(Every character depicted in the story below is a consenting legal adult over the age of 18)

A/N: Amadeus does NOT let sleeping dogs lie.

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Alright no, he can’t just let a comment like that pass him by. As much as Amadeus might want to leave it be, he needs to recognize now that he’s taken responsibility for this woman and her friends by reincarnating them into his peerage.

Holding up a hand to call for a pause, Amadeus shakes his head.

“Please explain that comment to me, Mira. Why do you think you have to prove yourself worthy at all?”

The tall red head immediately freezes up, her eyes widening in shock as if just realizing she’s perhaps said something she shouldn’t have. She stands stock still for a moment before recovering enough to shake her head.

“I… forget I said anything. It’s not important. Sorry.”

When she turns to begin moving towards where Zoey is currently congratulating Rumi on her successful first flight, Amadeus steps forward and reaches out, grabbing her by the wrist to stop her in her tracks.

“That’s not good enough Mira. I’m not just going to forget what you said… and it sounded very important to you. And what’s important to you is important to me. So please… explain.”

He injects a note of command into his tone at the end there, trying not to be too harsh but also making it clear he’s not just going to let her wallow in whatever the hell this is about. As far as Amadeus is concerned, none of the girls have to ‘prove’ themselves to him… he wouldn’t have even reincarnated Rumi let alone all three of them if he didn’t already consider them worthy of life and happiness. Everything else was just… additional.

Mira bites her lower lip, looking uncharacteristically nervous and uncertain. For a woman who had seemed remarkably self-possessed and confident, it’s both strange and worrying to see her acting like she is now. As well, she’s staring at where he’s holding her by the wrist rather intensely… and Amadeus can feel her pulse rapidly increasing via his grip on said wrist.

Belatedly realizing he’s probably upsetting her by being so forward and physically aggressive, Amadeus lets go of Mira’s wrist and grimaces.

“Sorry, I shouldn’t have just grabbed you like that.”

But to his surprise, Mira shakes her head and suddenly steps back towards him.

“No. I… liked it. Just goes to show… sometimes you have to be honest and stake your c-claim, huh?”

Before he can ask what Mira is talking about, her lips are on his. She has her hands on his shoulders and is kissing him… and there’s absolutely no way to describe the kiss as chaste. Indeed, it’s pretty much the exact opposite, a deep and passion-filled thing that goes on for a little bit too long before Amadeus catches up to what’s happening and grabs Mira by the hips, pulling them apart.

He’s obviously surprised, while Mira looks exceedingly pleased with herself… right up until he frowns and shakes his head.

“Mira, I don’t… I’m sorry, but I can’t return your feelings. I’m… I love Grayfia.”

Mira twitches, her face twisting for a moment before settling on mulish.

“Yeah? Well… if you want to be exclusive, maybe tell her that.”

Huh? Amadeus is so caught off guard that Mira is able to pull herself from her grasp, whirling and stomping off in a visible huff. She makes her way over to the others with her arms crossed over her chest and Zoey and Rumi are so distracted with one another that they don’t really notice the cloud over her head.

Amadeus though… Amadeus’ eyes can’t help but track to Grayfia. He’s not an idiot after all. Mira might not have explained herself fully or very coherently, but he’s more than capable of putting context clues together.

“… Grayfia.”

He says her name quietly, in an even tone, knowing full well that only she will hear him from this far across the flat top of the pyramid. Indeed, her head twitches and her eyes are upon him in an instant as she hears her name upon his lips. Amadeus gestures for her to join him and she does so immediately, appearing at his side in a burst of speed and leaving the members of Huntrix on the other side of the pyramid.

“Master? What is it?”

“Grayfia… did you tell the girls that they needed to prove themselves worthy of me… if they wanted to be with me intimately?”

No nonsense, no bullshit. Just cutting straight to the heart of the matter. Amadeus doesn’t have the patience to beat around the bush here… plus, by asking so bluntly, he’s hoping to receive an unequivocal ‘no’. After all, it’s entirely possible he’s misreading the situation here. In fact, Amadeus hopes he is.

Unfortunately, he quickly learns he isn’t. Grayfia freezes up much in the same way Mira did, looking entirely caught out. For a long moment Amadeus just stares into her eyes as she stares back at him, waiting for her response. Finally, Grayfia clasps her hands in front of her and bows her head.

“… I’ve overstepped, Master. Apologies. I should have consulted with you first before doing or saying anything. I will accept any punishment you see fit.”

