"... In summary, today's date was a rather pleasurable experience. Four and a half out of five stars," Judy concluded on our way ho from the restaurant. We originally planned to co ho by car, but since the weather was pretty mild and we had a hearty al with calories asking to be worked off, we decided to walk instead. I'd like to say it was a romantic late evening stroll under the stars, but they were barely visible under the lit streets of the city, so it was semi-romantic at best. But back to Judy's comnt.
"Only four and a half?" I teased her with mock disappointnt. "So harsh! How did we fail so miserably?"
My dear assistant promptly elbowed in the side in response, eliciting a giggle from my other girlfriend.
"I had a lot of fun today," Elly remarked between two chuckles. "Even the movie was good!"
"It wasn't bad, but it's the reason why I deducted half a star," Judy responded in turn. "Why did we watch a martial arts movie of all things?"
"Because you don't like romance movies, and it was the only decent alternative," ca my unabashed answer.
"Hey! This movie was romantic too!" the princess protested on my other side. "The way the protagonist battled through the palace to save the love of his life was really sweet."
"True, but the kiss-slash-roundhouse-kick ratio was really low," Judy countered, but seeing the princess was about to start pouting, she quickly added, "That said, I didn't expect that the movie would put so much ti and effort into the love subplot, so that was a pleasant surprise."
"That just once again proves that you can't judge a book, or in this case, a movie by its cover." Judy gave a tentative nod of agreent, so I decided to push my luck a little and added, "The sa goes for people too, I suppose."
My dear assistant sent a sideways glance and asked, "You're talking about n at the skating ring, aren't you?"
"It's still called a rink, but yes," I answered with a smile as we rounded a corner onto the street leading to our neighborhood. "Who would've thought that they were just nice guys who were worried about you two and wanted to give you skating tips."
"No Chief. They were definitely bad guys hitting on us," Judy stated in an extra-deadpan voice.
"Don't be silly," I scoffed. "They were perfectly agreeable guys. They even apologized for bothering you."
"Yes, they did, because when you showed up, you looked like you were about to cut their hearts out with the paper cup in your hand."
"Whaaat? No, I didn't," I denied with an over-exaggerated expression of incredulity. "That's just silly-talk! You'd need at least a plastic cup with a straw for that."
Judy promptly rolled her eyes at my protests and stressed, "You might think it was funny, but we were scared by them, right, Elly?"
My other girlfriend didn't react right away, so Judy forcefully cleared her throat to get her attention, at which point her cheeks flushed a little and she hastily said, "Sorry, I just rembered the faces they made when Leo showed up, and it was funny, and I spaced out a little. Could you please repeat the question?"
"Judy was just talking about how you were scared by those three random punk rockers approaching you, and she wanted you to reinforce her point."
"Oh, I see now," the draconic girl by my side muttered like she just understood sothing profound, only to then frown and blurt out, "I wasn't scared. It was fun!"
"It was?" Judy muttered in surprise, the words apparently hitting her like an unexpected left hook.
"Yes," Elly doubled down with a delighted smile. "The way you made fun of them was so funny I could barely stop myself from laughing!"
"A.. So you protected the princess by heckling the guys? That's sweet."
I thought my comnt would earn so complaints from my assistant, but she remained suspiciously silent. When I took a closer look, I found her just a little flushed, and she ultimately told , "Elly's not so good at that kind of banter yet, so I overcompensated a little."
"But if you had the presence of mind to do that, you couldn't have been that scared," I pointed out, which finally earned an indignant huff.
"Maybe not that much, but it was still a tense mont, and I wouldn't have dared to confront them if I didn't know that Elly could beat them up if they tried to get physical."
"So you compensated for each other's weaknesses? Isn't that just plain wholeso?" I asked one hundred percent innocently, but whatever answer Judy was about to give was lost in the stunned silence as we rounded the corner leading into my street and we beheld the signs of destruction in front of us.
Even from this distance, I could see that the lamppost in front of my house was diagonally severed, taking down the power lines and all the other lights on that side of the street. The lamps on the other side of the road were still in working order though, which allowed us to see the full brunt of the damage done to the sidewalk in front of my house. Aside from the aforentioned lampposts, there were a couple of deep gashes in the concrete and the asphalt. Furthermore, even though the other poles were still standing, at least one of them had sothing that looked like claw marks on it, and one nearby traffic sign was bent by ninety degrees at the middle.
