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It was the mystical night of Halloween, the night of ghosts and monsters, of sweets and pranks and of costumes. What better occasion to throw a party than that night? A big group of friends had planned to gather in Dainsleif’s house, a university student who had the privilege of living alone. Therefore, his house was just the perfect one to throw a party in. Obviously, given his stern character, he wasn’t the organizer. He only offered his house, and all the preparations had been made by his girlfriend Lumine. She gathered her friends from school and a group of friends from her brother’s boyfriend’s circle, and they rounded up a whopping 12 people. Quite a lot, he had to say. Lumine had talent at making friends, so he wasn’t surprised.
Given the day of the gathering, everyone had been instructed to wear costumes, and matching costumes were highly encouraged. Dainsleif was forced by her girlfriend to wear a vampire costume, because, her words, he would have looked stunning in it. Well, he surely had a nice physique, being tall and fair-skinned, but he seriously doubted vampires were blonde and with blue eyes. The high collar of the mantle looked familiar, however. Weird, he never wore such things. He wondered where he got that feeling from. At least it wasn’t an uncomfortable costume, and he could move quite freely in it. Once he got ready and finished cleaning the house he just waited for the guests to start coming, since it was already getting late.
It didn’t take much longer for Lumine to get to his apartment, even though she was a bit late compared to the expected time, and once she got in Dainsleif took a moment to look at her costume. She dressed like a witch, and the slender black dress and the wide hat looked really nice on her. “You look really pretty.” He complimented her, smiling softly and kissing her.
In response, the girl giggled, her cheeks warming up a little. “Thank you! I did my best, especially with the makeup! How does it look?” She twirled, looking pleased with her job. Oh, so was that the reason why she arrived late? She must have spent a great deal of time in the bathroom, with all the complicated eyeshadows.
“It’s really cute. You’re good at this kind of thing, while I really don’t get it. I tried using fake blood before, but the result was… bad. More importantly…” Dainsleif looked behind her, surprised at her being alone. “… where’s your brother? Didn’t you have to come together?”
“Ah, Aether is still at home with Xiao, they were still not ready. You know, I did his makeup too! He looks soooo cute!”
“Cute…? Who, Xiao?” He met him just a couple of times, but he could picture him being displeased at being called ‘cute’. Well, any man would probably have been, if he had any manly pride.
“Of course! You know, him and Aether are coming in couple’s costumes! I assure you, he’s as pretty as it can get.” He still didn’t understand how, or why, he needed to look that pretty. He would have understood it soon, he guessed…
And indeed, he did find out. It was… nothing like he ever imagined. Poor boy, he looked so embarrassed. He was dragged by an extremely pleased Aether dressed like a butler, his face as content as Lumine’s when she showed him her makeup, who really didn’t want to leave his hand.
“Poor you, Xiao.”
“Don’t talk. Don’t you dare comment, Dainsleif. This is utterly ridiculous...” The blonde was his senior, but he didn’t care an ounce. He just wanted to clarify he didn’t want to hear any comments. What was there to comment, after all? He had girly makeup, with long eyelashes and rosy cheeks, and was (probably) forced to wear a long Victorian maid dress, complete with apron and headpiece. Well, for sure he looked cute, he had a pretty face and a small build. But still, it was shameful, especially because he himself understood that it looked good on him.
Aether, however, who was not forbidden from talking, happily commented on it, clinging lovingly to him. “Come on, you look so cute! And we’re a couple! Isn’t it perfect?”
“It’s not! It’s… It’s uncomfortable, and it itches…” Ok, Dainsleif could bet it was something other than the costume to be uncomfortable, given how the poor young man was squirming. Lumine’s brother was a force to be reckoned with, he had far too many ideas.
“Anyways, cute Xiao aside, what about the others? Up to now it’s a double date! I want a big party!” The only girl pouted, visibly displeased at the absence of many people.
“Ah, I talked with Xingqiu and the others. They said they just picked up Xiangling and are arriving.” Aether responded, looking at Xiao to wait for info on his side.
“Venti said he’s late because he’s buying alcohol. Ganyu and Keqing should be here in a couple of minutes.” Damn drunkard, Xiao thought. He wouldn’t have touched a drop of alcohol. Not even if forced.
