It finally happened.

  Nel Chamberlain couldn’t believe it— her plan had worked out. She was finally spending some alone time with Kai himself. She had been looking forward to this for so long. It was everything she ever wanted.

  She didn’t even want to be an Inquisitor. Her Class made her a bad fit to become one. She was a [Sacred Stalker]. A [Rogue]-type Class. Which meant that she was more suited towards reconnaissance rather than direct combat. If she even intended on joining any military faction of the Church of Life, she’d probably join the Templars, since if she were placed into a leadership role, she wouldn’t even have to fight.

  But she had no real plans of doing that. She would rather work in the Holy Academy once she graduated— or better yet, just live off her father’s name and wealth for the rest of life. Honestly, that sounded tempting. She could just spend her days in her private library, perusing the many books she adored reading. Perhaps she could even pick up the pen herself one day and secretly author a novella or two of her own under a pseudonym.

  That was what many noblewomen and other women of high society often did— so that their reputations would not be ruined if it was discovered that they were authoring books with… questionably explicit content.

  Anyway, there was a reason why Nel Chamberlain had very little interest in working at any branch of the Church of Life. Because as a woman, her situation was complicated. She couldn’t become a [Priest], nor could she become a [Bishop].

  And she had no interest in joining any of the sects of nuns that worked in the shadows of the Church of Life. She knew very little about them, but from what she heard from her father, she didn’t like what she heard.

  At most, she could have become a [Priestess]. But as a [Priestess], the scope of her position was quite limited, even if she would technically be above a regular [Priest] in the Church’s ranking. Furthermore, she could never really rise up higher than the rank of a [Priestess] if that was the path she chose.

  It was honestly ridiculous. This was why Nel Chamberlain had very little affection for the Church of Life. Even if she was grateful for what she had been given by her position from her father.

  But that was also why she really respected Kai and what he had accomplished. Because for a commoner to overcome all the obstacles and challenges the Church of Life would have in place to stop someone like him from rising the ranks…

  He was truly amazing.

  Nel glanced back at the Inquisitor as he slowly trailed behind her. She stared at him dreamily for a moment, before shaking her head. Because she shouldn’t be too happy.

  After all, even though she finally had her quality time with Kai…

  Nel saw the distance between the two of them. They had been together for nearly a day now, and they had barely interacted. She wasn’t even sure what to say or do. Well, at first, she had tried to get to know him. But after asking him a hundred questions and only getting one-word responses, she realized that would have gone nowhere.

  But what could she do now? This wasn’t going how she thought it would go.

  It’ll be fine, Nel reassured herself as she turned a corner in this maze. I have plenty of time to figure this out…

  Because she was very much lost. And she wasn’t going to find her way to the next floor anytime soon. So she was going to find a way to make Kai fall in love with her before this expedition was over.

  ***

  As expected, navigating through the second floor of the labyrinth was extremely tedious and time-consuming. Even though we stuck to the strategy I devised, it had already been two days that passed since we split off from Kai and Nel, and we still had yet to find the exit that led us down to the third floor.

  Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

  But while that was concerning— since it meant that any advantage we had from having a map to make it through the first floor was gone— I was not too upset about this, since there were plenty of golems down here for me to kill, just as I had expected.

  There were the light metal golems, which were fast and relatively weak in terms of durability, which usually clustered together in groups of four to six. But in addition to that, there were also heavy metal golems, which were much harder to take down compared even to the golems on the first floor.

  I was pretty sure that these heavy metal golems were Gold Rank too, unlike the light metal golems which were probably high Silver. The heavy metal golems were slow but strong, and they were usually alone, so I assumed that they were meant to be dealt with as a team. Or better yet— they were supposed to be avoided entirely.

  But I dealt with them with ease as well. And as such, I managed to level up two more times, which was exactly what I wanted.

  *ding!*

  You have reached Level 7!

