Dave sighed at the pile of paperwork in front of him. The Reyer team had issued several official protests aimed at disqualifying Johan. It was all nonsense of course. Pretty much all of it was stuff he’d anticipated with Brisset and written up ahead of time. It was just a case of going through the intentionally long, meandering language of each protest with the officials.

  “Okay, venepuncture response here,” said Dave, flicking his fingers for another Scribbler's Instant Image on yet another boilerplate rebuttal. The official he was handing it to was smiling patiently, also aware that Dave was wading through bureaucratic bullshit and resigned to being grateful that at least Dave had the decency to be succinct and format his rebuttal like a sane person. Dave flicked his fingers again.

  “That one’s against the ‘peasant’s can’t bear weapons’ charge,” continued Dave. He’d actually had to look that law up half an hour ago. Baron de Valmont had proclaimed it two hundred years ago using emergency powers during an adventurer’s riot. Unsurprisingly it’d been rescinded as soon as the riots were over. Dave flicked his fingers at document after document casting Scribbler’s Instant Image each time. “This one’s for the ‘ungentlemanly touching’ accusation.” Flick. “That’s for the illegal residence accusation.” Flick. “That’s the blasphemy laws one.” Flick. "And, the banditry accusation.”

  “Thank you, Mister Booker,” said the Warrior official. She indicated the three clergy behind her. “Neutral members of Knowledge, Justice and Dominion shall pass judgement on the arguments as soon as the gods see fit and you will be summoned to hear the response… let’s face it, within the hour.”

  Both Dave and the Warrior official cast a glance at the three clergy. The Dominion and Knowledge acolytes had already finished. Only the Justice clergy was meticulously going through each legal argument before referring to Dave’s rebuttal.

  “I’ll just have faith that the Lady will let Hugh know if I’m needed again,” said Dave. The official smirked at him and bowed his head politely.

  Dave was, in fact, summoned somewhere else twenty minutes later by an ominously happy Lord Diego Noguera who brought with him a shitstorm of urgent news and activity.

  “Okay, let me get this straight,” he said to Diego who was grinning happily, trying to sum up the news as they strode towards the social club. “The dirty nobs insisted a little too hard that Johan really, definitely wanted a cash payout instead of the armour, de Saint-Pierre soul-smacked an iron ranker hard enough that they divulged that the armour is missing, Warrior clergy has marched into the social club, nobs made up some rights that don’t exist, Dominion clergy marched into the social club, nobs decided that they’d been peacefully talking all along actually, everything is tense and you dropped my name into it?”

  “Exciting, yes?” said Diego.

  “That’s one word to describe it, yes,” said Dave dryly.

  “I will not believe that the noble people of these lands are capable of something like this,” said Johan, striding behind them like a friendly wall. “They must have been manipulated!”

  “They tried to have you disqualified for ‘attacking your betters’ during the tournament and you have trouble believing they might commit thievery?” asked Dave with obvious sarcasm.

  “Some monsters play as men,” said Johan zealously but still, there was a slight tightening of his lips as they approached the social club doors.

  Diego, still beaming happily, ignored the doormen with the completeness of those born wealthy and strutted into the social club, leading the trio.

  “Here he is, everybody!” announced Diego, waltzing into the social club with a wide grin like he owned the place. Some of the patrons glanced up from their expensive drinks at the appearance of their inferiors in the club - they probably categorised the staff as helpful furniture - and a few shifted themselves to better pay attention to the ongoing drama. Dave reluctantly stayed with Diego under the gaze of the nobles and gazed right back, mentally clicking each of them and making sure to get the name of each one.

  While Diego grinned and enjoyed the attention, Dave took in the room. It stank of wealth. The disgusting kind, dressed in silk and gold that hid decadence and degeneracy. The kind he’d seen in high end clubs and casinos back home. Johan followed Dave closely and his innocence missed what Dave’s attention couldn’t avoid. Johan was smiling, nodding and bowing at anybody who made eye contact with him. It made Dave shake his head and smile at the lad.

