"What are you doing here? Tell me or I'll cut her throat."
The female ask David while holding a blade to Christine's throat.
David raise his hands up slowly, trying to look harmless to the female.
"I dare you to kill me. I have a life saving token given to me by Archie in person. The moment I died, I can be revive in just 10 seconds. By that time you will be branded as a threat immediately and your entire church will be hunted down and burn to the ground, not only by my guild the Maharlika Guild and also David's guild Frost Legion but by the entire Hunter Association as well with Archie as it's main fighting force along with the enslave Lich.When that happens no matter what your rank is, you will not survive."
Christine said as she threatened the women holding a blade to her neck.
The women wearing a white robe with a tree symbol on her back still hasn't retreated her blade. She already know that they were sent here by the Hunter Association and she was also aware of their identity.
David immediately catch what Christine did and take it as an opportunity after seeing the hesitation of the mysterious women.
"We didn't come here to make enemies out of you that's why we told you the possible consequences of your actions." David said.
The women looks at him with doubts.
"You are bluffing. How do I know that you are telling the truth when you cage the entire perimeter of the newly build chapel with Ice."
The women pressed the blade at Christine's neck to the point that it bleeds out.
The blade is made of a monster part and it has mana of its own, which makes it possible to penetrate Christine's skin.
Christine having the same level of item as hers before, knows that she is an S-rank awaken as well. She doesn't know why both David and her couldn't feel her presence but a weapon of low quality to be effective against her, the owner must be of the same rank as her first. Christine knows it well.
"If you think were bluffing then cut me. But know this, the moment that you did it I will hunt you down along with my entire guild with or without the support of the Hunter Association. With several A-class along with me in my guild even someone like you will go down. Although I have a life saving token, I still prefer not to experience death." Christine didn't show a hint of fear to the women.
Even though she is bluffing about the life saving token when in fact she only has the teleportation scroll given to her by David, she know that if someone like the women knows about Archie, she probably also aware on how unique Archie's ability is. The probability of Archie giving them a life saving token as he send them to a dangerous mission is not something that one could easily dismiss.
Christine is guiding the women's thinking process, that she probably can only defeat her here but she still can survive and the results of that is ultimately a war between the two factions. Something that the women is already aware of.
"Release Christine now, we want to avoid unnecessary conflict here. We only came here to investigate your church, on why it has many awaken in it. Especially someone of your caliber. The Ice cage is only a cage to prevent the one who attack me first from escaping. Nothing more nothing less. I just want to make it clear that I am not holding them as hostage."
David said as he tried to deescalate the two sides.
"I'll trust your words if you remove the Ice Cage that you made."
"Ok, I'll do it but after I did it I will count 1 to 3. If you still didn't let go of Christine at that time, I will freeze everything and everyone here and send them all to Hunter Association to be arrested and investigated.I wish I made my self clear."
David look at the Ice cage and cancel his magic. The Ice is slowly dissipating. David return his sight to the women and the women has her eyes on the dispersing magic.
Few seconds later the magic has been fully cancelled. The women immediately push away Christine towards David.
David didn't have to catch Christine as she somehow manage to balance herself out. David immediately freezes the wound on Christine's neck to stop the bleeding.
The women then walks behind David and Christine and headed towards where the believers of the cult was. David and Christine couldn't help but arm themselves for any possibilities of confrontation.
"Thank you for letting these people go, since you are here anyway let me tell you something. The Church of Light Reformation believe that all awaken has the obligation to protect the non-awakens. These Church does not cause harm to anyone. That's all I can say."
"If you have no intentions of harming the civilians why are you collecting awakens? Where did they came from? What purpose does they serve here that is most important than dealing with dungeon monsters instead? Your actions so far are very suspicious."
Christine who just receive her freedom asks. Currently her opinion about the cult is not good after what happened.
"I cannot tell you anything more than that. The answers for your questions is so valuable to hand it over to you. We will surely encounter each other again. Hopefully he'll come with you that time."
Suddenly a shadow encapsulated everyone in the women's radius. Upon seeing it both David and Christine brace themselves for possible attack. David created an Ice Barrier for both Christine and Him while Christine charge her arrow.
But no attack came. The shadow vanish along with the people that has been here earlier.
"It's not an attack, its teleportation. They're gone now ." Christine said.
"She's not a mage. She's probably a special grade Assassin. I can feel their presence not far away from here. It seems like the transfer skill she just perform is just a short range."
"Hmm... Yeah I can feel them now. Should I shoot them from this distance?" Christine readied her bow and magic arrow and raise it towards the sky.
"No, let's not. Aside from threatening us earlier they didn't do anything that deserves death.Let's just leave them for now and report our findings to the Chairman. Our objective here is to investigate their cult not to eliminate it."
Christine put down her bow and look at David.
She judge him to be serious which makes her feel like listening to his words. Now that he mention it, even she hasn't experience killing someone. But unlike David, Christine has a principle to her self that she will absolutely use her powers if threatened even if it means killing someone, just like what happened to her earlier.
"Is your decision final? I am fine if you decide to follow them and watch their actions from afar. I have a good eye sight for that."
"The terrain is full of trees, it's impossible for you to use your skills from a distance where you can see them at the same time they can't feel you. The mission is really bound to fail because of one important aspect that we miss. We forgot that every awaken can detect their fellow awaken and know their strength. We taken for granted that we are strong that no one is able to threaten us, but now we know that it's not true. Let's return to the Hunter Association, I also wanted to ask the Arch Enterprise for a magic item that can hide the power level of someone."
David said and he signaled Christine to follow him back to return.
"You can do that? I know that you are close to Archie but how is it possible for you to be able to just do what you want to his business? I am meaning to ask this to you before, what is your relationship to Archie?"
David stopped walking and look at Christine.
"We are dating, although he doesn't want it to become public."
Christine's heart becomes heavy after hearing it. Although she already expected that there is something between them but what she didn't expect is for her to like David in a short amount of time that they spent together. Luckily she only likes him right now because of his good character and great stature. Also both of them still hasn't spend much time together, preventing Christine from falling deeply in the wrong person.
The walk continued and Christine pick up the teleportation magic circle that David gave her. It's obvious to her that Archie gave it to David to keep him safe.
"I see, thanks for being comfortable for telling me that. You are a great pair together. I promise that I'll keep it to myself. By the way, shouldn't we use this teleportation paper or scroll that you gave me to return? It's much faster that way."
"You can keep it to yourself for emergency purposes. Don't use it unless necessary. Archie cannot make a lot of it that is easy to use and doesn't need mana stones to activate. My supply with that is not great to begin with so I prefer not wasting it."