Satsuki Nakamura – författare

Having learned that the emperor is rooting out forbidden magic, Shu Keigetsu and Kou Reirin return to the palace with the body swap still in place. Their next idea is to undo the switch during the Repose of Souls - until the emperor foils their plans yet again! He sends the Maidens to the kingdom's border to dish out food on a charity mission. Moreover, Reirin is assigned a particularly inhospitable area far from Keigetsu and the others! Can the girls make it through this ordeal without falling back on Keigetsu’s magic?

After staving off sabotage during the Congee Conferment Rite, Kou Reirin and Shu Keigetsu have successfully turned the tables on the emperor’s assassin. Their former adversary - now accomplice - sheds some light on Emperor Genyou’s past, giving our heroes the context they need to plot their counterattack! It all comes down to the body-swapping spell and a fateful confrontation from twenty-five years ago. Reirin won’t rest until the ultimate sovereign gives Keigetsu and her forbidden magic his blessing!

Thanks to Gyoumei’s and Keigetsu’s timely intervention, Reirin is back from the brink and ready to dish out seismic fury! At the same time, Unran pulls through after the magistrate’s betrayal. With the team reunited and recuperated, it’s time to close out the Harvest Festival, and the Untouchable Village is set to be the centre stage. But this festival is not just about having a good time; it’s also about justice. Time for Reirin and Keigetsu to drag the shadowy villains behind all this trouble into the light!

Prepare for swirling court intrigue in this magical 'trading places' tale of maidens competing for the crown--and don't miss the original light novels, also from Seven Seas!

DANCE LIKE A BUTTERFLY, FIGHT LIKE…A RAT!After a rocky start, Reirin and Leelee have no time to lose before they must compose themselves for the Ghost Festival at the Maiden Court. There, Reirin must tread a tight line between the villainess role she’s been cast and employing a diplomatic tit-for-tat of her own: confronting Kin Maiden Seika and her menacing court lady Gayou’s plots. Keigetsu, meanwhile, is pushed to wits’ end by her new body’s precarious health–the risk of her plot’s discovery rises!

Just when Kou Reirin has gotten the dysentery outbreak in the Untouchable Village under control, the village chief mysteriously shows up on death’s door. Reirin fights tooth and nail to keep her new friend alive—but it might not be enough to get him through the night. Meanwhile, Shu Keigetsu is all fired up and ready to get her tea party for the Maidens underway. Now that the outwardly meek Ran Houshun has shown her true collars, it’s time to best her in a game of psychological warfare!

In the Kingdom of Ei, five clans put forth their maidens as imperial consorts - but only one will be crowned empress. Just when frail and beautiful “court butterfly” Kou Reirin seems poised to marry the crown prince, jealous “court rat” Shu Keigetsu steals her body! Reirin wakes up in the dungeons as the conspirator, and things look dire… or do they? Now that she’s got a robust new body, not even the looming threat of execution can stop her!

The Maiden Court’s blazing summer of plots and curses wanes into cooler autumn days. Keigetsu buckles down to restore the Palace of Vermillion Stallion in the turbulent wake left by the ex-Noble Shu, along with Reirin’s bolstering support. That fateful Double Sevens night almost seems like a different lifetime, but the seasonal change also marks a big event - the Harvest Festival, a chance for the Maidens to trade the palace for the southern region, in none other than…Shu!

Taken hostage, Reirin (in Keigetsu's body) and Keikou must face the Untouchable Village's retribution by...toiling in the rice paddies? Why, it's just the type of challenge the earth-loving Kou siblings delight in! Their bamboozled captors are left in the dust whilst the dynamic duo launch a top-to-bottom agricultural revamp. But their bucolic days are cut short when a familiar face joins the captives. As hidden truths and machinations are tossed into sharp relief, everything Unran has scraped together for his people teeters on the brink. So far from home, how will Reirin face the Village's unprecedented malaise?

Keigetsu knows she must act when rumours threaten to make her already bad position at court even worse. To find the source of the rumours, she hosts a tea party with the other Maidens. But finding out who is behind the slander will take careful tact. Can Keigetsu convincingly act like the genteel Kou maiden and keep her true fiery nature under wraps? Meanwhile, dysentery grips the Untouchable Village, sending Unran on a desperate gamble to bring back medicine for his people. Reirin has always kept up a happy outlook even at the worst of times, but with so many innocent lives at stake, will she be pushed over the edge?