Among the VIPs here, the one who felt the most awkward was the Pope of Death.
After all, Anna was his subordinate and was even someone in a real position of power within the Holy Church of Death.
If there was really any issue with Anna, then the entire Holy Church of Death would need to go through a cleansing.
âNo need to look at meâ the Pope of Death said, âI am loyal to God and would never shelter a bad subordinateâ
âAre you really? Then how about we call upon the will of God right now? What do you think, Your Excellency?â
The Pope of Mysteries looked at him with an unsmiling smile.
Before this Pope made it to where he was today, he had once tasted bitterness at the hands of the Holy Church of Death, so once he had attained a high position, he would always participate in anything with the Holy Church of Death to try and interfere with them.
The Pope of Death kept an expressionless look on his face and curtly replied: âBe my guest, I intend to remain impartial to this in the first place. But remember wellâââ if there is no issue with Anna, then please be sure to take full responsibility for the punishment of disturbing Godâ
The Pope of Mysteryâs smile froze on his face.
Those who were just about to follow up on his words also shut their mouths.
During this past year, Godâs Will would not easily show itself like before, but each time it did, it would always carry raging murderous intent.
If someone called upon it without any usable information to provide, their outcome would not be pretty.
Two VIPs of different Holy Churches had already been subjected to âDivine Punishmentâ, after undergoing that torture, not even their souls remained.
So when the Pope of Death said this, no one else tried to speak up regarding that.
No matter how much of a grudge the Pope of Mysteries held against the Holy Church of Death, he wouldnât bet his life on it.
The Pope of Mysteries did not reply to that but instead criticized: âHmph, the very root of your Holy Church of Death has already gone rotten. Iâm sure thereâs a problem with this âAnnaâ, otherwise, why would she become angry enough to kill someone?â
The Pope of Death coldly looked at him: âOne must be prepared to take responsibility for their own words. Youâre quite the character when youâre alive, so after your death, I will make sure to give you only the best treatmentâ
âThereâs no telling whoâs going to die firstâ an air of murderous intent appeared from the Pope of Mysteries.
âEnough! Stop your bickering!â
âArbitrarily bothering God, are the two of you tired of living?â
âSilence, both of you, we should see what the truth of this matter was before anything elseâ
The other Popes quickly spoke up.
Seeing them all give him room to retreat, the Pope of Mysteries didnât insist on summoning Godâs Will anymore.
But he had already prepared what to do next and called out:
âMadame, I would like to ask you to act nowâ
Everyone followed his gaze.
A woman in a grey robe stood up on his prompt and sighed: âThis is quite unnecessaryâ
She was the Pope of the Holy Church of Fate â an expert in temporal techniques.
âPlease, I insist that Your Excellency look for the truth. Whether or not that girl had betrayed God is a very serious matter, it cannot be let go that easilyâ the Pope of Mysteries insisted.
The other Popes and various VIPs of the churches also tried to convince the grey-robed woman.
But everyoneâs attitude towards her was considerably respectful.
After all, normal techniques and secrets were unable to affect matters related to time.
And people who held the power of time were rare.
This Pope was a considerable expert even among those who held temporal abilities, enough that even God respected her abilities and decided not to hand her any punishments when she made a mistake.
This was the only person in all of the seven Holy Churches to truly gain the favor of God.
The grey-robed woman glanced at the Pope of Death.
As the Pope of Death saw everyone elseâs attitudes, he realized that he was their common target this time around.
The Pope of Mysteries had planned for this so that it couldnât be stopped.
If I tried to stop it now, wouldnât that prove that there really was an issue with Anna?
Taking it one step further, would there be an issue with the entire Church of Death itself?
After a brief moment of hesitation, he could only helplessly nod.
If there truly was an issue with Anna, he no longer had any way to protect her.
How unfortunate, such an excellent seed...
The Pope silently felt regretful.
The grey-robed woman no longer hesitated and walked up to the Mech maintenance platform to carefully check it.
