The Simulacrum

~Chapter 150~ Part 1

"… What?"

No, seriously. What even was this? What was I looking at?

Right then and there, I had one of those moments. The kind where an hour's worth of thoughts would flash through one's mind in the span of a single second, and the cognitive overload causes none of them to be properly considered or answered before a dozen more would appear. It was kind of the opposite of being stupefied, but from the outside, it looked pretty much the same; me standing there like a deer in the headlights, motionless and eyes glazed over.

I might've stayed like that for quite a bit longer, if not for a sudden battle cry shaking me out of my stupor.

"It's youuu!"

With a mighty (if slightly strained) bellow, Angie's wings and halo suddenly sprung up, dyeing the surroundings in their golden radiance. The unexpected spectacle caused the nearby guests to also awaken from their first shock, but to their credit, they didn't panic. Probably because they were already used to being on guard against Knight attacks in the past, I figured.

Whatever might've been the case, they gave a large berth to Angie even as they retreated away from the center of attention in an orderly fashion. Over there, the hostess dragged the young cellist behind the stage, Yseult was doing her best to figure out what was going on, while Naoren and Rinne were… grappling? From the looks of it, they were probably both trying to protect the other by standing between them and 'Bel', but they just ended up rooted in place and struggling with each other. Go figure.

But speaking of the masked man, he was focused on Angie for now, with a hand in front of his mouth mimicking chuckles.

"You dare show your face in front of me again?" the Celestial girl bellowed, Deus momentarily asserting control while she was out of it, but then she soon followed it up by a much more natural (and just a touch more panicked), "T-That's not important! W-We have to keep him occupied and protect the people!"

Josh was of the same mind, and he also flashed his wings as he drew forth his magical arm-blade, striking a pose next to Angie. It was probably meant to signify that he got her back, and she hurriedly took up a matching stance, as if they had practiced this beforehand. Which… considering it was these two we were talking about, wasn't out of the question.

More importantly, someone was tugging on my sleeve, and when I looked down, I found Judy glaring at me.

"Chief?"

"Don't ask, I have no idea either," I told her in a hurry before she could level any accusations against me.

She would've still done so, if not for my family barrelling through the retreating crowd; Penny and Snowy were coming from our left, while Arnwald and Morgana arrived from the rear, more or less at the same time. Thanks to all the emergency drills, they automatically put on their respective Magi- and Uniformers.

"Leonard? What's going on here?" Morgana was the first who levelled an understandable question at me, and she unsubtly jerked her head towards the masked man on the stage.

"Deus, old pal! It's good to see you again! Last time we parted on a sour note, but I hope that this time we can have some fun!" The 'Bel' up there rubbed his palms together in anticipation, only to then pause and tilt his head to the side wonderingly. "By the way, did you bring the biscuits? Or was it cookies in this timeline? Ah, who cares! They're almost the same thing anyway, right, old chap?"

"T-They aren't!" Angie protested, and while I couldn't see his face from this angle, Josh's body language told me he must've been giving her a deadpan stare that practically screamed 'Dude, are you seriously objecting to that in this situation?!'.

But putting Josh being the straight man aside, I had to give it to the guy on the stage; he was doing a perfect imitation of my Bel act, down to the small gestures. Like how he swept the tails of his coat out when he did a scraping bow, or the way he tapped on the chin of the mask to indicate confusion. That… gave me a rather foreboding tingling up and down my spine, but I pushed it down for the moment and turned back to the impatiently waiting Morgana and company.

"I don't know what's going on, but I intend to find out." I glanced at the princess. "Elly, please look after Judy."

"On it!" my draconic girlfriend declared with gusto and hugged my dear (though currently still very disapproving) assistant from the side.

"You two, please get Naoren and Rinne out of the crossfire, and then call for backup."

Morgana was visibly unenthused by my previous non-answer, but when Arnwald gave me a salute with a solemn, "As you command!", she quickly joined him and the two of them left in a hurry. That left me with my sisters, and when I turned to them, I found Penny already hyped up.

"Don't worry, Brother! I'll protect Snowy!"

"I… was actually going to ask you two to help the stragglers evacuate the courtyard and secure the perimeter."

"Oh…" My Knightly sister twitched in mild embarrassment, but only for a moment before she perked up again. "I can do that too! I'm good at multitasking!"

