Dismissed
"So. What is it you wanted to say."
Evan glanced sideways at the heroines' faces.
Guilt sat heavy on every one of them. The moment their eyes met his, they flinched — the exact reaction of people caught red-handed.
That, and the whole atmosphere hanging over the room. From those alone, Evan already knew what this was about.
So the time has come.
They were planning to leave the party.
Well, of course they were. He'd been waiting for exactly this. Common sense said a party this broken couldn't keep running. Wouldn't have been strange at all if it had fallen apart ages ago. Honestly, the fact they'd made it this far was the real miracle.
At last, with a lightened heart, Evan waited for whatever they were about to say next.
"What we wanted to tell you is… ahem…"
"W-well, that is…"
"…"
But why were they being so painfully awkward about it?
Apparently the guilt was real enough that none of them could quite bring themselves to open their mouths. While Evan sat in silence waiting, Judy was the first to break.
"…Honestly, I'm disappointed."
"What?"
"I-I mean, of course my feelings would cool off! It's weird that you'd enjoy something that filthy — it's not like you at all…"
Evan's face said, plain as day: What kind of brand-new bullshit is this?
Judy appended the rest in a voice that shrank smaller and smaller.
"We've known each other for over ten years. All that time we spent together, I thought well of you, Evan… but this is just not okay…"
She kept rubbing her arms as if the words themselves made her uncomfortable. But her voice never stopped. Judy locked eyes with him and started picking through her grievances one by one.
And the rest of the heroines didn't just sit there either. Each of them chimed in, piling weight onto Judy's words.
"H-hem. Those back-alley women are… pretty rough, you know… And who knows? Maybe the reason you've been so twisted lately is because of them."
"I agree. Evan — they say a healthy mind makes a healthy body, do they not? You seem to have been corroded by addiction to a dissolute lifestyle. For your own sake, it would be best if you exercised some restraint for a while."
"Th-that's right! This is morally wrong!"
What was the real reason for their disappointment? Sure, there was the moral angle they kept citing. But the biggest share of it was pure feminine pride.
Judy, Chloe, Illinet, Cecilia.
On the surface they called themselves Evan's friends — but that didn't mean there was no romantic feeling mixed in. And every time Evan treated them well, they felt happiness… and, at the same time, a swelling of self-love.
I'm a woman of this caliber. I'm special enough to deserve this kind of precious treatment.
Evan's continuous kindness had inflated that self-love until it scraped the sky — past self-esteem, all the way into outright vanity.
And in the end, Evan had gone and thrown himself into other women's arms.
"There are other women out there… so why of all people…"
"Um… maybe next time you could take an interest in cleaner girls? There are women everywhere around you, Evan…!"
"Th-that's what I'm saying! What matters in love is the relationship you have with the other person!"
He left us sitting here and went to bed with cheap whores who sell themselves for a handful of coins?
Why? What was missing? Was my charm less than a prostitute's?
The same question took root in every one of their hearts. Jealousy, inferiority, every ugly desire imaginable tangled together until it felt like their entire lives as women were being denied.
Of course, none of them wanted to show it. Admitting defeat was something their pride would never allow.
"Evan…? You understand what we're saying, right?"
"…Wow."
After scratching his head for a long moment, Evan stood up from his seat. Then, in a voice thick with pure disbelief, he muttered:
"Setting the disappointment aside — what exactly gives any of you the right to lecture me like this?"
They'd fully expected Evan to fold a little, to give them some ground. Hearing the opposite left the heroines stunned speechless.
"Let's be real. You lot have been spreading your legs for every kind of man out there too, haven't you? So when you do it, it's romance — and when I do it, it's cheating? Is that the logic?"
"Th-that's not what we meant!"
"We're guilty of that too, but! The degree is completely different!"
The heroines erupted in protest all at once.
"At least we never paid for sex or sold our bodies for money!"
"And at our age, still being a virgin would be the weirder thing, wouldn't it? W-we didn't cheat on anyone! We're allowed to sleep with men!"
"We're women who want to be loved by someone too!"
"Th-that's right! We're women too!"
Evan looked at the lot of them — yapping and squawking in unison — with pure contempt. Then he clamped a hand over his mouth like he was fighting down a wave of vomit.
"Ugh…!"
Even through that, the heroines' defenses kept coming. Those nauseating voices drilled into Evan's ears and echoed there.
Someone once said it: no matter how hard you wash a rag, it never becomes a towel.
Evan took that nameless sage's words to heart and locked them away in his chest.
"We're not asking for an apology! We're just saying don't go sulking!"
"Like Judy said — the part that bothers us is this. You did wrong too, so stop treating only us like the sinners."
They'd been walking on eggshells because their own consciences were pricking them. When had he ever treated them like sinners?
The sheer shamelessness of it left Evan with nothing to say.
"Haa."
He squeezed his eyes shut for a moment and dragged in a breath. Then he raked his fingers roughly through his hair, stopped mid-scratch, and rose to his feet.
"All of you shut the hell up, you filthy whores."
"Wh-what?!"
The thick curse twisted the heroines' faces.
