Somewhere, in a dim room lit by magic light…

「It's the one on the right.」

The hooded man with a graying, pepper-and-salt beard says while looking at two golden drakes of same denomination. He sets them down and slides them aside with both of his hands to the man sitting next to him.

「…The right one.」

The man says, and passes the banknotes further down the table in the same manner.

「Right.」

「I think it's right.」

「It's the right.」

The hooded old men say after a brief glance at the drakes as they pass them around, causing one of them down the line to tap his finger on the table louder and louder.

「It's very obviously the one on the right.」

Another old man says, and passes the bills onward.

「…I think it might be the left one.」

「It's the left one, actually.」

「Is most everyone here as blind as a bat? It's the one on the left, clear as day.」

Another man says, and the drakes make it all the way around the table to the man tapping his finger in frustration.

「…Gentlemen, as you can see yourselves, while it may not be perfect it certainly is good enough. Everyone after Ear got it wrong-」

He stops tapping his finger and points his hand to his hooded colleague just a few seats away.

「I've swapped them around.」

Ear unceremoniously declares, with his fingers interlocked and his elbows on the table.

「…What?」

The man with the drakes says, and looks at them closer. Indeed, the right one now seems to be the left.

「I've swapped them around. Just a little sleight of hand. If everyone was simply repeating what the last man has said, you would have gotten the same result regardless. It's a good copy, I'm particularly impressed by the art, but these defects are unacceptable.」

Ear calmly explains to the man, who has his brows furrowed incredulously in anger.

「But how? What defects? It looks fine to me!」

He spreads his hands, holding the counterfeit drake in one of them. It flaps and flutters quietly as he moves it.

「The ink seeps into the paper, and the text becomes blurry. An average peasant or a city dweller would have been fooled if they were handed an entire stack of them, but a single genuine copy in the mix would cause the illusion to shatter. Not to mention, shrewd merchants would pick up that something is wrong.」

Ear explains further, and the men around the table nod their hooded, elderly heads. The man with the drakes begins tapping his finger on the table again.

「…It's a good attempt. It's definitely worth another one… But we can't afford to do things good enough. They will be cautious, and we must be doubly so. We can't afford to have all our effort be ruined by some of it being just good enough.」

Ear says, looking side to side at his colleagues. Everyone nods in silent agreement, aside from the man angrily tapping his finger away at the table…

…

In the evening, in Ossen…

「Okay, here we go.」

The public wagon driver says as he pulls aside to a stop. The people in the wagon dismount, and Straf casually hops out.

「Thank you for your business!」

The driver nods politely as his passengers depart. Straf walks up to the side of the driver.

「Hey, are you going to that city with the big arena?」

He asks with his hand in his pocket.

「Kreisfeld? I might. Not today, though. How much are you willing to pay? If I get less than 1 gold between all passengers-」

「Tsk, I can give you a drake right now if that's what you need. I'm just asking because walking everywhere is a drag. Man, I really need to figure out flying, or teleporting…」

Straf says, and begins rubbing his chin as he considers his alternatives. The driver laughs the moment he hears the strange man utter out a statement of a lunatic with a straight face.

「Hahahaha! Flying, huh? That'd be a good trick. Listen, I'll wait a little past noon, give or take an hour. If you're here and pay me, we're going to Kreisfeld. If you're not here or don't pay up, I'm going back to Draconis.」

He leans a little towards Straf and nods his head towards him as he offers his deal.

「Deal. You'll get 5 stars if you don't talk all the way there.」

Straf snaps his fingers and says while walking away towards the sewer entrance.

「…What stars?」

The man shakes his head in confusion, pausing for a moment to furrow his brows and think. He shrugs, and whips the horse with the reins to slowly ride off elsewhere.

「Huh. That's weird.」

Straf says, looking at the brick wall where the door leading to the sewer would be. He shrugs his shoulders, and presses one of them into the wall.

Crrrkkk… Crack!

