I stare at Cent. What… just what in your mind makes you think it’ll be a good idea to fight me, a baby?

…at the very least this gives me a good reason to kick him out.

Saith looks at Cent in disgust. “Cent, we’re here to be the child’s caretakers. Not to bully him.”

Cent clicks his tongue.

I debate my options of his challenge anyway.

He’s probably tough and strong, but possibly slow and clumsy. I doubt he can use magic. I’ve done a little research and someone will tend to look in a way their statistical balance supports. It’s also rare that someone will have too many high stats.

Speed and Vitality, and Strength and Magic don’t need to both be high. Only one of each needs to be particularly high compared to the others.

People tend to have statistics that fall into ‘builds’. The speedy warrior, the tough knight. Stuff like that.

I don’t think Cent could possibly hit me anyway with my skill. A flinch is really, really fast. I can’t control it other than choosing to flinch or not to flinch at the moment though.

As such, the question is more of can I even seriously harm him? My earthen spear isn’t something I can use since it’s too heavy for me. I wonder if I could muster enough force to penetrate deeply into his body with a knife?

I pull off my left glove and toss it at Cent’s face.

It’s one of the ways someone can challenge another to a duel. Most nobles wear gloves as part of their normal attire since it’s considered as one of the least brutish and quickest ways. A way like Cent used is unacceptable to most nobles.

A concerned look flashes across the eyes of the others.

After all, if the baby were to die, it would be a blow to their reputation, as well as a mission failure.

Cent swipes up the glove before it reaches him with a grin.

Now if they were to interfere, it would be even worse for them. A duel is something that is sacred,no matter what, in the Lithari Kingdom, as well as the surrounding kingdoms.

Saith narrows his eyes at Cent. He seems to have a sense of justice.

He throws his glove at Cent. “You can’t seriously expect me to allow you to bully a baby and jeopardize our mission. I’ve heard you like to bully people, but Akashi is a baby and not a mere commoner.”

Cent simply laughs as he picks up the glove. “I’ll fight you after I’ve had my fun.”

…at least you tried, Saith. I thank you for that. Though I doubt Cent can beat my Spacial Flinch. You can’t beat someone if you can’t hit them.

The only things that I think would be able to beat my flinch is if I were traps meticulously, or if an AOE spell with a range larger than 24 meters were fired at me. Though an AOE with 24 meters of range would have to be a dead-center shot to do anything.

…AOE spells with more than 24 meters of range in terms of diameter aren’t particularly rare among good mages though…

But still, I’m quite invincible in a melee that this will probably be. I can’t imagine Cent using AOE magic. I would’ve heard about him being someone exceptional.

As such, due to the low risk, it’s worth the risk.

“I want you out of here if I win.” I tell Cent

He laughs. “I’ll still be staying here another day, little baby. Do you think you have any chance against me? Heh. I want some money for my faction for beating you up.”

Such a rude guy…

Theophania faction and House Ulden, I’ll be taking this as an insult.

“I believe I do. Now, let us go to the courtyard.” I reply

I slowly make my way towards the courtyard as Cent leers at me as if I was prey and the rest of my potential ‘caretakers’ follow us.

Rosalie has a shadowy looking face, Theresa looks rather shocked, Bert has a look of fear and dread on his face, and Saith looks angry.

Cent really seems to like causing trouble, huh?

I’ll be sure to cause you trouble. If you were beaten by a mere baby in a duel, no matter who that baby grew up to be, your honor and pride would be dead, no matter what you did afterwards.

Though by the looks of things, Cent doesn’t have much honor or pride to speak of in the first place.

Hmmm… I wonder if I should kill him in the duel? It’ll be a shining example to never mess with me.

Killing during a duel, no matter who it is, especially if it’s someone of a lower station, isn’t against the law. You also can’t expect a baby to hold back, can you?

I’ll kill him if it’s possible.

We reach the courtyard. I call a maid over and have her bring me a knife.

Cent takes his sword out of it’s sheathe after I have a dagger in hand.

His sword is rather fat and short. It’s especially top-heavy.

I’ll be dead if it hits me. Probably most people would. I bet it would trash armor as if it were an axe or something.

Cent swings his sword a few times.

He’s faster than I expected for someone who’s so big… he’s about average in terms of speed.

I hold the dagger out in front of me like a sword and crouch down a bit, careful to keep my balance.

…I wish I had a spear… I feel so unsafe being outreached like this…

Cent closes in slowly and tauntingly, taking advantage of my lack of reach.

He stabs towards me.

I dodge to the side. I’m actually fast enough that I’m not much slower than him despite being so small.

