Jeanne's first day at Chaldea went without a hitch, quite uneventful actually.

She did not expect the Roma Empire.

P.S. Please feel free to leave comments / reviews ~ ! Thanksies!

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Enter Nero, one of the emperors of Rome.

As soon as she's done striking a pose in front of us, she turns to me very expectantly.

Looking at me with expectant eyes, I open my arms to the very affectionate Saber.

She practically tackles me with that short yet well endowed body of hers.

She snuggles me quite nicely and I give her golden head a soft pat.

"Praetor! I have been looking everywhere for you!"

I chuckle at how needy and child-like this emperor can be at times.

"It's good to see you up and about, Nero."

She stops snuggling her face on my shirt as she looks up at my face with her beaming green eyes.

"Umu! I suppose this day is lovelier for you now that I've graced your presence, hm?"

My companion clears her throat to catch both of our attention.

"Master, who the hell is pint-sized blonde? You two seem very close, non?"

"Ah! Jeanne, this is Nero Claudius. She's one of the first servants I summoned here in Chaldea."

Nero looks over Alter and suddenly her eyes have that usual chipper glint in them.

"Ho ho! This is Jeanne? The Maid of Orleans?" As she says this, she moves away from me and starts circling around Alter to get a better look of her features.

"Umu, did you get a haircut? Ah! Your face seems so different too with that scowl of yours Hmmm, is black all over the whole new phase for saintly clothes now?"

I really have to stop her barrage of comments before a certain white haired Avenger decides to burn her on the ground she stands upon.

"Nero, this is Jeanne Alter. She's just been summoned here and I'm currently giving her a tour of Chaldea." I explained to her briefly.

This stops Nero's line of comments for a bit and she stops in front of the Avenger to study her face better.

"You know, you have that scowl on your face, but you're so beautifully fair ~! Uwa! A short haired Jeanne looks great too, though your clothes could certainly use a lot more color, umu."

Once that blonde's mouth opens, it's going to take a whole lot to get her to stop.

Alter has just been looking at Nero with an increasingly annoyed scowl.

Nero, you may be the most adorable Rose of Roma, but please read Jeanne's face right now.

Luckily, she stopped her perusal of Jeanne and she nodded her head as her sign of approval.

Approval of this girl being aesthetic in her standards is what I mean.

Little Roma turns her giddy attention back to me.

"Ah! Praetor, I've been working on my singing again! This is a time of celebration, umu! A new beautiful face has graced my even more lovely and beautiful presence after all."

"Ah, is that so?" I laugh a bit nervously.

Alter seems to have caught on the nervous undertone of my laugh and she's currently looking at me suspiciously.

The appearance and brightness of an angel is what Nero has.

An angel's voice? Uh, not so much.

"My name is Nero ~ Clau~dius ~!"

Uh oh, she started a song.

She danced about so gracefully, but dear heavens my ears are starting to want to kill themselves.

"Ro~ma! Roooo~maaaa!"

She continued dancing about and out of nowhere, she somehow conjured a rose in her hand.

I look over at Alter to see how she's faring…

Shit.

She's practically glaring at the blonde at this point and she seems just about ready to chop off Nero's prized ahoge.

Which is oddly very mobile for hair, as it kept waving about during her performance.

This was only the first verse of her little concerto, I don't know if I can take it anymo-

My train of thought was interrupted by Alter walking over to Nero and firmly grasping her shoulders to stop her mid-performance.

"Midget, cease your song now. Your "grand display" is utter torture for my ears, it's as if someone had been repeatedly stabbing my ears with a filth caked stake !" Alter said in a rather cruel and mischievous tone.

Nero, of course, stopped a bit to register the taller female's words.

I scanned Nero's seemingly blank face for any signs of emotion.

In a weak voice, Nero quietly asked "Jeanne, do you really think my performance was that bad…?"

This didn't sound good at all.

Most people can handle a hyper, happy Roma Saber, but not a whole lot of people can handle how emotional a sad Nero could be.

Alter just gave Nero a stern look, as if saying she wasn't taking back anything she just said.

"I stand by my words, you brat. You're a long way from pleasing me with such poor vocals."

"Umu, I see."

She said quietly as she backed away a few steps.