The mortar between the bricks begins to buckle and send streams of sandy particles down the wall's cracks. Straf pushes his shoulder into the wall just a little harder.

Crack!… THUD! Thud! Thud.

The mortar gives way, and a large chunk of the bricks rips away from the rest leaving a man-sized hole in the wall. They collapse inward into the sewer, causing a deafening, thunderous rumble on impact and shattering into small chunks. An singular brick tumbles further down the stairs, making more noise as it lands at the very bottom.

「There. I'm not taking the long route, fuck you.」

Straf shakes his head in annoyance as he descends into the sewer…

…

A few moments later and after passing the guards startled by the sound, Straf makes it to Thieves Incorporated office.

「Profits up, costs down I hope?」

Straf says with a grin as he enters. Fost and everyone else in the room glance at him, before lowering their eyes and hanging their heads in somber silence again.

「…Okay. Who the fuck died?」

Straf asks with a one-eyed squint, spreading his arms.

「Nobody. Yet.」

Fost says, and takes a few large gulps from his fancy mug.

「Yet? Hold on, I'll figure out who it is… There's the beard guy. There's that guy. I vaguely remember those guys-」

Straf begins pointing his finger at the people in the room, but Fost interrupts him.

「It's Nona.」

He says, clenching his fist before he takes another large gulp.

「Tsk. You just had to ruin it. So, what happened? Some sort of magic blood disease? She'll have to give up on all her dreams and become a pity pet?」

Straf asks with a sneer, pulling out a chair from Fost's table and sitting at it with him.

「…She'll have to give up on her dreams alright. She's getting the rope tomorrow.」

Fost says, and gulps down the rest of what's in his mug.

Clank!

「Shit! I told that idiot not to use her real name! I told her to be more careful! I told her to tone it down a little! I warned her she should have more escape routes! It's like she was looking for trouble!… Get me a fucking refill!」

With a curse uttered, Fost slams his fancy mug on the table making a loud, hollow ringing clank.

「Huuuuuh? And the trouble found her, huh?」

Straf asks, propping his face up on his hand with an amused grin. A lowly corporate worker pours more of a straw-colored bubbly liquid into the CEO's bejeweled mug.

「…Yeah. We can't even slip her a lockpick or anything. She's kept under nigh-constant watch. I actually got to talk with her not too long ago.」

Fost nods, trying to veil his sour frown, but the alcohol spoils the attempts.

「So what happened?」

Straf asks with a slanted mouth and bored eyes, still propping his head up.

「What happened was…」

…

「Ahahahaha!」

Nona laughs like a madwoman leaping out of the open window. She lands on top of a beam that has a store's sign hanging off of it, and jumps down to the ground with cat-like grace holding a large clinking bag in her hand.

「Fuckin'-! Go! Don't let her get away! Go!」

Two armored men rush to the window and lean out, looking at Nona walk away with a springy step. She momentarily turns around to stick her tongue out at them and grin before disappearing beyond the corner of a building. The man pushes the other back towards where they came from, rushing him along.

The evening sun stretches long shadows across the busy streets. Nona flicks the hood of her mantle on top of her brown head, barely holding back laughter with a massive grin as armored men, screaming something incoherently in their rush, run out from an adjacent street behind her and head in the opposite direction to her heading.

「…Fost is going to die laughing.」

She says to herself with a smirk, turning a corner. The sight of multiple city guards in the center of the street within her proximity cause her to stop in her tracks out of surprise. The guards pause their conversation to look at the hooded woman with their brows furrowed.

「…Wait! There she is! That's her!」

「Uh oh.」

One of the guards screams at the top of his lungs, pointing his finger at her. Her smirk twists into a nervous grin, and her amber eyes wince. The guards rush after her, and she breaks into a sprint in the opposite way.

「Sorry! Outta the way!」

She shouts, slinking past the crowd in the streets and causing the congestion to worsen, rendering the path behind her impossible to traverse without shoving somebody.

