After Alvine's departure, it took only about thirty more seconds for Nicco and Brave's party to appear in the wild plain.
Like Alvine, they were dazed by this view and this sudden change in their environments.
"Have...Have we been easily teleported without even knowing it?" Myulan murmured in a fly voice while scrutinizing her environment.
"I don't think that's the case. This place makes me feel uncomfortable, and the atmosphere seems bland and tense. It's as if we were always underground. But yet, there is a sky above us." Vlad responds to Myulan, who is also an elf.
Naturally, she could understand what Vlad was referring to. As one of the few species that breathes magical energy with their skins, the surrounding atmosphere is one of the things they constantly feel. Therefore, they are entirely accustomed to handling the slightest change in the latter.
At the same time, Nicco advanced five meters from the group and leaned toward the ground, finally noticing the message Alvine had left behind him.
[Be careful with the sky, Henia!]
Seeing these words written in the primordial language, Nicco guessed that this short message could only come from his master. But what she didn't understand was the strange name he had used to address them.
"Sigh, he really didn't dig his head to find a nickname. Who would have thought he would use the first syllable of our names? Finally, it's not a bad thing in itself." She murmured as she erased Alvine's words and looked into the sky with her magical perception.
"Follow me." The next moment, she ordered by floating skillfully in the air, followed by others who no longer put her orders in doubt.
Throughout the journey, Brave, Elaydja, and Zanac followed them mysteriously without saying a word while keeping a reasonable distance between them, perhaps not to sow discord or perhaps for fear of being caught off guard by Nicco.
But despite all the risks they took, the small group did not hesitate for a second to follow their enemies with fearless eyes and objectives that only they knew, except Serena, who had decided to keep quiet about it.
Just like with the Alvine arrow, when the small group reached a height of five hundred meters, they all disappeared into the air!
-Bang!!!
And above the artificial sky, Nicco and the others were caught off guard when they noticed Alvine being propelled by an enemy he had been facing for a few minutes already.
"Don't get close!" Alvine shouted these words while wiping the little trickle of blood on his lips.
Then, hearing these words from him, the others stopped and looked in front of them, more precisely at the person who had just sent Alvine to waltz by fifty meters.
"Huh?! Is it imitations?!" Fyora stammered to herself when she saw ten silhouettes resembling traits of their lord.
Whether it was the clothes that Alvine wore, the weapons he used, and even worse, the ten silhouettes were in the same ranks as him and had almost all his skills, including his unique skills and the affinities he mastered!
"No, not necessarily, they are... Doppelgängers!" Nicco murmured heavily with incredulous eyes.
"W-What?!"
"Sigh, guardian monsters can take the appearance, skills, and ranks of their invaders. The more powerful their targets, the more powerful they will become too. But I don't understand why such monsters supposed to be fairytale existences exist here?" She continued with the rest of her explanations.
"If...if that's the case, then wouldn't it be better to go and help him? If these...things take our appearance, the battle will only be easier for our lord, am I wrong?" Barade murmured while watching his lord face the ten clones with dismay.
"Sigh, it's not so simple; as long as the person they have taken appearance is stronger than his enemies, they will not bother to change their appearance. And on the other hand, if only one person joins the battle, there will be ten other Doppelgängers with the same power as those who face the master.
-And the worst, if I try to help him, these bastards will not only take my appearance and copy my skills their numbers will also increase to twenty. And if this happens, the situation will become catastrophic!" Nicco murmured as he touched the translucent barrier that separated them from Alvine.
The barrier did not prevent them from entering but instead prevented Alvine from turning around to escape.
As for the others, after hearing Nicco's explanations, no one could hide their concern.
"Does this...mean that we will leave Lord Alvine to his fate?" Vlad whispered these words.
"Heh, it's not vulgar Doppelgängers who could beat my master. In the end, no matter the result, the master will not die, as long as the lord is alive." Nicco whispered her last sentence while watching the battle between Alvine and the ten Doppelgängers.
At the same time, the ten created more than fifty pearls with different affinities and bombed Alvine with them.
Afterward, seeing their hostility towards him, Alvine's sharp eyes narrowed in their orbits as a mischievous smile emerged on his lips.
The next moment, just before the pearls reached his body, he created a shield of black flames around his body.
-BANG!! Booom-Bomm!!
As soon as the pearls touched his blaze shield, they exploded, trying to reach him.
"Haha, as expected of my own power, even if their power remains weak compared to mine, these pearls of affinity remain destructive spells!" Alvine's carefree tone resounded inside his flames.
Just like that, the Doppelgängers continued their successive assaults without giving him a break.