Meanwhile, Snowy was giving her a sisterly 'Oh, what am I going to do about you?' kind of look, so I left them to their own devices and faced the unfolding situation in the front. The 'Bel' on stage was still heckling Angie and Josh, making wild gestures as he walked up and down and giving a passionate speech about pastry discrimination, while the senior Knights had already reached the couple in the middle, who were now also struggling with Yseult trying to intervene and drag them away herself.

In other words, it was a classic, Grade-A flustercuck that came out of nowhere. As they often tended to do. And the 'Bel' on display was still giving me the mother of all bad premonitions, chills and all.

"Stay safe," I told the girls, and with a deep breath, I activated my Leoformer and donned my Polemos gear. Considering the circumstances, with the whole hubbub going on between Angie and this 'Bel of the Abyss', I figured this was the most appropriate way to insert myself into the conversation.

With measured steps, I walked over to the side of the childhood friend couple and then stepped between them and the stage, my right arm extended to the side and forming a barrier (figuratively, not magically) to signal that they should stay back.

"I'll take it from here."

Josh looked relieved by my arrival (though maybe also a little miffed because I took so long), but on the flipside, Angie looked furious.

"No! I told you that we would fight together and beat this motherfu—" On second thought, that was probably Deus, but before he could launch into a tirade, Angie reasserted control and let out an annoyed, "Mou! Stop it! Leo's gonna be mad at us again!"

"Oh, look at that! We have a full reunion!" The Bel on the stage clapped with unbridled enthusiasm, and disappeared in a blink of an eye, only to rematerialize just a few steps in front of us with his arms open, as if he wanted to sweep up all of us in a huge hug. "All three Archons, together once again! It's the Bel and Polemos and Deus and Deus variety hour!" He remained stock still for a beat, then his whole body twitched and he adopted a thinking pose, with his chin resting on his knuckle. "By the way, Polemos, dearest of all my friends! You still haven't explained what that is all about, you know? It really hurt my poor little feelings."

For the moment, I ignored the fact that his gestures and tone were way, way too natural, and focused on the rest of the scene. Thanks to him moving over, it provided an opportunity for Arnwald and Morgana to close the distance and they finally managed to drag the three arguing stragglers out of the theatre of action. By this point, most of the guests and staff also evacuated, but there were still some who remained behind, either looking to provide help if necessary or for some juicy gossip.

In either case, I hoped my sisters would convince them to leave soon so that I could focus all my attention on this… was 'impostor' the right term? I kind of hoped it was, but deep down I had an inkling that things were more complicated than that. Anyhow, he was the right height and build, he had my Bel act nailed down to a tee, and he could even teleport somehow. That last one was a bit of a pickle to explain, but I decided not to jump to conclusions yet, and instead I reached out with my phantom limbs. As I did, there was a strange and incongruous feeling, as if they had to pass through water to reach him, but when they did and I took a look at his outfit…

…

Yep. This was definitely my Bel gear. The one I used before switching to the Leoformer. It even had the anti-draconic enchantment on the gloves and everything.

…

Well, fuck. That meant there were two possibilities left: either someone who looked just like me when disguised as Bel sneaked into the underground base, stole the old outfit from the secret storage under Galatea's watch, and spent who knew how long to mimic my acting to perfectly impersonate me, or…

"{Testing, testing. Can you hear me?}"

My internal turmoil was interrupted by a strange, warbled voice coming through the Leoformer's communicator. It sounded like a badly tuned radio broadcast of an old text-to-speech program, including the flat tone and emphasis on the wrong syllables all over the place.

"Leo? Are you listening to me?" Angie fumed behind me, and since I couldn't recall her saying anything new, I apparently wasn't.

"Just stay back for now," I told her without taking my eyes off this Bel and took a step forward for emphasis before extending my phantom limbs again and plugging into the communication array on his mask. At first, I couldn't decide how to respond, but I ultimately settled on a safe, "{I can hear you.}"

"Oh, the heroic Polemos to the rescue!"/"{Good. Listen, let's put on a show first, and then I'll explain what's going on later.}"

It took me a while to parse the two different lines, one spoken and one transmitted through the communication enchantment, and when I did, I felt even more apprehensive.

"{Are you me?}"

"{In a manner of speaking,}" he responded, but before I could ask anything else, he suddenly Phased away, and since my phantom limb was no longer connected to him, our communications were effectively cut.

As for why he did so, it probably had to do with the ball of compressed air landing in front of his feet and kicking up a small explosion of soil and grass.

"Josh! What the shit!?" I yelled at my friend behind me, but he remained undaunted and met my glare tit for tat.

