The Insider System

Chapter 276: There's Nothing You Can Do To Me

It didn't take long for the Temple Head to get close enough to make her move. As Lake watched using Mana Vision he could tell the fight could start at any second. Sadly he was unable to keep his eyes on them the whole time with the constant dodging around he was having to do so that he wouldn't accidentally take a tree down by running into it.

He wasn't worried about the noise because of Mute but there was no way a tree falling wouldn't alert the people he was following behind. Seeing the Temple Head was even closer than she had been when he looked up this time Lake knew he was seeing her chosen method of getting Tiffany back.

Knowing they should come to a stop soon no matter if the temple Head succeeded or not Lake changed direction slightly so he would be in a good position to attack if it became necessary for him to do so. It would be kind of silly for him to attack from the same exact direction the Temple Head had because that should be where the person was looking during most of the beginning of the fight.

Looking back Lake saw that Tiffany was still on someone's shoulder but having looked away during the actual exchange he wasn't sure who had her so he got closer as the next attack happened. Seeing as they were still both alive, Lake knew the Temple Head had either failed to land an attack or just took Tiffany and was now defending against the kidnapper.

Only moving whenever they did it took a while for him to get to a place where he could see the fight and instantly he knew that the Temple Head had somehow failed in the rescue attempt. Tiffany was still squarely on the shoulder of a person he had never seen before and not wanting to give himself away on the off chance he had been right about this person being able to tell when someone was tracking them he didn't use Detector to find out more about them even though he really wanted to.

Getting an arrow out, Lake held it but didn't turn it into a Magic Arrow right away and got ready for a sign that he needed to act. At the moment the fight seemed to be a stalemate with the Temple Head too afraid to use any real attacks but being able to dodge all the ones that were thrown at her but Lake knew that at any moment the person holding Tiffany could snap and use her to make the Temple Head stop in her tracks.

Eventually what he was waiting for happened and the person pulled Tiffany from their shoulder and started to yell. "There's nothing you can do to me." Taking that as a green light he let the arrow fly from his hand after using both Magic Arrow Crunch and Imbue Fire. He had spent a lot of time killing undead with this combination so he knew it would be lethal if it actually hit while it might not without the fire.

Seeing the silent arrow quickly accelerate as it went, Lake knew there was a good chance the person was dead but quickly pulled the arrow back as the person turned towards him and Tiffany got in the way of his attack landing. "Did you think I didn't know there were more of you? Get down here before I start cutting into your friend."

Seeing that exactly what he was hoping to avoid had happened, Lake jumped out of the place he had been hidden and landed next to the Temple Head. "Get down on the ground." Hearing they were being told to get on the ground by the person, Lake looked at the Temple Head and seeing she was doing it he decided to just go with it.

"Which one of you was tracking me?" Lake didn't know if he should tell the truth but when the Temple Head didn't say anything he deactivated Mute and said. "It was me." As he was saying this he used Detector to see if it would be able to tell him anything about this person. He started with the classic people that could kill me and sadly or maybe thankfully Lake didn't see the person start to glow.

Wanting to find out if it was actually a good thing Lake switched Detector to look for people and like he had thought the person still didn't glow knowing that this could still just be because they weren't considered a person Lake tried to think of something that could only mean them. The thing or person that was holding Tiffany was what he went with and once again the person didn't start to glow which meant he had been right and they were somehow stopping Detector's effects.

This meant they might be able to actually kill him since the fact they hadn't lit up when he had checked didn't mean they were harmless. "You're too powerful for me to let you live so you have two options: either drink this or I'll kill this girl." Hearing what the person said Lake had to smile because this was the first time being able to tell when someone was lying had been extremely useful.

"You wont kill her, you should say what you would actually do if I refuse to drink whatever that is." Lake could tell no one liked what he just said and after a while of silence the person said. "Don't make me do it."

"You're not going to kill her because you took her for a reason and you know you're not allowed to hurt her or whatever. Let me guess you're under the loyalty curse and were told not to hurt her. That's probably why you were still able to use her as a shield since you weren't the one that would hurt her."

Lake was making everything up as he was talking but he felt it was probably close to the truth from how the person was reacting. He felt like if he was wrong Tiffany would already be dead and the person who had been acting really cocky up intel now would be laughing at what they had done.

"You should say something before we both get up off the ground and start attacking again." Lake knew it was a funny thing to be the one who had taken control of the situation while still laying face down on the ground but he kept himself from cracking a smile and kept his tone serious as he asked. "You don't have anything you want to say, or maybe you can't say anything that would confirm what I just said because of the curse."

The silence from the person lasted for a few more seconds before they turned and started to run. Neither him or the Temple Head said anything before they got up and started chasing them again. It was only after a few steps that Lake realized he had gotten too caught up in what he had been saying and had forgotten to control his speed.

Looking away from the person they were chasing, Lake saw the Temple Head was looking at him keeping up with her like it was no problem. Lake really had nothing he could do at this point and got ready for a difficult conversation after this was over. Looking back at the person who was trying to get away from them, Lake went ahead and set Detector to look for Tiffany on the off chance they somehow sped away.

If he was in the person's position he would try to hide Tiffany and try to trade that information for his life. It would probably work but it was always better than just being killed without trying anything. It was even less likely with someone like him around since even when something got in the way he had two skills that let him see people through things.

They wouldn't know this though so he got ready to run and catch Tiffany if the person tossed her somewhere they shouldn't be able to see as they were running. As they started to catch up with them Lake started to have a hard time keeping up with the Temple Head since she continued to speed up while he had hit the max speed he could go while not constantly hitting things.

He was fine with this though because he would be able to say this had been one of the reasons why he had decided to make her carry him when she eventually asked him what was wrong with him. This and a few other details should make her drop this issue but it wouldn't make her forget about the fact that he was as fast as he was.

Trying to think of a good reason for this, the best thing he could think of that would save him from having to tell the Temple Head all of his secrets was to tell her about the job he had unlocked Fleet-foot. Hopefully she would have heard of this job before and it actually could explain his speed.