Surprisingly, I didn't quite expect what Nero's reaction was going to be, as she suddenly crossed her arms and nodded her head in approval.

"UMU! I see!" She beamed pridefully in her once again bright and confident self, "This version of Jeanne must have higher standards of taste! No wonder I failed to impress her, she of course expected more from the most beautiful emperor of Roma! I see clearly now, umu!"

I could tell that Alter didn't expect such an optimistic reaction from the short blonde.

"Very well then, I will go practice my concerto for you to its finest, my lovely new comrade!"

Nero then turned to look at me with that determined gaze and smile of hers.

"Praetor, I expect you to be there to watch my performances and tell me if I'm getting closer to reaching this Jeanne's high standards, umu!"

Scratching my head, I ended up smiling at her usual antics.

"Yep! You can expect me to be there, Nero."

Pleased with her fruitful interaction with me and the newbie Avenger, she decided to take her leave as she strutted about in the direction of her room while waving at us every now and then.

As soon as she left, Alter decided to break the silence.

"Is she always like that?"

I turned to Alter and saw a rather perturbed expression on her face.

"Heh, you'll get used to it, Jeanne." I chuckle at the expense of Alter's annoyance.

"Simply put, I just shot down that girl's piss poor singing. I expected a look of despair upon her face, having her prized talent for performing be degraded so harshly and all."

I smirk at her attempt to deflate Nero's shimmering ego.

"She's got guts, y'know? She isn't the type to give up so easily anyways."

She sighed in resignation, "Ugh, so there are even more of these hero types than I expected. How annoying, Mast-"

She would have continued her whole tirade, but couldn't stop herself from stifling a yawn.

I glanced at the window outside and saw the warm setting sun upon the tundras.

Well, I suppose I could already show her to her room. It's getting quite late anyways.

"So, sleepyhead, why don't we head over to your room now?"

She whipped her head towards me as she heard how I addressed her.

"Sleepyhead? We aren't that close, Master. Don't you go familiarizing yourself with me so soon." She narrowed her golden eyes towards mine.

"Still, I'll take you to your new room, Jeane." I look at her with an earnest smile.

She just shrugs and huffs out of impatience.

"So be it then, pick up the pace. I do wish to clean myself up nice and clean after looking at all these filthy do-gooders."

We eventually walk over to her room.

The rooms for most of Chaldea's people were quite uniform and minimalist ones. The necessary furniture and supplies had been placed and readied in each room.

The only thing that differentiated this room from the rest was a neatly printed name plate on the front of the door.

It was a neatly printed nameplate with "Jeanne D'Arc (Alter)" on it, and at the sides of it were purple dragons and fleur-de-lis.

She squinted a bit at the letters in the middle of the nameplate, but she seemed quite pleased about the little designs on the sides.

Ah right, I forgot.

I don't think I'll tell her yet that the original Jeanne had been practicing calligraphy and drawing for this. She had this printed after she made a design she thought was suitable for her Alter self.

Yeah, definitely don't want Alter to ruin her counterpart's earnest gift to her.

I look at the time on my watch.

Yikes, it's this late already?! Well, I've toured her around the important places of Chaldea, so we can just end here.

"Well, it's getting quite late now, Jeanne. I'll be taking my leave, okay?"

Alter looks at me with mild annoyance.

"Last I checked, I'm serving a Master here, not a mother. Hm, just go on your merry little way now, I don't need your help here."

She really does have her own way of saying things.

Other Alter, this is one tall order you're asking for in a promise.

"Night then, Jeanne! We'll be heading out tomorrow, okay?" I said as I waved off to her and started walking towards my room.

Alter sighed at her doting Master. "You really are annoying, you know?"

Still, a trace of a smile was seen on her face as she soon headed inside her room to rest for the night.

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Side Story: A Night with The Maid of Orleans

Historically, Jeanne D'Arc is considered as a figure of great renown in France, but she was an illiterate country girl.

The more serene Jeanne had taken it to be her responsibility to at least try educating herself in reading and writing, as she looked for a pastime to do while she was on standby at Chaldea.

A dedicated spirit and an even quicker study, she was soon able to read and write quite legibly. Although, if any of the other servants and I happened to see her in the library, she would ask for help regarding vocabulary and spelling.