As expected, the other guests started arriving not much later. Ganyu and Keqing, Xiao’s friends from university, were the first to arrive, the first dressed as a nurse and the second as a black cat. The next to arrive were Aether and Lumine’s friends from school, accompanied by Qiqi, the little neighboring girl Xiangling babysitted from time to time. She wanted to come with them because they would have gone trick-or-treating, and she wanted some of the sweets. Having a little girl with them would have also been useful to gain more sweets. The little girl was dressed like a mummy, and Xiangling, holding her tightly by her hand, was wearing a skeleton costume. Then, Xingqiu and Chongyun, bickering like always, were dressed respectively as a Liyuean ghost and a werewolf, even if the albino wanted to dress as an exorcist to exorcise the whole group, and finally Xingyan, laughing amused at the two, was dressed as a zombie. The last one to arrive, unsurprisingly late, was Venti, screaming a loud ‘I’ve got booze’ and dressed as an angel.
Now that twelve people were in the room, it was starting to get cramped, and the air was full of chattering and laughter. Venti was already trying to pass alcohol around, half of the people obviously refusing because they were still minors, and Dainsleif was trying to hold him in place. Ganyu and Keqing had gotten introduced to the high school group, and were absolutely smitten with Qiqi and her childish mannerisms in grabbing Xiangling’s trousers. Xingqiu was happily chattering with Xinyan and Aether about his progress with his novel, while Chongyun and Lumine were all over Xiao’s cuteness, much to his chagrin.
Since the party started at around dinner time, they arranged a buffet to eat something here and there. Everyone brought something, be it a drink or some food. They ended up with pies, sandwiches, buns, and also lots of cookies and muffins. One of the main ingredients used was, quite obviously, pumpkin, and the sweet perfume of the fruit flavored the air, mixed with the pleasant smell of chocolate and chestnuts. Aether and Lumine had also brought from home a music player and a couple of discs full of music for the party. The volume was low, just for background, but everyone could listen to the most popular songs. Occasionally someone hummed to the tunes, and while some people proved to have especially nice voices, like Keqing and Xiao, others, like Ganyu and Xingqiu, had really no talent for singing. Someone else instead, especially Xiangling and Xinyan, often launched small vocal and dancing performances, with Xiangling acting like an idol and Xinyan pretending to play her guitar. Sometimes Venti tuned in, joining Xiangling in her idol impression, while Chongyun and Dainsleif only displeased the loudness of the three. Qiqi, on the other hand, looked amazed at the performance, begging them to teach her how to dance too.
Two hours quickly went by with all the fun they were having, between music, food and lots of photos, and the one to point out how late it was getting was Keqing. “My, it’s already so late. If we want to go trick-or-treating we should start moving.”
“Qiqi wants to eat chocolate. Will we get chocolate, XiangXiang?” The little girl lifted her gaze towards her babysitter, a finger resting on her lips in a perplexed way. Xiangling couldn’t help but smile brightly, nodding with her whole body.
“Of course we will! Once people see how adorable you are, you are sure to get sweets!”
“Yeah, we’re gonna get those sweets! If I get more than you, we’ll do halfsies, ok?” Xinyan tuned in, reassuring the little kid. Her face might have looked stern, but everyone in that room understood she was a kind and passionate girl, even the little girl, who in return smiled a little at the guitarist.
“My, Xinyan, you have a future with kids. Might it be that they understand you better than adults?” Xingqiu giggled, patting her on the shoulder. Well, he for sure understood her. After all, she was one of his childhood friends together with Chongyun and Xiangling.
And speaking of Chongyun, who was previously speaking with Ganyu, he had hurriedly returned to the group, his eyes wide, and he hid his face into Xingqiu’s baggy dress. “Scary…! University is so scary! Professors are monsters!”
Xingqiu couldn’t help but sigh lovingly, patting his head and calming him with a soft ‘come, come, it’s not that bad’. Well, at least he tried. There was always someone ready to destroy the moment of calm, namely two stern university students named Xiao and Dainsleif.
“Oh, no, it is that bad. My professor of psychometry is wild. What’s up with all the assignments? I am human, and my days are not made of 32 hours.”
“You’re not even close to what preparing a thesis feels like, Xiao. I’m telling you, the work you have to do is massive and the professors have absurd demands.”
