Chapter 28

Walking out, he felt a hole in his heart at the potential of lost gains, but he could always gain more, and he needed to be alive to do that.

He had a few close calls on the out, and John had returned with a plethora of guards, but Seth had already hopped the fence, collected his snake ally, and disappeared into the night.

Seth still had a crown to pick up.

Running over to the Theatre he found Richard sitting backstage sweating as he realised the severity of his actions. His father had run away from the theatre in a storm, right as the curtains fell and Richard felt like his father was disappointed.

Anger surged inside the man as he justified his actions to himself, he was right, his father had been the one who threatened him gone. It was his fault.

He felt the crown in his robes, and he remembered the audience's awe when he wore it. That was what he wanted, acceptance, awe, and glory.

Money would also be enough. His dreams could do the rest, occasionally he would work and make his father proud. Secure the inheritance then return to his mother's embrace.

Seth looked at the child sobbing away. How could this demon have a heart so full of innocence, Seth did not know.

Richard continued and eventually arrived at a tavern, Seth joined him, and they ate.

They also talked about life, and regrets and Seth felt his bond grow to a level that would hinder his plans. Fear was what drove Seth, and sadness was what steered Richard.

Two men who lived such different lives yet were both running.

Seth was different. He had died, he was right about his fear. He was destined to be a Thief. As Richard keeled over and blacked out again, Seth stole his future for his own selfish needs.

Seth wasn't the good guy; his heart was clouded in fear and although he showed a face of smiles and told jokes like a clown. At the end of the day, he was a scared child afraid of death.

A tear fell to the pavement, the moonlight scattered as it fell, and the man who shed it continued walking. A shadow loomed behind him, so Seth was forced to not stop.

POV Change: Locke

The Detective was not having a great day. The past half a year, ever since that thief case had appeared on his desk, everything had gone downhill.

There were even rumours that the Crown of the Emperor had been stolen though the culprit was most likely not that Thief.

Looking over the case, Locke was 80% sure it was an inside job, but the evidence was needed, and the owner and the victim weren't being incredibly cooperative. Which only pointed in one direction.

The war raged on between the 2 factions, and one of the extreme parts of the Baskerville family even attempted a bombing in the Theatre where the Crown was last used. That only served to complicate things further.

The war wasn't even fought officially, it was done in the unmonitored dungeons where casualties were just figures but a spike was noticeable and was often where a team of each side would enter but only one would exit.

More and more families arrived saying that another family member had disappeared and each and every time Locke lost something.

His father would have done something by now, but Locke just couldn't figure out what. The problem was so messy and morally grey that the police had no ground to stand upon and that only made Locke more depressed.

He remembered his time in the apprenticeship, with his father: dreams of being the best, greatest detective to ever live and yet as time moved Locke found his dream so far from reality.

Locke wanted to help, he wanted to follow his father's words, but as time passed he wondered if the two goals were conflicting.

Time passed more, Locke's bright face his orange eyes turned darker, and his face took a gloomy expression. Days got harder to do, waking up in the morning got harder and Locke's ambition felt an all-time low.

He was drained, this war had taken his heart away. No physical injuries were inflicted but Locke's heart suffered from the visions, the sounds.

The crack only grew worse, the building was nearing disaster.

POV Change: Seth.

Not many times in this new world had Seth cried. In his younger years, he didn't bother trying to cry, especially when he was born. He was far too shocked at the time but do anything but listen.

A baby was oddly in far less control of the body than one would imagine. Seth's limbs moved like jelly as no muscles had developed at all.

For the first couple of years Seth eventually started acting `normal` he started speaking early and he started working out every day but that soon stopped as Seth wasn't the most active.

A ripped baby turned into a medium build youth and eventually, he was 11. Where the story started off.

Seth did wonder what his friends were doing. Arabia was likely dead. Noah didn't have a class yet and his best friend Dion was likely doing nerd stuff.

Today was an emotional day for a man who stole a 100 Gold crown. Obviously, it wouldn't sell for that, and Seth had to melt it down and sell it as pure gold which would reduce its value, but he should end up with a great payday.

He locked it up in his safehouse and brought his new book home. It was time for a read of the book on the weird pedestal.

...

The book was confusing, Seth hardly gained much from it, but he did learn a better mana control training technique from the first page of the book.

The other pages maybe had a lock of sorts because the words were visible to his eyes, but his mind couldn't extract any meaning from them. It was like reading a foreign language or a text made of words that you used to know.

Whatever it was Seth gained a new technique to better train his control and that was a good, immediate gain.

Seth had learned a lot from this heist and wanted to properly develop his gains before he tried another. One thing he noticed was the complete lack of use of his Phantom Hands skill and his lack of combat training was obvious during the planning phase.