Amadeus grimaces. Ugh, so it was definitely what he thought it was. Fuck, this was a messy situation. On the one hand, he loved Grayfia with all his heart. He would have preferred her to give up any servant-like titles and become Lady Valefor. But she didn’t want that. She liked being his servant. The problem, of course, was that as his servant, he had to discipline her if she did something wrong. And this here…

“Grayfia, what exactly did you do?”

“Ah… I told your new servants that if they wanted to join you in bed, they needed to prove their value beyond just becoming members of your peerage. The one called Zoey is eager to learn how to be a maid from me, while the one called Rumi was incentivized to bring us here in order to prove herself. I thought… I could tell how they’ve been salivating over you, Master. It only stood to reason that they shouldn’t be able to just expect to slip into bed with you without working for it.”

He just stares at her for a long moment, taking that in. Obviously, his first instinct is to protest that the girls haven’t been salivating over him. Unfortunately, said protest dies on his lips without ever leaving his mouth, largely because one of them literally just tried to stick her tongue down his throat. So… Grayfia certainly saw something he didn’t and if Amadeus looks back at the events of the night, he can sort of see where he was missing the obvious signs.

Okay, so maybe Huntrix was ‘salivating’ over him. There had been multiple comments about his looks, after all. And some flirting he’d definitely let go over his head. Combine all of that with the fact that he’d literally just saved Rumi’s life and given them all near-immortal lifespans as reincarnated devils and it sort of started to make sense, as much as Amadeus wished it didn’t.

Still…

“You know I don’t need any other woman besides you, right Grayfia? I don’t want you to fill my bed with a bunch of girls, whether they’re in my peerage or not. You’re all I want… all I’ve ever wanted.”

Grayfia smiles faintly at that.

“Ah… as nice as that is of you to say, it’s not entirely about your needs, Master.”

Huh?

“You have rather brusquely inserted yourself into those girls’ lives. And they are immensely attracted to you… j-just as I am. It’s no wonder, given how amazing you are. Now that they’re reincarnated devils and part of your peerage, do you really think that there’s any other man, be it on Earth or in the Underworld, who can possibly measure up to you? It wouldn’t be fair for them to pursue a relationship with anyone else aside from you. Not to themselves nor to their prospective partners.”

That was… Grayfia was being ridiculous. That definitely wasn’t true… was it? Amadeus’ mouth opens and closes a few times before he decides that he’s done enough talking about the others behind their back at this point. This sort of thing… needs to be discussed as a group.

“I’m still unhappy with you, Grayfia. There will have to be a punishment later, even if I don’t know what it will be yet. For now… follow and remain silent, alright?”

Taking him very seriously, Grayfia nods sharply and moves into place slightly behind and to his right, quiet as can be. Amadeus gives her one more look before letting out a sigh and marching forward. He crosses the top of the pyramid and makes his way over to Rumi, Zoey, and Mira, all three of whom have stopped talking by this point and been watching him and Grayfia talk from afar.

Once he’s close enough, Amadeus stops and crosses his arms over his chest.

“I have been informed by my… head maid as to what she told you three. About ‘proving yourselves’ if you wished to… bed me.”

All three members of Huntrix go bright red at that and Amadeus holds back a groan at the wide-eyed blushes. Okay yeah, they had rather quickly developed attraction towards him. But perhaps it was simply a temporary thing brought about by heightened emotions? Yes… that might be it.

Holding up a hand to forestall any comments, Amadeus continues on.

“This has been an incredibly long day and night. For you three, it’s been more than just that, in fact. Its been weeks. Emotions are heightened. Things that you might feel certain of right now, you may come to regret in the light of the morning after a solid night of sleep.”

They definitely don’t agree with that, judging by the looks on their faces. Amadeus sighs.

“If you don’t… if you three actually feel like you want to be with me in the same way Grayfia is… we can discuss it in the coming days. I’m not going to leap into anything too quickly, however. And I’m especially not going to demand that you three ‘prove’ yourselves in some way. If… if anything happens, it will be because we all wanted it to. There will be no requirements, nor any conditions you have to meet first. Do I make myself clear?”

Rumi, Zoey, and Mira all nod their heads rapidly and Amadeus wonders if maybe he was a little too sharp with them. None of them had technically done anything wrong after all, not with Grayfia quite literally egging them on in her own way. Speaking of which, Amadeus grimaces again and looks to Mira.

“Apologies for pushing you away like that, Mira. I suppose knowing what I know now, you weren’t doing anything you didn’t think I would want.”

Mira shifts from foot to foot, even as Rumi and Zoey glance at her in confusion.

“Huh? What happened?”

“What’s he talking about, Mira?”

Looking anywhere but at her two friends, Mira coughs into a fist and speaks in a quiet tone.