"Angie is right! We can't let this opportunity slip away! He's a threat, and it's three-on-one this time! We can get him!"

"Right!" Angie exclaimed next to him, and the two of them struck matching poses again, bringing out their magical arm-blade spells and flaring their wings. "We've got this!"

I was just about to tell them to stand down, but then 'Bel' showed up on stage again and reconnected to my communication line again.

"Oooh! Aren't you a pair of eager beavers? You know, I came here for something else, but if you really want to play like in the good old times, I'm game!"/"{Don't overthink this. This is fine. They are the protagonists of the scenario, so we need to give them the opportunity to do stuff like this every once in a while.}"

Barely stifling a groan, I turned to the stage and, after a long beat, I retrieved Teeny from my storage enchantment and brandished it over my head.

"Fine. But you follow my lead, got it?"/"{Fine, but I want to get some bloody answers afterwards, goddamit.}"

"Sure!" Angie exclaimed, and the childhood friend duo lined up next to me, forming a united front. It was only then than she awkwardly added, "B-By the way… Grandpa Deus asks if you have a way to deal with his teleporting?"

"You can teleport too, right?" Josh whispered on my other side. "I mean, not like this guy, but can you, like, tie him down somehow?"

I wanted to tell him that it's not how that works, but then my communicator came to life again.

"{Okay, so here's the plan: Tell them you'll stop me from Phasing, and I'll play along. Don't worry; I upgraded the arrays on the outfit in my free time, so I have some pretty decent physical enhancements. I'll manage with danger sense alone.}"

I didn't know what felt more incongruous; the oddly natural and friendly way he was messaging me, the fact he was using my terminology without batting an eye, or that my gut reaction was an immediate 'Yeah, that sounds good', as if it was my own idea.

Oh, dear god… he really was me, wasn't he? Please, please tell me we didn't jump the shark and—

"Huh?" Suddenly, the Bel on the stage staggered, and glanced left and right. "Oh, Polemos, you cheeky, cheeky sausage! You had something like this up your sleeve the whole time, huh?"

"What is he talking about?" Josh asked, raising his arm-blade defensively.

"It's… spatial coordinate oversaturation," I spoke the first somewhat fitting string of technobabble that came to mind. "He can't teleport now, but it won't last for long."

"We'll make it count!" Angie (or more likely, Deus, based on the tone) declared and spread all her wings before suddenly lunging forward like an arrow loosed from a bow.

"Wait! Don't rush in alone!" Josh yelled and leapt after her, and they both engaged the man on the stage in a close-quarters battle that almost looked like a choreographed dance number, with all the spinning and everything.

"{Inquiry: Is this an appropriate time for Interface:Teeny to ask for information about the situation?}"

"No," I responded a touch dourly and joined the dance… I mean, fray.

Meanwhile, Josh used his wings to jump extra-high, nearly hitting the scaffolding holding the speakers overhead and did a dive-bomb attack with his two arm-blades extended. Bel casually avoided the initial attack by twisting his body to the side, and then jumped over the weird, spinning follow-up-strike Josh did after landing. At the same time, Angie was singing a slow Gregorian-style chant while floating over our heads, and it summoned half a dozen transparent, glass-like flying swords around her. Each one was about a meter long, tinted in a golden yellow colour, and had what looked like bits of the flames from her wings embedded in them.

It all looked really majestic… until she started beatboxing (no, seriously) to rapidly fire them at Bel. He weaved between the incoming projectiles, and when they landed on the stage, they pierced right through the plywood flooring before exploding. Luckily, there was no shrapnel, but the burst of flames that accompanied them made me fear that this might've been a fire hazard.

"Hey, watch it!" I yelled at Angie and brandished Teeny, swiping at Bel's feet. To my surprise, while he perfectly dodged all of Josh's various stabs and slices and Angie's exploding projectiles, he barely managed to jump over it in time. I didn't need to wonder why though, since…

"{Careful. Danger sense doesn't warn about attacks that don't intend to hit me, so give me a heads up beforehand.}"

Resisting the urge to roll my eyes, I messaged back, "{Upswipe. Keep your arms clear.}"

Making good on that, I swept Teeny vertically upwards, and this time he casually got out of the way.

For the next minute or so, the three of us were just tagging in and out while attacking the guy, making a few sweeps here and there before switching out and giving someone else the opportunity. I guess it must've looked really impressive from the outside, but internally I was screaming pretty much non-stop, because I had to spend most of my time constantly repositioning and trying to make sure we wouldn't bump into each other or end up causing a friendly fire incident.

