At the annual Christmas dinner, the toasts went round after round.
As the sole man of the house in this "Crystal Palace," and moreover a man who, when the mood struck him in the dead of night, never failed to come up with some new trick, the "grudges" the ladies had bottled up were not exactly few. So, seizing this rare opportunity, everyone joined forces in unspoken agreement.
The knight Jeanne, who always dreamed of turning the tables on the "battlefield"; the cunning Rose, who had been plotting to grind a certain someone down with a war of attrition; and even the usually gentle newcomer Iri and the cold-on-the-outside, fiery-on-the-inside Margaret, all took advantage of the noise and atmosphere of the holiday banquet to launch a tender "offensive" on Leon at the dinner table.
Laurier and Aura hauled out baskets full of all sorts of liquor bottles from the ice cellar for who knew how many times now, fine sweat beading at their temples, watching the men and women at the table whose "war" still showed no sign of dying down with frightened eyes, feeling a chill run down their spines...
"This is... s-scary..."
One cup, ten cups, twenty cups...
Round after round, round after round...
As time wore on, the mood at the table not only didn't cool down, it grew hotter and hotter.
"Come on, come on...!"
"Keep, keep, keep going..."
"Laurier! Fill me, fill me up...!"
Laurier, like a little maid resigned to her fate, pursed her lips and stepped forward to pour a heavy refill for the flush-faced, glassy-eyed Leon.
"Drink yourself to death!"
Seeing that Leon was already getting tipsy, the corner of Rose's mouth curled up almost imperceptibly. Then, eyes sparkling, she lifted her cup of red liquid with a beaming smile and led the toast, clinking it against his.
"Cheers, darling!"
"Hehe! Cheers!"
...
Three hours later.
"Clatter..."
After who knew how many cups of colorful liquor had gone down...
Leon finally couldn't hold out. A smile on his face, he swayed, then "thump," dropped back into his chair, and then, as a matter of course, slid right under the table with a slither.
Watching the fallen Leon, knowing smiles surfaced on the ladies' faces one after another.
"Tsk tsk tsk... pathetic man."
Aura leaned against the corner of the wall, coolly observing the scene, a trace of pity in her eyes as she gently shook her head.
Even a man who possessed the Demon Lord's Crest, faced with this endless, smiling "siege," had in the end completely collapsed his defenses under those sweet, coaxing pleas to drink.
Jeanne proudly tilted up her chin, like a swan that had finally bested its rival, and gave a soft snort.
"Stupid man, so that's all you've got!"
"..."
...
"Dong... dong... dong..."
The chime of midnight rang out clear and bright at just that moment, piercing the warm, humid air and echoing softly through the room.
When the last note faded, this banquet that had stretched into the dead of night finally drew to a close.
The warm yellow lights went out one by one, leaving only the flames in the fireplace still stubbornly dancing, gently surrendering the whole house to the wind, snow, and night outside the window.
...
"Rustle, rustle..."
In Leon's bedroom, faint sounds drifted out.
When Jeanne, tiptoeing, quietly locked the door behind her and turned around...
She saw Rose sitting on the edge of Leon's bed in a sexy nightgown, and Kureha, fingers somewhat awkwardly hooked at the hem of her tights, slowly peeling them down...
Those pale purple eyes flew wide open, a buzz went through her mind, and she went instantly blank.
"You, you... you two..."
Rose stood up, crossed to her in two steps, raised an index finger and pressed it gently against her slightly parted lips.
Those ever-smiling eyes looked especially deep and playful now in the dim light.
"Shh..."
Jeanne's throat tightened, and every sound was forced back down.
Rose bent forward slightly, her lips close to Jeanne's already-scarlet earlobe, breathing warm air as she murmured slyly.
"Jeanne, you don't want Iri and Margaret to find out you were trying to sneak off, do you?"
"Ngh...!"
Jeanne let out an adorable "wail of despair"!
...
...
Leon had a bizarre, fever-dream of a dream.
In the dream, after a full year of "tireless effort," Jeanne had finally turned the tables and triumphantly achieved her "ultimate ideal" as a female knight. And before he could even mourn a certain poor soul reduced to a steed, the next to take the stage was... Rose, transformed into Her Majesty the Queen, who had trained a certain someone into perfect obedience, and the female Sword Saint, who carried more than a little of an "Ais worship" complex and was deep in the throes of an "atonement" ritual...
"Ah...!"
Leon's eyes snapped open and he sat upright in bed, his breathing uneven as consciousness rapidly returned.
"So... it was just a dream."
He shook his head self-deprecatingly and muttered under his breath.
"How long has it been since I had a dream, sheesh..."
"What a strange night... huh?"
Before the words were out, his gaze froze.
Two pale, smooth arms were draped casually across his waist and chest, and farther off, a long, shapely leg lay flung over the covers without a care. When he turned his face and followed the arms and the leg with his eyes...
The next second, his pupils contracted sharply!
Three quietly sleeping figures were nestled right beside him, faces serene, breathing even.
None other than the three leading ladies from his nightmare: the knight Jeanne, the queen Rose, and the atoning Sword Saint Kureha.
Leon: "..."
This... what was going on?
Leon's face was a picture of bewilderment, but as his clear consciousness gradually returned, the fog from just waking up rapidly faded, and the fragments of memory began to piece themselves together.
The Christmas dinner...
Being cleverly egged on by Rose...
The war-of-attrition toasting...
Drinking himself tipsy...
And then, there was no "and then"...
Leon's memory cut out after he'd taken who knew how many cups handed to him by Rose. The last clear image was frozen on that meaningful little smile at the corner of her lips, as if her plan had succeeded.
And then, the moment he opened his eyes again, it was the scene before him...
"So, last night's 'dream' wasn't actually a dream?"
Leon's expression went blank, his eyes glazed, and he stiffly turned his neck, sweeping his gaze one by one over the tranquil sleeping faces of the three ladies beside him. Finally, he stared dumbly out the window at the goose-feather snow swirling down outside, sinking into a long silence.
"...I'm numb."
There's an old saying in the East: walk by the river often enough, and how can you not get your shoes wet?
Day after day finding new ways to "bully" Jeanne and the others, in the end... on this very night, Leon had let his guard down and lost his stronghold.
"Did I really... crash and burn?!"
It took a good while before Leon managed to squeeze a single sentence through his teeth, his cheeks flushing red from the tangle of emotions.
"Damn it, Rose, you devious thing, I'm going to personally..."
Recalling all the things that "Queen version" Rose had done to him in the "dream," Leon stared at her alluring profile, mere inches away, his back molars practically itching with rage.
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