The return trip home was the same as arriving in the capital.
But now, Midori-kun opened the portals and landed right outside their brand-new palace.
"I don't get it," Konrad mumbled as they entered his lavish home. "Wasn't this a short-range spell? No, never mind that. But if you can portal back and forth across the entire country—"
"Why do we bother Lily-chi with it all the time?" Yuki finished the question for him.
He only had to nod.
"Well, I extended my portals' limits," the former Demon Lord explained. "But they still exist. Like, casting takes about a minute, and I can only target places I have already visited before."
"Meanwhile, I can—whoosh—teleport anywhere, anytime, immediately."
And what better way to illustrate the point than having his first wife appear out of the blue?
"Otsukaresama, Lilisuke-san," the little emo greeted her without batting an eye. "Think Lu calls it a day now? Wanna spend some time with Kon-chan again—it has been some time."
Hmm, yeah. It was, in fact.
And ever since he had returned from the Zone, all he did was sleep and attend—
Whatever this royal ball thing was.
Which also meant—
"I should start working in earnest," Konrad grunted, heading towards his office.
Or—that was his intention, but um—was he already lost?
"Aww, come on," Yuki pouted. "Eyna-san can handle most of the things, right? Right?! We couldn't even play since you came home, and—look, I can do some magic now."
She summoned sparks and an unstable, flashing ball of light, but ran out of steam fast.
"Ah, I was actually wondering about that," he noted, too. "Did they take you to fight as well?!"
"Only as a support," Lily, Maou Midori, and Yuki-san all replied in unison.
Although the tone was rather different.
"How did you even learn magic this fast?" Konrad scowled, looking them over one by one.
"I don't know," Yuki said, shrugging. "Since Lu-san messed with my memories, kinda thought I could cast stuff from the start, but—nope. And, uh, turns out, I was inefficient with stuff."
"She does have some of my memories, but not my magic essence," the demoness smirked.
"Makes sense," he nodded. "She has all the mana in the world and tends to brute-force her spells. Even I couldn't pull those off, although—"
Hmm, now that he thought about it, with this enormous pool he had?
'Once you filled it up,' Paula reminded him. 'Because you're running on fumes right now.'
"I wouldn't call eight hundred mana fumes exactly," Konrad snapped back. Which, yeah. He might've made the others scowl. "Sorry, answered to telepathy."
"That Paula gal?" Lily asked, raising an eyebrow. "I'm starting to be jealous."
"W-wait," Yuki mumbled, too. "You have eight hundred mana? All at once?!"
Should he have told them about the most recent changes?
"How much do you have?" he asked instead, crossing his arms.
"Um, well," the emo girl said, fiddling with her dark hair. "That light show was all I could do right now. B-but Midori-kun says I could hold up to, like, a hundred mana at once."
"She's improving fast," the ex-Demon Lord confirmed. "But not fast enough."
It was more than what Konrad started with a few months back, but—
"Why do you bring her to the battlefield, then?!"
"I'm great at begging," Yuki-chan claimed with a wide grin.
Which—okay. As cute as she looked now, he could understand. But—
"Not so great with mana recovery," Midori-kun grunted, taking off his coat.
"But she does help out a little as support," Lily added, ruffling the girl's already messy hair.
"Oh, and I help Eyna-san, too, when she asks," Yuki-san claimed. "And also teaching Dmitry the Kasserlani language. And I can recover my mana my way, thank you," she ended with a pout.
Hmm. That was all nice, but—why was she trying so hard?
"Yeah, your way," the ex-Demon Lord groaned. "As I've said, you can't start playing music in the middle of a battlefield. And your rate is slow, even with the lute, so—"
"Well, duh," Yuki-san snapped back. "Because the lute's boring. And it's better to play in a band."
Oh. So that's what she meant by playing.
Fair enough.
If it weren't for her, Konrad could never have recovered his essence in Tokyo, either.
"Kon-chan and I had this spark going on, you know?" she claimed. "I bet if we sat down and played some cool rock together, I'd be back to full in a minute."
"Oh?" Lily crossed her arms as well. "A spark, you say?"
"As if you weren't there," Konrad scoffed. "Well, a version of you, anyway."
Heck, in a sense, Yuki-san was also one of Lily's many alter egos.
But the original seemed to be the most jealous of them all—
Especially for someone who even told him to have a harem for fun.
"And when was the last time you spent a private moment with this version of me?" the demoness pouted. "Between saving the world and nuking the heavens, you're always busy."
Ugh. Good thing Gabrielle didn't return with them yet, but—
"Please don't bring that up," Konrad pleaded. "And yes, I am busy. Or at least I should be. But considering that I must take responsibility for you, this town, its people, and the duchy—"
When was the last time he acted in his actual role and rank?
Wait. Did he ever?
All he had done was dump his work on poor Eyna and the rest.
'That said, you weren't exactly slacking, either,' Paula noted. 'And taking up that weird little girl on her offer and play—it'd both help you relax and recharge this vast mana pool, no?'
Well, thinking of it like that—
When was the last time he actually relaxed?
He dragged that rebuilt guitar around everywhere, even to the Zone, but—
Did he play it, like, two or three times at most?
"Eyna," he sighed, slouching. "What's the most urgent, most important task for me as the Duke of Halaima?"
The purple-eyed beauty blinked, wringing her hands.
"W-well, it'd be to sort out our finances, but I can handle that," she mumbled, not too convincing. "We should also start planning for next year now, if we were to restart agriculture."
Okay, yeah. Those were actually important.
And with his logistical background, they were right up his alley, too. But since the ball didn't last all day, and he did have to fight poor Zoltan and handle all the small talk—
"Fine. Think I deserve a little rest, and I could do with recharging my essence, too," he said.
And that was all it took for Yuki's expression to brighten.
"No idea where my guitar is, though," Konrad grunted. "But if you find it and take it to—uh, anywhere it's appropriate? We could play a bit before I look over those finances."
"Hai, hai," the girl yelled, skipping past him. "I'll bring it in a minute. Anywhere's fine."
And while she disappeared, he squeezed Lily's arm, too.
"You've also been working hard," he whispered. "Go, rest some. And if I finish with those numbers before the sun rises—um. Would you show me around in my new bedroom?"
"Oh?" the demoness grinned, squeezing his hand back. "I can arrange that."