The three of us shared a cautious glance and I told the girls, "I'm going to check things. Be on the lookout for trouble."
They both nodded, and I imdiately slipped into Far Sight and focused on the dot of my sister, and its direction told she was in the house, along with two other marks. I glanced at her, and once my vision cleared and I got used to the darkness, I let out a shallow but distinctly relieved breath and told the girls, "Everyone's fine, but let's be careful, just to be sure."
My girlfriends wordlessly agreed and we lined up in a single file, with at the front and Elly at the back, so that we could keep our only non-combatant safe in case of an ergency. I didn't want to Phase in the open, especially since I would've bet good money on Lord Grandpa putting long-range surveillance on my house after I rebuked all of his more direct attempts, but I still wrapped my Phantom Limbs around Judy and Elly, just in case.
Fortunately, I never needed to act on my precaution, as we made our way over to my front door without any incident. The front door was left unlocked, so I pushed it open, and a mont later I was greeted by the barely visible sight of my sister poking her head through the door leading to the living room.
"Ah. Welco back," she greeted in a slightly strained voice as she ca over to the entrance, a three-pronged candlestick with matching white candles on it in hand. She was also wearing her maid outfit, so her appearance made think that I accidentally entered into a period murder mystery. I quickly shook the idea out of my head before I accidentally gave the ubiquitous yet intangible Narrative any funny ideas, and I invited the girls in. Hearing the commotion, another person entered the vestibule in a hurry, and once she realized it was just us, she let out an unexpectedly relieved sigh.
"Welco, Leonard-dono," Rinne welcod with a deep bow, followed by two slightly shallower bows directed at my girlfriends. Today she was wearing a sweater and jeans instead of her usual pantsuit, which was rounded out by a fluffy kitten slipper. I had sothing like five different sets of these things, so I let her borrow one while she was staying over. Anyhow, Judy peeled herself out of her outer coat in the anti, while the princess took one last cautious glance outside before she shut the door behind herself and let out a small huff, probably miffed by our date ending on a weird note.
"What exactly happened while we were away?" I asked the most pertinent question at the mont, and after a second, Snowy gestured for us to enter the living room.
"It's… a long story. We should sit down first."
"I agree," Judy, well, agreed, if I may be redundant for a mont. "My legs are tired."
I had no reason to object, and once we were inside the candle-lit room, we all but stumbled upon the owner of the third mark I've detected no too long ago in the form of Ichiko. She was wearing a white T-shirt and a pair of loose, bright red knee shorts, probably the closest thing she could find that resembled a Japanese shrine maiden outfit among Judy's hand--downs, and she even had a fluffy slipper of her own. As I said, my house had a lot of these things for so inexplicable reason. Speaking of inexplicable, at the mont she was trying her best to light an unfamiliar blue kerosene lamp sitting on the table. Once she noticed us, she flashed a toothy smile and exclaid, "Look, Ue-sama! I found this in the garage!"
Oh, great. First it was my kitchen, and now even my garage was starting to get filled with weirdly convenient stuff I'd never seen before. For a mont, I couldn't decide whether that was a good or a bad thing, but considering I had more important things to worry about, I shelved the issue for another day. Elly seed oddly fascinated by the lamp and quickly walked over to help the foxy miko light it, while Judy was considerably less interested in it, and instead she made her way over to the thermostat.
"It's not working either," she uttered after fiddling with it a little.
"I guess the furnace isn't working if the electricity is out," I responded, followed by the question, "Did you report the outage?"
"Y-Yes…" Snowy nodded before sitting down on the couch. "The utility company said they would send soone in the morning to fix the pole."
"Let's hope we won't have to explain why or how it was cut cleanly in half," I comnted on autopilot as I also sat down on my usual seat and, after a deep breath, finally asked, "Now then, could you please tell why the street in front of us looks like a warzone?"
"Allow Rinne," the highly visible ninja proposed and, without waiting for an answer, she made her way over to my side and fell to one knee. I glanced at my sister, who didn't seem to mind, while Ichiko and Elly were still occupied with the lamp, so in the end I gave Mountain Girl the go. She gave a firm nod and began her explanation in an unusually serious tone. "The incident procured roughly two hours ago."
"Rinne-san ans 'occurred'," Ichiko chid in from the side without looking up from her project, and I acknowledged both of them with a slightly impatient grunt.
