The Protagonist's Party is Too Diligent

When the doorbell rang, I opened the door and found a delivery waiting outside. There was one large box... and another box that was even larger. The courier had already disappeared into the elevator.

It wasn’t anything out of the ordinary. Most of the money was still in my account, but the others living with me spent it too.

Back when we lived in a villa, we used to split our income evenly to prevent overspending and set aside savings, but ever since winning the lottery, we hadn’t felt the need to be that strict.

It’s not like they were going out and buying designer goods worth millions of won at a time. And even if they did, we had more than enough to handle it without issue.

But today’s delivery—

...was really big.

One of the boxes came up to my thigh in height and was nearly as tall as I was in length.

I silently thanked the courier who had lugged it all the way up and picked up the box.

It wasn’t too heavy for me to carry alone, but it was bulky. As I lifted it, I could hear something sliding softly inside.

“Oh! A delivery?”

Claire came running over a little late after seeing me open the door and immediately helped me carry it.

“Is this something you ordered?”

“Yup! I bought it!” she said with a big smile.

A life-sized teddy bear, maybe? I tried to imagine what kind of oversized item Claire might have bought, but nothing came to mind. Then again, because it was Claire, it felt like whatever was inside wouldn’t be all that surprising.

She brought one of the boxes inside and then went back out to grab the smaller one.

“Hm~”

After a brief moment of thought—

“Let’s open them both in the living room.”

She made her decision.

“What’s going on?”

Alice had clearly heard the sound of us moving heavy stuff and came rushing out—only to stop in surprise when she saw the box nearly as tall as me.

“Oh, perfect timing. Can you help us move this to the living room? I can carry it alone, but it’s too big to handle easily.”

“What is this?”

Once one person came out, the others started following.

With the weather getting noticeably colder, we’d been spending more time indoors. Though we still went out for meals about half the week, staying warm inside with hotpot or shabu-shabu around the living room table had become a cozy routine.

Eventually, Charlotte and Mia joined in to help move the boxes.

“Phew...”

Alice let out a small breath as she placed her hands on her hips, staring at the imposing presence of the two boxes now sitting squarely in the middle of the living room.

“So? What is this? Doesn’t look like it’s an appliance or anything.”

If it were an appliance that size, it would’ve been much heavier. And you wouldn’t be able to dent it just by gripping the box.

Whatever was inside wasn’t box-shaped either—corners had already crumpled during transit. Probably from being bumped around during delivery.

“Hehehe. Well, this is...”

Claire dashed into her room and came back with a box cutter, extending just the tip of the blade.

Then she began slicing down the taped corners of the upright box from top to bottom.

Once she cut the tape vertically along the corners, the box unfolded neatly in four directions—almost as if that was exactly how it was meant to be opened.

“...”

And when we saw what was inside—

“Ta-da!”

Claire spread her arms wide and presented the contents of the box.

I said nothing and turned to look out the window. The days were getting shorter lately, but it was still bright enough that I could see the outside world clearly.

The air was dry and cold, but no snow had fallen yet.

Wait—hadn't it already snowed in Gangwon Province? Well, at least here in Seoul, we hadn’t seen any yet.

Which made sense, since we were just entering the second week of November.

...Isn’t it a little early for a Christmas tree?

“Oh, don’t worry—it’s fake. No need to water it or change the soil or anything. And once Christmas is over, we can just stash it in storage and bring it out again next year!”

I had to give Claire credit. Coming from Azerna, a world with completely different religious traditions, her ability to adapt to the holidays of this world was almost admirable.

Although, the fact that she was clearly assuming we’d still be here by this time next year did give me some pause... but I decided to let it go.

“Christmas is still over a month away.”

“Sis, you really don’t get it.”

Excuse me? I lived here.

“These kinds of things are all about the season. No one takes out a tree on Christmas and puts it away right after. Who does that?”

Okay, fair point.

Most shops pull out decorations in early December and pack them away by the end of January.

Still...

It’s not exactly common to decorate your home like this, is it? Maybe if this were Europe or America. But here? Most people only care for those holidays if there’s money in it—or if they’re in a devout Christian household.

Then again... just looking at us, I suppose we do seem like the type to celebrate every Western holiday.

......

Let’s not even bring up Halloween. If Claire found out, she’d definitely insist on celebrating it late. If she’s decorating for Christmas in early November, she’s probably not worried about it being a week past Halloween.

“What? Don’t like it...?”

“...Not at all.”

When Claire asked with a slightly deflated expression, I chuckled and replied.

“Well, since you already bought it, we might as well put it up early. It’ll save us the trouble of dealing with it again in December.”

Claire beamed at my answer.

Alice and Charlotte also smiled, though theirs looked more like what can you do kind of smiles.

Mia, meanwhile, was looking curiously at the unopened second box.

Oh, right.

I guess she’s never done anything like this before either.

“Okay, let’s open this one too!”

Claire, clearly excited, sliced open the tape on the smaller box as well.

And inside—

“Ta-da!”

Huh.

I had expected string lights or wreaths for the tree. Instead, the contents looked completely unrelated to Christmas.

Why was there a plastic pumpkin?

“I found out afterward that Halloween is one of the holidays too, right?”

Uhh... That’s not a Korean holiday.

Then again, from Claire’s perspective, all of these were foreign holidays.

Though I’m not even sure if Halloween is officially a holiday overseas.

For reference, we didn’t do anything traditional for Chuseok either. Instead, we went outside and enjoyed the quiet streets of Seoul while everyone else was out of town. Claire had seemed a little disappointed we didn’t have any kind of ancestral ritual.

Maybe this was her way of compensating for that non-celebration.

“Oh, don’t worry—I made sure to get proper Christmas decorations too!”

Claire said, pulling out strings of fairy lights from deep within the box.

“Oh, and the Halloween stuff was super discounted!”

Of course it was. Halloween had already passed.

Not that I needed to say it out loud—I wasn’t that dumb.

*

The final result... was an utterly ridiculous setup.

We had space for the tree, thankfully. Since it was fake, we didn’t have to worry about sunlight or anything. We placed it between the window and the TV.

There was a star on top, fairy lights wrapped around it... so it technically qualified as ✪ Nоvеlіgһt ✪ (Official version) a Christmas tree.

But hanging from it were glowing plastic ghosts, jack-o’-lanterns, and all sorts of Halloween decorations.

Instead of a big Christmas stocking under the TV, we had a plastic jack-o’-lantern sitting there.

Mixed in were glittery candy-cane shaped ornaments and sparkly star decorations, which only made the whole thing look even more absurd.

If you had to define it, I guess it gave off Halloween vibes. After all, Santa costumes do show up at Halloween parties.

“Mmm, perfect!”

...Is it, though?

“Are we really going to keep it like this until January?”

“Hm? Nah, we’ll take down the Halloween stuff by the end of this month. Can’t leave that up for Christmas.”

...For someone planning to remove it, she sure hung a lot of it. But I didn’t say anything this time either.

So... we’ll be living with this bizarre decor for the rest of November, huh?

Well, I guess it is kind of fun.

Some clothing-like items had been buried at the bottom of the boxes too, which gave me a brief pause—but I decided not to dwell on it.