  +2 [Magic]

  +1 [Vitality]

  +1 Free Point

  *ding!*

  You have reached Level 8!

  +2 [Magic]

  +2 [Speed]

  +1 Free Point

  Name: Nox (Eli)

  Race: Human

  Rank: Gold - Level 8

  Class: [Soulfire Cleric]

  Class Skills: [Arrows Of Light], [Shield Of Holy Fire], [Lance Of The Divine], [Greater Healing Touch], [Greater Holy Fireball], [Domain Of Light], [Heal], [Holy Fire], [Advanced Light Magic Conjuration], [Boon Of Vitality], [Aura Armor Of Light And Retribution], [Boon Of Strength], [Purifying Touch], [Lesser Poison Resistance]

  Titles: [Returning Death God], [Velmond’s Blessing], [The Bloodied Blade], [Demon’s Bane]

  Title Skills: [Remembrance Of The Fallen], [Death Magic Supremacy], [Basic Blessing Of Life], [Aura Blade], [Excorcism Tempest], [Temporary Fear Resistance]

  General Skills: [Demon Summon: Zerith the Abysslord], [Spirit Summon: Vorth the Spectral Sentinel], [Elemental Magic Proficiency], [Quick Dash],

  Attributes:

  [Strength: 130]

  [Speed: 130]

  [Magic: 695]

  [Vitality: 160]

  [Dexterity: 140]

  Free Points: 0

  Of course, Myrla couldn’t help but complain about the fact that I was hogging all the kills for myself. So I gave her the opportunity to try to deal with a heavy metal golem on her own. She survived for just barely a minute, before I had to intervene.

  “This is so annoying…” Myrla pouted as she trailed behind me, while we continued to stick to our plan of only turning left. “I can’t believe I’ve fallen behind this far…”

  I didn’t want to break her heart by telling her that she had never even gotten close to catching up with me. So I just remained silent.

  Especially since comparing us wasn’t even fair to her. I was the Death God— and I had kept a large chunk of my mana from my previous life due to my meddling with the reincarnation process.

  I’d rather let her believe she could catch up to me to motivate her to work even harder.

  Both Myrla and I continued making our way through the maze, running into even more golems, while occasionally running into a trap or two. But the traps weren’t very complex. They were very simple— very weak.

  I easily deflected them using my [Domain Of Light]. It functioned as a barrier, and it was more-than-enough to deal with a few magical arrows that could barely classify as a Bronze Rank spell.

  So the second floor continued to be a breeze, with the only issue being how luck-dependent it seemed to be. And I thought we would have continued navigating the maze for maybe another day or two.

  But as we decided we were about to finally retire for the day and set up camp— where Myrla and I would alternate who kept watch— we suddenly came across a strange hallway that was… well, just a long straight line that faded into darkness.

  “Do you think we should go down there?” Myrla asked as she peered down the hallway. “I feel like there’s probably a trap…”

  I shrugged at her as I walked forward. “I mean, by the law of always turn left, we have to, so let’s go.”

  Myrla nodded as she followed after me. We continued down the path, expecting for there to be a crossroads— or anything that could be down here waiting for us. But there was no trap, no golem, no nothing.

  Instead, the corridor started to incline downwards, before slowly winding around until finally—

  “Wait, what?” I blinked at what I saw there.

  The passage opened up to a vast chamber. It was massive, and we were overlooking it from above as our winding path slowly descended down to it. But what caught my attention wasn’t the chamber itself. It was what comprised this chamber.

  “This is the third floor?” I blinked as I swept my gaze over the room.

  “It’s a labyrinth!” Myrla exclaimed.

  But it was not any ordinary labyrinth. Because while an ordinary labyrinth was pretty much no different than a maze that led to a center room, this labyrinth was going to be a lot harder to solve because…

  “The walls… are they seriously moving?” Myrla gasped at the sight.

  And I nodded as I took a step forward. “Yeah, it’s a magical labyrinth… just as I expected.”