Marfud was not a thief, but he stole his own toaster collection. Why? Well, why would someone be watching him look at toasters every morning? He kept up the show, though, going downstairs in the morning and acting through the grief of having lost a pile of magic metal. So what was his next move? Who knows, Marfud didn’t; he figured it was someone else’s turn, or… he was just crazy. Both seemed ok.

Diones was a thief and did not steal Marfuds toaster collection. So, where did it go? Did someone else get their greasy fingers on the toasters? No shot. Why would they? The police would be interested, but they wouldn’t have quietly got the toasters and left. Any result of someone caring about the toasters but not Marfud didn’t make sense. Diones would not accept that there were actual magic toasters. Diones was stumped, their plans already going off the track because Marfud decided to buy a toaster store, which now became a lot worse. There had to be another person involved; by some turn of fate, there was another thief with too much time on their hands. It didn’t make sense, Diones thought they were one of a kind, but nothing made sense right now. Diones needed to figure out how to rope this new player, player Zero, into their game. Likely Zero was already aware of Diones’s involvement, so Diones needs to pretend as if they didn’t know Zero existed. Diones would play the ignorant card and pretend like Marfud stole his own toasters; Diones chuckled as if Marfud still had enough brain cells to do such a thing.

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

To rope Zero in, Diones would need to understand Zero’s motivations. It seemed most likely that Zero and they had the same motivation, which was for the enjoyment of the craft. However, Zero also could be in it for the money or any other reason. Pinpointing the reason seemed unreasonable at this point. The next move should be to test and prod for what Zero is after. Diones also needed to find out whether Zero was involved in the toaster store purchase.

Information gained. That is what Diones needed to maximize when testing for Zero’s motivations. The more information gleaned and the early, the better. One test could be giving Marfud another “magical” object, but this time make it more expensive, like a phone. This could test Zero’s money interest, but the results might be vague, and the time invested would likely be signficant. Perhaps a better route is to prod with the storefront since Zero might also be connected to that investment. If Marfud’s purchase were, in fact, legitimate, then an exciting move would be to fill up the stores with new toasters. If Marfud’s purchase was a scam perpetrated by Zero, then Diones should also try to get scammed the same way. Either way, the strategic move is first to investigate the store’s real estate transactions. Diones’s evening was breaking into Marfud’s house, once again.