「Out of the way! Thief! Thief!」

The guards shout, ramming their armored shoulders into the people in their way and toppling them like trees. Nona continues navigating the streets with ease, gaining distance albeit very slowly.

《Ahhh! And it was almost going to plan, too!》

Nona cringes, panting heavily as she runs at her top speed, blazing with ease through alleyways and hopping over crates and woven baskets that were set aside.

The guards meanwhile run into a conundrum whether to attempt following her exact path, knowing their armor will slow them down, or try to take a different route and cut her off. The guards decide to split and do both.

《Great! I've almost lost them! Through here and I'm gone! Suckers!》

Nona sprints with a grin towards the docks. She abruptly slides to a stop, and runs sideways into one of the warehouses.

「There! She went there! I saw her! Get that fucking bitch!」

The guard first out of the alleyway screams when he catches a glimpse of Nona's mantle, pointing at the warehouse side door as he runs towards it. The rest that followed quickly catch up to him. Inside, Nona looks over her shoulder as she runs towards another door.

「Ahahaha! Too easy!」

Nona laughs again, appreciating the rather heavy bag of loot in her hand already.

《Now it's just through the door, then into the alley spaghetti! Good luck catching me there!》

She thinks, reaching for the door just ahead of her.

Thud!

「Agh!- Eh?」

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Nona rams her shoulder into the door that should swing open with ease, only to painfully stop when it moves ajar just enough to maybe slip an arm through.

「Huh?… But I checked this door just a moment ago?…」

A chill runs down her spine and her heart sinks when the gravity of the situation dawns on her. Her unnaturally orange eyes stare in wide-eyed shock at the door's ring grip, and her cocky grin has evaporated.

She pushes at the door, and it stops in the same spot. She shoves harder with her whole body weight, and it refuses to budge even a little past that point. In panic, she shoves her face in the gap to check what's on the other side.

「Wh-?…」

Her amber eye spies a cart loaded with cargo just outside the door, parked in an unfortunate manner. She retracts her shaky hands hands from the door and takes a step back.

《…What do I do, then?… I can't stay here!》

She quickly thinks, and breaks into a sprint back to the other door. Her escape is short-lived as the guards in pursuit flood the warehouse with heavy armored footsteps. She aborts her run, and starts swiveling her head in search of an escape route in scatterbrained panic as her heart thumps in her ears from the run and fear.

「There she is… Haaaah…」

The lead guard says, panting heavily with his halberd pointed at Nona.

「You thievin' whore…」 「I've got enough exercise for a year because of you, bitch.」

The exhausted guards begin hurling insults at the cornered thief. Nona glances at her dagger, considering her options.

《Do I fight my way out?- No, that's ridiculous! There's too many! What do I do!?》

She shakes her head, banishing the thought of breaking the guild's rules out of desperation.

「Now… Drop that dagger and get down on the ground! Try anything funny and we'll turn you into a fucking pincushion!」

The lead guard catches his breath, and shouts a command with a threat. The guards walk around the crates to the side, keeping their halberds pointed at her, completely cutting off any and all available routes back.

Nona's fearful amber eyes jump back and forth between the two groups, and her shaky hands slowly draw her dagger.

Clink-clank! Clunk!

She hesitantly drops it just a little in front of herself out of her reach and drops the bag of loot at her feet with a metallic rustle, then raises her empty hands.

「Good girl… Now on the ground!」

The guard shouts as they collectively close in, making the threat of the halberds' points more tangible by the second. Nona reluctantly gets on her knees, and lowers herself down to prone.

「Get her. Arrest her.」

The lead guard points his armored gauntlet at her, and the guards swoop in.

「Does anyone have a rope? Good job everyone. What a fucking menace… Someone go report this to the captain, he'll jump in joy.」

The guard asks, acknowledging the team effort. He walks closer, glaring down at Nona with spite.

