Finding her way to the familiar ‘Order of Templars’ branch, she shortly arrived, finding it appeared a bit different to when she first arrived.

The most noticeable difference was that the entrance to the Church was now guarded, unlike last time, by two heavily-armoured men who were covered from head to toe in thick, steel plates similar in appearance to what English Knights wore within the 15th century.

Yet, this was not the only change because the church as a whole also seemed to be more crowded than usual, and there was a sense of urgency about it like something major was about to happen.

Approaching the entrance she was quickly stopped by the two guards who were glaring at her fiercely.

“This is now a restricted zone, citizen, you’ll have to wait until the Mayor finished his business with the Priest.” The armoured guards gravely voiced sounded behind his helmet.

Talia just smiled at the guards' refusal, and said, “Priest Omar is expecting me, I think it may have something to do with this, perhaps?”

The guard remained silent for a moment before turning to his companion and said, “Tell the Priest if he was expecting and guest, ask whether or not she should be ‘privy’ to the situation.”

His companion nodded, before entering the Church, after a few minutes passed by quickly, the Guard re-exited the Church and said, “The Priests wants her to enter, the Mayor has accepted.”

The armoured guard nodded, before opening up the entrance to Talia saying, “Go on girl, hurry up and enter, the Mayor is a busy man, we have no need for your dawdling.”

Talia brushed off the guards' brash attitude, entering the Church she found the young priest in training, Roger waiting for her. Instructing her that Priest Omar and the Mayor was in a room awaiting her, she quickly entered, finding that there was already voices arguing within the room.

“What girl is so important that we would have to await her?” A deep voice said.

“She is the one to discover the evidence which has lead to us discovering this information sooner, you should be more appreciative Marcus, otherwise you’d still be completely unaware of the intruders which have long set up their nest within your territory.” Priest Omar’s voice replied.

After the occupants of the room began to register her presence, there was a mixture of emotions in the room, the one most especially apparent was astonishment, especially after seeing her youthful features.

The voice belonging to the one arguing with Priest Omar earlier, Marcus, snickered saying, “This is the girl you described? She looks younger than my daughter, don’t tell me you’re joking, she looks the type to run screaming at some rat, never mind defeating what my men registered as a Tier 1 Magical Beast.”

Voices of agreement echoed throughout the room, showing they also questioned the validity of Priest Omar’s words.

Priest Omar laughed and said, “Whether you believe or not, this girl presented both the body and evidence, also when did you have the courage to question a Priest of the Order of Templars, word? When has a member of our Order dared to lie about such things, in order to become so untrustworthy in your eyes?”

The other men quietened down at Priest Omar’s comments, knowing he was correct.

Marcus said, “Fine, so say if you are true, correct. What is the point of bringing this outsider here to solve this problem? I see no benefit from involving a girl you just met, who knows she could be a spy sent by them to infiltrate this very meeting!”

Priest Omar responded straightforwardly, “You doubt my judgement to spot a spy? They reek of a familiar scent that is uncanny for us belonging to the Order, I won’t be able to miss such a thing even if I wanted to, instead I’ve long since suspected that you have a spy hiding among your people if only you’d believe me in the first place, but your stubborn attitude has allowed people from that cult to worm their way into this Town.”

‘Cult?’

Just by picking up this keyword, she knows what those within the room was discussing, the cult which was being mentioned, to begin with, of course, had to do with the strange situation with the Red Fishkin.

It was already something familiar to her because the cultists had been the cause of numerous problems within multiple Kingdoms, but the difference was she did not encounter them this early within the game making their involvement here something unexpected to her.

Marcus, the Mayor of Stonehead Town could only lower his head in slight shame, after all, he knew that the Priest was telling the truth, and said, “Fine, even if she is not some spy, what can a young girl like her to do to help in such a matter?”

A slight smile emerged on Priest Omar face as he said, “Exactly what your men or a person from my order cannot do, rat those guys out within the Town. All of the people we could send to infiltrate are too much of a risk of being recognised, and to hire some mercenary is not good either, as the trustworthiness of the person cannot be guaranteed. We cannot let these cultists slip by, which is why I believe the young girl is the right choice, she proved that she is fairly capable by defeating that beast, and even if she is a bit lacking compared to some of our experts, she will not be needed to battle the cultists anyway.”

After Priest Omar finished his words, a detailed discussion filled the room arguing whether Talia is the correct choice, Talia just sat in silence, knowing it was not worthwhile to involve herself in the debate.

Yet, Marcus upon seeing Talia quietness, saw it as a lack of confidence, which prompted him to say directly, “Lacking in guts, girl? If you don’t have the courage to speak and allow those to speak for you, why should you be trusted with such an important task?”

Talia just shook her head and calmly responded, “It is not that I don’t dare to speak, it is just little of what I say would affect your judgement, you have already had long formed your own prejudice of me, what I say would do little to affect that. And in the end, you’re asking for my help, it is not the other way around, so why should I need to beg you for my help?”

A man laughed in amusement at her response as he said, “Haha! This girl has spite, she has my vote, Priest.”

A few others in the room also showed obvious approval at her response, which surprised Talia, after all, Marcus was the Major of the Town, a status which is not considered low, who are these men to act so daringly?

She supposed that she could also be included among them, but she only opposed him in such a way because she knew about his true personality through the game.

