Chương 98: How to Find a Shapeshifter

Damn it.

What kind of monster is this?!

Richard picked up the knife and examined it carefully, while recalling the legends about shapeshifters in his mind.

Shapeshifters, as the name suggests, are monsters that can change their physical form.

No one knows where these guys came from, and very few people have seen what they actually look like.

One of the few certain facts is that they are mostly followers of the Prince of Conspiracy, born with abilities equivalent to high-level polymorphism and considerable mental talent. They are immune to spells such as charm and the Domain of Honesty, and can read other people's personalities, habits, and fragments of memories.

This allows them to easily impersonate someone, with virtually no flaws in appearance or behavior, and then infiltrate human society to create all sorts of disasters.

At least, in the stories of bards, they basically never did anything good.

And at this sensitive moment, a small knife belonging to this monster appeared on the ship— Richard frowned and examined the knife closely.

It has bloodstains on the surface, but it is relatively new overall, with no rust or attached algae, so it was probably not accidentally picked up by fishermen and brought aboard.

That would most likely mean the shapeshifter brought them up himself.

So, is one of the people on the ship actually a shapeshifter in disguise?

"Hey! Little poet, what are you thinking about!"

As Richard was pondering this, he was suddenly tapped on the shoulder. He turned around and saw Grace smiling.

He subconsciously began to doubt the other person's identity, but then immediately realized that Grace would not be a problem.

After all, for a shapeshifter to disguise itself as a person, that person must disappear without a trace. Otherwise, if two identical people are created, anyone who sees them will know something is amiss.

As for making Miss Red Copper Dragon disappear without a trace—if shapeshifters had that ability, Richard might as well just surrender.

Okay, let's use the Eye of Insight to confirm one last time—great, although most of the content is question marks, the name is still Grace without a doubt.

Once confirmed, Richard immediately wanted to tell Grace about his discovery.

But considering that it was inconvenient to talk about the cheat, he first tentatively asked, "Grace, don't you think this attack is a bit strange?"

I had originally intended to guide her step by step, but to my surprise, Grace immediately nodded.

"It's really strange. Generally speaking, the fish-men in inland rivers don't gather in such a large group, and they all fight to the death without retreating—"

"The knife in your hand is strange too. It doesn't seem like a merman's weapon, but the blood on it smells like human blood—has any mercenary been so frightened by mermen that they tried to commit suicide by cutting their wrists?"

Huh? How did it all turn into wrist-cutting suicide?

But your nose is really sharp!

Seeing that Grace also had doubts, Richard took the opportunity to suggest that a shapeshifter had infiltrated the ship.

Although there were still some logical inconsistencies, Grace simply smiled and stopped asking questions, relying on Richard's guesses to continue the analysis.

"If they are shapeshifters, then this is really troublesome. Their shapeshifting abilities are, in some ways, even more powerful than mine. In any case, I'm not confident I can see through them—" Grace pursed her lips and then said, "Tell Isabella about this first. Your princess is a powerful paladin, and she has a bunch of gadgets on her that even shapeshifters can't touch."

"And Elsa and Mary, with Isabella constantly watching over them, should be fine too—" Um---- Actually, this matter may not be that complicated. As long as the shapeshifter's level is not much higher than mine, the chances of me being able to discern its name and race using the Eye of Insight are still quite high.

However, it does require gambling on probability.

Acting solely on the back of cheat codes is difficult to explain afterwards.

After thinking it over, Richard agreed with Grace's suggestion and went with her to the cabin where Isabella and Cinderella were.

"A shapeshifter?"

Upon hearing Richard's explanation, Isabella immediately frowned—having experienced events such as the Sleeping Treant Tavern and the underground of the Stone Keep, she had complete faith in Richard's observational skills.

She continued, "According to you, that shapeshifter must have taken the opportunity during the merman attack to kill one of our team members and infiltrate the ship in his place."

"Whatever its purpose, we must find it out as soon as possible."

"The investigation should be conducted discreetly, since it probably doesn't know we've already noticed. That's our advantage—well, let's first confirm who's definitely safe."

Isabella looked at Amelie, who was always in her sight, and said, "Use the excuse of teaching Aisha magic to go and call the three Peggotty siblings here."

Richard tilted his head and asked, "How can you be sure those three weren't replaced?"

Do you perhaps possess the ability to see through things?

Isabella replied with a smile, "Jonia is a priestess of the Earth Mother Goddess, and her power comes from divine blessings, something that shapeshifters can never imitate."

"The siblings in the Peiguoti family are actually triplets. From birth, they have had a special connection with each other, which is something that shapeshifters cannot imitate."

"In other words, as long as Joania is okay, we can rely on her to confirm whether the other two people are okay."

Good guy.

Another group of spellcasters, and triplets—their parents' luck is truly something else!

Soon, Amelie brought her three siblings in, making the already small cabin feel a bit crowded.

However, no one present cared about such a trivial matter.

At Isabella's command, Jonia used divine magic to prove her identity, and then joined the discussion with her older brothers and sisters.

As the highest-ranking mage, Jon rubbed his temples and said with a troubled expression, "The best way to find a shapeshifter is to use True Knowledge, but that's a spell that only high-ranking mages or priests can master. Neither my sister nor I have that ability."

Jonia added, "Ordinary detection methods aren't entirely ineffective, but the failure rate is very high, requiring a great many, great number of attempts—" Finally, Jonya raised her hands and made a large circle in the air to show how many times she had done it.

But Richard always felt that she was drawing a big watermelon.

Given his identity as a pastor of the Earth Mother Goddess, there's an inexplicable endearing quality to him, like a pastor visiting the countryside and discussing the harvest with farmers.

Isabella added, "I actually have three scrolls of True Knowledge in my backpack, but they are all Lesser True Knowledge, so the effect is not continuous and can only target a single specific target."

Grace nodded: "So, if we just reduce the number of suspects to three or fewer, we can use a scroll to find the monster?"

Jon continued, "During the battle, I was always standing on high ground, and the people on the foredeck were all within my sight. The most likely cause of the accident was the people on the aft deck."

Isabella counted on her fingers: "It probably included warriors from four Iron Axe mercenary groups and three boatmen—"' Richard blinked in surprise.

My lord, your memory and observation skills are truly remarkable.

So, there are still seven suspects. I should be able to confirm them by taking a look with my Eye of Insight.

But how should I explain this?

and many more!

Suddenly, Richard had a good idea and immediately smiled and said, "Those shapeshifters are all immune to charm, right?"