This is not the date I wanted.

"Oh, yes."

Turning her head slightly, Meng Yue answered in an unclear tone.

"You are so slow! Why did you come back so late, my compatriot?"

As soon as Meng Yue walked into the living room and put down her backpack, she heard dissatisfied complaints coming from the kitchen.

"I can't help it. It's my turn on duty today."

Meng Yue shrugged and replied.

"I'm not happy. We agreed to go to the shopping mall together to buy food and decorations, but you broke the promise. Meng Yue was too careless today."

"Sh ...

"So I'm sorry, I didn't expect it to take so long."

Meng Yue apologized with a wry smile.

"Don't say that... Yoshina... Mengyuesan... there will definitely be gifts too."

As if feeling sorry for what Shionai said, Shionai walked out of the kitchen, bowed slightly, and whispered encouragement to Mengyue.

"Thank you, Yoshino."

(Sorry, Yoshino.)

A sense of guilt emerged in Mengyue's heart.

It was true that he had to stay at school because of duty, but that was not a coincidence. He had asked the teacher to arrange it on purpose, and deliberately delayed it until now so that he could find an excuse not to go with Shidou Tohka and the others.

Mengyue had no interest in celebrating Christmas. If she prepared with everyone, her depressed attitude would inevitably be exposed and dampen everyone's mood. Although she didn't want to celebrate Christmas, she didn't intend to be tactless and dampen everyone's mood.

Shidou and the other spirits except Mengyue prepared the Christmas Eve dinner. Probably because it was a Western holiday, the kitchen was preparing Western-style dishes. From the living room, Mengyue could see Tohka and Shidou busy in the kitchen.

However, although they wanted to show their obedient side, after all, they were not the ones who cooked often. Tohka's way of peeling potatoes as if she was swinging a broadsword was obviously not done cleanly; Yoshino, who was holding Yoshina in her hand and trying to stir a large bowl of salad, also looked worrying; Yui and Yakuya had unknowingly entered the racing mode while cutting meat... Mengyue could see the embarrassed sweat on Shidao's forehead at this time.

However, this time Meng Yue did not help as usual. Miku, Kotori and Nanashi did not help with the decorations in the room, but just lay on the sofa and pretended to sleep.

——Santa Claus’ gift. To be honest, Mengyue didn’t really want it. If he really gave gifts to good kids, then Mengyue would rather be a bad kid for a few days.

————————————————————I am the dividing line for cooking completion——————————

Finally, in the carefully decorated living room, the dining table where we usually eat is now filled with a variety of sumptuous dishes, including large plates of pasta and salad, bite-sized rice croquettes, and colorful raw meat slices. The main dish is not turkey, but it is also a generous roast chicken, and there is also a Christmas cake bought from the cake shop in the shopping street. Everyone showed a satisfied expression for such a delicious Christmas dinner.

After that, after dinner, it was time to enjoy the games.

There were various games prepared, such as Jenga, UNO, Life Game, Pirate Barrel, Twister. Although there were some situations where Miku actively interfered with the players during Twister and the game ended, and Origami could not be contacted at all, everyone's mood was still very high.

However, when it was almost eight o'clock, Mengyue couldn't keep up with the cheerful atmosphere anymore, so she went back to the Elf Apartment to rest on the pretext of being tired.

"Are you okay Mengyue?"

When sending Mengyue back, Shidou couldn't help but ask worriedly.

"It's okay, it's okay. I just played games a little late yesterday. I'll be fine after a nap."

Mengyue smiled and waved her hand.

"I see, life needs to be a little more regular, Mengyue."

"Hi hi."

Seeing that Mengyue really seemed to be fine, Shidao felt a little relieved and said.

"But it's really unexpected. Normally, Mengyue seems to be the most enthusiastic about celebrating festivals, but today she seems a little absent-minded."

"Well, I get tired sometimes..."

After a moment's silence, Meng Yue spoke softly.

"Shidou, tomorrow is Christmas, right?"

"Yeah. Yeah." Shidou nodded and replied, "What's wrong, Mengyue?"

"No, nothing."

Hearing Shidao's answer, Mengyue couldn't help but breathe a sigh of relief and a calm smile appeared on her face.

December 12th was his birthday. Meng Yue once accidentally revealed this to Shidao in the game of Orimori. Although Shidao had recovered his memory in the game world, it was just a trivial incident during the many reloads. It was normal for Shidao to forget it. No, it should be said that it was best to forget it.

At that time, she didn't expect Shidao to do anything for her on Christmas, it was just a whim.

"See you later then, do your best, Shidou."

"Yeah. Meng Yue too, have a good rest."

After saying that, Meng Yue returned to her room in the Elf Apartment and fell asleep. And Shidao also returned to the Gokawa family and continued to play with everyone.

Mengyue's Santa Claus (Part 2)

==============================

tick-tock-

On the clock on the wall of the living room, the second hand and minute hand moved slowly at different paces, and finally overlapped in the silent night.

"it is good……"

Shidou looked at the elf apartment next door from the balcony, and after confirming that the lights in all the rooms had been turned off for almost an hour, he began to prepare to change his clothes.

He was wearing a red and white furry outfit, thick boots and a belt, a big beard that covered half of his face, a red and white hat of the same style on his head, and a big bulging cloth bag on his shoulder.

That’s right, at this moment, Shido Gokawa’s outfit looked exactly like that of Santa Claus.

