Tick-tock, tick-tock—
The clock on the living room wall had its second hand and minute hand slowly advancing at different paces, finally overlapping in the silent, dark night.
"Alright..."
Shido peered from the balcony at the Spirit apartnt next door. After confirming that all the lights in the rooms had been out for nearly an hour, he began preparing to change his clothes.
A red and white plush suit, thick boots, and a belt. On his face hung a large beard that covered half of his face, and on his head he wore a red and white hat of the sa style. He also carried a bulging large cloth sack on his shoulder.
That's right, Itsuka Shido's current attire looked exactly like Santa Claus.
"Kotori, I'm ready."
"Mhm, I'm almost done preparing on my end too. Just to be safe, wait another 30 minutes before sneaking into the apartnt."
Kotori swiped her finger across the tablet in her hand, seemingly instructing the Fraxinus staff on their tasks.
"Understood."
Shido took a deep breath, letting the freezing air fill his chest to alleviate his sleepiness.
If you ask why Shido was doing this, the reason goes back to a few days ago, when Tohka, Yoshino, and the Yamai sisters asked him about Christmas.
—Santa Claus distributes presents to good children.
As the saying goes, the speaker has no intention, but the listener takes it to heart. Shido didn't think much when he said this, but Tohka and the others firmly believed it. To get presents on Christmas Day, they behaved exceptionally well these past few days.
However, Shido and Kotori, who had actually witnessed their old man dressing up as Santa Claus and sneaking into their room, naturally knew that there was no such human in the world who only needed to work one day a year.
Spilled water cannot be gathered up. Now, if they didn't receive presents from Santa Claus, the Spirits would likely be greatly devastated. So Kotori and Shido discussed it and decided to have Shido dress up as Santa Claus and deliver presents to everyone on Christmas Day.
Half an hour later—
"Sorry about this, Kotori. You're clearly very sleepy too. And I'm making you stay up with ."
"I don't know what you're talking about, I'm leaving this to you."
"Haha, understood."
Scratching his fake beard with a bitter smile, Shido got up and prepared to head to the entrance. As he was leaving, he seed to suddenly rember sothing and turned to look at Kotori.
"By the way, Kotori, how are preparations for that going?"
Hearing Shido's words, Kotori put on an "I can't deal with this guy" expression and sighed.
"Don't worry, I arranged that a long ti ago. Shido, you focus on doing the task at hand first, and rember not to be discovered by everyone."
Kotori chuckled and shrugged, then waved her hand as if urging him to leave quickly.
"That's true. I understand."
Feeling his sister's steadiness and reliability, the corner of Shido's mouth lifted, and he pulled open the front door.
"By the way, Kotori."
"What?"
"rry Christmas."
"...Mhm, rry Christmas."
—————————
"...Excuse ."
Inputting his fingerprint and vein pattern, and using the authentication code Kotori gave him to open the main door of the Spirit apartnt, Shido couldn't help but feel a bit like a guilty thief as he whispered softly.
However, clearly the Spirits were all sound asleep by now, and the only response to Shido was silent stillness.
"Phew... good."
Breathing a sigh of relief, Shido took out a flashlight from his pocket, kept his footsteps light, and climbed the stairs.
"First is..."
Recalling the room numbers of the Spirits, Shido quickly sorted out the order of visits.
"Yutsuki's room, I guess."
Checking the room naplates one by one with the flashlight, Shido soon arrived at Room 214 on the second floor, Yutsuki's room.
"Eh? It's locked."
Pulling the door handle, he unexpectedly t considerable resistance. Only then did Shido realize that Yutsuki's room was currently locked with an electronic lock.
"No way... hitting a wall right at the start."
Shido didn't have the skills to quickly pick an electronic lock by himself. Left with no choice, he could only press the call button on his earpiece to tell Kotori about the situation.
[Yutsuki-nee locked the door?]
Kotori's voice through the earpiece couldn't help but sound a bit surprised.