「I'll go get some.」

One of the guards says, and the warehouse largely clears as most of them follow him out. A tense silence begins as the guards stare at Nona, physically restraining her and glancing at each other. An awkward cough breaks the silence, but only for a second.

「Lift her up. I want to interrogate her while we wait, and I don't want to bend my back for it.」

The guard nods to his colleague who has her in his grasp.

「Get up. To your knees, and don't try shit.」

The man says, lifting his weight off of her. Nona raises herself a little to her elbows, but her weak arms make the effort to prop herself up further difficult.

「I said get the fuck up!」

The guard shouts in anger, yanking at Nona's hair and pulling her up, forcing a pained yelp out of her.

「Owowowow! Sorry! Sorry!」

She cries out as her eyes fill with tears from the sudden pain.

「Sorry, huh?… What are you sorry for exactly, you fucking bitch? Making us work long hours? Double shifts? Stealing from all those people? Or are you fucking sorry that you got caught? Huh!?」

The guard screams in the terrified woman's face.

「I'm sorry! I'm sorry for everything!」

Clunk!

「Agh!-」

Nona tearfully apologizes, and receives an armored backhand from the guard causing her head to snap to the side.

「I'm sure you're fuckin' sorry for getting caught, bitch. Now, where are the rest of you fucking rats hiding!? Where do we look!? And don't say I don't know, because I know you are fucking organized!」

Some guards in the rear chuckle as the guard interrogating the thief screams in her face. Nona shakes her head, holding her aching side of her face with barely held back tears.

「…You think they'd be quiet for you? You fucking idiot. They'd sell you out if they got a single day off of their sentence. Now fucking talk.」

The guard squats down, glaring at her with a hateful expression. A brief silence ensues, causing the guard to let out an amused snort. Another guard grabs Nona's cheeks between his thumb and fingers and forces her to look at him.

「…What's with her eyes?」

「Dunno.」

He asks, and the guard restraining her shrugs his shoulders. Her nervous eyes glance from one guard to the next with furrowed brows, becoming malleable like clay in fear of more abuse.

「…She's not bad looking for a thief, isn't she?」

The guard holding her face comments, taking a look at her toned, tan body and thick thighs.

「…Why don't we have some fun with her?」

「…Eh?」

The man holding her hair suggests with a malicious, lecherous grin as the other guard lets go of her face. Her amber eyes open wider, and her head starts to turn left and right to gauge whether the guards took the outrageous suggestion as a joke or not.

「What if someone finds out?」

A voice of reason calls out from behind.

「What? You mean the people? They'll fucking clap if we dish out our own punishment. When all the victims come forth, she'll dangle by tomorrow evening. It's fine.」

The lead guard chuckles and stands back up. The guards close in, and Nona catches the eyes of the man holding her dart all over her.

「Wait… Don't. You're supposed to enforce the law-」

「Oh, we're going to enforce it right now, whore.」

Nona's pleading falls on deaf ears as the guards begin fiddling with their belts. Her amber eyes drift to the forgotten dagger she dropped, inconspicuously resting by the lead guard's sabatons. Her heart thumps as she considers her options.

《I have no other way out!-》

She thinks, and leaps for the dagger while the guards are distracted. Her hair slips out of the armored gauntlet's grip with relative ease due to the sudden and violent movement. She grunts when she lands on the floor, and rushes to rise to her knees again and lift the dagger point up to her throat.

Clank!

「Augh! Agh!」

The lead guard in front of her stomps on her hand with his armored foot, and the rest of the guards dogpile in on her, gripping at her wrists and ankles. He squats down again, clenching his armored fist while tears run down Nona's cheeks.

「What the fuck were you thinking? You could have played along and not made this worse for yourself. Did you really think you can try to kill a guard, and get away with it?」

The guard growls, spitting venom at the sobbing woman.

「No!… Myself…」

She sobbingly replies with her lips trembling.