  “This is Detective Booker! Detective, this is everybody. And, you all already know Mister Schmidt!”

  Dave ground his teeth while bowing in the style of a commoner presenting themselves to nobility. Fortunately, he was saved being paraded in front of the local inbred aristocrats by all eyes sliding off him and resting with great ease upon the magnificent, broad-shouldered figure of Johan who bowed wholeheartedly in turn.

  A susurration of murmurs rippled through the room. One man, Everard Reyer he was labelled as, stood near the fireplace, his hawk-like gaze narrowing in suspicion as Diego introduced Dave.

  “What the gods is this, Noguera?” Everard’s voice quietly cut through the air like a knife aimed at Diego’s throat. “You said you had a solution! Now you’ve brought this… peasant here to embarrass me? You dare?”

  Diego somehow laughed softly in the face of the higher ranked will bearing down upon him. “Oh, come now, Lord Reyer. He is on Mister Schmidt’s team!” Diego reached behind him and pulled Johan to the fore as evidence of this. Johan bowed low to Reyer. “Dave here,” Diego did the same to Dave who bowed minimally, “already knows about this little accident and besides! His position as Schmidt’s ally only makes him motivated to find the prize, no? He has some certain skills, he wants to help his friend and he is very professional. Show him one of your agreement papers, my good detective!”

  Everard’s lips curled slightly, but he said nothing in response to Dave drawing a boilerplate non-disclosure agreement from his inventory and holding it out. One of Reyer’s lackeys took it.

  “See?” said Diego, beaming as though Reyer was reading the agreement paper with enthusiasm. “This solves your problems, Reyer, doesn’t it?” Diego suddenly looked mischievous. “You don’t want the detective here to embarrass you, but he already knows the scandal! But, you can hire him to solve the riddle of the misplaced armour and have him legally bound to silence if you just sign there.” Diego punctuated the point by tapping the page where the Reyer’s signature would go. Dave added his own dramatic flair by flying a pen out of his pocket and having it hover over the page

  Reyer angrily eyed the other nobles for confirmation that the paper would do just that and they nodded. Suddenly, Dave saw it. Diego had known that Reyer wouldn’t accept handling anything given to him by Dave and used that to make sure that he could announce it to the room so that Reyer wouldn’t be able to hide that a potential solution to all of his problems was in front of him, because the other nobles would have read the non-disclosure agreement first. Diego had backed Reyer into a corner who was glaring at Dave. Dave was painfully aware that between himself and Diego, only he had the lack of social rank that Reyer could aim any ire at.

  Dave cleared his throat. “Look,” he said, his voice cutting through the tension with professional calm. “My lords and ladies, nothing in that contract is binding or exclusive to me being the only investigator. How about we all just show me the scene. I’ll take a look around, and ask a few questions. If I can’t solve the case, your own investigator can look it over when they get here, no harm done, Right? And if I do solve it, then this whole mess is cleared up before any of that embarrassment happens, right?”

  There was an uneasy shuffle among the nobles, but no one spoke up. Reyer just glared.

  “Right, yes!” exalted Diego, ignoring the icy atmosphere on purpose. “Case solved, no scandal, no whispers. It’s everything you wanted, isn’t it Reyer? Ah! Baron Franchet!” Diego Bowed at the tall, stern figure that’d appeared in his audience. “Don’t you agree?”

  “I agree that Mister Schmidt’s team would have most motivation to embarrass their betters, now that their moment of fame is over,” said Franchet imperiously.

  Johan flushed but Dave rallied.

  “Then have me shadowed by someone you trust to ensure that I solve the crime instead of plant evidence against you,” said Dave.

  “Yes!” said Diego, clicking his fingers. “Of course, that is everything you ask for, no?” Diego leaned in, lowering his voice conspiratorially, “I’m sure our good detective here knows quite well that the armour is just... misplaced.”