'Sigh, I was panicked at first, but it seems that even if they master about the same affinities and spells as me, they remain limited in terms of the power they can put in their attacks. Which is an understandable thing since they don't have the same amount of energy as me.' He whispered these words to himself while continuing to wait patiently.
Unlike before, since he had entered this place, his flames have protected him from themselves without using magical energy to control or guide them. He felt like he had Kimiko that knew how to make its own decisions without needing its master's order.
After another five minutes, the Doppelgängers finally stopped flooding him with their attacks. Maybe because they realized it was unnecessary as long as Alvine remains in his flame shield, or perhaps because they were starting to run out of energy?
Finally, to check this, Alvine only had to order his flames, and they half broke the round shield into half a moon, exposing half his upper figure.
As I imagined, these Doppelgängers are only imitations; I think they are created only through arrays that allow them to maintain their existence. In any case, confirming a hypothesis is a hundred times better than referring to a simple theory.' While continuing these words, he reaches out his hand in front of him, and part of his flame landed in his hand and formed a gigantic long spear of more than twenty meters and threw it towards one of the targets that was closer to him!
-Wooooshh!!
When the doppelganger in question noticed Alvine targeted him, he moved away from him with speed worthy of itself and avoided Alvine's spear with a proud little smile on his lips!
"Huh?! But what a bastard!" Alvine squeaked his teeth when he saw his target imitate even the expression he would do in such as situation.
The next moment, he also showed the same smile as the Doppelgänger and snapped his fingers.
Following this action on his part, the spear stopped in its race and reforested the path, and targeted the Doppelgänger again!
And this time, its speed was faster than the lightning itself!
"!"
When the Doppelgänger noticed the spear flying towards him again, it tried to act accordingly, but before it even moved three steps away, it was pierced directly by a fiery spear!
"Haha, you're a fucking funniest guy. I knew that the necromancer could not be the only obstacle in my way. But, well, it will only give me more entertainment!" He said, snapping his tongue while keeping his triumphant smile on his lips.
"Well, who's a turn?" He continued by scanning his other targets.
But simultaneously, he noticed the Doppelgängers creating multilayer divine shields around them.
Seeing their actions, Alvine was not the only one finding this situation becoming more exciting; he could even feel his flames ignite more.
"Haha, you've already done enough; let me have fun too." He murmured while stopping his flames from acting on their own.
Following this, he looked at the nine other Doppelgängers in front of him, each of whom was a hundred meters from him.
[Dimensional jumps!]
He then murmured, and his silhouette flashed and appeared in the middle of the doppelgangers.
"Let me show you the difference between you all and me." He then murmured with a mischievous smile when he saw them disperse to move away from him as if he were a scourge.
[Spellcrafting: fusion of three-dimensional lock and pearls of the frost queen!]
While muttering these words, he joined his two thumbs and index fingers while closing his left eye and looking at his targets through the hole of his four connected fingers.
[One, two, three, and four!] He then continued to mumble these numbers while successively looking at one of the doppelgangers through his fingers' hole as if he were marking his targets.
After completing his preparations, the doppelgängers who had just moved away from him while keeping the same distance stopped after a hundred meters between them.
"Hehe, do you think you're safe by staying away from me? Definitely, you only know a small part of my skills. Finally, it may be time for you to take me a little more seriously! After all, I have no more time in front of me!" While muttering these words, four pearls of affinity appeared in his left palm.
And unlike other pearls of ordinary affinity, the four pearls he had just invoked were white and exuded an icy cold that could freeze divine mages without too much pain.
But the next moment, one of the four pearls disappeared in his hand.
As his targets looked around them to find out what had just happened or where one of Alvine's pearls had gone,
-Freeze!!
One of the doppelgangers on the left instantly froze in his shield!
!?!
"Haha!! You're curious, aren't you? Ah, I'm sure you're curious to the point of wetting your pants." He then grumbled these words with his eyes barely open by his wicked smile.
"Good, good. Since you're so ignorant, let me help you a little." He said, pointing his hand at one of the doppelgängers with sudden cold blood.
"You will be next!" He said then that one of the pearls disappeared around him.
Simultaneously, the pearl that had just disappeared appeared behind the doppelganger, who had just been designated by Alvine, while ignoring his multilayer barriers!
!!
-Freeze!!
Before the doppelganger acted in time, it turned into an ice sculpture!
The next moment, his other two pearls proceeded in the same way and froze their targets without them opposing any resistance.
"Well, now we have less prey to hunt. Ah, it always hurts my heart to kill creatures that look the same as me." He said, laughing like crazy.