Double Robbery

Chapter 26: Double Robbery

[Status:

Mercury Rainfall Starlight

Lv.: 13

Species: Zetraspa

Titles: <Tenacious Genius>, <Forest Usurper>, <Tutorial Completer>

- - -

Hp: 105/105

Mp: 306/306

Sp: 170/170

- - -

Strength: 50

Vitality: 26

Dexterity: 39 (+1)

Agility: 31 (+1)

Intelligence: 51

Wisdom: 49

Willpower: 54

Luck: 17

- - -

Ability points: 37

World points: 5

Skill points: 760

Gold: 2914

Beast familiars: 1/2]

Huh?

Mercury didn't quite believe his eyes when he checked his status, so he made sure to look again.

[Beast familiars: 1/2]

...

Okay. Deep breaths Mercury. Calm down.

He took a moment to look around, making sure the road was somewhat empty before indulging himself.

"AAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!"

pant, pant.

"FUCK YEAH!!!"

One of his companions was still alive! Alive!! How could he have missed this?! UGH!! Whatever. He knew now. He knew that his direction was absolutely correct, as he went into a light jog further towards Stormbraver.

He was already on the way there when he finally decided to check his status. If he wanted to start gathering information, where better to start? There was a magic academy, there were multiple arches, alchemists, runecarvers...

It was a hub for people of power, as well as an important political spot. It was a capital, after all.

And so, after double-checking his map, Mercury went forward with much more enthusiasm.

- - - - - -

Applause.

Roaring, roaring applause.

Applause by a number of hands that was uncountable, cheering from voices unimaginable.

A woman stood up and bowed, breathing deeply. She wore a red coat with golden embroidery and shoulder pads and a white shirt underneath. A black leather belt held up her pants of the same colour, which disappeared into the almost knee high black boots. Short, white hair fell just shy of her shoulders in slight curls, framing her sharp face, her dark brown eyes now closed.

Wilhelmina Amadeus Mozart. Perhaps the greatest musician of her time, a genius among geniuses, a prodigy, a wunderkind. Well, wunderadult now.

The concert was... rather enjoyable. The cheers of the audience. The bright magelights, the cacophony of sounds, yells, shouts. It was so easy to get carried away sometimes. A wonderful escape from reality. One of the few pleasures she sometimes indulged in, other than her books.

She had long ago thrown away all notions of the expectations on her back. She had abandoned her exploitative parents, dismissed their poor attempts at covering up their greed for fame with excuses of furthering her talent.

Truth is, she did have a certain knack for music. But at the start, she hated it. Her teachers were all stuck-up idiots, old fossils with little connection to uprising movements. Stubborn nobles with their heads so far up each others' bums that they couldn't see good music if it was biting their ankles.

That wasn't her life. It never was. The tours her father wanted to get her to go on, even when her health was suffering from it. The rigorous practice her mother put her through, even after she had torn a ligament in her hand.

Nobles with their desire for the best when they know not how to enjoy it. In that society she would forever be limited by her "betters" and even her audience. No, she wanted freedom. A journey. To play music not on her own, but with similar minds, people who would revolutionise music alongside her.

She started writing her own songs as soon as she left, pawning them to libraries to afford food. Soon, she found an Inn to perform in, using the violin she had stolen. Those early days were rather thrilling, she reminisced while slowly walking off stage.

She had done so many things since then. Seen so many places. Heard so many songs. Played for so many people. It was the life for her.

As she exited the concert hall she wrinkled her nose a little at the familiar stench of brimstone. This continent had some of the most energetic people she had ever met, but their rules were also quite difficult. The society based on absolute power, the entirety of their political intrigue... it was sometimes difficult to handle.

Luckily, when she challenged the demons to duels, most of them readily agreed, thinking that they could easily take her music on. Idiots.

Their nobles were easy to tame like that, always insisting on using one of their inborn Skills, <Pact>. If she won, the pact dictated they would simply be honest and sensible.

If she lost, she bet her soul.

Bigger winnings than losses made demons accept easily. But Wilhelmina was quite confident. She had already beat quite a handful of their nobles, after all.

The small smirk on her back quickly enlargened when a very familiar voice called out to her with a smack on the back.

"What a damn show!" It was her guitarist, Oliva. A raccoon beastkin in their thirties, dark brown hair reaching to their chin, surrounding their rather gentle face, almost constantly filled with mirth. They somehow seemed unshakeable, always laughing and smiling. Always confident. She admired that.