  “That’s my leading theory so far,” said Dave dryly, his eyes flicking over Diego whose eyes were glinting with amusement; however, Dave groaned under the collective pressure of the presences in the room crushing him.

  Everard Reyer set his jaw and stepped forward.

  “Very well,” he said. “If you insist, Lord Noguera. Let's get this farce over with. Perhaps ‘Detective Booker’s’ insights will assist the real investigators when they arrive.” Reyer turned to a lackey. “Summon my daughter, and have her show these men to the armour storage.”

  Reyer was really leaning into the social convention of not directly addressing people who were his social lessers. Dave's whole body hurt with how badly he wanted to tweak Reyer’s nose but instead turned to his HUD.

  Dave accepted the quest and turned his attention back to Diego.

  “It’s alright, I know where it is,” Diego was saying. “Your daughter can meet us there. Onwards, Detective Booker! Come, swordsman Schmidt!”

  Diego whirled and practically skipped from the room, not out the door but further into the club. Dave bobbed a bow to the aristocrats and trailed in his wake. Johan adorably attempted to bow properly to every lord and lady he passed and practically stumbled his way across the room. Diego turned back often to grin at the display.

  Once in the staff area, the glitz and gold-leaf-everything fell away and the noises switched from hushed tones with harp music and chimes to the sounds of catering staff trying to do their jobs. The walk to the secure storeroom where the armour was last held was short and the three had to wait until Reyer arrived. When she arrived, she rounded the corner and walked quickly up to the trio, blue half-cape draped casually over her left shoulder. The same she’d used in the tournament. Her legs opened the split in her long skirts revealing blue leggings as she stalked the trio down, one hand resting casually on her rapier. The arms were covered in a white, loose-fitting blouse over which she’d placed a close-fitted, sleeveless doublet of sturdy, dark leather. Avril’s auburn hair was tied back in a ponytail and she was wearing a hawk-like gaze that she’d inherited from her father.

  “Good,” said Avril in clipped tones. “Let’s get started.”

  Johan began a bow but Avril cut him off.

  “Stop that,” she snapped. “I just endured my father talking about my place in life, yet again, and saying-not-saying to screw up your investigation so that he can still give your prize to me later after you’ve already accepted the cash payout. So, get on with it.”

  Johan short-circuited, stuck halfway through a bow and moving his mouth like a goldfish, unable to break out of his hard-coded politeness. Thankfully, Diego continued without him.

  “Excellent, excellent! Please open the door to the room where the templar armour was stored!”

  Reyer opened the door and stepped back. Reyer, Diego and Johan went in but Dave hung back a bit and scribbled a note to Johan. It’s her birthday and it sounds like her father is demanding achievements from her instead of celebrating her. Talk about anything but her rank or her family. He floated the note into Johan’s hand and then joined the investigation.

  The trophy room where the armour had been stored before the matches was both grandeur and utility. Dark wood-panelled walls framed glass display cases of trophies, shields, medallions and display weaponry. Below it all, pale marble floors reflected a ghost of the room back under the glow of enchanted sconces, giving the illusion of walking in a much larger space. In the centre was the raised pedestal, where the armour should have been. A velvet-bottomed, square glass display case with a simple, wooden frame that should have held the armour. The room had the solemn feel of a grand museum, a bit like visiting a church in the early morning hours when nobody was around. Or, how the Louvre might feel if you could get rid of the everpresent horde of tourists.

  “That’s where it was,” said Diego, gesturing dramatically at an ornate cabinet that Dave could see laced with magic formations. “The armour was there. Under lock, key and curse.”

  Dave’s HUD had quest sparkles over quite a few objects in the room. He started with the one in front of him. “Well, I’ll get started. It might be a while so, Reyer, if you get bored, Johan was wondering about that thrust you opened today’s match with.”

  Her scowl turned on Johan who was projecting wholehearted embarrassment and apology in such quantity that her expression softened.

  “It - was very… good,” Johan managed to sputter while physically restraining himself from bowing.

  Dave left them to chat as Diego, practically hopping up and down, drew his attention to the cabinet.

