The Novel's Draft

Slamming his blade down at the false Incus, making the copy jump back.

However the real Incus had already appeared behind her.

A sudden sea of sword thrusts exploded.

"Thousand spear sky!"

"Scales of dragon, block her."

The dragon scales that the fake had protected her from the blade thrusts.

Turning her attention to Steinen, she placed the blade on her hip and lunged forward with impossible speed.

"Sweeping stream."

Not bothering to block the attack, Steinen stood still.

A layer of a translucent looking fabric came off his medium armor.

It must be some sort of enchantment.

Stopping her attack, Incus jumped up in the air cloaked in wind.

"Excaliburn!"

"Excaliburn!"

The two of them fired an arc of flame.

However, Incus merely used that as a diversion.

In the next moment, the sky was covered with swords made of ice that resembled a drill.

Standing up, I pulled in Vertere and Acro close to me.

"Scales, block... the falling attacks..!" The scales started forming a dome just above us, with poles to hold up the scales.

The swords of ice then started to fly down towards the false Incus.

Steinen was already protecting himself by raising his giant sword over his head.

When the burst of fire finally died down, the swords of ice were already nearing the false.

Summoning the water hero sword, the false started conjuring multiple swords of ice pointed upwards.

When the swords immediately formed, they shot up.

But it wasn’t enough time to summon the same amount of blades as Incus.

Changing the sword in hand, the false started swinging her blade with haste.

"Excaliburn! Excaliburn! Excaliburn!"

But the arcs of incredibly large blaze weren’t enough.

The ice swords already reached the ground.

The copy instead called for the dragon scales to protect her.

However, Steinen jumped forward and swung at the scales just when the ice swords were a meter stick away.

Being left completely defenseless, the false Incus gripped her blade harder and continued to swing with fire flying out of her sword.

The ice swords struck against the dragon scales over us.

Steinen had managed to cover himself just in time.

After what seemed to be minutes that passed by, a mountain of ice left the crater looking like a field of a snowy day.

Looking around, I tried to see if the false Incus was still alive.

And she was.

Being badly wounded, her armor and clothes were torn pretty badly, making her practically nude.

Descending from the sky, the real Incus walked towards the copy and made her blades disappear.

The truthseeker eye that belonged to the false deactivated.

In the next moment, she was slapped across the face.

A stinging red hand mark was imprinted on her face.

The false Incus continued to be slapped.

Raising her hand all the way behind her back, Incus slapped her false self with all of her might.

The slap made her copy collapse to the ground.

Turning around, Incus started walking towards the demon king.

"You’re just going to let me live–?" The false Incus’ looked in awe.

However Steinen had squashed her like a bug with the flat face of the great sword.

"Good job Steinen." Incus nodded, stepping in front of the demon king.

"I greet your compliment with gratitude."

Pointing her blade, she opened her mouth:

"Now it’s your turn. Enough with the games."

"Hmm." The demon king rested his chin on his fist.

Standing up, an immense pressure was released.

Taking a step, the gravity seemed to double every time the demon king took the step there was an invisible force that stomped down on me.

Glancing over at Incus and Steinen, the force was putting an immense strain on them.

If this isn’t a demonstration of the demon king’s true strength then I don’t know what is.

"Are you proud of yourselves? Struggling so much against mere weaklings." The demon king suddenly appeared behind Incus.

Turning her whole body to slash the demon behind him, the king disappeared and was standing on top of Steinen’s great sword that was raised.

"You seem to be a strong guy, let’s see how you’ll fare against this."

Steinen’s arms started to tremble, almost as if the demon king’s weight had increased.

"You’re doing well, how about ten percent of my power."

Steinen’s legs began trembling.

"twenty percent."

The great sword crashed into the ground.

"Twenty percent of my strength, how impressive. But that’s with that buff that you have on you." The demon king disappeared before an afterimage of him in front of Steinen appeared.

The king punched him with a vertical fist.

Steinen was sent flying back but his feet were still connected to the ground, not only that but multiple of the translucent sheets peeled off his armor.

That can’t be good.

"Move!" Incus shouted before swinging her blade, "Excaliburn!"

An explosion of flame shot out.

Flicking his finger, the demon king conjured an even larger flame that completely swallowed Incus’ attack.

Covering herself with the dragon scales, Incus sprinted forward when the flame subsided.

Jumping in the air, Steinen winded up to crush the demon king with a downwards slash.

Without even turning around, the demon king flicked his finger.

A somewhat thin pillar of earth pushed Steinen back.

Crashing into the slope of the crater, more of the pillars flew towards Steinen when the king clenched his fist.

Appearing right behind the demon king, Incus stabbed her blade forward.

But when it should’ve pierced through the king, it instead bounced off.

His skin was incredibly thick.

Much thicker compared to his shallow copies.

"Nice try, but you’ll have to try much harder than that if you want to harm me." The king laughed.

His laugh was blood curdling.

It sounded otherworldly, I knew it was a laugh judging from his expression but the noise that came out sounded something that no humanoid shouldn’t be capable of producing.

"Of course I knew that my attacks wouldn’t work... but I have a few backups." Incus sneered.