Mayor Marcus might seem moody, cold, and uncaring, but deep down he greatly cares about the Town.

If she solved this solution, he would be very appreciative of her, no matter what his previous feelings were, the only reason he was acting this way was that he doubted her competence.

Marcus stared at her in brief astonishment on how Talia directly responded, as not many would dare too because of his status.

Yet, this was quickly replaced with a grumpy look as he finally voiced his opinion after thinking for a while, and said, “Fine, send the girl for all I care. If she dies, remember it is not my fault sending her to an early grave.”

With Marcus’s opinion finally made, the rest of the table made up their minds, all expressing their approval in agreeing with sending Talia.

Priest Omar chuckled delightedly at their response but a tinge of seriousness filled his face after thinking about the difficulty of dealing with the cultists.

“Alright, Talia, I will quickly go through with you some information about these cultists.” Priest Omar, said before briefly filling her with information, most of which she already knew, that for instance, they are likely responsible for the problem involving the Red Fishkin, and numerous other disasters around the Kingdom.

Eventually, though, Priest Omar reached the section which was relevant to her, “The reason we require your assistance, is that these cultists are hiding within the poor section of the Town, and are selecting sacrifices for their ‘God’ among the commoners.”

Talia nodded to show her understanding, before Priest Omar continued, “How they get away with this is posing as Church members accepting impoverished youths, providing them food and shelter. Yet the issue is, we cannot make a move of any of these organisations as none of them are the actual cultists, you see these are only middle-men at most, not many of them actually know who they are truly working for. If the cultists catch wind of us arresting them, it would only serve to alert them and make them even more untraceable than they already are within this Town.”

“So what can I do to make it any easier in finding them?” Asked Talia.

Preist Omar smiled in anticipation of her asking such a question and said, “It is simple although none of these groups holds actual cultists, they have something which identifies ideal human sacrifices. The problem is the item used is commonly used by other Churches to pick out potential clergy members, so what they are doing is a perfectly legitimate way in scouting for talent. Which not only fools the poor folks into believing them, but it makes it that more difficult to identify which group is the correct one, even though the ‘Order of Templars’ are on decent terms with the other Churches, we are not privy to genuine members of their organisation and would only risk offending them if we capture every one of these groups who holds such an item.”

Talia nodded once again showing her understanding which prompted Priest Omar to continue, “These cultists are now laying low, so they will not dare to pick out any human sacrifices for a good few months, so we need to present them a target so valuable that they will risk exposing themselves. And that Talia, is you.”

“Me?” Talia asked full of confusion, what makes her so valuable?

“I’m not sure if you know yourself, but as a Priest of the Templars, the signature of your soul is hard to miss. It shines like a burning sun, I’ve never seen such a strong soul on one who is so young before, and that is why you would be what called as a ‘perfect sacrifice’ to those cultist's eyes. You are simply too valuable for them to ignore, which would put the cultists exactly where we want them, what we have been debating about is whether to send the Mayor's subordinates with strong souls there, but it is too risky. And no one here wants to send someone without much battle strength into such a risky situation, so it is why I put you forward as I believe you are best suited to infiltrate, I don’t see the cultists exposing themselves for anyone else but someone as extraordinary as you.” Priest Omar said, revealing to everyone just how highly he thought of Talia.

Everyone present in the room stared in amazement as they didn’t expect Priest Omar to grant Talia such praise. Members of ‘Order of Templar’ are known for never daring to exaggerate or lie about the potential of a person, so what he was saying about Talia was truly the truth.

“You rate me that highly?” Talia asked surprised, even she not knowing her soul was considered that powerful, even considering the beast soul.

“Yes. I can tell your soul is unrefined and unprotected from my senses, which means you have never once trained in any cultivation techniques to do with the soul yet, but even so, your soul is that strong, it is something I’ve truly never seen before. This could only mean your potential is truly astonishing, and it would be a waste for you to not cultivate your soul, I would introduce you to our techniques, but it is against the will of the organisation that we give away things that freely.” Priest Omar admitted.

Talia was shocked that Priest Omar managed to glean that much information from her, but upon him describing that she could not receive any soul-cultivation methods, she felt a tad bit of disappointment, yet she knew it is inevitable that she will eventually receive one.

Now discovering Talia’s strong soul, no one in the room questioned Priest Omar’s decision, as Talia was simply the obvious choice with the most chance of success among all of the participants put forward.

“Talia, before we send you off to the biggest suspects which we believe, are working for the cultists, I have to warn you, that this task is by no means not without risk, you will be going in unarmed and we will place an item on you which will allow us to discover your location, but don’t believe your safety is secured with such an item. I won’t blame you if you decide to back out now.” Priest Omar warned, not hiding anything about the major risks which comes with infiltrating the cultists.

“I know the risks going into this, but I still am going to accept,” Talia said without hesitation.

She has always been a gutsy person and a big risk-taker, and she knew that what came with the biggest risks, often holds the largest rewards.

“Well then, let’s find you a suitable disguise, we will need to change your appearance, which is mainly thanks to you being so active around Town lately, the chances of you being recognised by the cultists like this is high.” Priest Omar said.

Talia blushed in response, knowing that her rampant completion of quests had already built her some reputation within the Town, it is not a good idea to go like this at all because she would be recognised by the cultists' spies straight away, thus she was fully compliant as Priest Omar escorted her to a room for her ‘makeover’.