He takes his miss in stride and spins his sword to take advantage of centripetal force for a particularly fast and heavy blow.

He’s using the thing not like a sword, but more like a club or something.

He would’ve hit me if not for my skill.

I teleport out of the way as the blade comes down on me.

I land a bit to his side.

He freezes a bit and starts to look around. By the time he’s spotted me, my dagger’s already cut into his leg.

It’s not very deep, sadly, but it’ll do for now. I can tell that I’m bad at using this dagger.

He takes a swipe at me.

I teleport out of his range.

He grunts. “So that’s your skill, huh? No wonder you were so confident. Chantless teleportation is quite strong. You won’t be able to keep it up for long though.” he laughs

Teleportation is something that isn’t actually overly rare. It can be learned as a spell if you have the space affinity without too much trouble. However, all magic takes the user’s concentration and their brain’s energy. Doing it chantless makes it even more difficult.

As such, keeping it up for a long portion of time is super difficult.

However, I’m not teleporting the traditional way, but with my skill. My skill lets me teleport with barely any effort.

I rush towards Cent, but this time I lose my balance when I’m next to him.

This is still fine.

I teleport upwards above Cent and slice at the side of his neck with my knife. Then I teleport back away before I’m slammed against his shoulders.

I land on the ground in a crouch.

Cent huffs in anger. He rushes at me with one large step as he swings his sword as hard as he can. I see sooo many things that would be openings if I had the same reach as him…

I try to dodge but have to teleport away in order to do so.

At this point, Cent’s bleeding a decent bit.

I can wait for him to bleed out enough for it to affect him.

Time’s on my side.

Cent holds his sword out in front of him and steps forward.

I back up.

We repeat this a few times. He goes towards me, I go back and turn a little.

That way we stay in a circle.

“You little shit you’re frustrating… stop retreating and fight me” Cent grumbles, limping by now

Could you be any less like a proper noble…?

I continue backtracking.

Cent loses his cool and charges at me. He’s telegraphing really badly…

If he doesn’t beat me sooner or later, he’ll lose though.

I manage to dodge correctly.

The feeling of danger is almost completely gone because of my skill… it’s replaced by confidence.

I drive my knife’s tip up and into his groin. It hits bone.

I can see Bert’s face visibly lose color. I pull my knife out and back away.

Cent’s knees buckle.

He collapses.

“Do you surrender?” I ask

I’ll make you feel pain. 1, you’re my enemy. 2, I heard someone mention that you heard that you enjoy bullying people and wanted to bully me… Also, anyone who challenges a mere child like me is definitely trash anyway.

If you enjoy bullying people, you’re quite a trash of a human being.

“I… su-surrender…” He groans

“Hmm? Did you say something?” I ask with an evil grin.

Looks like my sadistic side is showing up again… I won’t stop myself though. I love putting trash through hell.

“B-bastard!” he shouts at me

I push his sword out of his reach with my foot.

He could grab it if he were to fall onto the ground completely.

He falls to the ground to try to reach it. Perfect for me.

I place the tip of my dagger to his neck and place my foot on its hilt.

“Trash like you can go die.” I tell him

His finger touches his sword.

I step down.

My dagger slides through a good portion of his throat nicely before it hits bone. I’m not strong enough to get through bone yet, even with something as sharp as my dagger.

Aah… that felt kinda good actually. I should let it get to me though. Only killing people that are trash like this is okay.

I pull my dagger out of his neck and wipe it off on his shirt. I gently hold the knife near its tip and hand it back to the maid who was watching.

She grabs it and wipes it off with a towel, before sheathing it and holding it tightly to her chest.

I pull out my handkerchief and wipe Cent’s blood off of me.

Something touches my back.

I flinch away and teleport forwards.

That’s a good reminder that my skill doesn’t make me invincible…

I look at what caused my flinch.

Saith’s standing there. It looks like he was trying to pat me on the back.

There’s a nervous grin on his face.

“You really can fight, huh little viscount?” he laughs before leaning in close to me and whispering in my ear “Also, great job on getting rid of him. He’s a shame to the kingdom’s nobles”

I think I kinda like Saith. If I have to choose one I’ll choose him.

Bert, still wincing, probably from imagining Cent’s pain from his nuts getting cut open, also congratulates my win.

Theresa does in the proper way a noble should. It’s common noble etiquette to congratulate someone after they win a duel.

Then Rosalie comes along.

She looks very intimidated and shy…

She also congratulates me. She’s stuttery and timid and shy about it though. It’s quite adorable…

We start heading back towards the receiving room.