

So they would want a man who could offer them a similar lifestyle.

The problem was the men able to do this were all nobles, or rich merchants, and catching their eye, well it was very, very difficult.

Few wanted such an 'old and experienced' woman as their life partner, especially one who carried such as a stigma. The moniker of prostitute, dancer, or playgirl was not a good title to have for any woman.

Many of the upper class also knew exactly what went on at those noble parties, with sometimes even rich merchants and tycoons getting invited to them.

So, although most men were not that too bothered by a small body count, if that number reached the three or in some extreme cases four digits, that started to become quite alarming.

Now, some women still managed to do the impossible, but for most….well, if they had that level of charm, they would have already snatched a man during their frequent contact with the lord.

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