  “The lock was undisturbed when Reyer senior last checked,” said Diego. “No sign of tampering, he said.”

  Dave crouched down, inspecting the glittering object carefully. It was one of those magic items where moving parts of the object would change how the leylines of the formations wrought upon it interacted. Too intricate to pick without a lot of skill and magical knowledge, as well as the tools for both. He manifested Tome, flicked a piece of paper into his hands and focused on copying down the formation.

  “Tome give me the most comprehensive selection that describes this formation,” said Dave.

  Tome fluttered open, blowing pages to a page from Secure Designs by Valeria Di Luca. He used Stop and Think to read the page.

  “Huh,” said Dave, coming back to reality. “The lock hasn’t been tampered with but it’s holding more mana in the formation than the background magic has.

  This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.

  Diego was watching him like a hawk but Dave was about his work now, following the leylines from the keyhole to the lock and out of the lock to the cabinet itself.

  “Yes, of course the lock hasn’t been tampered with,” muttered Dave, face close to the square glass cabinet and briefly noticed his HUD show a hundred and twenty lesser coins added to his inventory, “The thief ignored the lock. They took the whole front panel off. See here? Cleaning marks. Someone brushed a cleaning cloth along the hinges, you can see the marks, but the rest of the cabinet is spotless. I’m betting someone with a cleaning ability normally cleans here. Reyer? Can you witness this?”

  “- from Rimaros, yes but mostly they - Oh, yes, detective. What is it?”

  “Cleaning marks on the hinges but none on the rest of the cabinet indicating that the hinges were tampered with.”

  “Oh? Yes. Yes, I see it. Anyway, as I was saying I’ve met a few good duelists from Rimaros but mostly they’re monster hunters there.”

  Johans eyes were alive with wonder as Reyer was telling him about duelling metas in different parts of the world. Diego pulled Dave back to the case.

  “So, you know how they got into the case, what does that mean, my friend?”

  “I don’t know,” said Dave flatly. “Let me check the rest of the room.”

  Dave went over the other sparkly bits of the room his HUD was lighting up. There was a pair of formations, intertwined and hidden in the sconces that lit the room.

  “Okay, this one…” he checked Tome, “basically sets off the alarm if a limb leaves the floor while touching an item. This one… yes, alarm if any flight, telekinetic or the like magic is mixed with an item.”

  Dave walked frantically around the room with Diego at his heels while Johan and Reyer debated the finer points of when a duelist should use half-swording.

  “Alright, both formations are still complete with no sign of tampering, and there would be signs of tampering because the runes are engraved into the bronze,” muttered Dave. Two hundred and forty lesser coins became his. “So how did they move it?” mused Dave, staring at the cabinet.

  “You tell me!” said Diego. “You’re doing so well!”

  “Hrmf,” grunted Dave. “I’ve done nothing but prove they got in. We already know that! The damn armour is missing. The burglar popped the pins out of the hinges, opened the front panel and must have carefully twisted the panel off the latch of the lock but then made the armour not-armour to… wait. You can do that. “Tome, The Essence Of Power. Go to the summary.”

  Tome flapped open to a page from The Essence of Power: A Treatise on Magical Essentialism by an Archmagister Edric Thalassar. Dave flipped quickly through several pages using Stop and Think to spend only a moment of real time on each page.

  “Yes, if you can make one object essentially part of another, usually larger object then the essence of the original object is subsumed by the larger object,” said Dave, still completely focused on the book.

  “What does this mean?” said Diego, hopping from foot to foot.

  “It means that whoever did this has studied templar armour,” said Dave, rubbing his chin. “Or, is some kind of magic savant. If Thalassar is right, because the armour is magical they’d not only have to physically but magically interact with the object in a way that treats it as non-armour. Like maybe connect it to a mana source, some fire quintessence and call it a space heater or something? Doesn’t matter. In order to change it magically, they’d have had to know the magic of the armour beforehand as well as be able to afford the quintessence that this kind of magic would need.”

