The Insider System

Chapter 338: Real Quick

Chapter 338: Real Quick

"I'll bring you around the Temple so we can speak in private." They had finally made it back to the Temple and Tiff couldn't wait to go inside. Being home was nice but to be honest the main reason she wanted to go in was to get away from the Oracle. As they got further and further from the Metal Domain the Oracle lost her usefulness and just became annoying to listen to.

"That would be nice but I would like to be shown to my room first. I've spent a few days in the mountains and I would like to have the chance to fix my appearance before the people see me." Tiff stopped listening to what the two of them were talking about at this point because it had nothing to do with her and climbed out of the cart to go inside.

She wanted to go say hello to Dawn since she had just gotten back but after that she would be heading to her room to sleep. It had been more than long enough for her to need to sleep and if the oracle hadn't been with them Tiff would have probably done so in the cart. Arriving in front of Dawn's room Tiff was able to tell she was already asleep and decided to just wait till tomorrow to tell her that she was back.

Walking into her room Tiff went to go sit on her bed when she heard a knock on the door. Figuring it was something important that had happened while they were gone she got back and opened the door even though she didn't want to. "The Temple Head wanted to see you."

The two of them had been separated for only a few minutes but she guessed something had already come up that required them to have a meeting. "Alright, thank you for letting me know." Walking out of her room Tiff was about to walk to the Temple Head's office when the person who had delivered the message said. "She isn't that way? I'll bring you."

Following the guy down a different hallway Tiff tried to think what this could be about and why the Temple Head would need her to meet her in an empty part of the Temple. They had been put through training to notice weird situations like these and judge if they were in danger or not because the biggest threat to them were traitors.

All it would take for the Temple to lose their biggest weapon against the Demon Worshipers was one poisoned knife in the back and they would be gone like the god that mothered the element that the Temple valued so highly. To keep this from happening they had been walked through how people ended up getting assassinated and being led away from people by someone you didn't know was definitely on the list.

She did question if she was just being paranoid though because Lake had apparently been able to check for traitors and the like and that had only been a few days ago. She wasn't saying it was impossible for the Demon Worshipers or some other group to get a new person on the inside in that amount of time, it just seemed unlikely to her.

"Could you stop for a second?" There was no way around stopping their progress to ask some questions though even if she felt it was unlikely that anything nefarious was going on. "Do you need to go back to get something from your room?" Tiff could see someone who was actually bringing her to see the Temple Head thinking that but a good spy would say things like these to diffuse suspicions at every turn.

"No, I wanted to ask where the Temple Head was before we go any further." She saw the look on the man's face change as the meaning of her words dawned on him. "Oh, I guess this does seem kind of weird. She's up ahead with the Oracle. The Oracle is eating at the moment but they wanted you to be there for the discussion they're having."

"Can I take some other guards with us just in case none of that is true?" There were guards all over the place so getting a few to accompany her would only take a few seconds. "It's up to you." It was true she hadn't needed to ask the man this and the only reason she had was to gauge their response.

It hasn't worked but really all that meant was that she could be dealing with a spy that had been trained well. Once she had a small group gathered she sent one ahead to make sure that the Temple Head was actually in a room at the end of this hall. When the guard returned and confirmed it was the truth Tiff continued her walk but waited till she saw the Temple Head with her own eyes to apologize to the guard that had originally sent to bring her. "Sorry for doubting you."

"No, I understand." After the guards had all left she walked into the room and sat next to the Temple Head on the other side of the Oracle. "Now that you're here we'll catch you up. The Oracle has continued to get updates from the God of Metal about what's going on in the Metal Domain."

Tiff found that interesting but surely she didn't need to hear it right now. The Temple Head seemed to be able to tell what she was thinking because the next words out of her mouth were. "Don't worry we'll let you head off to sleep soon. I just wanted to tell you that the God of Metal passed on some information about Lake."

Hearing this Tiff instantly perked up a bit. There was no way around wanting to hear about the person that was after the dagger. "Did something happen to him?" It had been a big fear that leaving him to go forward alone would come back to bite them so she hoped it was nothing bad but for a god to take notice it had to be something big like a large fight or something.

"No, he took some time to help the guards we left behind before he moved on." Tiff guessed that was weird since it was a waste of time and the mission they had left him to complete was time sensitive but she knew some people had a hard time turning a blind eye to people that needed help. "He already moved on though, right?"

"Yeah, after he helped the guards he quickly left the Metal Domain. It seems whoever had the dagger moved from the Metal Domain already. So we have no idea when he'll be back." Tiff understood why the Temple Head had wanted her to hear this because when she was in her room she kind of assumed Lake would be back in a few days. Now she understood that was wishful thinking.

"Is that all you wanted to tell me?" It was bad news but it wasn't anything she could change so going to bed was still more important to her. "Yes that's it." Getting up to walk back to her room Tiff gave the oracle a brief nod because they were in her room and she hadn't said anything to her the entire time she was here.

Once she was back to her room she didn't waste any time and got into her bed. She really didn't have anything to do tomorrow which wasn't that rare for her so she figured most of her day would be spent talking to the Temple Head and the Oracle about what was going on in the Metal Domain.

With the oracle here they had access to information about anything going on in the Metal Domain so it was possible for them to finally understand what was going on there. The People they had sent hadn't sent any messages back as far as she knew so they still didn't know what was really going on.

The Oracle herself would probably already know a lot so they would probably get the full story of what had happened already and that should help understand more about the things the Oracle said on the way here. Saying that the God of Metal wasn't going to declare war after what the Demon Worshipers did was insane to her and she felt there had to be more to it than a vague suspicion that the Demon Lord was going to force a truce using this situation as leverage.

She understood that it was possible that the Demon Worshipers could pull this same attack in other domains but if that happened some of the gods would finally join them in the war against the Demon Lord which was something they had wanted for a long time.

Realizing she was thinking about something that she should save for tomorrow Tiff rolled over onto her other side and closed her eyes. If she let her thoughts keep her up for too long the sleep would leave her and she would lay here for hours before she was able to get the rest she needed.