ââ-the maintenance platform had been burnt to a charred, broken crisp, a lot of the tools and components that were originally here had been destroyed, many of the storage compartments underneath the platform had also become unfit for use.
âAre you certain that Anna had placed something here?â the grey-robed woman asked.
The followers exchanged glances and nodded.
The leading man spoke up: âI saw her crouched down as if to hide something. When she noticed that we were there, she immediately stood up and hurriedly made effort to gloss it overâ
â...If that is the case, I can only use my powers to do thisâ
The grey-robed woman glanced towards the people of the other Holy Churches and continued: âThis temporal technique will drain all of my power, after which I will return to the Holy Church of Fate to rest. During that time, if any of you dared to touch my Holy Church when I awaken, I will make sure to report this to God and ask for his judgementâ
The other Churches could only express their attitude and vow that they would not offend the Holy Church of Fate.
ââ-she was using her power to help them do something that no other could do.
If someone really did try something sneaky after this, she could openly ask Godâs Will to resolve it.
No one was willing to offend her.
No one was willing to face the current Godâs Will.
The grey-robed woman continued: âAfter I fall to sleep, the Holy Church of Fate will temporarily be under the control of Cardinal Su Xue Erâ
âAs you wishâ the two servants who followed her here responded.
After she had arranged everything appropriately, the grey-robed woman stood and faced the Mech maintenance platform.
She lightly placed her hand on the Mech maintenance platform and chanted an incantation of hallucinatory sounds:
âTime is the length of life, but it is also the partner of my covenantâ
âMysteries hidden in time will reveal themselves, as time itself responds to my callâ
âCome, turn back time to the moment when Anna placed that item!â
For a split second, the entire platform changed beyond recognition.
ââno, it didnât change, it simply returned to a certain moment in the past.
This miracle-like scene caused everyone here to feel heavily moved.
âDid you find anything?â
The Pope of Death acted calmly and asked.
âIndeed, at that moment in time, Anna had placed something hereâ the grey-robed woman muses for a bit before confirming that.
The Popeâs heart became heavy.
This would be a very definitive sentence, after today, the entire Holy Church of Death will most likely experience a grand cleansing that causes the deaths of many followers.
Even the Demigod that Anna was close with and him wouldnât be able to get off too easily.
The grey-robed woman raised her hand and tapped something in the void of space.
The panels of the maintenance platform detached themselves.
âAh, I can see it, it should be this itemâ
The grey-robed woman lightly waved her hand, summoning an item from below the platform.
The Pope of Mysteries abruptly stood up and laughed triumphantly while shouting: âAhahaha, I knew that was the case! This is definitive proof of the Holy Church of Deathâs betrayal, we should call upon God right now!â
The other VIPs quickly whispered in discussion and nodded in agreement.
The Pope of Death said nothing and simply sat there with a pale complexion.
However, no one noticed that the grey-robed womanâs expression seemed a bit strange.
âSilence, I have something that I need to be clarifiedâ she declared.
Everyone looked towards her.
The grey-robed woman carefully looked back at the item in her hand, then at the followers who tailed Anna and questioned: âAt that time, you saw that Anna was crouching behind the maintenance platform, only after she noticed you that she abruptly stood up and hurriedly tried to cover this up, correct?â
âThat is exactly how it happened, Your Honorable Excellency!â the followers excitedly confirmed.
With this definitive proof, they will have made a great contribution and obtained a bright future ahead of themselves, how could they not be excited?
The grey-robed womanâs expression now became dicey.
She opened the box inside the bag, read through the instruction manual once, then carefully looked back at the item again.
The Pope of Mysteries couldnât hold himself back anymore and loudly declared: âI want to call upon God to see this himself!â
He triumphantly glanced at the Pope of Death and began the ritual.
The grey-robed woman glared at him, then slowly spoke: âIf you want to die at the hand of God, then I wonât stop youâ
The Pope of Mysteries forcefully ended the ritual.
He didnât obtain the position he has today through pure luck, so he naturally noticed more than blank threat within those words.
