Chapter 185: One of my body doubles

“Raul, drink this!”

I tossed a bottle of potion to Raul after strengthening him through Villager Enhancement.

“*Glug glug* Ha! This is great. All my wounds vanished just like that.”

As soon as Raul found an opening, he drank the potion and all his wounds from before vanished.

“You’ll make me know the taste of defeat? Do you still not realize the gap between our strength?”

“You’re the one who doesn’t realize. Can’t you see I’m so much stronger than before!?”

“Tch…how did…”

“Enough talk, I want to beat you up right away, you shitty father!”

Probably mindful of Villager Enhancement’s time limit, Raul said so and then kicked the ground.

For a moment there, I lost sight of him. When I next saw him, he had closed the gap with father already.

“Wha…”

“Careless! This ends now!”

*gakiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii!*

Sword clashed against sword, producing a loud metallic, clanging sound.

Father was having a hard time defending against Raul’s slashes, and eventually, Raul’s overwhelming power caused father to rise to the air.

“Such power…!?”

“Oraaaaaaaaaaa!”

“––!?”

Father was able to do a safe landing, but the moment he did so, Raul has already approached to follow up.

“––!”

“What’s wrong, father!? Is that all you can do!?”

As to be expected of doubling Raul’s strength, he not only closed the gap in power between them, he was even overwhelming father.

“This is stupid…how can I…”

“Ora, ora, oraaaa!”

Upon seeing Raul’s drive and terrifying strength as well as father being pushed back in a duel, the soldiers around them unintentionally stopped fighting and watched.

“O-oi, why is Raul-sama…?”

“More importantly, look, Edel-sama’s struggling against him…”

“T-this is just a joke, right…?”

Unfortunately, because Raul had a time limit, that meant that even at this point, victory wasn’t guaranteed. That said, if things kept going like this, he should be able to defeat father before that deadline.

But then…

“…huh?”

There was a suddenly an impact in my back.

Wondering what could have caused it, I nervously turned around. There, I saw the last of my father’s generals.

This rather small man had stabbed me in the back with a dagger.

“…the reason why Raul-sama is suddenly this strong…is you, Luke-sama…if so, we should…deal with you first…”

This man with a peculiar way of talking was named Pipanell.

His specialty was assassination through excellent covert action. He was capable of completely erasing his own presence, just like what he did now.

By sneaking into enemy lines and killing the enemy’s commanders without anyone noticing, he could win a war all by himself.

“…this dagger…is laced with poison…in 10 seconds…you won’t be able to move…at all…”

“So, it was you. No wonder I didn’t sense anything even when you were near. My map was showing you as a red dot this whole time though.”

“…? Why…why are you so calm…after being stabbed…? No, before that…why aren’t you bleeding…?”

“Oh, that’s because this is a body double.”

“Wh…”

While in this body, I didn’t really feel pain and poison didn’t have much effect if any at all.

A body double would vanish after receiving a certain amount of damage, but it didn’t seem like I’ve crossed that threshold just yet.

“You’re using the term…body double…in a strange way…”

“You bastard! What have you done to Luke-samaaaa!”

“Don’t expect mercyyyyyyy!”

“–––!?”

My consciousness then returned to my real body.

From this new vantage point, I saw the nearby villagers getting furious and attacking Pipanell.

“Ahh, no, I’m alright though…?”

I waved my hand and tried to say I was perfectly fine, but maybe due to being blinded by rage, none of them noticed me.

“Luke-sama! Hurry, drink this potion!”

“Don’t panic, I’m fine. That was just one of my body doubles.”

In no time at all, the villagers managed to pin down Pipanell and proceeded to beat him up.

“…more importantly, how is the battle between Raul and father going?”