Chapter 31 - Rumors Of A Defect

A few days later, on the 4th of January, in Year 711 of the 50th General Calendar Layla celebrated her tenth birthday. As the daughter of a grand duke, her birthday celebration was obviously very lavish with hundreds of guests in attendance.

After the celebration party ended, Layla had her magic blooming. She did not know when it started, all she remembered was speaking to her father when she suddenly noticed her magic being unstable. Before she could say anything about it, she lost consciousness.

When she woke up, she was on her bed in her room, her mother was sitting beside it, having fallen asleep while watching her. She felt very uncomfortable lying down so she sat up, only to feel more weight on her shoulders than usual.

She looked back to see a pair of jet-black wings sticking out of her back. It was then she remembered the reason she collapsed in the first place. Checking her magic, she discovered that the amount she possessed had almost tripled and her manipulation was smoother than before.

The magic she used was naturally sensed by her mother, which woke her up. Her mother first of all checked her body worriedly and even used multiple scanning magic to make sure that she was alright before hugging her in relief.

Her mother's worry was natural as there have been cases of devils losing their lives or gaining defects after their magic blooming. Apparently, it was not normal to lose consciousness and when she did, her parents were increasingly worried for her. Seeing her mother's face full of relief instead of her usual stern expression brought a smile to Layla's face.

'It'd be nice if she's always like this, too bad she'd probably go back to being strict by tomorrow.'

When her father returned, he was visibly happy to see she was awake and without any problems, he then decided she should begin training to control her increased magic so she does not accidentally lose control when she had to use magic at a crucial time.

Layla naturally agreed with this.

After having a bath and freshening up herself she suggested to her parents that she should begin absorbing magic energy cores to improve her strength after her magic manipulation training.

Absorbing energy cores is one of the most widely known ways of improving ones strength and increasing in realm/level of existence.

When an energy core is absorbed, part of the energy contained is used in strengthening ones physical body before increasing their energy level, except in some cases where one might have a special physique or a racial trait that makes their energy absorption occur differently.

In addition, when absorbing energy cores, one must be careful not to absorb too much or absorb energy from a core that is above their realm or strength by a large margin.

If one is in the inferior stage of the master realm, it is advisable to absorb only cores of the inferior, intermediate and superior stage of the master realm. Absorbing cores of a higher realm come with a fixed 50% chance of imploding due to the difference in energy levels. This chance increases as the stage increases so it is advisable to only absorb cores up to two stages above them, anything other than that is simply suicide.

If someone in the master realm absorbs legendary cores carelessly, it would simply result in that persons body being unable to take it and there are various consequences.

One might have a great decrease in strength by a few stages or entire realms, some might loose the ability to absorb energy for a period of time or for life and worst case scenario, instant death.

After an increase in stage or realm, ones energies are temporarily in a state of instability. Thus, it is advisable for one to take a break from absorbing energy cores for a while and stabilize their strength. Although there are various ways to do this, the best is simply through fights or battles.

Fights or battles are also ways to increase ones level of existence. All beings have energy cores within them, it can be in many forms, like the 'dragon heart' of a dragon or the 'divine spark' of a god.

Upon defeating and killing an enemy in battle, a percentage of the energy in the defeated's energy core is passively absorbed by the one who defeated them. The percentage varies depending on various circumstances including racial traits, use of artifacts or magic tools, the area or location of the fight can also affect the percentage of energy absorbed.

As Layla recalled this information, she felt joy thinking about how she was finally going to become stronger again.

"Speaking of becoming stronger, maybe I'd challenge Arthur this time, I should be able to win without running out of energy."

As she said that, the faces of her parents clouded instantly. Noticing this she asked,

"What's wrong, did anything happen?"

After a few seconds of deliberation, her father finally spoke.

"Layla, have you looked at your phone since you woke up?"

"Huh? Come to think of it I haven't."

Picking up her phone, she switched it on to see various unread messages, more so than she expected, however the real surprise was the date.

"Haaaa! It's been three days?! How the hell did I sleep so long?!"

As she was clearing up most of the unwanted messages, she discovered two links that caught her eyes. They were both news headlines about Arthur. Opening them, she could not believe what she was seeing.

"Prince Arthur's magic blooming unsuccessful - is our dear prince going to be stuck in the master realm forever?"

"Prince Arthur's defect - still unable to use energies after tenth birthday."

When she saw this her first reaction to question its authenticity, she even asked her dad when the royals were going to take action against who started spreading this news, however her Father's reply wasn't what she expected.

"Firstly, it is true that the prince is unable to use his energy even after the time for his magic blooming, I confirmed this personally.

Secondly, the one who spread the news was the prince himself."

Hearing her Father's reply, Layla was shocked for a moment, the next, she stood up and left the house, going straight to the castle using her family's teleportation gate that had direct access to the castle.

Although it was only supposed to be used in emergencies, her father had already told the guards to let her pass as he predicted she would immediately go to the castle to speak to Arthur.

Arriving at the castle, the knights guarding the teleportation gate let her through as they were already familiar with her and have been ordered by Arthur to allow her go wherever she wants within the castle, as far as it was not out of bounds.

Confirming that Arthur was indeed in his southeastern tower, she went there and asked the servants of his location.

The servants informed her that he was in the training room on the fifth floor. Each tower has ten floors with various facilities on each floor for the use of the royal living there.

When she got there, she opened the door and was about to speak however, the sight she encountered left her dumbfounded.

The room was big; it had spatial expansion magic casted on it to make it 5 times larger than it looks. Normally, there should be a collection of hundreds of artifacts on the walls alongside various weapons of exceptional quality. The floor was covered with a sturdy material, which was also safe enough to prevent Injuries from falls during spars.

That was how the room was supposed to be, however what she saw now was different.

There was sand on the floor, an amount that should only be found on beaches, there was also a net installed in the middle. The actions of the people in the room were far from her expectations.

To sum it up, they were playing beach volleyball.

Arthur, Cattleya, Creuserey, Hades, Inglis, Diablo. The referee was Aurora.

It would be fine if it was normal beach volleyball, however they were infusing mana into the ball that was obviously an artifact. The effect of this was simple; it made the ball stronger, faster and more lethal. She was sure she would be dead if it accidentally hit her.

It was a sight that she never expected to see, the sight of the great Devil king Diablo, the one who's name invoked fear in the hearts of many, was simply playing volleyball with his family like any normal human on a day off from work would.

Naturally, they all noticed her long before she entered so servants had already been instructed to hospitable with her. She just couldn't comprehend the sight in front of her so she just sat down to cool her head with the cold drinks the servants brought as she watched all of them jump up and sometimes fly around with their wings.

'Wait. All of them?'

It was then she realized that Arthur was also flying with wings.

'So the rumor was a lie?'

By the time she was done questioning herself, they were already finished with their game.

"Layla!"

She was brought out of her sea of thoughts when she heard her name being called out loud.

The one who did so, picked her up and pulled her onto the sand before she could react.

Sighing to herself, she sat down on the sand and spoke to Arthur,

"Explanation, about everything."

"Context?"

She held up her phone sand showed him the news headlines about his magic blooming failure.

Arthur, realizing she was serious, decided to give her the explanation she seeks.

"So where do we start, how bout I just recount everything that happened from that night?"