I had walked over to the library at this point in the evening as Jeanne had requested for it. This just so happened to be a nightly routine I had with the gentle blonde for a while now.

It started with Jeanne asking me to help her in pronouncing a few words that she saw whilst reading, but at some point she became more and more confused. So, I offered to at least read to her some of the stories for her.

Eventually, that led to us two reading stories together as our occasional pastime. She may be a Heroic spirit, but she was still a country girl that was young and innocent at heart.

After even more practice, she soon thought about practicing calligraphy and drawing as she seemed quite interested in the art forms. As a way to practice her new found arts, she decided to make customized name plates for her fellow servants' rooms. After all, a good amount of servants had accidently stumbled into another servant's room as the doors just looked the same.

That and Blackbeard used that as an excuse to snoop around the rooms of Mash and a bunch of other servants that were in the lecherous pirate's "strike zone".

I walked over to Jeanne and took a seat next to her. I noticed that she seemed quite focused on her current calligraphy project.

"Ah? Jeanne, what're you writing now?" I asked her out of curiosity.

I looked over her shoulder as I saw that she was creating a name plate for her Alter self.

"For your Alter self, Jeanne?"

She glanced at me with a serene smile upon her face.

"Well, Master, I'm sure she's bound to come here at some point, oui?" She said to me as she looked back at her paper and practiced her calligraphy strokes upon the paper.

"I would at least like to make her feel at home here, even if she treats me quite roughly. She's just a rather troubled version of me. I had initially rejected such a side of me existing, but at the end of our fight in Orleans, I was wrong to do so. True, maybe in the deepest depths of my heart did I resent those that betrayed and abandoned me. Still, I was able to serve many more for the common good, non?"

I looked at how her smile had gotten more wistful at remembering those events.

I decided to comfort her by holding her hand and gently squeezing it.

She seemed more relaxed after that.

"So, I also heard about that promise of yours to that other me, you know?"

"Ah, so you did hear about it. Well, I suppose you wanted to find out for yourself since Alter was involved at that time."

She nodded her head, then looked over at me with a small yet teasing smile on her lips.

"Hm, are you so enamored with that other me, Master?" She said in an innocently teasing manner and continued, "Still, if that was true, wouldn't that mean you'd be quite enamored with me as well, Master ~?"

I avert my eyes from Jeanne's own sapphire gaze.

"I was just being honest with her, J-jeanne…"

At the expense of my embarrassment, she laughs at me goodnaturedly.

"Still, it means a lot to me, Master. That you would swear to another me that you would take care of them, it really does mean a lot to me that you'd still extend your hand to even that side of me."

I look back at her own serene and grateful visage.

It really doesn't help that both of these Jeannes are too beautiful for their own good.

"Anyways, shall we start our little story time, Master? I've been making good progress so far with these stories from Greece, but somehow I have gotten too used to you narrating these stories for me."

Little did the Master know, but Jeanne was fully capable of reading those stories on her own. She just preferred her Master reading to her and used it as a subtle excuse to spend time with him in their free time. She looked forward to their meetings in the night, as she found her Master's narration endearing and his voice calming.

I held my chin in thought, as I tried to remember which story we were on.

"Ah! We were talking about the story of Perseus, I believe."

Jeanne packed up her calligraphy materials back into her bag as we moved to the leisure reading area. This section of the library had couches and much more comfier seating.

We settled on a couch and then Jeanne eagerly waited for me to come back with the book of Greek heroes and heroines.

After some searching, I wasn't able to find the book in its usual place.

Hm, I wonder where that went? I was sure it was around this shelf.

My thoughts were answered as someone from behind tapped me on the shoulder.

"Looking for this little thing here, Master?"

I turned around to see a tan red headed boy in battle gear with a regal looking cape on him to boot.

This boy was Alexander the Great. Yes, that famous conqueror all the way from Macedonia. More accurately, the one in my presence was his younger self. His massive adult self, Iskandar, had probably been off playing video games with a certain long haired Caster.

"Ah! Alexander! Nice to see you around here."

The redhead greeted me back with a nod and handed me the book. Afterwards, he glanced at my awaiting companion for the evening and looked back at me with a cheeky grin.

"I suppose there are much nicer faces you wish to see in this library, Master?"

Realizing who he was hinting to, I blushed out of embarrassment.

