I followed the men in the professional clothing quietly through the crowded streets and managed to easily avoid making contact with them. It was evening, and streets were full of people on their way home after having done with their work for the day. So, it was easy for me to blend in and follow them from a distance.

They travelled together, looking like they were making light conversation with one another. It didn’t appear to me like they were friends, but I could be wrong. Still, I was following people I know next to nothing about except that the guy with the briefcase got something that’s going to put the lives of many people at risk.

“Bastards,” I cursed, and I glared angrily at him.

If I sound like I’m composed, it’s because I’m fighting hard to restrain the anger that was searing inside of me. From the conversation I heard them engage in, it was obvious the guy with the briefcase was the one responsible for the night raid that had cost me all of my happiness and set me down this path of vengeance.

“I must not let others suffer like me.”

That’s what I thought because there were many poor people trying their hardest to lead low, but decent lives. If something like the night raid happened, many children would be sold into slavery while many others would run away and become thieves. I, now, understood why my dad built that secret door inside our home; it’s so that I would be safe in case something bad happened to them.

“Mum. Dad. I miss you.”

Yes. I miss my parents very much, and we didn’t even have a photograph of each other because we couldn’t afford it. All I have are these memories of the lovely time I spent with them, and my rage towards that person and all the people that accepted his idea increased dramatically.

Still, I maintained my cool and followed them at a distance that they wouldn’t notice me immediately. Besides, I don’t think they even saw me while I was hiding behind the newspaper. Maybe one of them glanced at me? I wasn’t sure, but I have to keep my distance just to be safe.

Soon, the men began bidding each other goodbye and went their separate directions to their respective homes. When they parted ways, I hid myself near a shopping centre and watched covertly to see whether any of them would be returning or not. I waited a few seconds to check, and when all of them went their separate ways, I quickly went after the man with the briefcase.

The guy was walking casually, without a care in the world in a lofty attitude that pissed me off greatly. I could feel my anger reaching a boiling point and was hoping the bastard would hurry up and get to wherever he was staying at.

Luckily for me, I found him stop outside a luxurious looking hotel and walk into it. Unfortunately, by the time I walked up to the front and saw him through the see-through glass doors, I caught sight of his disappearing coat as he climbed up the stairs.

“Man!” I complained, looking annoyed at the situation.

I had come this far, and I was so close to him, and yet, I lost him entirely. At least, I know where he lives, but what good does it do me when I don’t know which floor and which room he lives in? It’s just a step up from square on. Maybe a second square? I’m not sure.

There I was, torn between whether I should just walk in and ask the receptionist about him, or wait and see what happens. I decided it was best that I waited and saw what happened because I would appear very suspicious if I suddenly appeared before the receptionist and asked about him.

So, I walked a little away stood out of sight while having a clear view of the hotel. I sat down on the pavement and waited patiently for him to appear. For probably twenty minutes, I sat there staring at the hotel when I saw the swishing of curtain on the second floor. And then, when the curtains got pulled back, I saw the man I was after as he looked out of the windows at the street down below.

“Must be checking to see if someone followed him,” I thought, smiling wryly as I thought that maybe he got suspicious of someone, probably me, following him. “Too bad, he doesn’t know it’s actually me. That gives me the element of surprise, and with his stupid decision of poking his head out, I now know which floor he was in.”

The only thing that I didn’t know was which room he was in, but I thought it didn’t matter as I just had to enter the room that he lived in. Well, it shouldn’t matter since it was the room facing the street below.

“Now, how do I get into that place?” I muttered quietly to myself.

Going in from the front was out of the question, so that left the other option of going in from outside. Basically, I’d be climbing up the building and breaking myself into the room he’s in. Shouldn’t be too difficult considering I could see ledges that I could grab onto to climb up.

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The real problem here was that this would be my first time attempting at breaking and entering. I’ve never once attempted to break into someone’s home and steal their belongings because I believed performing such a high scale robbery was risky because you never know how well secured the family were, and I could find myself being knocked out and arrested even before I realised what happened.

In those cases, I had the choice of simply stealing from others on the street without getting discovered. But now, faced with this tricky situation, I have to wonder whether I have the capability to pull it off successfully. I mean, can I even climb up to that floor without losing my grip, making some sort of silly mistake and falling down?

My biggest fear was that falling from that height could break my bones, leaving me unable to do my daily thievery without issue. On the other hand, this was an important mission as many lives were riding on the line if I didn’t act soon. But was I doing this for those people? No. I was doing this so I could get my first revenge against The Empire by making this bastard pay for what he’s done!

