POV Shift: Detective Locke

`How did he know?`

Such a baffling question had Locke lying on his chair staring at the station's ceiling for hours. He thought of a possible mole, which was the most likely culprit, but Locke had only told his Captain and the officers who came with him to break down that criminal's door.

He had done so many interviews that he found a similar person in all of their reports, `A man wearing black hooded clothing with vibrant blue eyes` After gathering testimony after testimony, he had enough to finally locate the man.

Locke then patrolled around the market and spotted a similar-looking man; he watched as the man seemed to walk past crowds of people and yet bump into 20 of them on the way. It was almost like he was doing it on purpose.

He then walked up to a victim and asked them to look for their wallet, she looked in her coat pocket and seemed confused. She had just had it, but now it was gone.

Locke had found his culprit. Now he just needed to apprehend him: he followed the man, using a safe distance to make sure he did not see him, and he found his home.

With a location and heart of justice, Locke called in reinforcements and not even 10 minutes later a local police team had arrived and were ready to apprehend or, if needed, exterminate the evil classer.

They broke down the door and ran inside screaming "You are arrested! Get down and place your hands on the floor or face immediate justice!"

Yet, as they looked around the broken-down room, they found not a single person inside.

Finishing his reminiscence, Locke could not, for the life of him, think how that man had gotten away. He clearly underestimated this villain and he clearly had advanced escape methods, or even worse, he had better hiding methods, like invisibility. That would be a nightmare!

For now, Locke decided he would keep an ear to the streets for any pickpocketing, and when he did, he would not allow that rat to get away again! He would make sure that evil criminals faced justice!

POV Shift: Seth

Seth looked around the colossal Colosseum to see the seats replaced by stalls and the centre hosted a large gladiator ring in which fighter classes fought with various stakes. Shouting of bets and screams of loss cried out throughout the crowd.

Here was the centre of Darter's criminal underworld and Seth thought he would fit in nicely.

Looking around the stalls, Seth's mind glossed over many potions created by Alchemists who created them from Dungeon ingredients, the effects were as varied as they came. From strength potions to disguise potions, they could do anything the mind could imagine.

Seth also saw many higher-rank weapons and armour created by Weaponsmiths and either Tailers or Armourers. These were made with materials mined in the dungeons themselves or rarely from the deep mines of this world.

The stall owners all had marks of being owned by the top Clans or Families which was unsurprising for an aware Seth, who made note of which sectors the top factions controlled: namely the Baskerville Family owned the Weaponry and Metal armour sections, whilst the Abyssal Sect controlled the Alchemy and the Leather armour sector of the market.

Seth was sure this coincided with the Baskerville Family owning the mines and the Abyssal Sect controlling the farms and gardens of this city's industries, after all, that was the best way to extract as much money from the market as possible.

Moving on from that Seth bought several tools and a bag from the market, though he was sure he was royally ripped off by a skill, but he had no control over that, and it was legal. So what could he do?

He wasn't high level enough to put up any resistance to any skills that could influence him and that was a severe weakness that Seth had to account for.

Luckily for him, no shopkeeper overdid their exploitation as his badge gave some authority in the matter.

The torches burned and Seth had finished his little shopping trip, so he quickly exited the `Paradise` and returned back to the overworld. The night was well and truly set by now and with that came the cover of night.

Night was truly the domain of thieves and Seth was in no position to deny its help. So, utilising the dark, he made his way towards the 4-story building.

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It was a wooden and mud combination building that was structurally stable mostly through the extravagant use of skills. Aesthetically, the wood was perfectly good by itself, and the mud was dyed white and smoothed out for a good finish that transformed the building into an upper-class housing unit.

The building was in a block with other houses lining up like dominoes, after all, why waste space in a city where the land is so costly?

Seth observed all the entrances to the third floor, which was where the specific apartment resided, namely the stairs towards the door and the windows. Sadly, Seth couldn't jump the 15 metres needed to go up that high, but he did find a close tree, and its branches were fairly close to the windows.

These trees were part of a demand for the Gardener classes that needed constant experience and it added to the ambience of the area, so the City Sect planted them years ago. Now, they were going to act as Seth's greatest accomplices.

The only downside about the trees where that they were placed by the side of a road, which was usually fairly busy, but in the dead of night there was not a person in sight. So, Seth climbed his way up the tree. It reminded him of when he was younger and happier, but he shut out those happy memories and focused on the task at hand.