  “Ahh, but they still have to take it out of the door,” said Diego, pointing.

  Dave looked at the door they’d walked in by and he was surprised that the door frame was also sparkling. It’d been behind him when he walked in and he’d missed it earlier. He walked to it and started inspecting its formation.

  “Okay, sure this is… much more… Yeah, the formation here breaks each item into component parts to check. It’s just that,” Dave used Magican’s Megre Magics in the doorway with a few experimental boundary and shield projections,” yeah, it’s easily blocked but the guard outside would’ve noticed someone opening the door and installing a blocker…”

  Then it hit him and he practically ran to the last sparkling quest indicator in the room. He barely noticed the hundred and twenty lesser coins notification in his chat log and accepted the next stage of the quest without reading it. He ran up to the rectangular bit of wall and placed his hands upon it, running them back and forth over the innocuous bit of wood panelling. There were lines in the wall at the edge of the sparkle indicating that this was a hidden compartment. Dave selected it in his UI and used Epistemology with ‘opening mechanism’. He pushed the wall hard with both hands. There was an audible click and the wall opened to reveal a cupboard full of cleaning equipment.

  “Ahh, you’re changing sides?” said Diego, happiness still all over his face. “Hiding the evidence now? I thought crystal wash at a crime scene would be too much of a give away, no? Nothing cleans better but it takes aura residue with it, yes?”

  “What? No! That’s not it. It’s…” Dave hesitated as he looked into the cupboard. There was a sparkle over one of the bottles of crystal wash. He noticed that it had less dust over it than all the other bottles in there, apparently the inside of the well-camouflaged cupboard didn’t need to be as clean as the rest of the room.

  “This one!” said Dave, snatching up the bottle and pushing it at Diego. “I don’t know how but the - what the fuck?”

  Dave had pushed the bottle into Diego’s chest who’d reflexively taken possession of it and in that moment, it’d started showing dimensional magic. Just like a magic bag. A magic bag that’d been concealed with a ritual designed to dissolve when picked up by the person whose aura imprint matched the caster’s. Dave looked at Diego with saucers for eyes. Diego’s grin could have given Sam’s best a run for her money.

  “YOU DID IT!?” whispered Dave being both quiet and loud in his disbelief.

  Diego gave an open-mouthed smile and nodded enthusiastically.

  “Ugh… What? Why?”

  “I stole it so that you could find it!” said Dieg and winked. “When it seemed like Johan over there was going to win, I wanted to make sure he got his prize. Reyer would never let his prize slip away. Too much ego. And, when you said you were a detective I knew. I knew that the gods had put you in my path to be my friend!”

  “Ugh, you’re going to have to explain that one to me,” said Dave.

  “Dave, my now and forever friend,” said Diego as solemnly as he could with his mischievous smile. “I… am The Silk Cat.”

  And with that, he reached inside his voluminous coat and drew out a cat-shaped piece of folded silk which he placed inside the cupboard.

  “One second,” said Dave, nonplussed. He used Stop and Think and Epistemology to look up The Silk Cat. According to several wanted posters and some Adventure Society documentation, The Silk Cat was an iron rank burglar of high society who left a signature cat of folded, black silk at every scene. Dave came back to Diego.

  “Ummmmm, yeah. Wow, okay, that’s a lot,” said Dave. “Ugh… why are you The Silk Cat?”

  “Ah! Yes, thank you. Such a good question,” gushed Diego. “I must expect such questions from the only detective good enough to solve my little game.”

  “Sure,” said Dave. His eyes flicked to Johan and Avril who were deep in their own conversation and completely missing the confession taking place.

