Beach (8)

Once she came back to her senses, Maria turned her attention back to the ingredients in front of her.

Seeing them all spread out like this, she couldn't help revealing a wide smile.

The look on her face, it was as if she could already taste them.

The crab, the mussels, the clam…and the most important thing of all, the lobsters!

These weren't the small farmed lobsters that would be found in stores. There were small lobsters that had washed up on the beach, but the ones she picked were the largest ones here.

She couldn't wait to chop them up and stir fry them. There was also the option of going the traditional way of boiling it and then dipping it in better. There were also a few bottles of good wine in Seul Ah's villa that she could use to create the perfect sauce for lobster thermidor

There were all different kinds of possibilities and all of them excited her.

Not just the lobster, but also the crab, the mussels, the clams, and etc.

These were all seafood that were fresh from the sea, so the taste couldn't be better.

Seeing the look on Maria's face, both Guang Liang and Seul Ah couldn't help looking at each other before shaking their heads with faint smiles.

They knew that Maria was completely lost in her own world and it didn't matter what they said, she wouldn't hear them at all. She only had these ingredients on her mind and no one would be able to pull her away from them.

But they weren't planning on pulling her away in the first place.

This was something that she enjoyed doing, so they were happy seeing her like this.

Not to mention…they knew that there wouldn't be their portion missing from tonight's dinner, so they couldn't help drooling at the thought.

Maria's food was the best food in the world in their minds and since she ran a cafe, she rarely made anything with fresh seafood like this. She might use the occasional shrimp and such, but seafood really was hard to keep in a cafe.

So being able to eat fresh seafood cooked by her really was a treat.

It was a treat that the other S Rankers didn't get to enjoy.

Even if they were envious, they couldn't do a thing since it was Maria who chose to go with her.

Guang Liang and Seul Ah were both planning on sharing photos of Maria's cooking in the S Ranker group chat later just to brag.

But then Maria suddenly said in a confused voice, "Eh?"

Guang Liang and Seul Ah were both pulled out of their daydreams and immediately came to Maria's side with worried looks, asking at the same time, "What's wrong?"

Both of them had immediately raised their guard just in case.

They didn't want anything to happen to Maria just because their guards were down temporarily.

Maria was surprised by them suddenly running over to where she was and she couldn't help moving a step back when she saw how intense they looked. But then she said, "It's nothing, it's just that I can't find the sea urchin."

"Eh?" That was the only response Guang Liang and Seul Ah had to this.

They couldn't understand why Maria would be so confused about not finding some sea urchin.

Maria saw the look on their faces and explained, "I could have sworn that I found some sea urchin earlier. I gathered them and put them on the side, but now they're gone."

Guang Liang and Seul Ah still didn't know how to respond to this, so they just blank nods.

Maria didn't mind and turned back to her stock of seafood before looking over the large beach. She could still see that there were plenty of ingredients that were scattered all over the beach…

So she picked up her bucket and shovel again before saying, "I'm going to take another look."

They already had plenty of seafood for their dinner, but she couldn't just give up on the taste of sea urchin.

That sweet and salty taste that had a richness to it, it was not something that she could give up.

Not to mention that she didn't have the chance to eat sea urchin often since it was just too expensive for her!

If she didn't grasp this opportunity, it would be unknown when she would get another chance to eat sea urchin. So of course, she couldn't give up this opportunity and headed off to search for the sea urchin.

Guang Liang and Seul Ah just watched her run down the beach without following her.

This was a private beach after all and they had already deployed security from their guilds around it. It could even be said that this private beach was already the safest place in the world with five of the top guilds in the world and five S Rankers guarding it.

That was right, five guilds…

Before they left, Alexei, Alexander, and Anne Marie had all gotten their guilds to send people to guard this place as well.

But even if they hadn't, their guilds would have sent people to guard them anyway since these S Rankers were the core of these guilds.

As important members of these influential guilds, they would naturally have made enemies in their career.

There were all kinds of accidents that could have happened.

After standing there in silence for a bit, both Guang Liang and Seul Ah also picked up their buckets and shovels and started heading down the beach to look for the sea urchin. As they headed off, there was a bit of a competitive look in their eyes as they looked at each other.

They knew that whoever could find the sea urchin would be praised by Maria, so they couldn't help feeling a bit competitive towards each other.

But they still loved each other, so it wasn't as if this competitiveness would ruin their relationship.

In fact, a little bit of competition was good in a relationship sometimes since it would keep the relationship interesting.

The two of them hadn't even taken a few steps before they suddenly heard a surprised cry come from in front of them.

This time, it wasn't just Guang Liang and Seul Ah who reacted, it was also Alexander and Alexei and Anne Marie who were in the water that reacted.

Alexei immediately created an island of ice in the ocean that lifted him to the top and he immediately jumped out towards the beach.

At the same time, Anne Marie created wings of light and floated out of the water, flying out of the water and floating into the air. With the way that the wings glowed on her back, she really suited the title that she was given, saintess.

As for Alexander who had been lying on the lounge chair, he immediately turned into a bolt of lightning that flew up into the sky before falling back down right near Maria.

Both Guang Liang and Seul Ah had also turned into light and fire respectively as they charged over to Maria's side.

When the dust had settled from all these excessive movement techniques, the five of them had surrounded Maria in a full battle formation. With the way that they were organized, not even a fly would be able to get past them to reach Maria.

Maria was stunned by this sudden reaction from them, not being able to speak for a long time.

But when she recovered from her shock, she slapped them on the shoulder and shouted, "What are you guys doing?"

All of them looked at her with concerned looks as they started speaking at the same time, but this just made it so that Maria couldn't understand a single one of them.

So she raised her hand to stop them before saying to Seul Ah, "What's wrong?"

Seul Ah came forward and looked Maria up and down before saying, "Are you alright? We heard you scream."

Maria looked at them like she couldn't believe what she was hearing before saying, "You did all that because you heard me scream?"

Seul Ah had the same serious look as she said, "We thought that you were in trouble."

Maria didn't know what to say in response to this.

After a long period of silence, she finally said, "I was just surprised by something wriggling in the sand over there. It's nothing that important."

"Oh." All five of them said, but there was no sign of remorse on their faces at all.

Maria really didn't know what to say in response to this.

If this was how they reacted to her being surprised, then how would they react if she was actually in danger?

Would they destroy the world just trying to protect her?

This was Maria's first time traveling with them on vacation since normally she either went on vacation with Seul Ah alone or went on family vacations with Guang Liang. She had never gone on vacation with this many S Rankers before.

So this was a new situation that she had never experienced.

At that moment, she vowed that she would never do something like this before…

It would be too dangerous for Earth if they did something like this again…

After shaking her head with a sigh, she turned back to the wriggling thing that she had seen earlier.

She reached out and grabbed at it, grabbing onto what seemed like a tail before pulling the thing out of the sand.

What appeared in her hand was a little lizard that was just dangling there in the air.