“Okay, that’s enough! No talking about school!” The twins said in unison, distracting their respective boyfriends from the topic to save the poor Chongyun from getting even more scared. Meanwhile, Ganyu looked really sorry, and was trying her best to apologize.
“I-I am sorry…! I did not mean to scare you! There are also good things in university! Like making new friends, or finding love!” Keqing felt her cheeks light up at the remark about love. Oh, there she was, her girlfriend was bragging! … Or maybe not, she was just genuinely thinking about the poor scared boy.
“Yeaaaaah, Ganyu dear, I’ll tell you our Chongyun here already has a boyfriend, and it’s that nice gentleman he’s cuddling.” Venti intervened, wrapping an arm around Ganyu’s shoulders. If there was gossip around, he knew everything about it. Ganyu didn’t, however, and couldn’t help but blush at the revelation. “Man, you’re all so boring. Like, half of you is gay. Can’t you have a little variety?”
“We do have variety. We have a hetero couple, two gay couples and a lesbian couple. This is as much variety as you can get.” Dainsleif answered him, feeling called into question, calm and collected like always. Well, he was also the oldest in the whole bunch, so he kind of had to rein everyone in. “Now, everyone. Let us go, or all the houses will have no more sweets for us.”
The group started strolling through town in their costumes, each of them armed with a small basket in which to put the candies and sweets they would have received. To make everything more interesting, they decided to split into two groups of six, battling to get the highest number of sweets. One group was the high school group, made of Chongyun, Qiqi, Xianling, Xinyan and Xingqiu. The other, the university group, was made of Dainsleif, Ganyu, Keqing, Venti and Xiao. Now, there was only one problem. The twins technically belonged to the high school group. However, both their boyfriends were in the university one, and neither of them wanted to concede.
“I have the right to be with Dainsleif! We’ve been together longer than you and Xiao.”
“What?! What does that matter?! I want to be with Xiao too! We like each other more!”
“That’s not true! Me and Dain definitely love each other more!”
“But me and Xiao have matching costumes! We have to be together!” Ok, things were getting heated. Someone had to stop them or they would have ended up pulling each other’s hair like kids.
Keqing, acting like the diplomat she was aiming to become, made a simple proposal. “Can’t we just take both the twins?”
“No way. You have one more person this way. Numbers are important.” In the other group, the one to lead the charge was Xingqiu. This was turning into a battle of wits, and neither side wanted to concede.
“Yeah, numbers are important, but we have Venti. That’s big enough of a bane.”
“Hey, Xiao?! Is this how you treat your childhood friend?!” The musician complained, hurt at the snarky comment. Well, not really hurt. Xiao was always snarky with him, and it was his way to be affectionate. And in this moment, he wasn’t the happiest he had ever been, between the dress he had on and the fact that Venti had practically to drag him out of the room with Aether’s help to make him go trick-or-treating, so… he was justified.
“And the twins also want to be with us. Is one person more or less really going to make a difference?” Dainsleif sighed at the unexpected trouble. These kids were really too picky on the weirdest things…
“Of course it is! You can visit more houses if you split, with one more person! That’s unfair!” Xiangling pouted, visibly offended at the lack of understanding.
“XiangXiang, is something bad happening? Can’t we go get candies?”
“No, Qiqi, everything’s ok. We’re just fightin’ a tough battle, and we’ll win it!” Xinyan reassured the kid with a smile and a thumbs up, before turning to the university group. “Oi, you all! I’m telling ya, this is not fair! Either one of the twins or one other of you comes with us! If you don’t choose, we get both twins!” Obviously the two blondes responded with loud displeasure at the decision, and in a second they were once again back to arguing.
“U-Uhm, if it’s such a big problem I can go with the other group…” Ganyu timidly lifted her hand to speak up, but was soon cut off by her girlfriend.
“You are a university student and you deserve to be in this group! We won’t leave you with the high schoolers.”
“Seriously, can’t we drop Venti on them? He’s dumb enough to fit a kindergarten, and he’s the only one of us to not be in a relationship.”
“You’re really cruel, you’re dropping your best friend in favour of your boyfriend…! That’s not being a good friend!” Yeah, Xiao surely wasn’t being a good friend, but the damn annoying Mr.friend was annoyingly clinging on his arm, visibly annoyingly tipsy. Did he already mention he was annoying?