"I said watch it! And Josh, stop spinning and pay attention to where you're going!"

"I do!" he yelled back, but then I had to nearly smack him with the butt of my weapon to stop him from jumping right into the middle of Angie's next beam-spamming spell.

"Argh! I just told you to pay attention!"

"But I nearly got him!" Angie whined back and pointed a Josh. "Quick! I'll use a slowing aria, get him while he's distracted!"

"You're not supposed to yell your plans out loud!"/"On my way!"

And then Josh rushed in, and guess what? He did another divebomb, but this time with extra nonsense vertical spinning slashes that landed him right in the middle of Angie's spell, and got momentarily slowed down, forcing me to engage our opponent on my own until she dispelled the debuff. These two might've practised posing beforehand, but team combat tactics, they most definitely did not.

"This is unfair. Am I the only one who thinks this is unfair?" Bel said in a whiny tone, and snapped his fingers, which was… He was wearing gloves, so how did he do it? Wait, on second thought, I could do that too, so how did I do it? Questions for later. "I know! Let's get another Polemos too! That should balance the scales and make things more fair."

"Silence, bastard!" Angie and/or Deus yelled and got ready to summon another salvo of sword-like objects at him, while Josh was sneaking up from behind and tried to hit him in his blind spot. Of course, his arm-blades only cut thin air. They exchanged a couple more strikes, but they only served to give Bel the excuse to evade in Angie's direction, at which point I got another message from him.

"{I'll grab her feet and swing her down before she can set the stage on fire. You catch her and hand her over to Josh.}"

"{On it,}" I answered reflexively, without much thinking, and threw Teeny over to my friend.

He was stunned for a moment, yet managed to ham-fistedly catch it before the shaft bonked him in the nose. Meanwhile, Bel made good on his plan, and after a few dance-like steps he jumped up and grasped both of Angie's feet. She tried to avoid him, but the scaffolding got in the way and she couldn't rise higher, and once he seized her, whatever magical effect kept her floating got disturbed and he casually swung her to the ground.

Of course, I was already there, and using my patented girl-catching reflexes, I wrapped her in my arms and dissipated the force of the impact by rotating my upper body. Then, I yelled, "Switch!"

Josh, for once, was quick on the uptake, and he automatically threw Teeny up into the air at the same time I tossed Angie over. He caught her, though with considerably less finesse, and the two of them landed butt-first on the stage floor, while I snatched my spear out of the air and did a quick flourish before lunging at Bel.

"{Statement: Interface:Teeny is currently experiencing a sensation of dizziness. Interface:Teeny didn't know that was possible.}"

"Hush. I need the communication line uncongested," I whispered and then followed that up with, "{Short thrust aimed at your neck.}"

"{Got it. I'll activate the enchantment on the gloves and counter with a blast to gain some distance.}"

"{I'll stand my ground and block it, then feint at your thigh before a vertical sweep.}"

"{Roger.}"

Then, things proceeded just as planned. My initial thrust was evaded with minimal effort before I was hit by a pressure wave, the effect of the anti-dragon blast enchantment being discharged into thin air. I braced myself with Teeny, and then once it passed around me, I lunged forward and did the feint combo.

But that was just the beginning. We followed it up with a series of exchanges; all of them simple and straightforward. No crazy twirls. No magic missiles. No jumping three meters high into the air like a Street Kombat character. No running around like Sanic the bloody Hedgehog on methamphetamines. Just simple, traditional close-quarters combat. Toe to toe, head to head, mano a mano, et cetera. I would swipe, and he would dodge. He would punch, and I would counter. Then we would work together so that he would convincingly deflect my counter-thrust with his bare hand, like a perfect parry from a video game, followed by yet another quick exchange of blows.

Before I knew it, we spent nearly a minute doing this, and I was so immersed in the back and forth, both in messaging and combat, that I only belatedly recognized that Josh and Angie didn't rejoin the fray. Instead, they were just staring at us exchanging blows, as if trying to memorize our moves.

"{That should be good enough,}" came the next mechanical-sounding message, followed by a taunting stretch from Bel. "Ah, yes! There's nothing better to get the blood flowing! Morning radio callisthenics, eat your heart out!"