  “Because it’s fun!” said Diego with his happiest grin. “And my essence abilities. It’s all stealth, mobility, deception. You know? If I join an adventuring team, I’m just a lowly scout! Weeks and weeks slinking through wet forest, cold and miserable but,” his eyes twinkled, “as a cat burglar? Warm and safe in hotel rooms, planning my next exciting heist! Oh, and the difficulty! Oh, my friend, you wouldn’t believe how much more quickly my abilities grow. So many security features are above iron rank. I evolved a racial to overcome rank disparity with my abilities in only six months of being a burglar. Can you believe it? And you, my friend. Yes, you are being to be what takes me to bronze and beyond as I, the greatest bronze rank thief am pitted against you, the greatest bronze rank detective! Ha!”

  Dave’s head whirled as he kept up with the strangely coherent insanity.

  “So you stole the armour to see if I could find out it was you who stole it?”

  “Yes, yes! And more!” said Diego excitedly. “My family has had dealings with the Reyers. Reyer senior worked in trade taxation before his recent promotion to minister, you see? All ego, he is. I knew he’d never hand over the prize he intended for his daughter. When it looked like Johan could win, I knew something must be done and when Johan himself told me you were a budding detective, I thought that perhaps the gods had placed you in my path.” He looked at Dave with tears of happiness in his eyes. “And they did! Dave, my friend. As soon as you solved that little crime without leaving your seat? I knew we were destined! Destined to be together, side-by-side, sharpening each other’s wits, progressing through the ranks as gentleman thief and brilliant detective.”

  “Okay,” said Dave, only succeeding in keeping his face straight because he couldn’t move it. “For now, should we tell the others I’ve solved the case?” He indicated Reyer and Johan who were animatedly discussing their ideas for beating opponents with prehensile weapons.

  “Ha! Yes!” exclaimed Diego. “I give you full permission to keep my secret however you like. A detective as glorious as you surely knows what to say, eh? Avril, Johan! Come look at this! Dave has found the armour!” Then he reached into the false bottle and in full view of both Johan and Reyer, drew out what Dave could only call a work of modern art. The armour was part of a diorama of a kitchen scene with the helmet as a pot, breast and backplates as benches and the rest artfully arranged as shelving and furniture. The entire piece was moving slightly with the gloves, which were playing the part of chefs, little aprons and all, moving little vegetables back and forth.

  “Uuuugh,” said Avril, her lip curling in confusion.

  “Why is… Well, it’s… nice,” said Johan, equally confused.

  “No, it makes sense. Tell them what you found, Dave,” said Diego, grinning and winking at Dave.

  “Ah, yeah,” said Dave, giving Diego the most suspicious look he’d ever thrown. “The thief hadn’t completed stealing it -”

  “And it was The Silk Cat!” interrupted Diego, unable to contain himself. “See, Avril? Right there is the cat.”

  Both Reyer and Johan craned their heads to see into the cleaning cupboard.

  “Yes, The Silk Cat was hiding the armour in that false flask there. It had a magic concealment spell over it in the cupboard but I noticed the flask didn’t have dust on it so I looked closer. It’s actually a dimensional container. I guess the Cat figured that cleaners wouldn’t care to investigate unfamiliar supplies and guessed they wouldn’t have magic sight abilities even if they did?”

  “Oh, this is one of those bulk ones,” said Reyer, turning the container over in her hands and passing it onto Johan. “Accepts bundled items like crates in a single slot. You normally see them on Adventure Society delivery jobs. Best way of getting supplies to remote towns.”

  “I didn’t know,” said Dave truthfully. “But I need you to witness here, Lady Reyer.” He walked to the central display cabinet with Reyer and Johan tagging along, their interest stirred. “The thief came into this room and, when they were alone, popped the pins out of the hinges of the cabinet - you remember the hinges - and, without moving their feet put the armour into this pre-arranged display which made the essence of the armour dissolve into the work of art. Now that it was art it could be moved and, The Silk Cat, clever as they are, put the whole thing into the dimensional container, put the container into the cupboard and then just walked out of the room! No doubt, in their deviousness, The Silk Cat intended to return weeks after the investigation was over with an artful way of sneaking the container out. Possibly while posing as a security technician running tests.”

  Diego, who’d been puffing up with pride at Dave’s praise of The Silk Cat, nodded happily in agreement.

