Finally, Seth was finished preparing for his heist and on June 30th, the day before the heist, Seth had gathered up his members and gave them a run-down of the final plan.
He gave them 2 separate meetings to really hammer down his plan and mainly to tell them of the knowledge he had gained of the extra security.
He had his items ready, and his potions on hand. In fact, so much money had gone into his preparation that Seth had to sell off one of the skill books for money, using the Deck Of Madness' services.
They were ready and now they only had to fulfil the plan that Seth had toiled endlessly at. Unlike last time, Seth made sure no blunders were even possible and even planned for unexpected situations. He was ready, and they were prepared.
They slept early and woke much before any other. 2 AM and the three had already started moving.
The Treasury had three possible escape routes: the front door, the back door, and the roof. Seth had planned for all three, so he needed to get a carriage near every exit.
After he parked those close by, the roof exit needed something to be brought in. Weight reduction potions, courtesy of Hex were perfect for the job and bonus, they could be used to reduce the weight of whatever they were going to steal if they chose to take another route.
They also had to equip their disguises, which had two possible directions: you either went with outlandish and clearly faked masks, or you tried to mislead an investigation by changing your appearance slightly, coloured contacts were a good example.
Seth chose outlandish masks because they were cheaper and if you only changed your appearance slightly then they still had some features that would match like facial shape and sex.
Seth also needed weapons. He already had one himself: the dagger from an early heist, and Liam also had one for unknown reasons. So Seth bought a weapon for Amelia and now they were pretty much done for preparation.
It was now 4 AM and the morning shift started at 6 AM so they had a few hours spare. The trio used this time to add to their plan, for instance, they got themselves familiar with the Treasury's surroundings.
At 5:30 AM they began enacting the main phase of the plan. Seth and Amelia went to local parks and started setting fires wherever they could, they wanted fights to break out and for police to be lured away.
During this time Liam, who was in the clothes of a bank employee, not wearing a mask, walked, and acted like he worked there. His smile played a key role as even though some employees were confused that they hadn't seen him before, his cover story of being a new employee and his clothes, together with his smile, warded off their fears and so Liam was allowed in.
But it was only a matter of time before someone checked out his backstory, so he spent his valuable time learning everything he could about each employee and anything extra about the vault.
His information would come in key later. For now, Seth and Amelia arrived at the Treasury and walked in with their masks on, this was at 6:10 AM. Without a word, they locked the doors behind them and put up a sign saying it was closed for the day due to the festival.
The reason that sounded so believable was the banks used to close during festivals but because there are more than 30 festivals every year, it just wasn't feasible to close for every single one.
This worked in the trio's favour, so they were certainly not complaining.
After the door was closed, Seth looked towards the till to find Liam at the till. A security guard at each corner of the room was now closing in on Seth but without too much of a rush. They did not know the severity of what was about to happen.
Seth shouted, "Everyone if you would be so kind as to lay down, with hands behind your back, it would be much appreciated. For those that choose to not, well, it would not be the first time this dagger had seen blood."
Seth tried his best to sound as deranged as possible and it seemed to work. Many till workers laid down after seeing the betrayal of their new colleague as Liam now quickly made sure no silent alarms were set off.
Nobody screamed, nobody made a sound. Which did surprise Seth, maybe his gentlemanly speech was actually beneficial in a way.
The guards decided his grand speech was not enough, and as Seth saw one of their hands glow he quickly chucked something at their feet.
A vial of the best sleep gas they had, enhanced by many skills, it acted instantly and the glow on their hands faded away. Skills were hard to counteract but 99% of the time you couldn't use them if you were asleep, so Seth walked around the Treasury with a cloth sprayed with the particular strong sleep potion.
Liam had done his part and all tellers were now asleep, he also unlocked the door between the teller room and the main hall, allowing Seth to enter.
Most people in the building were now asleep and their unconscious bodies were dragged to the bathroom, now the trio just needed to hunt for the final few. Liam had counted 28 people walking into the building, 8 of those were guards assumably in the basement with the vault.
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14 were already asleep so that left 6 non-guards to knock out. The trio searched through the second floor and knocked out another 5 and Amelia was sent to knock out the final one on the third floor. Whilst this happened Seth and Liam went down to the basement.
But 2 guards were now on the main floor, they were patrollers. They did not seem panicked and did not seem to notice the lack of people around, this was due to them being in the back of the main floor and not in the teller/main hall area.
Seth and Liam quickly threw another of the strongest at them. Seth shed a tear, the cost of those was anything but cheap but until Seth gained any fighting skill these would have to do. Whilst walking Liam filled Seth in about what he learned during his information gathering.
Sleeping potions were the essence of this plan and also the main cost. Since they focused on strength they only had a timer of 30 minutes and so as the time ticked past 6:20 they had already used 10 minutes. Seth had brought 4 and used 1 to dose each of his member's rags, this was so they could put the employees to sleep.
