Too Late

With everything settled on Margaret's side with the children and Cassie, Ezra only had one thing left to do.

Ezra made his way into the guild building.

He had left the house first in the early hours of the morning before the sun was even up to raid one dungeon. He got there around 4:30am and started, and was done with all the monster except the boss before 8:00am, which was when the others arrived. He decided to leave them there and attend to another pressing matter.

Everything looked to be normal and everyone was going about their business within the guild. Without any hesitation, he headed to the top floor to meet the guild leader. He had decided to leave the guild. There was never any real need to join the guild to begin with, but he did after all, thanks to Small Lee.

On entering the guild leader's office, Lance let out a sigh as Ezra walked in.

"You went and did it, huh? And after assuring me it wouldn't happen again." Lance said, not angrily, but more in a defeated tone. "Forget it, I knew it would happen anyway."

Ezra didn't expect the situation to be like that, so all he could do was smile through it. Lance beckoned him to have a seat while he too did.

"Since they haven't made any move until now, best guess is they won't. The guys you took out must be unimportant, or maybe something else is the cause."

"You think? Those eastern gangs are brutal." Ezra said, worry slightly evident in his tone.

"The only reason why they won't be after your neck would be in the event where they are occupied with something else more important."

"Then that means it's a matter of time."

Ezra quickly relayed to Lance his plans to leave the guild. Putting it plainly, Lance wasn't the happiest about the development, giving the fact that Ezra had killed two of his guild's promising hunters, and is now leaving the guild himself. Besides that, them having any sort of relation would mean being targeted by the Earth Scale Gang, so he was ok with letting Ezra go.

'Hmm, maybe it's the effect of concealment, he can't see my true rank.' Ezra thought to himself while leaving the guild.

This was still morning hours; it was close to 10:00am. "I'm already late." Ezra said to himself as he looked at the time on his wrist watch. With haste, he hurried towards the dungeon site where today's raid was to begin.

Clearly, he was late, nevertheless, he didn't stall to listen the trashing Kyle so readily dished out. After all, they had done worse earlier, and the fault was Kyle's for not informing the other teams, including Luck and Mailyn.

"Come on Kyle, don't be so shameless. After all, it was your fault we didn't come early today to begin with." Luck spoke.

"Oh shot it. What? Because he solos a few B rank dungeons, we should be afraid now?"

"Pftt, anyone can do that anytime, easy." Kyle's wingman said. He alone had been behind Kyle in whatever he was doing for the most time.

Luck who wore a neutral expression most of the time crunched up his face slightly on hearing all of this, but he restrained himself, took a breath in and just left the matter be. Mailyn who was watching from the side just turned her face elsewhere and minded her business.

An hour and a half later, Ezra emerged from the gate and they headed for the next. He went through them of after the other until he had gotten to the last B rank gate.

"I'll go take care of the other one. They should be done by now." Ezra said before leaving for the fourth gate where the other teams were working. It had been a few hours, so he reckoned they were done already.

To his disappointment however, the mining team was yet to finish their work in the dungeon. Because Ezra had given no break, the workers were tired and needed rest. Their vitality wasn't as much as his to begin with. The fact that they worked throughout the previous day was also a factor. There wasn't really much Ezra could do in that situation, so he was forced to wait and watch them handle their work.

During that short break he had, Ezra got approached by Luck who had some interesting things to say.

To Ezra's genuine surprise, Luck had actually asked if Ezra would be establishing a guild in the future and even asked to join the guild. Of course, Ezra refused and assured him that he wouldn't be creating any such thing as a guild. After all, he preferred to do things solo. Luck looked a bit dismayed, but that wasn't the time for Ezra to be sympathetic. He was interested to know why Luck would even ask such a question out of the blue, but then the mining team notified him that they were through.

Luck went into the gate to take care of the boss monster while the rest of the teams moved to start work in the last B rank dungeon. This time it took under three hours, and Ezra was out of the dungeon, with a smile on his face. Outside, he met Luck and Mailyn who accompanied him back to the last B rank dungeon. It was late afternoon already as they made their way there.

"Hey, Ezra, let's stop for a quick ice cream! The weather's particularly hot today." Luck suggested. Ezra declined and urged them to get some for themselves while he went ahead before them.

"Excuse me! Hey!" Ezra called out to the head of the excavation team, "where are the two hunters that were supposed to here?"

"Them? I'm not sure, but they entered the dungeon sometime ago. Actually, not too long ago."

While the man explained, Luck and Mailyn arrived on time to hear what the man said.

"Those two…" Mailyn said, her brows furrowed.

Luck's expression changed in an instant like he had been hit with sudden realization, "Don't tell me it's what I think??"

Luck hastily explained to Ezra what his thoughts were before consuming the ice cream in his hand like a gluttonous snake. He couldn't waste it after all. It was apparent that something was wrong, to which the leader of the excavation team was told to bring out his team and to inform the other teams. He tried to run after the disappearing figures, but alas, his pot heavy stomach would not allow him the luxury. Even then, he carried himself the best he could.