Slowly but surely, he made his way to the top and when he did, he found himself in jumping distance to the house. Windows were a security risk, so they had magical locks created by these Trappers that could secure an area for a certain amount of time.

Depending on the level of the Trapper and the skill mastery of a particular trap, was the strength of the trap and the amount of time it would take to diffuse. Skills like this could either be beaten away through brute force or dissipated through special objects: Seth had the option of both.

Seth decided on the economical option, so he needed to get closer. Slowly moving on the unstable branches, that faltered under Seth's weight, he held his breath as he got as close as possible and with a deep breath, and an activation of his skill, he jumped...

15 metres up and with a cool air flowing through his hair Seth giddy with excitement. He loved this, more than he could ever describe. But he kept a cool head, and he landed and fumbled for a moment as his rapid hands found some places to hold onto. But, he got to a safe spot and started trying to tackle with those pesky locks.

The windows had a little ledge and Seth used this to keep one foot on and the other was used to beat the window down.

It was uncomfortably loud. The sound of shaking and battering could be heard by anyone awake but Seth hedged his bets that people thought that he was just locked in. Locksmiths existed but nobody here could afford them, so the good old-fashioned way had to do.

Tens of seconds passed each seeming more lengthy as the time ticked by and Seth could swear his kicks were getting excruciatingly louder. Finally, the magical lock that held the window closed cracked and then disappeared. Like that, Seth was in.

It was pitch black, unlike the street, which was somewhat lit up with the stray torch, here there was no light at all. Fumbling into his utility bag that he had picked up at the shop he pulled out an orb of sorts and after shaking it 3 times it hummed into a dim light source.

This one cost 20 silver and lasted 20 minutes. It was mainly used to discover ancient caves or to light up some noble's houses. Unlike torches, they used latent mana in the surroundings and turned it into light.

Fascinating stuff Seth could not care less about right now.

He moved with silence and observed the surroundings. He was looking for either a safe or a locked drawer, maybe even a loose floor panel. Anything that may make his investment worth it and not long after this he made his way into a bedroom and found a bedside table that held a bag of silver.

Good, but Seth was not happy with just that. No central banks existed for common people as the common man simply did not trust anyone enough to store their money, so people usually held their life savings in a home vault. The nobles and Sects did use modern-ish systems, but this world was far too power-hungry to care about modern banking for the lower class. Especially in a rundown kingdom like the one Seth was in.

Rummaging through drawer after drawer finding several incriminating `art pieces` as he went, Seth could just not find the safe. When he decided to look at the floor, he noticed some severe scratch marks near the chest of drawers.

It was hidden under it! Seth quickly moved the chest, trying his best to make as little noise as possible and voila! The magnificent sight of an iron box was beholden to Seth's twinkling eyes.

Like a child on Christmas day, he immediately jumped towards the safe and tried his best to unlock it. Safe's were perhaps the most expensive thing lower-class people had and there was good reason for it. They were criminally hard to open to anyone but the owner and even Locksmiths struggled with good ones.

The cold metal case was like Pandora's Box to Seth's inquisitive eyes, and he reasoned that it was a rank 5 Safe, so it was made by a level 50-59 Vaultsmith. It was unusually high ranked, but people could be paranoid and overly invested in good safe, Seth hoped that this homeowner was hiding some great stuff inside.

For now, Seth would take the mini-vault home and take his time opening it. It probably had a location service on it but that was only for the owner, and he was long dead, so Seth unlocked the front door and simply walked out.

Running down the dimly lit streets he found his way to a decent local inn where he booked a 3-day stay, he kept the safe outside and then climbed his way into the room through the window to avoid them seeing the safe.

Sat on a bed of cotton, Seth's heart still had not calmed down. He enjoyed that, way, too, much. He felt like he was on a drug, his mind was so disarrayed with excitement that the smile on his face felt permanent.

He knew he could have been more cautious: like checking the way out before just rushing away but his mind simply was too busy full of endorphins to care. He loved it; he hated it.

Ever since he reincarnated Seth was a mild freak about control. Or more accurately was to say he was absolutely terrified of death. He still remembered it, and whilst some of that trauma had died down in his peaceful family, he just experienced something that remotely felt like that place.

That brought a frown to his face. He could never return there; he would do anything. Maybe Seth was a coward, his face one of an eternal joke to humanity and its glory but he didn't care.

Anything, anyone that could harm him or stop him in his growth was a threat, a threat of death and a calling of a place he once called home.

He fell asleep that night, regret, pain, and anger fuelled his nightmares.