"Do you really think you have the leeway to play around like this?" I asked with a suitably angered hiss, but at the same time I also messaged, "{Good enough? For what?}"

"{For today's performance. Let's do one last exchange. Finish your combo with a low stab, and I'll step on it, so you can knock me over.}" He followed that up with a cocky wink and spread his arms. "Oh, my dear Polemos. What is the point of life without games? It would make existence such a—"

There was a small, barely perceptible nod, and I instinctively understood that it was a signal. I didn't wait for him finish his line and lunged forward. First starting with an overhead diagonal swing from right to left, then a horizontal drawback from left to right before finishing it with a low thrust aimed at his feet. As expected, he easily dodged the first two strikes, and then when the tip of Teeny tapped against the plywood flooring, he immediately stomped on the flat of the spearhead.

"Tut, tut, my friend. That wasn't very sportsmanlike."/"{Three, two, one… now.}"

On his mark, I swung my weapon up. For extra effect, I turned on the fireworks by forcefully bringing out my wings for a split-second, and Bel let out a startled yelp and did a perfect prep-fall, landing on his back with a loud 'Keh!'. He was really selling this to the audience, and… wait… Was this kayfabe? Were we doing pro wrestling right now?

"{Focus.}"

Shocked out of the sudden realization, my body automatically went through the motions, twirling Teeny overhead before dramatically swinging down and stopping the spearpoint just a few centimeters from the familiar mask. This was the perfect situation for a one-liner, but I was drawing a blank, so I just said the first thing that came to mind that fit the situation.

"Life is not a game."

We locked eyes, and Bel let out a chuckle.

"Au contraire, my dear Polemos. Life is most definitely a game. It has rules, winners, losers, and it even has abilities with effect durations and cooldowns! Isn't that just quaint?" He casually flicked the tip of the spear, and added, "Speaking of which, time's up. See ya!"/"{Good effort. Let's meet up at the usual spot.}"

"Wait. What does that—?"

Before I could finish, he suddenly disappeared from the end of my weapon, startling everyone, myself included.

"Son of a discounted goat merchant!" I groaned and pulled back my spear, then after a moment of hesitation, I glanced at Josh and Angie and yelled, "I'm going after him, while the trail is still fresh! Stay on guard!"

They nodded, looking a bit out of it, and then I closed my eyes, pretending to concentrate really hard before suddenly opening them wide and disappearing from the scene. Of course, all of that was just for show. In reality, I figured out where he would go immediately, despite not having a mark on him. A second later I materialized in the dark, out-of-the-way storage room in the depths of the underground base, only illuminated by a single, weak safety light.

"Oh, here you are," the 'Bel' on the ground noted, one hand absently patting a confused Pudding-kun. He remained sitting on the floor and rubbed the back of his neck like a blue-collar worker after a long day at the job. "Ugh… I keep forgetting that this body is a bit fragile."

Meanwhile, Pudding-kun looked almost panicked as he kept glancing between me and the man on the floor. He tapped his side with his many fleshy appendages, then skittered over to me to do the same to my legs, only to return to him and repeat the process, ultimately letting out a distressed 'Nyuuuu?' sound and almost turning into a meat-coloured puddle on the floor.

"Easy there, little guy," Bel spoke with a chuckle as he rose to his feet and scooped the swirly-eyed little eldritch abomination up into his arm. After giving him a soothing shake he faced me and he used his free hand to take off his mask.

The face underneath wasn't mine. Instead, it was the face of Bel; as in, the fake face provided by Pudding-kun whenever I wore him as a disguise, except his mug seemed natural. His hair was jet black, while his irises were a dark shade of grey. As for his features, he had a jawline more defined than mine, and a slightly bigger nose, but overall he was still on the handsome side. Though again, I could count the people in the Simulacrum who weren't handsome on two hands, so that probably went without saying.

Much more importantly though, the moment we locked eyes, I was once again hit with a strong sense of foreboding, and I had to swallow hard.

"Before we start," I spoke, squeezing out the words through my clenched-up throat. "Be straight with me. Please, please tell me you aren't literally me from the future…"

He eyed me, lips hovering just on the edge of an awkward smile.

"Well… on a technical level, I'm not."

"Oh, for the love of…!" I threw my hands in the air. "That's exactly what I would say if I got involved in some stupid, bloody time-travel bullcrap! Argh! I knew it! I bloody knew it!"

"Easy there," Bel… no, yet-another-me told me and held out Pudding-kun. "Just breathe and take this emotional support mini-shoggoth to calm down."

"Well, don't mind if I do!" I groaned and snatched it up before sitting down onto a nearby crate, placing the one-eyed meatball on my lap, and furiously petting it while glaring at the other person in the room. "Give me a minute, and then we talk. Don't go anywhere."