âDo you mean that..â
He tried asking.
The ritual being forcefully ended caused his chest to feel a bit painful from the backlash, but he already couldnât wait to hear a confirmed answer.
The Pope of Death also looked up in surprise.
A favorable turn?
The grey-robed woman looked towards the group of VIPs in the room and gestured to the Grand Priest of the Holy Church of Life to come closer.
âWhatâs the matter?â
The Grand Priest asked in confusion.
âCome take a look at thisâââ only you and I studied the language of that Earth World, and since you are also female, I think youâll be able to understand the situation the same way I doâ
The Grand Priest stood up, came forward and received the item from her hand.
She trembled for a brief moment.
âAnna was crouching behind the maintenance platform at the time...â
She muttered and quickly made sense of everything.
Who couldâve thought it would be something like that.
She exchanged glances with the grey-robed woman, then both of them turned to the Pope of Death.
The Grand Priest hesitantly asked: âYour Excellency, pardon me asking but, is Anna... married?â
The Pope was very confused by the question, but still answered: âShe isnâtâ
âThen, was she involved in any scandals?â
The Pope shrugged: âShe is a brilliant genius among the young people of the our seven Holy Churches, if she was involved in any scandals, I believe the two madame are more likely to know about it a lot sooner than I doâ
The Grand Priest and grey-robed woman both had complex looks of contemplations on their faces.
âWhat exactly is going on?â the Pope of Mysteries couldnât help but ask.
âââit seems the situation isnât quite as I thought it would be, what exactly happened?
The grey-robed woman explained it a bit awkwardly: âThis is a Technology-type product, although it is simple, it doesnât require any supernatural power to use with relatively perfect accuracyââ the use isâââ erm, to check if you are pregnant or notâ
The Grand Priestâs explanation was in a completely different style.
She spoke without mincing her words: âFrom what the followers here explained, Anna had just crouched down, probably to pull down her pants and check if she was pregnant when they barged inâ
The grey-robed woman followed up on those words and concisely expressed her stance: âIf I were to be disturbed in such a situation, then get caught in a fire for no reason, I would probably have made a few irrational choices in anger as wellâ
She was making it clear, as a woman, she was taking Annaâs side.
The Grand Priest muses: âThat world at the time no longer had the ability to suppress supernatural power, so Anna was most likely afraid of someone else using some unknown power to probe her situationâ
âA girl is nervous about of such things more than anyone else and would definitely not allow other people to know about it before they doâ
The grey-robed woman agreed and continued: âSince this was related to a girlâs honor and reputation, it made sense for her to find a secluded location away from everyoneâs attention to check it for herself firstâ
The Grand Priest followed up: âEven after taking so much precaution to stay away, as soon as she had just pulled down her pants, a bunch of people barged in, question what she was doing and suddenly tried to put her on fireâââ if it was me, I would probably have killed each and every one of these people before I calmed down againâ
After the two of them finished, the entire secret room became silent.
Deathly silent.
Not a single person uttered a word.
The followers who were responsible for observing Anna and reported this situation were already completely frozen.
Causing such a huge commotion and involving so many VIPs, and yet this was the result.
âââwill I be able to survive after this?
As soon as that thought crossed their minds, they began trembling in fear and sweating bullets.
The Pope of Death made a big smile and shook his head: âI should thank everyone here. Iâve never thought you were all so interested in our Holy Church of Deathâs scandal that you invited the Pope of Fate and even wanted to call upon God to witness it as wellâ
He patted the Pope of Mysteries on his shoulder and said in a friendly tone: âHow about I call upon Godâs Will for you and report these arrangements of yours for you? Iâm sure that will prove that not only did you manage your Holy Church well, but youâve also splendidly performed your role to collect intelligenceâ
The Pope of Mysteries wanted to snap back at him but hesitated to open his mouth and even utter a single word right now.
ââ-
TN: Can I just say I love how everyone completely missed the mark on what GQS chose to disguise for Anna, and how much trouble heâs going to be in when/if she finds out.