Picking up the pace they left the bodies there and made their way to the basement. Seth used the path the man a beacon took and using this route they were quickly in front of the vault. A large hulk of metal which would have cost unreal amounts to forge was looming in Seth's vision but as 2 guards were running in their direction, he threw his last potion at them.
There were now 2 final guards left and Seth had run out of potions, he was only equipped for 10 guards to be onsite. So, Seth and Liam had to improvise they slowly walked around the basement and found the two playing cards in an employee restroom.
Liam walked up to them, nonchalant as always, smiling as much as he could. Luckily the guards found nothing to be wrong and just continued playing.
Liam then started making a Bubbletop and made 2 for the guards as well. This took valuable time, so Seth walked back and started working on the vault, he just needed a key and in time Amelia returned with said key.
The last person on the 3rd floor was the branch manager, he had the key that Amelia was tasked to get. Successful in her mission she was happy, scared and trying her best to calm her nerves.
Unlike Liam who was a showman used to high-pressure scenarios and Liam who cheated with his calm mind skill, she only had minor stage performances where the stakes were rather low.
This time she was sweating and panicked so as Seth took the key, he calmed her down a bit, "Amelia, it's nearly over, the hard part is already done. Now is when the fun begins."
They unlocked the large hulking steel doors, that were actually mostly hollow, and open came the large doors. Inside various coins melted into their respective bars and a few steel-enforced boxes.
Roughly a bar was worth 5 of their coin so Seth was looking at 200 gold coins if he was just looking at the golden bars alone.
As much as Seth wanted to run in there and take them, there was one last sneaky security step. A tripwire very highly levelled that would only allow one type of shoe to be allowed past it. This was a key security measure that the vault offered and because the tripwire was made by a level 125+ the cost all of a sudden made sense.
The metal outside was hollow, it was only a show. This was what would get the criminals caught but as Seth was aware of it, well it was as easy as taking candy from a baby.
Now Seth knew that a certain shoe was needed, but he did not know which one in particular, but that could be easily guessed. The branch manager was a weird addict of certain polished black boots so much so that Liam had overheard that he had a foot fetish and that was why he was so adamant about his shoes.
Combining this information Seth knew which shoes he needed so he ran as quickly as possible, after telling Amelia to stay put, to get the only pair.
It took him 3 valuable minutes and he was exhausted by the time he got back. But he still practically ran into the vault and started taking loot out of the main door. Amelia then loaded them into bags that they took into the Treasury.
The looting phase had begun. Liam during this was finishing making the cup of Bubbletop and was dripping his knock-out cloth into it as much as possible. He then gave them to the guards and waited.
The two started to get drowsy but they never fell, By this time 5 minutes had passed, and Liam was getting anxious, so he decided to knock them out the normal way.
The first was easy, as he was not expecting it but the other noticed and got up.
His looming figure against Liam's scrawny body was a laughable match-up but as the guard spoke it became clear how bad the potion was affecting him.
"Wha, yu dooin to... mi friend."
The guard then used a skill that Seth had no way of planning for.
Self-Recovery
Like that, the guard was back to normal and now facing off against Liam. Liam used the codeword for help as he ran out and tried to get back up.
The trio acted quickly, and once all three came together ran at the guard with two rags of sleeping potion as their main weapons.
The guard was powerful and had another skill that made his body glow. Any punch the trio tried to land felt like they were hitting wood but as the three fought the singular guard it became clear that he was winning.
Amelia attempted to climb on the man in a weird attempt at strangulation, Liam tried to distract the guard with his skill and attempt to throw the guard off, and Seth was repeatedly punching the man using his skill Deft Hands for extra efficiency.
The guard, an aging man in his 40s shouted at the group, "GET OF ME!" The guard was so disoriented, so confused at what was going on that he forgot how to fight. The drugs certainly did not help but having three people start fighting you all of a sudden made the man feel like he was having a fever dream.
Colours blurred as he swung his fist, the pain felt almost like an illusion.
Finally, Seth's fist glowed for a moment and once he punched the man in the head, he fell unconscious at last.
The three were royally exhausted but had to keep moving, so Seth gave a quick "C'mon we're almost there." And the three started looting the vault.
Gold bars filled sacks and they were carried off by Liam to a waiting carriage outside. Seth and Amelia continued to fill up the remaining bags with Seth in the vault taking out the bars and Amelia putting them into the sacks.
This process continued and by the time the clock was 6:30, only a few gold bars were remaining in the vault. With 10 minutes remaining the group decided to take the boxes and leave, They had already taken enough money to secure them a massive profit and so with those surprise boxes, the three ran up the stairs.
Across the corridor, over the guards who were patrolling and out of the back door they went. Into the carriage, Liam took the helm, and the group completed their first heist lucky they chose to escape now as there was a scale under the gold bars which alerted the police If it fell below a certain point so if they had left not even a minute later, they likely would have been caught.