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After shaking off the knights’ pursuit, I returned to the Capital Raum.

Using the forest terrain and Stealth Gift to my advantage, losing people who were amateurs at investigation was a trivial task.

For the time being, I decided to head to Maxwell’s mansion. I had to convey what I confirmed today.

Nicole was to be guarded in his mansion tonight. Cortina was aware of that already. Since the situation affected Michelle’s parents, there was nothing suspicious about me being protected by Maxwell, who was the biggest firepower of this city.

“Oh, welcome Nico-… Who’re you?”
“Thanks for the welcome. Mateus, was it?”

This was technically the first time I was meeting him as Reid, so I pretended that this was our first meeting.

However, Mateus was tasked with protecting the house, so it was natural that he would stay vigilant towards an unfamiliar man.

Seeing him reach for his sword, I felt like teasing him for a bit.

In the end, I didn’t get to move my body much when dealing with Lichtenberg. Even with Kufar, it was my overwhelming victory in terms of affinity.

In other words, I still haven’t had an opportunity to fully display my current power. With a tough guy like Mateus before me, I could do that just fine.

“I’m the old man’s acquaintance.”
“That’s quite a sneaky way of putting it. Even enemies are acquaintances, right?”

Instead of answering his question, I just revealed a meaningful smile. It was an attitude to get him to misunderstand it. And he easily took that bait.

He forcefully pulled out his swords and attacked me right away. The speed he put into it showed that he was not holding back at all.

However, for the current me, those slashes were awfully slow.

I dodged his left slash by shifting sideways, and hit his right slash at the blade’s base, turning it away.

In response, I sent a low kick towards his shifted leg, but he avoided it as expected.

That was within my calculations, however. Instead of killing my momentum, I swung my arm on top, did a half-rotation, and added a backward roundhouse kick.

Switching from low to high attack while his posture was broken proved to be too much for him to react to and he took the attack on.

That said, he wasn’t so bad to take that hit directly. Thus, he stopped my kick with his shoulder, and decided to charge at me. But his feet suddenly stopped.

“You really have no openings, huh, mister?”
“You did well to notice it yourself.”
“…Alright, it’s my loss. Come on, I lost again? Why is Raum so filled with monsters lately?”

Mateus, who shrugged his shoulders with those words, had a thread coiled around his neck. The thread was going over the doorknob, so if he had charged earlier, it would have strangled him.

“Still, I was charged with protection. Couldn’t you tell me your name at least?”
“Yeah, sorry for provoking you earlier. I’m Reid.”

It was just a momentary exchange, but I managed to easily ward Mateus’ heavy attack away with one hand and capture all his movements, so I was satisfied.

As expected, someone on Mateus’ level was no opponent for me in this body. Confirming that fact alone was a good enough result.

After a short while, Maxwell returned home, and after being guided by Mateus, I reported the situation about Kufar to him.

Maxwell looked a little surprised to see me return so soon, but quickly collected himself, thinking that it was possible knowing the former me, and we moved to a different room for discussion.

“So yeah, Kufar turned out to be the reincarnation of the priest from my previous life, and a Slime.”
“Wait, I am not following you, so explain it from the start.”
“Well…”

Hearing my clear and concise explanation, Maxwell criticized me. It was bothersome, but his judgment was usually correct, so I had no choice but to explain until he was satisfied.

After he heard that he had sprouted an ego under the influence of some Ley Line in the north, and remembered his previous life, Maxwell couldn’t help but be astonished.

“What, how can that be… If it was not you, I would have laughed it off as nonsense.”
“We both reincarnated similarly, but we are fundamentally different. I was reincarnated by Maria’s spell, after all.”
“In that case, he is a natural reincarnator huh. Quite a valuable existence.”
“Well, I leave how to convey this to Cortina to you old man. Also, I used the Polymorph scroll today, so tell her I can’t see her this month.”
“Oh dear… The first half aside, please do not make me say the second half. A maiden’s hysteria is beyond my hands.”
“Still, if I don’t disguise, she’ll realize what I’ve been doing as Nicole.”

If it was some unfamiliar uncle, I would have attacked in my original form. But this time it was different as the people concerned were Michelle’s parents. They both knew my face, so if I displayed strength that clearly exceeded an adult’s they would start suspecting things.

Maybe I could have deceived them with the Illusion Ring, but rescuing them was connected to the risk of physical contact, thus I chose to go with Polymorph instead.

“This happens because you use Polymorph without considering the situation…”
“Come on. Though I did think I wasted it at the end.”

As I was holding my head in regret, pain ran through my body. It was the same pain I have experienced several times over the past few months. In other words, the pain of reverting to my original body.

“Kh, I’m out of time huh… Maxwell, please…”
“Clothes? Give me a moment.”

I left the rest as I grit my teeth in pain. Hearing it, Maxwell rushed out of the reception room.

After experiencing it over and over, I could endure it without fainting, but I still couldn’t move. I asked him to get my clothes for me.

The underling solder clothes I was currently wearing were too big for my original body, so I needed to get changes. Well, it was just Maxwell, so I didn’t really mind staying buck naked either.

Just as I finished my transformation, Maxwell returned with my uniform. I languidly accepted them and started changing. Seeing how I didn’t care about being seen, Maxwell retorted in exasperation.

“Goodness, it seems your road as a lady is still long.”
“I’m not even walking that road. Leaving that aside…”

Our conversation got interrupted due to Polymorph’s time limit, but Kufar’s case was the focus now.

“There is certainly Den’s case, but I had not considered that a Slime would undergo abnormal evolution.”
“Yeah. You said there was a disguised culprit in the Adventurer’s Guild despite magic being sealed there. That was probably also Kufar.”
“So you are saying that he used the Slime’s characteristic mimicry skill to disguise himself? That is one troublesome monster when it possesses an intellect.”
“Also, the poison that Cloud found the other day…”
“Disease Slime fragment? There were no cases of it being subjugated recorded in the north.”

The rare species of Slime that appeared in the north. It had disappeared without being ever subjugated.

And then, the poison of that same monster had spread in Raum, and at the same time, Kufar, who was also a Slime, had appeared. He seemed to be trying to improve the Half-Demon’s standing in the society by summoning Devils, and there was also an organization with similar goals and methods.

It would be weirder to not make a connection among them.

In that case, Kufar’s claim that he was the same priest that became the reason of my death was quite convincing.

“So the same person that drove you to death became your enemy again? That is… Quite a strange coincidence.”
“To the point that I’m starting to think that it was part of Whitey’s scheme.”
“Incidentally, Reid, how is your equipment? A Slime should have been corrosive. It would be very sad for equipment of that quality to get ruined.”
“Everything’s fine on that end. It’s made with the Evil Dragon’s materials, and the threads are Mythril too. Corrosion can’t do anything to it. Materials play the part too, but Aste’s skill has to be praised as well. As for my katana, I’ll take care of it later.”
“So you hold the advantage over Kufar alone? Physical attacks are hardly effective against slimes as you know.”
“I have Enchant for that. The current me can deal with him easily.”

He wasn’t someone I needed to be afraid of as long as I knew his true form. As long as I didn’t get dragged into his trap, I could deal with him.

I declared fully convinced in my words.