Jeez, I really shouldn't let these servants of mine fluster me so much.

"Yeah, it's story night and Jeanne wanted to continue the Greek mythology stories, y'know."

Raising his eyebrow out of amusement, Alexander said "Well, I suppose it would be bad manners if you kept the eager maiden waiting, wouldn't it?"

I scratch the back of my head and sheepishly chuckle.

As I took a few steps going back to Jeanne, Alexander said his parting words.

"Just remember, Master, the true conqueror doesn't just travel on one road to his destination, but instead travels as many roads as he wishes to his destination. A conqueror does take as much as his hunger for wealth and joy, don't you think?"

Puzzled, I turned around to respond to his odd choice of words, but the redhead had already gone the other direction while waving me off.

Soon enough, I got back to my blonde companion with the book she awaited me to read along with her. While I went to get the book, Jeanne had laid out a small arrangement of snacks and refreshments on a nearby coffee table.

"So, shall we start, Jeanne?" I said as I turned to face her with a smile.

She returned my smile and nodded eagerly.

"Just go when you're ready, Master."

I spent the night doing my utmost best to narrate to her the tale of the son of Posiedon.

She had looked at me with giddy amazement and excitement in her eyes as she desperately kept on egging me on to continue the tale of a hero from long ago.

It was a rather peaceful night with the blonde saintess.

Soon enough, the blonde's luster in her eyes had gotten dimmer as the night grew older and colder. She eventually closed her eyes and started dozing off as she laid her head on my shoulder.

Sensing how tired she was, I decided to end it here and I closed the book.

I just realized how tired I was as well, plus the couch we were on was too comfortable anyways.

I didn't want to wake the golden haired maiden on my shoulder either, so I decided to doze off as well.

Jeanne, she smelled really nice. I only realized how much her faint scent was akin to freshly bloomed flowers in spring.

She felt warm too. As if to say, that her warm smile and demeanor was truly at the core of this steadfast saintess.

Yeah, it's not a bad way to sleep right now.

The two readers slept peacefully in the cozy library of Chaldea, albeit a slight chill from the night seeped into the room.

As the two slept, Alexander passed by to check on the two. He chuckled to himself how bad the Master was at hiding his emotions at times, but that was his honest heroic charm anyways.

Trailing close behind him, was his older and muscular self and a well dressed man with long hair.

The long haired man was a Caster demi-servant named Zhuge Liang, though he preferred his title of Lord El-Melloi II.

Don't you ever drop the II from his title though, the man would cast a barrage of spells at you to get his title right. That was unless you were a redhead Rider all the way from Macedonia.

"Hm! It appears the Master here has already started his road to conquest, hee hee!" Iskandar quietly cheered his Master's success at such an intimate moment.

"There's no need to call his advances towards the holy maiden such a crude metaphor, Rider." Zhuge Liang shot back at Iskandar's rather rowdy way of saying such a thing.

The massive Rider had shrugged at his comrade's killjoy mood.

"Still, the two look quite good together, don't you think?" The burly Rider asked his two other companions.

Alexander gave his older self an energetic thumbs up and grin in response, while Zhuge sighed then smiled in silent agreement as his response.

"Pity, the young Master hadn't thought that far ahead. He didn't even bring the saint a warm blanket for this chilly evening." Iskandar said as he unclasped the massive cape upon his shoulders which he then draped over the sleeping duo.

"There we go! The two should be cozy enough, hm?"

Iskandar chuckled victoriously over his attempt to push his Master closer to the beautiful saintess.

Alexander decided to call it night for them.

"We should get going now, after all we wouldn't want to ruin this moment for either of them."

His taller companions nodded and they soon took their leave as they let the budding romantics have their moment.

Somehow, for a certain sleeping pair in the library, their soft spoken warmth kept Chaldea's colder nights at bay.

Although, a certain saintess had woken up briefly after a massive cloak was draped over her and her Master. She had looked at how close she was to her reading companion and softly smiled with cheeks tinted cherry. She snuggled close enough to him to hear his heartbeat, which lulled Jeanne back into sleep.

'Master...'

Ah, how the holy maiden wished for more moments like this.

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What's better than one (un)holy maiden?

Yes, another one.

But the vanilla one.