"At that ti, an unknown enemy attempted to infiltrate Leonard-dono's abode, but she was thwarted by Sister-san's onmyodo."
"She ans my wards," ca the next correction, this ti from Snowy.
"Describe the intruder," I requested, and Rinne imdiately complied.
"A girl about the sa stature as Sister-san. She had red hair and used a western sword. Sister-san also attempted to draw her into the Land of Twilight to avoid damaging Leonard-dono's house, but she sohow resisted it."
"I'm… fairly sure she ans a Restricted Space," my sister comnted again, this ti a tad more uncertainly.
"I got it," I responded, my words intermingled with a drawn-out sigh. "Did she try to attack you?"
All of a sudden, Rinne's solemn appearance crumbled as she conspicuously glanced aside, imdiately skyrocketing a suspicious brow up my forehead.
"She… didn't actually attack us. Not really," Snowy noted, and when I glanced at her in turn, she hastily explained, "She couldn't pass through the wards, so she was mostly just shouting outside and demanded that I co out and talk to her."
"Did you?"
"I… thought I would be safe as long as I stayed inside the warded area, so I only walked out to the front porch," my sister sheepishly admitted.
"Rinne followed after Sister-san," Mountain Girl added, suddenly back in her serious mode.
"Okay, let's cut the chase: if she couldn't pass through the wards, and she couldn't be taken into a Purple Zone, that ans that one of you…" I purposefully paused here as I directed a long, pointed look at the huntress still kneeling in front of . "… had to go out to pick a fight with her, doesn't it?"
"Rinne-san did not pick a fight!" Ichiko butted in while jumping to her feet, nearly putting out the lantern they've spent so much ti lighting if not for Elly's quick reaction. "The girl called Neige-ue all kinds of nasty nas!"
"That's right!" Rinne followed her up, obviously relieved that she had backup. "As Leonard-dono's retainer, Rinne must protect not only the lives of the mbers of his household, but also their honor! Rinne could not stand idle while soone bismarcked Sister-san's good na!"
"Rinne-san wanted to say 'besmirched', but otherwise she's correct!" the little miko doubled down. "Claiming that Neige-ue wasn't ue-sama's true sister and she must've used vile thods to seduce ue-sama! How shaless! How outrageous!"
When she got to the 'no true sister' part, Snowy visibly twitched, but before I could act in response, Judy was already by her side and patting her head. Since she was taking care of that, I continued to focus on the conversation at hand by adding, "So because of that, you attacked her."
"After a warning," Ichiko pointed out in hurry.
"But you still attacked her and caused a lot of collateral damage." Both Rinne and Ichiko fell silent, and I kind of wanted to let them stew in their own juices for a while, but Elly was giving an impatient look, so I decided to stop beating around the bush. "Still, I can't fault you for trying to protect Snowy, so let's just chalk this up as a learning experience. Next ti, be more mindful of your environnt." The little miko nodded repeatedly, while Rinne only let out an affirmative grunt. "Speaking of which, I hope you weren't seen by anyone."
"Rinne doesn't think so."
"Good. The last thing we need is the Magi or the Celestials pestering us for breaking the masquerade. Next question: I figure the girl managed to get away, otherwise you would've ntioned capturing her. How exactly did she do that?"
"She was fast," Mountain Girl told , and no matter how long I waited, she didn't elaborate any further.
"Fast? Is that all?"
"Yes," she asserted with a serious look. "She was weaker than Rinne, but she was much faster, so we couldn't manage to land a clean hit. Once she disengaged, we didn't give chase."
"So she was faster than you…" I reiterated, and she reaffird it with a nod. "Was she wearing any armor?"
"No. She only had a sword," Ichiko noted on the side, and I let out a soft 'Huh,' in response.
So, just to summarize: the Knight girl ca to my house while I was out, picked a fight with Snowy, the ninja woman and the fox girl decided to teach her a lesson, but she outmaneuvered them and managed to escape scot-free, and did all of that without the benefits of wearing her full gear. That… sounded more than a little troubleso, but on the other hand, at least nobody got hurt. My evening plans were pretty much torpedoed by the lack of electricity, but that was small potatoes compared to how things could've turned out. Actually, that reminded of sothing.
"So all of this took place in real-space, right? Why didn't you call ?"
"We… didn't want to disturb your anniversary," Snowy spoke up without looking in the eye.