"D-did he just… whore…?"
"D-did you just call us whores?!"
An uproar burst from their mouths at once. Evan answered them in a low, quiet voice.
"I said shut up. Your mouths reek of a chicken coop."
"Wha…"
"Your lower holes might be wide open, but at least keep the upper ones closed. Got so used to flapping your holes around that you can't stop, is that it?"
Finished, Evan swept his gaze over the women and let out a hollow laugh.
"And what? You're disappointed I played around with prostitutes? You absolute lunatics. You're no different from prostitutes yourselves — what is this, self-hatred of your own kind?"
The shock was so far past the limit that Judy looked half-soulless. She forced her mouth open and stammered:
"W-what did we even do!"
"Just a friendly tip — don't go into acting. If you pick that career path, you won't make a single coin and you'll ruin your whole life."
"Wh-what?!"
"I can see right through you. You'd have better luck covering the sky with the palm of your hand."
Judy went mute as a honey-stuffed mute in an instant. Chloe picked up right where she left off.
"Ha! I must have completely misjudged you, Evan! I honestly thought of you as a reliable friend — I'm really disappointed!"
"Hey, Chloe. Sorry to cut in, but wipe the hair off the corner of your mouth before you talk. What the hell kind of hair is that, anyway?"
"…?!"
The bold Chloe clamped her mouth shut just as fast. Leaving her pawing at her lips, Evan turned his eyes to Illinet and Cecilia.
"Cecilia, stop stealing food already. What are you, a beggar?"
"Wh-what?"
"The emergency rations I kept in my pack. Did you think I wouldn't notice whose stomach they disappeared into? And Illinet."
"Me…?"
"If you're going to fuck, do it in a damn inn room. Mid-sparring at the training grounds, swinging a sword one second and getting railed the next. Your moaning is so loud I can't sleep."
"I-I have no idea what you're talking about…"
"And why do you never clean up after yourselves? The people who show up for morning training nearly have heart attacks."
"…"
Not a single one of them could find another word.
Out of guilt? No — out of rage.
Judy's hands shook with fury before she finally managed to speak.
"…We'll let that slide. But what we're taking issue with is your attitude."
"My attitude?"
"Yeah! You completely ignore us whenever we ask for something! One little mistake and you crush us into the dirt! If that isn't a sign of rebellion, then what is it? You're doing it on purpose because you're bitter at us!"
It was a story that made no sense whatsoever.
Evan had simply been acting according to his own nature. He hadn't particularly scolded these women or vented anger at them. The only difference was that the original Evan had been absurdly soft — soft enough that this shift felt, to them, like a catastrophic change worth making a whole issue over.
"We're sick of it. So we talked it over among ourselves, okay? Want to know what we decided?"
Judy seized the moment and launched a coordinated assault.
"We said we can't take it anymore. If you keep acting like this, we're not just going to sit still either."
Without missing a beat, she dropped the finishing blow.
"Bottom line — we're leaving this party. You thought you could just treat us like suckers forever? Sorry about that!"
Judy's voice began to tremble. Anger and guilt tangled together in it. And it wasn't just her — the other three were the same. Every one of them was hoping Evan would show them mercy.
If the conversation went that way, they were fully prepared to forgive him. Whatever the reasons, they weren't exactly standing on high ground themselves.
"…Evan. I hope you'll understand how we feel."
Unlike the aggressive Judy, Chloe only showed a mild discontent.
"I'm not saying we're leaving this very moment… Evan… if you start treating us well again, we can reconsider…"
Illinet said it while looking away, guilt written all over her.
"R-right…"
Cecilia twisted her body back and forth like a dog that desperately needed to go.
Even Judy, belatedly coming to her senses, added a touch of apology to her voice.
"A-ahem. Anyway, that's how it is. Nothing's completely decided yet, so don't get too sad about it."
Hesitant, yet desperately trying to persuade him — that was the women.
Evan looked them over once. Then, in a thoroughly annoyed tone, he said:
"Nah. Just leave as you are."
"…? Huh?"
"What did you just…?"
"Don't worry about my feelings. Go. I don't care. This party was a lost cause anyway — splitting up like this is better for everyone."
Something unnameable settled on their faces. Question marks. Just stiff faces full of nothing but questions.
This was not the reaction they had expected. A development that had flown completely off the map of their predictions.
If this had been the Evan they thought they knew, he would have done one of these things:
Sobbed and clung to them, begging them not to go.
Or flared up in a blaze of anger, demanding what the hell they were talking about.
Or, failing both of those, given up in quiet resignation. Any of those would have been actions born of affection for them.
The Evan standing here now was different.
Not a shred of affection in his tone, and his gaze was endlessly light — the way you'd look at a complete stranger. No: the way you'd look at some random person walking down the street, and feel absolutely nothing.
"Alright then. Our party's hereby disbanded. That's all — dismissed."
Evan clapped his hands once and stood up from his seat.
"W-wait! Where are you going!"
"Evan! Are you serious?!"
He offered a farewell to the women still reeling from the shock.
Why was it, he wondered — that as he walked away, his steps felt so light.