Blaming The 'Incompetent' Guild Master

Albrecht didn't waste a single second picking his mask back up and putting it on. As for Marie, she was still in a daze since their lips touched together. Her face was still as red as a beet, and she couldn't believe that Albrecht immediately went back to combat after that.

'Furthermore... he didn't even address that lip touch! Does that mean nothing to him?!' Marie screamed in her mind, but she didn't let her frustrations slip into her expression. More than anything, she was still grateful for Albrecht. And now that she thought about it, it was actually her fault for nodding like that while their faces were too close to each other.

In a way, the lip touch was her fault, and Albrecht probably ignored it just so she wouldn't feel as awkward.

"Marie! Are you all right?!" Grado asked, his gaze following Albrecht as he walked away after donning his mask. When he returned to combat, Grado was still staring at him.

"Yes, thanks to Al— him. If it weren't for him, I would've died." Marie gently spoke, her face turning an even brighter shade of red.

"I'm relieved. For a moment back there, I thought you were dead." Alexander voiced out as the other Heroes of Relics nodded their heads.

To all heroes present, death wasn't a sensitive topic since they'd met face-to-face with it countless times. This was just one of those moments where someone got too close to the abyss but got pulled back before the abyss completely stared right at her.

Inwardly, Marie wanted to express her thanks to Albrecht, but that sensation was overcome by the plethora of questions that existed in her head. For one, why was Albrecht a vampire? Why was he hiding his identity? And the most important question of all— was he always that strong?

All those questions bombarded Marie's head, and in the end, she decided to ignore them. There was no benefit in thinking about them right now, after all, since they were in the middle of a conquer attempt. In the meantime, she would continue doing what she could to assist him and Isaias.

'When all these are over... that's when I'm going to ask him the question. If he was that strong... why did he leave the Heroes of Relics? Why didn't he show his true power back then... or did he get a power up? I mean, he always looked like he was struggling back then." Once Marie thought of another question, her mind would go through this mental gymnastics and come up with even more pressing questions.

Shaking her head, Marie just backed off and 'resetted' herself. There was no use thinking about all these when she could just ask him about it later on. She made a mental note to have a meeting with him... and then... and then...

'And then what would I get from it? Nothing! I'm just going to ask him questions and more questions would come out!' Marie scratched her head, and then she decided not to think about anything altogether.

— — —

Meanwhile, on the other side of the Seventh Outerlayer,

The maze was too high for anyone's liking, and those who could float couldn't even go up above the maze since some sort of barrier blocked their path. They tried to have a bird's eye view of the entire map, but the maze was designed to be manually solved, so there was nothing they could do but concede to the outerlayer's demands.

"This is not working." Yulie Rosethorn commented. With every minute, she grew increasingly worried for the heroes who were currently duking it out with waves upon waves of who knows what kinds of monsters. She badly wanted to help, but she couldn't even regroup with her party.

"Don't worry, we just have to push forward and hope for the best." Azura Xalthor said out loud. "I'm worried about the Heroes of Relics. They're under me, and they're the next best thing that has the highest chance of defeating the Seventh Outerlayer. I hope they're all okay."

All this time, Yulie Rosethorn was too focused on the thoughts of Albrecht that she didn't even realize who Azura Xalthor was. Somehow, the fact that he was the guild master of the Rilegarthe Kingdom flew over her head, and it didn't even occur to her that he was way up top compared to the Heroes of Relics—

— which meant that he probably had a say or two when it came to Albrecht being kicked out of the party.

Just now, Yulie's head pieced two and two together and she slowly turned to Azura Xalthor with a look of disbelief on her face. Her pupils were dilated, and she was somewhat shaking as she tried to contain the anger that she temporarily felt.

"So it's you!"

"I've been waiting for so long? What are you talking about?" Azura Xalthor joked, quoting the all-time famous song from the olden days. However, after witnessing Yulie's expression, he realized that there was definitely something wrong... or worse! Something was wrong with him!

"Yeah, you! You were the one who kicked Albrecht out of the Heroes of Relics, didn't you?!" Yulie Rosethorn gritted her teeth. Now that she thought about it, there were a couple of instances where she could've brought up the topic. But right now was the most optimal time since they were together, and the adventurers under them were lagging behind.

"What are you talking about?! I never had a say in that! You can ask the Heroes of Relics. Heck, you can even ask Alb himself. I apologized to him after knowing what had happened and even offered him to once again be a part of our guild!" Azura Xalthor raised his voice a little bit.

As he did that, the other adventurers thought that something came up and they looked up to both Azura and Yulie.

"Heh~ then again, I should thank you, or rather, the Heroes of Relics for doing that. Because of that, our guild got a— do you know... you know what, never mind." Yulie was about to brag about Albrecht, but then she realized that Albrecht wouldn't want her boasting about his sheer power. She didn't want to do it, but she respected Albrecht's sentiment and decided to keep quiet about it.

—

—

At that moment, Azura's gaze steered from Yulie, and he noticed something on the far end of the maze, tucked away in a corner where another 'right' could be seen.

"Wait up... isn't that—"