"Very considerate, but imagine how much more it would've disturbed us to find out that you got injured while we were having fun." My point made her disposition even worse, so I cushioned it a bit by telling her, "There were three of you this ti, and apparently you had things mostly under control, but if sothing like this happens in the future, don't worry about being considerate, or at the very least call after the fact so that it wouldn't be a surprise when we get ho."
All three of them nodded in unison, so for the ti being I decided to drop the issue and focused on my girlfriends. The original plan was for them to stay over the night. Since we won't have school tomorrow, we planned to play around, discuss ta-things with Elly, and stay up until late. Now, while I admit doing all of that in a candlelit room had its charm, the lack of electricity ant I couldn't use my PC, which in turn ant we had no access to either my notes or the funny videos I downloaded and planned to watch with the girls.
In the end, I figured I'd postpone thinking about this for the ti being, and instead I addressed Rinne again, mainly as a way to gain so extra ti.
"Do you still want to take you over to the base again?"
She was a little surprised by my question, but quickly nodded and stood up. I already promised her that I would Phase her over, and I also had to pick up a few things from there, so it was hitting two birds with one stone. Three, if we count gaining so thinking ti as well.
In the anti, Mountain Girl picked up Onikiri, changed shoes, and returned to my side, so I stood up as well. Since everyone present already knew about my Phasing ability, I didn't have to bother with the whole 'magical teleport closet' thing, so before we left, I quickly addressed the rest of the group.
"I'll be right back. Do you want to bring anything back from the base?"
I only asked out of courtesy, but to my surprise, Judy actually had a request.
"Please bring over one of the board gas Angeline left there." I must've looked a little confounded, as she quickly clarified, "This is our first anniversary. I refuse to let a power outage completely ruin it."
"I second it," Elly agreed with a fiery look in her eyes, and while I was pretty sure Angie already took the most interesting looking gas from Lord Grandpa's 'gifts' for her own, I didn't exactly have much of a choice in the matter when faced with the determined expressions my girlfriends were giving .
As such, I gave them a nod, and then stepped up to Rinne, wrapped her up in my Phantom Limb, and a mont later we appeared in the main hall of the secret base. The Fauns, like Judy, proved to be remarkably adaptable to my sudden appearances, as us showing up in the middle of the training area barely raised any brows. I left Rinne to her own devices, and after a quick round of greetings, I walked over to one of the storage rooms.
By freak coincidence, the sa one housed both the board gas and my actual reason for coming over. In the corner, there were two unassuming paper bags. I picked them up, and after making sure their contents were intact, I took them over to the table with the board gas. At first I tried to choose one, but then I figured I didn't exactly have to, considering I could take the whole stack ho with the exact sa effort. Thinking so, I picked them all up, made sure I still had the paper bags, and then unceremoniously Phased back to my living room.
"That was quick," Judy noted as I put the boxes onto the table, careful not to disturb the lamp serving as our main source of light at the mont.
"I didn't have anything else to take care of over there," I responded, only just noticing that Snowy and Ichiko were missing. I vaguely gestured in the direction where my sister was sitting until now, and Judy imdiately picked up my aning.
"Neige and Ichiko are in the kitchen. She said we had a tal kettle and she wanted to try making tea with it on the stove."
"Ichiko said she was an expert of tea ceremonies, so she tagged along," my other girlfriend added as she walked over to my side and took a look at the gas in front of us. "Which one are we going to try out?"
"Whichever you want, but first…" I paused for a few seconds as I carefully placed the two paper bags on top of the tower of ga boxes. The mont I did so, Elly's eyes lit up with curiosity, and even Judy looked pleasantly surprised, so I lightly cleared my throat and told them, "Since this is our first anniversary, I figured it was only proper to give you so gifts for the occasion."
"Aw, Leo! You didn't need to!" the princess cooed as she caught in a hug, though the way she was eyeing the gifts told she didn't an it. My other girlfriend remained perfectly silent and only looked at expectantly, so I didn't waste any more ti and picked up the first bag.
"This is for you, princess."
She practically snatched the bag out of my hand and opened it up with a huge smile on her face, which turned a little perplexed when she retrieved the large, white mug from inside. It only lasted for a mont though, as once she turned it around and saw the writing on it, she exclaid, "A matching teacup!" and gave another hug.
To be precise, it was the exact sa type of mug Judy and I used, except hers said 'I
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