"Couldn't agree more," Wilhelmia said. "Those demons do know how to throw a party."

"Sometimes I do wish they'd lay off the fisticuffs though," Oliva quickly added. "The concerts get much more rowdy here than they did back on Rozarek..."

"Cultural differences, I suppose. They are quite proud, and stubborn, and usually very aggressive, but they also stick to their pacts. They're ruthless, backstabbing warmongers and unfortunately, I appear to be utterly enamoured by them!", Wilhelmia said with a laugh. Oliva couldn't do much but sigh helplessly while hiding her smile. Wilhelmia wasn't the only one who found the rather rough society of demons charming. Their incredible individuality gave them a lot of freedom here in their own right, especially with the protection of the many royals they had acquired.

Their biggest backer as of now was Zagan, the transmuter. A demon who was often worshipped by alchemists for her powers in changing the very foundation of objects. She was more mad than she was proud, and even more curious than she was mad, an achievement in and of itself.

She also wanted to hear all of the secrets of music from Wilhelmia, quickly accepting her challenge for cooperation, and similarly quickly losing it. Zagan might have been able to make gold from stone, but when it came to music, the creature was almost comically unsuited for it.

Wilhelmia calmly put a charr between her scarlet lips, quickly lighting it with a hellstone coated match, striking it against the firebeetle chitin of the box it came in. After inhaling a deep puff of the dark blue smoke, she slowly let it back out.

"I guess you aren't wrong," Oliva said after a while. "People really are different everywhere you go... is there any stop you are particularly excited for?" They beastkin specifically tried to avoid the clouds of smoke leaving Wilhelmia's mouth. It was a slightly unhealthy and addicting habit, which they had little interest in partaking in.

"Hmmm..." Wilhelmia furrowed her brows for a moment. A stop she was particularly excited for? Well... "Not really, I don't think. I think all places come with their unique challenges. The vampires are stubborn, the werewolves savage, the demons prideful, the dragons... well, they don't even let us "lesser beings" play. Hah!" She took a other deep breath of smoke, burning up almost half the charr in the process. "Most excited... I think the people are what makes places exciting. Everywhere you go, you see so many faces, and you never know which ones will stick with ya. I like seeing the differences in behaviour among peoples, but I usually like it best when I get to do some sightseeing at the start. When people don't know me. It's funny talking to people on the street normally sometimes. Seeing who really makes an impact, I suppose."

"That's very like you."

"Of course, I said it after all. How would it not be like me?!"

"Behehehe, I suppose so. Well, I better get back in and start working on cleaning everything back up. We gotta be ready to head out again in a few days, hm?"

For a moment, Wilhelmia froze up, quickly taking another puff of smoke and shaking it off. She took another moment to shake the ash off her charr and then nodded solemnly.

"I'll be right there to help you, next stop is Firefield, right?"

"City of eternal flames, you're dead on. It'll be one hell of a stage for our Ragnarok to perform on, huh."

"It sure will," Wilhelmia said with a smile. "Now head on in, I'll be coming right after."

"Alright, see you soon!"

After the door closed behind her, Wilhelmia let out a sigh.

"A pun. Seriously. That's how she had to say goodbye with?" She shook her head a little in disbelief. "Well, at the very least, I can say it'll be fun."

And after inhaling a final breath of smoke, she threw the charr aside, quickly stomping out the residual heat. Maybe pointless, given the sulfur in the air and the fires burning all over the place, but principles were principles after all. And one of those principles was to take care of one's equipment, like by packing it up properly.

- - - - - -

"God damn it, I swear I'd kill for thumbs." Currently, Mercury's equipment was half strewn across the floor, since he was not very good at handling it with his paws oftentimes. His map was a little smudged, but he could tell he was just a few days away from the capital.

He had sustained himself largely off the rations Kintra packed for him, so he didn't have to so much hunting and could instead focus on travelling and growing his mana veins a little further. They reached almost everywhere in his body by now, but he was having a little trouble bringing them into his claws. He was just met with a little more resistance, but it still seemed doable.

Other than that, the journey had been relatively quiet. Occasionally he saw some other travelers, driving by on carriages and giving him some weird looks, but most of them let him walk in peace. Some of them stopped to try and per him, which he promptly refused. He would not let some strangers touch his fur.

A small band of mercenaries talked about gutting him for his fur, but he quickly sprinted past them, making sure they left him alone.