「…Get that shit off of her. Spread her legs, and keep her properly fucking restrained this time. We'll take turns.」

「My bad…」

The lead guard stands back up, and the man holding her down previously gets a better grip on her wrists, pulling her back. A guard moves his hands to straps securing Nona's leather chestpiece, while another one pulls her legs apart, all chuckling to themselves with massive grins.

「No! Stop! Please! Don't!」

Nona begs, shouting at the men overpowering her.

「What is going on here?」

A loud voice asks from the door behind the guards. They all wince and click their tongues.

「Tsk. Fucking goody two-shoes…」

The lead guard mutters, and turns around to face the man.

「Captain! We've caught that menace of a thief!」

The guard brightly says, saluting. The guards abruptly halt their attempts to undress her, and the stark contrast of his voice and behavior deeply confuse Nona.

「Why is she not restrained? Why do you need so many men to hold down a woman of this size?」

The lead guard moves aside to let another armored man in a red cape through. He looks at the situation with furrowed brows and blue eyes of suspicion, bearing a coiled rope in his hand.

「We didn't have a rope on hand, sir. And she lunged at me with a dagger just now, because we took pity on her, sir.」

The lead guard says, glancing at Nona.

「Is this true?」

The caped man asks, looking at the guards restraining Nona.

「Yeah.」 「Yup.」 「The dagger is right there, captain.」

The men nod along, while Nona powerfully shakes her head, splashing her tears on the ground.

「T- That's a lie! They're l- Lying!」

She stammers with a mix of fear and hope in her eyes while looking up at the only guard she is not afraid of. He looks over his shoulder at the lead guard, then drops the rope at their feet.

「In any case, restrain her properly. I thought you might not have it, so I brought it along…」

The captain commands, and the guards twist Nona's arms behind her back, tying her wrists together and wrapping her arms and torso to make escape even more difficult, forcing her to sit.

「…Are you Nona?」

The captain asks with a cold glare and a serious expression. Nona quickly and silently nods back.

「…Are you responsible for the mass amount of thefts recently? Are you the one behind the winery theft?」

The captain asks another question. Nona hesitates for a second, but one glance at the guards standing nearby makes her nod again.

「…You're awful cooperative for someone who has committed so many crimes. If I have a single positive thing to say about you, it's that you didn't murder anyone while at it.」

The captain nods in contentment, and looks at the dagger on the ground again. The guards move aside to whisper amongst themselves, and Nona exploits the opportunity.

「You're going to the dungeons until-」

「They're going to hurt me.」

She interrupts the captain's words with chattering teeth and fear-filled amber eyes.

「Who?」

The captain asks, and Nona glances at the gaggle of guards. He looks over his shoulder at them, then back at the terrified woman.

「Are you certain?」

He asks, and she nods again.

「…Do we take her away, captain?」

The lead guard returns, and the captain's blue eyes drift down to the guard's belt that sticks out, having been mostly pulled out of its loops.

「No. I will get the special team to escort her. A prisoner of this notoriety poses a severe risk of being rescued by her work colleagues. Go inform the dungeon keeper I want them here, and tell them to make it quick.」

The captain orders the men. They nod, and turn to exit.

「…And tidy up your belt.」

「Yes captain!」

He adds just before they leave. They hastily and in panic start putting their belts back into their loops, and scramble to exit. His eyes return to Nona, his glare still as frigid as before.

「My trusted men will take you to the dungeon and keep their eyes on you, until you can plead your case. They follow my word to the letter, so you do not have to worry about them-」

The captain explains what will follow, but his explanation is cut short once again.

「Huuu… Thank you… Thank you…」

She breaks down into outright wailing and tears drip from her face onto the floor, sobbing as she thanks the caped man.

「You have nothing to thank me for. I will keep you safe until you can receive your sentence, but I have to say… I do not think you'll walk away with your life. I have nothing to say on this, and it's a matter out of my hands.」

The captain sighs, idly gripping onto his sheath's belt.

「Thank you… Thank you… Huuuuu…」

Nona shakes her head, grateful to the rare honest guard as her terror evaporates with her tears…