So, while being guided by my feelings, I accepted the risk of climbing up the hotel to reach his floor. And then, I waited in the shadows of the street corner while he kept peering out through his room window. He remained there for a few minutes before closing the curtains and disappearing.

I waited for a few more minutes, anticipating that he might reappear quickly and pull back the curtains to spot me. After all, he seemed like the cautious type judging by how he was glancing around down on the street.

Sure enough, it hadn’t even been a minute before the curtains got pulled back, and he looked out at the street. As I saw him reappear, I smiled wryly and felt triumph at being able to anticipate his movements so well that I managed to avoid him altogether. Finally, he closed the curtains and disappeared behind them.

I was ready to go out and inspect the hotel walls when I suddenly thought of something and hung back. The reason for this was because I thought that maybe I was fooling myself into thinking that he disappeared, when in fact he wanted me to think that way so that I would expose myself when he suddenly appears again.

So, I waited patiently for a few more minutes to see if he came, but it looked like he gave up. I sighed in relief, and while I did feel like I wasted time standing there doing nothing, I knew it’s better to be safe than sorry.

Once I was sure, I walked out of my hiding spot and began checking out the hotel, thinking of ways that I could break into his room without causing too much disturbance. I figured that I had two ways to go about this; one was to climb up the building next to it and leap onto the railings placed in front of the hotel to prevent people from falling. The other was to go in through the front or the back entrance.

“Well, climbing the building looks risky and dangerous,” I muttered, realising the great difficulty I had in my hands to do that.

There was a small gap between the railings and the neighbour’s veranda, but if I, by bad luck missed, I’d be plummeting to the ground and possibly breaking my bones. No. It was too risky, and it’s not feasible even if I were to wear gloves and attach myself to some kind of rope. Not to mention, this would be the first time I’d be attempting to scale a building, so I’d probably be very nervous try this.

“Yup. Not a good idea,” I said, declining the thought and looking at the alternative.

The other option I had was to go in from the front. Well, not literally from the front, but somehow make it into the hotel by breaking in somehow. Perhaps, if I pretended to be a worker there, maybe I could get in? If so, I’d need some kind of uniform, or some kind of job post that I could play off so that I wouldn’t cause unneeded suspicion about my backstory.

“Maybe a cleaner’s job?” I thought, slowly walking back to my hiding spot form before. “If I get ahold of a cleaner’s uniform and their id, I could slip in easily. Maybe, that’s the best way of getting into there without causing too much attention.”

That’s what I thought, and it made sense. Plus, it was safer and less risky than putting my life on the line and scaling a building for the first time in my life. I hadn’t even bothered to break into people’s homes and robbing their belongings because that’s way too risky and dangerous. Even if I did manage to get into the house, there’s no guarantee that I could steal anything without waking up the owners.

“Right,” I muttered, and observed the going ons at the hotel so that I could better understand what went on there and what I should do later to match that behaviour.

I sat down and watched from my vantage point, and I witnessed a lot of boring things happen, with regular people coming in and out frequently. At one point, I even felt like dozing off where I sat when I noticed a few people in a different uniform to the receptionists appear around the corner and then I heard them talking to each other.

“Man, why’d we have to come now to clean it?”

“Some guy got sick and threw up on the floor, so they called us to clean it,” another replied, sounding not too happy about their job.

“Yeah. Couldn’t they just clean it up and wait till tonight for the clean-up job?”

“Who knows? Whatever’s the case, we got a job and we’re getting paid good for it, so let’s get on with it.”

“You’re certainly in the positive mood.”

“I don’t want to get scolded by the boss for not doing my job properly.”

“Yeah. That certainly is true.”

I watched them come to the hotel and enter through the swinging doors before disappearing inside. From what I heard from their conversation, I gathered that they were scheduled to conduct cleaning in the night. Meaning, it was a perfect opportunity for me to knock one of them out, take his clothes, dress up as them and infiltrate the hotel.

“Perfect,” I muttered and smiled to myself, thinking how solid my plan was. Then a slight worry crept over me, and I muttered, “I just hope everything goes according to plan.”

There were too many uncertainties in this job, but then again, the same applied to being a thief. Since I succeeded in that field, I was feeling confident in my chances of performing well in this infiltration.

“Alright,” I said, feeling I was done being there.

I quietly walked onto the street and left as quickly as possible to not draw attention to myself. From then on, it was a matter of waiting till it was dark before I finally made my move.