He just couldn't fight someone, and he wanted to solve both problems by learning how to wield a dagger. In his fight against the guard, he noticed just how bad he was at fighting so for the Theatre Heist he had to plan for no conflict.

Seth was a coward, but he wasn't an idiot. Self-defence was great in a world where people killed each other for experience points and so Seth used a great number of guild points to get lessons about daggers techniques and `whatever necessary and possible`

All his skill books were however sold off for those guild points, but Seth thought the trade was good as the branch manager himself was going to be teaching Seth for the next 2 months.

Seth arrived at his first lesson at 6AM on the dot, his teacher was already waiting for him.

"On time I see. A good start, Seth."

Sir Leonard was dressed in his formal clothing, as always, but this time his gloves seemed dirty, and his shoes were less polished. These were practically criminal for such a pristine man, but it seemed that he took the training lessons seriously and so was ready to get dirty if the need ever arrived.

"Our first training shall simply be basics; in fact, a month of basics would help you far more than any fancy technique would so do 20 laps of this training ground and then you can have a break."

Seth looked at the training ground and although it didn't seem colossal, Seth couldn't imagine he could do 20 entire laps, just to make sure he asked. "You said 20?"

"Yes, and I have been praised for my clear manner of speaking so how you misheard that is, to be frank, a complete mystery. Tell me, what did you hear? I must work on my speech to be as clear as possible."

Rather than dealing with that Seth decided to bolt off and as he did he started to realise just how long 20 laps was.

The first was easy, and the second was also fine, but it was the laps after that were complete hell. His legs hurt, his breathing was rampant and a pain in his stomach would not shut up.

All his mind could think about was just `run`. He couldn't even think up a terrible joke, that was how bad it was.

He wanted to collapse and feel the concrete for how cold it would be. Maybe down there he could get some rest and maybe then his muscles would stop shouting at him.

Seth thought for a second. He was hearing stuff, and he looked around. His vision is slightly blurry.

"Your p#sture #s a #ess. S#raight b#ck and b#eath steadily."

`Oh, it was Sir Leo. I forgot he was here. What did he say, something about posture and breathing.`

Seth decided to take his advice and used what remaining mental capacity he had to straighten himself up and breathe deeply in and maintain it, then breathe out.

For a lap, it made no difference in the slightest. Seth's muscles still hated him for all their worth and his stomach only grew to hurt even more.

But as the laps went on, the pain slowly grew more and more. Seth found himself growing numb to it. He sweated, his muscles hated him, and that stomach pain was still growing worse.

But at the end of the day, they meant nothing. Seth wanted to be stronger and no matter the pain, misery, sweat, anger well no matter all of those he wanted it and so he was going to get it.

The cave grew brighter as noon rolled around and Seth finally arrived at the finishing line practically carling as he went. He tried to stay running but his body simply couldn't.

Literally, he blacked out and fell to the floor. If it wasn't for his teacher using his aura to soften the landing he may have found himself with a broken head.

After waking he just continued and this time he decided crawling was the better option. His teacher said nothing, so he assumed that meant approval and since he was already on his final lap he crawled to the finish line and fell promptly to sleep.

Leonard during this was amazed at Seth's resolve. Not many could force their body to do work under a no-stress environment, but Seth had done exactly that. It made him think about what Seth's background was and so he decided to relieve his interest.

It wasn't very gentlemanly, but he was a branch manager, and this was part of the job. It wasn't like they didn't already search his background.

Leonard put Seth into a bed in the home section of the cave and walked to his office where he eventually found the folder on Seth.

The folder read this.

Name: Seth (None)

Class: Some sort of stealing class, is a demon so could be new

Background: From the village of Chippie where his parents are and awakened the demon class to run away from his home. He arrived at Darter and started stealing, this is when the branch manager noticed his personality.

Recorded by the skill Personality Sight to be Extremely Obsessive and this with his demon talent has decided we recruit him.

The recruitment was done by Branch Manager Knight Leonard and was a success.

Leonard smiled at the document. He had first noticed Seth burning into a home and after seeing his personality with his skill he had found Seth to be a great recruit. Considering the wealth he had accrued to hire him he seemed to be doing well so for now Leonard closed the file and returned it where it was stored.

Today's lesson had gone well but time would tell if his determination would stay high. Leonard thought to himself, `What techniques should I teach him? Good footwork would do a Thief well. How about that? It would cost something though... I did not knock him out cold that one time so Lucky you Seth you can count this as being repaid.`

Leonard continued into the library; he got the feeling he was going to enjoy the next 2 months.