[That's strange. Didn't we tell everyone that Santa Claus was coming today and not to lock their doors?]
"Could it be that Yutsuki was too tired when she got back, reflexively locked the door, and went straight to sleep?"
[Mhm, perhaps. Never mind, wait there for a mont, Shido. I'll imdiately ask a professional to get the lock—]
Ding-dong—
Suddenly, an unexpected electronic sound chid from the electronic lock in front of Shido. Before Shido could react, the door before him was pulled open with a swish. And then, naturally, Shido t the eyes of the brown-haired girl wearing casual clothes.
"..."
"..."
[Shido? What's wrong?]
Hearing Kotori's sowhat worried inquiry in his ear snapped Shido out of his panic.
(Calm down! Calm down!)
His brain was working at an unprecedentedly fast speed. It was clear that if Shido answered Kotori now, the jig would truly be up.
(I'm disguised right now. Maybe Yutsuki hasn't recognized . As long as I can think of a proper excuse to bluff my way through—)
"Oh, dressing up as Santa Claus, huh? Shido."
(OK! No need to say anything, I'm out!)
The girl's plain words instantly snuffed out Shido's sliver of wishful thinking. Right now, his heart was as cold as a pitcher getting hit for a walk-off ho run on the very first pitch of the ga.
"...Yo, Yutsuki. So late, and you're still not asleep?"
Seeing that his cover was blown and knowing it was beyond saving, Shido slumped his shoulders and asked sowhat awkwardly.
"Rather than not asleep yet, it's more like I just woke up. I was planning to play a mobile ga for a bit and then go back to sleep. Then I heard noises outside the door, and thought it was Yoshino or Natsumi coming to ask to accompany them to the bathroom. And as a result—"
This is the current situation. Yutsuki spread her hands to show her helplessness.
"Haha—"
He could only say man proposes, God disposes. To this, Shido also returned a bitter smile.
"So, you're planning to act as Santa Claus and give everyone Christmas presents."
"Mhm, you guessed it."
There was no point in hiding it now, so Shido could only pretend to be straightforward and admit it.
"Well, hearing your conversation with Tohka and the others a few days ago, and considering how Tohka and the others have been acting these past few days, if there's no Santa Claus in this world, naturally you're the only one who can take responsibility."
"As expected of Yutsuki, observant as always."
"Cut it out, flattering won't do you any good."
Rolling her eyes in annoyance, Yutsuki then scratched her hair as if pondering sothing. After a mont, she sighed helplessly.
"...It can't be helped, I'll help out too."
"Eh?"
"Although I don't have much interest in celebrating Christmas, doing sothing to make everyone happy isn't bad either. With my help, Shido, you'll have an easier ti, right."
Yutsuki shrugged and proposed.
Working together with Yutsuki...
Shido felt slightly tempted in his heart, but then quickly shook his head and refused.
"No, no, no! That won't do! Having the person who is supposed to receive a present help deliver presents, isn't that putting the cart before the horse?"
"Then what? Do you have the confidence to complete the mission on your own, Shido?"
Yutsuki looked at Shido speechlessly and curled her lips sowhat disdainfully.
"Even though you just blew your cover right in front of ."
"Ugh—"
Shido was instantly left speechless.
"But..."
"If you don't agree, tomorrow I'll tell Tohka and the others that Shido is actually Santa Claus."
"I'm sorry, please by all ans help ."
Under Yutsuki's coercion and bribery, Shido very wisely and decisively chose to compromise.
"So that's how it is. Yutsuki says she wants to help out too. Is that okay? Commander.... ....-sama?"
Perhaps because he felt a bit guilty, Shido involuntarily used an honorific when reporting to Kotori.
[——]
He only heard a long, drawn-out sound of inhaling from the other end of the earpiece.
[You—!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Idiot Shido!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!Stick insect! Leech! Single-celled amoeba! Look at what you're doing!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!]
Imdiately after, Shido was deafened by his sister's furious roar.
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