“We’re minors, so we won’t take responsibility for a drunkard.”
“Whoa there, nice rebuttal, Chongyun. That’s my boyfriend for you.” A proud look was plastered on Xingqiu’s face, who was feeling they were winning the battle. Keqing still had some rebuttals, though.
“Then we’ll trade. You take both the twins and give us the child.” She said, certain that her solution was perfect this time. It evened the numbers, and they gained the cute child card.
“Hmm?” Qiqi seemed to understand they were talking about her, and in response she clinged to Xiangling. “No. Qiqi wants to stay with XiangXiang. Mommy said I have to always be next to her.”
“Xiangling is also the one responsible for her. We can’t just bring the child around, if something happens the blame will fall on her.” Dainsleif facepalmed, amazed at the naïvete of such a solution. Common sense, this stranger…
“Ya know, can’t we just throw a coin or somethin’? We’re wasting lots of time here. Head for Aether and tails for Lumine, the one who comes out comes with us.” Xinyan proposed, bringing her hands behind her head. Everyone turned to look at her, amazed. “What? It’s not something that genial.”
“It’s so basic, but we didn’t think about it… This surely makes everyone happy, no? We don’t have to fight if fate chooses for us.” Ganyu smiled softly, relieved to have finally found a solution. Well, the twins were not that pleased, since one of them would have ended up not satisfied, but if it really was the only solution…
“You really are a genius, Xinyan! You can always see things from a different perspective!” Xiangling hugged her best friend, making her blush a little from all the compliments.
“I guess it’s one of the perks of being a rock musician. That’s our Xinyan for us.” Chongyun smiled at her, exchanging with her a thumbs up. Meanwhile, Xingqiu took a coin from his pockets, looking with a challenging gaze at Keqing. The tension was high in the air, like a Natlan standoff. A coin was soon to resolve all their troubles, bringing with it the probable outcome of the challenge.
The coin spinned in the air.
It landed on Xingqiu’s hand.
He flipped it on his other hand.
“Nooooooo, Dain…! I want to go with Dain! This is unfair! Aether, no sweets for you! For a whole month!”
“What a pity, Lumine~ I’ll let Xiao make them for me, if you won’t!” The blonde-haired boy waved at her sister, dragged away by the group of friends, an angelic smile plastered on his face. Then, he clung to his boyfriend, or better said to his free arm, looking as pleased as ever.
“Great, I gained another koala. Can we just get this trick-or-treating done? I think I’m losing my arms.”
“Lessgoooo! We’re gonna get loootsa sweets! I’m not losing! The power of Barbatos is by your side!” Damn drunkard. Xiao really wanted to make him shut up. He was too loud.
The two groups started their round of trick-or-treating, each of them visiting their most well-known houses in the neighborhood. The high school group had no trouble at all receiving sweets, between having a small kid with them and being visibly young. Moreover, they had the amazing card of Xiangling with them, her cooking was so popular among the elders of the neighborhood everyone knew her and was willing to give her chocolate. They also had the amazing diplomat Xingqiu, who managed to convince even the most stubborn people to give them something to bring back home. Obviously, Lumine’s angelic smile also helped. They easily racked up a big loot of treats, with practically no one asking for a trick instead. Even in those cases, they actually did nothing at all, they didn’t want to dirty people’s houses just for fun. Chongyun was the first one to oppose tricks, and Xinyan soon followed his decision. It didn’t take long to convince everyone else, the only one maybe opposing them a little being Xingqiu, the biggest fan of pranks.
Meanwhile, the other group had many more troubles. Not only the people in the group looked a little older than the other group, with the exception of Aether and the girly-fied Xiao, and a university group going trick-or-treating looked weird enough… They also had a problem called Venti. He was extremely pro-tricks when they didn’t receive sweets, and people had to forcibly stop him from doing vandalisms such as writing on people’s doors or spraying sticky pastes on their mats. Being the tallest, the unlucky person chosen to keep him in check was Dainsleif, which in any case was so popular when going around to receive several girl’s numbers instead of sweets. The less he received, the better it was. Lumine would have been furious. To no one’s surprise, the one to salvage the situation was Xiao, who was hands down the one who received the most sweets. He was fuming by how many people mistook him for a girl, though. Keqing was visibly jealous of him, and demanded to know how he managed to steal so many hearts. She wanted to know all his makeup techniques to look absolutely flawless. Ganyu perceived how annoyed the young man was getting, and managed to stop her girlfriend from asking more, while Aether tried his best to calm Xiao down.