"Kotori, I'm ready."

"Well, I'm almost ready here. Just in case, let's sneak into the apartment in half an hour."

Kotori's fingers slid across the tablet in her hand, and she seemed to be explaining the assignment to the Fraxinus staff.

"learn."

Shidou took a deep breath, letting the cold air fill his chest to relieve his sleepiness.

As for why Shidou did this, the reason can be traced back to a few days ago, when Tohka, Yoshino and the Yamai sisters asked him about Christmas.

——Santa Claus will distribute gifts to well-behaved children.

As the saying goes, the speaker may not mean it, but the listener may take it seriously. Shidao did not think too much when he said this, but Tohka and the others believed it firmly, and in order to get gifts on Christmas, they behaved very well these days.

However, Shidou and Kotori, who had actually seen their father sneak into the room disguised as Santa Claus, naturally knew that there were no people in the world who only needed to work one day a year.

It is difficult to reverse what has been done. If the elves do not receive gifts from Santa Claus, they will probably be devastated. So after discussing with Shidou, Kotori and the others decided to let Shidou pretend to be Santa Claus and deliver gifts to everyone on Christmas Day.

Half an hour later——

"I'm sorry, Kotori. You're obviously very sleepy too. I still want you to accompany me."

"I don't understand what you're saying, please."

"Haha, I see."

Scratching his fake beard with a wry smile, Shidou stood up and prepared to walk towards the entrance. As he was leaving, he seemed to suddenly remember something and turned to look at Kotori.

"By the way, Kotori, how are the preparations for that matter going?"

After hearing what Shidou said, Kotori sighed with an expression that said "I can't stand this guy".

"Don't worry, I have already arranged that matter. Shidao, just concentrate on doing the task at hand. Remember not to be discovered by others."

Kotori chuckled and shrugged, then waved her hands as if to urge him to leave quickly.

"That's true. I understand."

Feeling his sister's steadiness and reliability, Shidou raised the corner of his mouth and opened the door.

"That's right, Kotori."

"what?"

"Merry Christmas."

"…Well, Merry Christmas."

——————————————————I am the dividing line for sneaking into the apartment————————————————

"……excuse me."

After inputting his fingerprint and vein, and using the authentication code given to him by Kotori to open the door of the Elf Apartment, Shidou couldn't help but feel a little guilty, and whispered softly.

However, it was obvious that the elves had fallen into a deep sleep at this time, and the only response to Shidao was naturally silent.

"Hmm...Okay."

Heaving a sigh of relief, Shidou took out a flashlight from his arms and climbed up the stairs with low footsteps.

"first of all……"

After recalling the room numbers of the elves, Shidou quickly sorted out the order of search.

"Mengyue's room."

Holding a flashlight, Shidao confirmed the room numbers one by one, and soon arrived at room 214 on the second floor, Mengyue's room.

"Eh? It's locked."

When he pulled the door handle of the room, he unexpectedly felt a considerable resistance. Shidao then realized that Mengyue's room was now electronically locked.

"No way... We're in trouble right from the start."

Shidou didn't have the skills to quickly crack the combination lock by himself, so he had no choice but to press the call button on the headset to tell Kotori about the situation.

[Sister Mengyue locked the door? ]

The sound coming from the piano in the headphones was a bit surprising.

[That's weird. Didn't I tell everyone not to lock the door because Santa Claus will be here today? ]

"Maybe Mengyue was too tired when she came back, so she reflexively locked the door and went straight to sleep."

[Well, maybe. Never mind, Shidou, wait there for a while, I'll ask a professional to lock it——]

Ding-dong-

Suddenly, a sudden electronic sound came from the electronic lock in front of Shidao, and before Shidao could react, the door in front of him was opened with a "swish". Then, of course, Shidao made eye contact with the brown-haired girl in casual clothes.

"........."

"........."

[Shidao? What happened? ]

Shidou was brought back to his senses when he heard Kotori's worried voice.

(Calm down! Calm down!)

His brain was working at an unprecedented speed, and it was obvious that if Shidou replied to Kotori, everything would be exposed.

(Now that I have disguised myself, maybe Mengyue didn’t recognize me. I can just try to come up with a suitable excuse to get away with it——)

"Oh, are you dressing up as Santa Claus, Shidou?"

(OK! No need to say anything, you’re out!)

The girl's bland words instantly extinguished Shidao's hope. He felt like a pitcher in a baseball game who was hit by a home run by the enemy in the first pitch.

"…………Hey, Mengyue. It's so late, why aren't you sleeping yet?"

Seeing that the matter was exposed, Shidou knew that he was powerless to remedy the situation, so he lowered his shoulders and asked with some embarrassment.

"Rather than saying I'm still asleep, it's better to say I just woke up. I wanted to play a mobile game for a while and then go back to sleep, and then I heard a noise outside the door, and I thought it was Yoshino or Nanashi asking me to accompany them to the bathroom, but -"

This is the current situation. Meng Yue spread her hands helplessly.

"Ha ha--"

Can we only say that man proposes, God disposes? To this, Shidao also smiled bitterly.

"So, you plan to be Santa Claus and give everyone Christmas presents, right?"

"Well, you guessed it."

There was no point in hiding it now, so Shidou could only pretend to admit it readily.

"Well, I heard your conversation with Tohka and the others a few days ago, and considering their behavior these days, if there is no Santa Claus in this world, then you will naturally be the one responsible."