“… I may have kissed him a few minutes ago…”

Of course, thanks to their newly enhanced devil hearing, both Rumi and Zoey hear her muttered words loud and clear.

“WHAT?!”

“You just went for it! That’s not fair, now you’re ahead!”

Amadeus blinks as Zoey says that last part, Rumi’s flabbergasted shock barely covering it up. Then, the youngest member of Huntrix turns to him with a determined glint in her eye.

“O-One kiss! Please Lord Amadeus, j-just to make things fair, Rumi and I should also each get one kiss!”

Ah… that was… really? Amadeus stares at Zoey for a long moment before glancing at Rumi. And then Mira. And finally Grayfia. Not a single one of them speaks up to protest the idea, though to be fair, he knew Grayfia wasn’t going to break her silence so long as his previous order stayed in place.

Still… they all seemed okay with it. The only question was, was Amadeus okay with it?

… Honestly, so long as Grayfia didn’t feel betrayed (and she very clearly didn’t, given what she’d been up to behind his back) then Amadeus wouldn’t mind exploring relationships with the bright, vivacious, and sexy girls in front of him. He really was serious about wanting to make sure their feelings were real before going too far… but in a way, it made sense that Zoey and Rumi deserved the same that Mira had already taken…

“Hm. Very well then. One kiss each.”

Zoey’s entire face lights up. Rumi is a bit better, her eyes lighting up even as she mostly schools her expression. Meanwhile, Mira smiles… not seeming a little upset at all that she’s about to no longer be ‘ahead’ as Zoey put it.

All but skipping up to him, Zoey clasps her hands behind her back as she stops mere inches away. Amadeus raises a brow, only to grunt as Zoey goes up on her tip toes and plants a kiss right on his lips.

She deepens it almost immediately and though neither of them is touching the other, Amadeus also doesn’t pull away, staying still as a rock. As such, his head remaining where it is, the kiss deepens as Zoey intends and goes on for a solid ten or so seconds before she pulls back with a smile.

“Thank you, Master. I can’t wait to wear a maid uniform for you~”

Amadeus tries not to blush too hard at that, even as Rumi shyly approaches next. The purple-haired half-demon twitches and fidgets for a moment in front of him… before blushing profusely.

“Um… would you… kiss me?”

Zoey coos and Mira grunts while Amadeus processes that for a moment before nodding. Taking a step forward of his own, he reaches up and takes ahold of Rumi’s face in his hands, brushing his thumbs over her cheeks. Her breath hitches and her lips part slightly as he tilts her head back and leans in close to kiss her on the lips.

She all but melts against him, her hands coming up to caress his chest as they kiss for… perhaps a bit longer than ten seconds. It takes him a moment to realize that since he’s the one doing the kissing here, he also needs to be the one to bring it to a close.

When he finally pulls back, Rumi remains in her pose, head tilted back, eyes lidded, and lips slightly parted, for a long moment more. Then, her eyes flutter back open and she seems to realize how she must look because she quickly pulls away, blushing like mad.

Amadeus stares at all of them for a moment before letting out a sigh.

“I think… it’s definitely time to go home and for you all to get some sleep. Rumi, can you get us back do you think?”

“O-Oh! Um, yeah… yeah just give me a second, I definitely can…”

It indeed only takes her a handful of seconds before she opens up a ripple in the air that leads right back to the Huntrix Penthouse. Together, all five of them step forward, no falling or any of that necessary, and they’re back on Earth in an instant.

The portal closes, only for a voice to call out behind them.

“There you all are!”

Huh? Amadeus turns with Grayfia and Huntrix to find a complete stranger standing there in the center of the penthouse common area, having been hidden behind Rumi’s portal. She’s a beautiful, seemingly young woman with blue eyes and raven black hair done up in twin tails. She’s also wearing a very strange, very pink outfit as she stands there with a cheery grin and her fists on her hips.

Staring nonplused, Amadeus tilts his head to the side.

“Uh… who are you?”

Doing a twirl, the woman giggles girlishly.

“Why, I’m Magical Girl Levia-tan, of course! Ah, but you can call me Serafall Leviathan. And let me tell you, young man… you’re in a LOT of trouble!”

What?!

Before Amadeus can fully process that, Serafall Leviathan takes a step towards him. However, before she can take a step more… the temperature of the entire penthouse drops and Grayfia is suddenly between them.

“You will not touch my Master.”

The look on Serafall’s face as the confident smile drops away would have been comical if not for the circumstances.

“Wha- GRAYFIA?! What are you doing here?!”

Well… shit.

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