After around an hour of going around the two groups decided to rendezvous back at Dainsleif’s house, and it was finally time to decide the winner of the night. The result was pretty obvious given how full the highschoolers’ baskets were, but Keqing, who hated losing, was still picky on counting. Besides the classic candies and chocolate, some even received bags of cookies, licorice or pie slices, and obviously the topic at hand became how to count such peculiar gifts. Venti even proposed to count Dainsleif’s phone numbers as treats, and it took a collective reassurance to Lumine to make her calm down. Xiao even ended up kicking the musician, screaming at him to shut his trap the next time.
It didn’t matter how much Keqing pushed to gain points, in the end the highschoolers won the challenge, and by a big margin at that. It was to be expected, everyone blamed it on the unfairness of having Qiqi with them and being younger. The results of the contest didn’t stop them from sharing all the sweets, however, much to everyone’s happiness. The air was filled once again with chattering and laughing, with everyone sharing sweets and chocolates, exchanging comments on the best sweets to try out or stories about things that happened while trick-or-treating. A group was welcomed by a middle-aged woman with curlers in her hair and wearing a nightgown, the other by an old man who couldn’t hear well. Then Venti made friends with a group of university students who were having a drinking party, while Xinyan bonded with a girl who played the guitar like her. Xingqiu managed to enter a building by just answering ‘it’s me’ to the interphone, while Ganyu conquered a young man with her puppy eyes. Then there was Aether pretending to be trick-or-treating with his sweet-loving girlfriend, and Xiao being forced to talk with a high-pitched voice, Xiangling teaching recipes to the grannies of the neighborhood, Keqing acting like a manager in how to go around houses and Chongyun dispensing tips on how to avoid ghosts entering people’s houses. Lumine was appointed to check the quantity of sweets in Qiqi’s basket, and she noticed a couple of times the level seemingly lowered too much. Qiqi swore she didn’t eat it, however, and no one managed to find the wrappings she probably discarded.
Each episode was followed by laughter, and they went on talking and eating until midnight. At that time, the group finally decided to disperse, with everyone returning home. The high school group of friends went back by foot all together, while Keqing came by car and accompanied both Ganyu and Venti back home. Xiao and Aether went back to the twins’ house, currently empty because their parents were on a trip, with Xiao’s motorcycle, while Lumine arranged to stay the night at Dainsleif’s place to help him tidy up.
The two were finally left alone, and Lumine couldn’t help but smile satisfied. “It was an amazing party! I had lots of fun! We should do this more often.”
“Yes, your friends are all really nice. Xiao’s are too, even if they are all a bit… extra. Maybe we could organize another party on New Year’s Eve.”
“That feels nice! We could also invite other people! Like, Xiao’s brother and his boyfriend. I heard the boyfriend is around your age.” The girl was extremely excited, her smile was so big it seemed to go from ear to ear. “Thank you, Dain. We couldn’t have made this without you offering your house.”
“It’s no big deal. As long as you’re happy, I’m willing to do anything.” Now that they were finally alone, they could be a little lovey-dovey without the risk of being at the center of attention. They wanted to leave that privilege to Xiao and Aether. The two hugged lovingly, Dainsleif softly caressing Lumine’s silky hair, and he gently kissed her forehead.
“It’s a pity though, I wanted to go trick-or-treating with you. Aether is a bully!” The girl pouted, hugging his boyfriend tighter. The blonde couldn’t help but giggle a little, his stern gaze turning softer. She was so loveable, he really wanted to protect her with his life.
“We can always go together next year. Now, won’t we recover the time we couldn’t spend together before? We will clean up tomorrow morning.” He bent down, planting a kiss on his girlfriend’s lips. The girl giggled excitedly, holding his lovely vampire’s hand and starting to drag him towards the bedroom.
“Ehe, I approve! Halloween night is not over yet, the best treats come now~”