Chapter 1080: Target Practice

Layla Eryrth, Nicole Harper, and Esna Wood were seated around a table, floating screens positioned in front of each of them as they discussed an urgent issue regarding the management of the territories currently controlled by Layla and Nicole.

Several decades prior, Esna had officially received a nobility title within the Devildom. She was merely a Baroness, the lowest possible title within the Devildom’s nobility, but the fact that she, a non-devil, had received a title in the first place was already enough to draw the attention of many nobles.

She was formally a vassal to Layla, more precisely to the Eryrth Grand Duchy that Layla was from, and when granting her the title, Diablo had explicitly stated that it was because she was essentially Layla’s administrative assistant that she was receiving said title.

She’d pretty much settled into that role over the past few decades, and today, once again, the trio were meeting to discuss important matters when suddenly Esna sensed a strange flow of magic power and raised her head, her eyes immediately tracing the source back to Layla.

Layla had also noticed that flow of magic power, and her eyes moved away from the floating screens in front of her and towards her neck, where the actual source of that magic power was located.

Her eyes widened in shock as she reached into her shirt and pulled out something that she’d worn almost every day for decades now: a necklace, which had suddenly begun to resonate while directing her towards a certain location.

"No fucking way...!"

Just as Layla muttered those words, the space within the room suddenly warped as a Cosmic Gate broke open, and a familiar young-looking man hopped out with a bright smile on his face.

"What’s up, guys?!"

In that same instant, Layla’s right hand moved, and creation law energy rapidly condensed into the form of a shotgun, which she grabbed without hesitation before pulling the trigger and unleashing a condensed bolt of Creation Law energy powerful enough to smoke out an average-sized star.

Her target’s expression immediately changed when he saw the sudden bolt of raw energy flying straight towards him, and he quickly raised one hand in front of his chest to block the incoming attack.

The bolt collided with his hand, its impact sending him flying backwards across the room, with his body crashing into a nearby table and knocking it over.

"What was th—!"

Before he could finish complaining, a second bolt of creation law energy was already flying towards his head, leaving him with barely enough time to react before it slammed straight into his forehead and sent him crashing into the wall.

"Ow! That hur...t?"

His words suddenly trailed off midway, and after a moment, he blinked in confusion as he reconsidered what he’d just said.

"Wait, that didn’t actually hurt."

He rubbed his forehead with one hand before looking down at it, only to see the residual creation law energy dispersing from his skin without having actually affected him in any meaningful way.

He was still staring at the energy around his hand when a third bolt of creation law energy suddenly slammed directly into his forehead, knocking him completely off his feet and sending him crashing down onto the floor.

The entire sequence of Layla’s actions had happened so suddenly and abruptly that the other two women in the room were actually more surprised by Layla’s reaction than they were by the sudden appearance of the young man himself.

Layla took a deep breath, then exhaled heavily, lowering her hand and placing the shotgun on the table before moving her hand back to the floating screen in front of her, a stylus appearing between her fingers as she said to the other two women, "Ignore that. Let’s focus on drafting the galactic budget."

She immediately began drawing lines across the screen, putting down figures as she read from the tax report displayed on another floating screen beside her.

While she did this, Arthur finally got up from his seat, groaning in pain as he glared at her.

"What the hell?! Why is everyone exerting so much violence towards me today?!"

Instead of responding to his question, Layla simply looked up from her floating screen, blinked as she looked around, and then asked, "Did I leave the window open? Why did such a loud buzzing fly get in here?"

At her reaction, Esna couldn’t hold it anymore and burst out laughing, while Nicole silently pushed her chair back, got up, and walked all the way towards Arthur before extending her hand to help him up.

"Ah, finally! Someone extending simple courtesy."

He grabbed her hand, and Nicole pulled him up, but before Arthur could even say a word of thanks, she let go of his hand, her fingers curling into a fist, and Arthur’s eyes widened a split-second before said fist crashed right into his stomach.

The impact made him keel over as he dropped down to his knees while holding his stomach.

Nicole then pulled back her hand, moving her fingers lightly in the air with a faint frown before reaching out and grabbing Arthur by the head and pulling him into a hug.

Seeing Nicole’s actions, Layla couldn’t afford to continue ignoring Arthur’s existence as she’d wanted to. She sighed, let go of her stylus, allowing it to fall onto the table before turning towards him with narrowed eyes.

"So, is this going to be a thing?" she asked, barely concealing the annoyance in her voice. "You vanish for several decades and just reappear all of a sudden?"

To this, Arthur replied, "Trust me, Layla, when I say that I’m the one who’s against this being a thing the most."

He got up to his feet, wrapping his arms around Nicole and placing his chin on her shoulder as he looked towards Layla and said, "Do you have any idea just how boring the past hundred years were for me? I was barely even in my own mind, and I mean that literally.

I was moving on autopilot, doing nothing but comprehending universal laws, absorbing cosmic energy, comprehending universal laws, absorbing cosmic energy, over and over and over again for an entire fucking century. You think I want to do that again?"

"Then why the hell did you do it in the first place?" Layla asked, her annoyance becoming even more apparent as she questioned his decision.

"Because it was necessary, Layla," Arthur calmly responded. "I needed to boost my strength by an immense margin while not under any form of threat to my life, so I had to make the people who would be a threat to my life think I was already a threat that had been eliminated.

That way, they wouldn’t bother searching for me, and as a plus, I had them all consume their forces in a war started by their attempt to eliminate me, which would also grant me..."

Arthur stopped for a moment, and when he continued speaking, the tone of his voice completely changed into something deeper and colder as he added, "the moral justification to completely erase all of them from existence in retaliation."

All three women who heard his voice flinched, and noticing their reactions, Arthur quickly dialled back on the coldness in his voice, raising his hand to lightly pat Nicole’s back before pulling away and leaning in for a kiss.

"All right, both of you should get a room," Esna immediately said with a frown.

Arthur chuckled at her words, looking towards her as he responded, "We will, soon enough."

Nicole silently pinched his ear and twisted it while pulling him down, and Arthur laughed lightly at her action.

However, when she whispered something into his ear, his eyes widened in shock as he immediately snapped his gaze towards her, disbelief plainly written over his face.

She acted like she hadn’t said anything worth such a reaction, letting go of his ear before speaking quietly, "Ah, right. Welcome back, Arthur."

Hearing those words, Arthur blinked and then exhaled softly before nodding and responding, "Yeah, I’m back."