Mentioning that, most travellers he saw were either mercenaries or they had guards. Apparently there was a group of bandits somewhere down this road, but the sages had to send all soldiers to the frontline, left with very few to patrol the roads. Too few to fight against a group of bandits.

Mercury disliked that. He had always minded stealing, especially if it was unnecessary. A starving child could steal some bread in his eyes, sure, but adults threatening and robbing anyone who came by? Seemed a little unfair to him.

Think of the devil. As he crossed a small hill, he could see a carriage with a large back, covered in a tarp, being stopped by a group of ruffians. Some men, some women, all covered in bits of different leather armor that largely fit them. Most of them had bastard swords strapped to their hip, though some also carried spears or bows.

They were currently tying up an aged looking man, probably somewhere in his forties, and what seemed to be his son, a blonde haired man wiggling in his bounds. As he got closer, Mercury could actually hear him yell.

"How dare you do this!! Who do you think you are?! You are going to pay for this!!"

Wow, what a temper. How stupid. He quieted down a little when one of the bandits pressed a dagger to this neck and whispered something into his ears, though he was still shaking with rage. Yo, was this dude okay? He seemed like he was about to fricking pop. Someone should get him some sedatives or something.

The older man seemed much more calm about the whole thing. No, maybe that wasn't right, more like resigned. He had his head down, eyes fixed on the floor and was a little hunched over. Man, that sucks. Imagine you're just travelling and a whole group of people show up armed to rob you. Damn.

It also didn't look like they were extremely wealthy, probably made decent money, but not enough to get guards. As he got closer, Mercury asked himself if he should help them or not. How annoying. Could he really watch people get robbed on the street? Could he really just let this all happen? I mean, obviously he could.

Actually, he probably should, Mercury thought. What would he be able to do against a whole group of people, all decked out with weapons? That sounded like a surefire way to go and die, something he would really rather not do.

He had a much better idea, actually. Mercury almost smiles to himself as he snuck by the bandits and crawled under the tarp of the cart, hiding between all the goods. He quickly searched for an approximately cat-sized box.

It didn't take him very long to find one, which he quickly flicked open and buried himself below the rolls of paper that were in it.

. . .

About half an hour or so later, he was flung through the air and had a rough landing. Not exactly a pleasant way of being sat down, but then again, he was disguised as a wooden box. The bandits had quickly opened it up, seen the scrolls and decided they could probably sell them to a fence.

They were laughing to themselves the whole way back, talking about how kind they were to make the merchants' journey lighter. Mercury really didn't like bandits a whole lot.

After hearing footsteps away from him, Mercury decided to poke his nose out, only to find the the box' latch was now closed.

Shit.

He remember that it wasn't a lock, luckily, since the box was supposed to be locked away somewhere itself, but a simple latch was already enough to cause him problems. Ugh. He could barely reach the outside of the box by sticking his claws through the small slit between the lid and the main body of the chest. Unfortunately, that wasn't enough to open it up, since he remembered he needed to get the handle of the latch-bar to the middle and then pull it to the side.

Well. Shit. Time to hope none of the bandits would miss a wooden box.

He quickly unsheathed his claws, pulsating mana through the little veins he had in them, and pushed then into the wood. The box was quite sturdy, so he needed to make quite a few scratches to get started, but from then one, he just kept removing material. He first completed a rough circle which he could probably squeeze himself through as a young mopaaw. Then, he shaved off some of the material inside the circle, to make space for his claws to cut deeper. After a good half hour or so, and more splinters than he would have liked, Mercury slammed his shoulder against the circle, punching it out of the box and creating his exit.

He quickly gave a look around, finding himself in a rather rough tent, leathers and furs held up by thick branches of wood. And around him were all the other valuables that the bandits had plundered and yet to sell.

No coin by itself unfortunately. That was probably split between the bandits so they could buy themselves some stuff when their fences came by.

Well.

Mercury hesitated for just a moment before tossing that aside. He did briefly think about giving everything here back to its owners, but that was ridiculous. No, he would instead take some stuff for himself. He quickly nabbed a few valuables, some brooches, golden buttons, things like that, and tossed them into his backpack.

Then, he picked out a decent sized leather pouch from the small hoard, quickly pouring everything in it out and stuffing it full of things he thought he could need. He packed the scrolls from the wooden box he hid in, every book he could quickly find, and some more valuable tidbits, before shoving it into his third inventory slot. He now had his log in one of them, then the backpack, the pouch, and two emergency rocks.

That title he got was really quite handy. Now the next question he had to ask himself was quite simple. How was he going to get out of here?