  “How did you know to look in the broom cupboard?” asked Reyer. “I didn’t even know it was here, actually.”

  “The exit door is almost impossible to sneak anything past without equipment that a guard outside would notice,” said Dave. “And when I confirmed that none of the magic in the room had been tampered with, I deduced that since the armour had not passed the door, it must still be in the room. I poked around a little, found the broom cupboard and disturbed the concealment ritual when I happened to pick up the curiously dustless bottle.”

  Diego dramatically ran a finger along the side of a dusty bucket in the cupboard and held the finger up for inspection to Reyer and Johan who both nodded.

  “Do we take the whole thing?” said Reyer. “To the social club, I mean?”

  “Yes, I think so,” said Dave. “Diffuse the political-religious debate going on, right?”

  “I can only hope,” said Reyer, rolling her eyes.

  “Hey,” said Dave, smirking. “Lighten up. It’s your birthday. Maybe it’ll work out? There’s clergy in there. Perhaps the gods will gift you a few hours of peace and quiet, hey?”

  In response, Reyer dramatically slumped her whole body in that teenage way.

  Dave took a backseat at the explanation in the club. Among his ‘betters’ he wasn’t to speak unless spoken to and he’d asked Diego to do all the speaking anyway. For his part, Diego really played up that Detective Booker was the only investigator who’d managed to thwart The Silk Cat and, contrary to Dave’s expectations, the nobility seemed to all sit up more straightly at the news. It seemed The Silk Cat had been more newsworthy than he’d initially thought.

  With the armour returned, extracted from its artwork, looked over and approved as undamaged by one of the silver-rank apprentices who’d helped make it, the award ceremony was held in the arena without delay. There were a lot of speeches that Dave ignored while he studied magic. Naturally, those same speeches held Johan’s rapt attention but eventually, the armour was given into his possession by the insincerely smiling Everard Reyer to the applause of the entire crowd.

  There was an after-party in which Johan was the guest of honour but, not being a noble, Dave wasn’t allowed in. He left Johan at the ballroom door in the care of Avril Reyer and started wandering back to the viewing room where he’d left Hugh thinking that maybe they’d have a quiet beer and play cards. Then he noticed he was being followed.

  Dave adjusted his meandering walk, turning a corner. The two heavy-set pursuers came around that same corner several moments later. Dave smirked back at them and they gave up any pretence of just happening to be there and started walking quickly and with intimidating purpose. Dave also began walking quickly away from them. Another corner later he found two more thugs coming at him from the front, which forced him to the stairs down a level to the arena basement storage. Dave tried the door and was surprised to find it unlocked. He was sure it should have been.

  At the bottom of the basement stairs, Dave took two items out of his inventory, threw them on the floor, manifested Tzu and waited for his pursuers while surrounded by spare chariot parts, straw targets and other arena props.

  “They said you was a smart one,” said the lead thug, stopping at the bottom of the stairs when he saw Dave waiting for him. His three compatriots lined up beside him.

  “Yeah, no point running. Only one way out, right?” said Dave, and channelled mana into the rope he was holding.

  A large cargo net sprang up over the four thugs and started shrinking.

  “What the?”

  “Hey!”

  The other two just spun about in mute confusion. The net kept slowly shrinking.

  “Smart enough to know that if you herd me to where nobody can sense you beating the hell out of me, nobody can sense you either.” said Dave. Still holding the control rope, he moved a few steps to the corner of a large tarpaulin he’d put down below the cargo net and propped the metallic ring in the corner on the handle of a cauldron. The net kept shrinking. It’d already gone from loosely draped over the four men to a little restrictive.

  “Hey!”

  “Let me out or I’ll -”

  One of them tried to use a magical attack to break the rope. The last shot a stream of crystal shards at him that Tzu intercepted with force beams.

  “Pointless, mate,” said Dave, nodding at the elf trying to break the rope. “They’re built tough to move cargo and I splurged on the bronze rank version. You know, this reality has some marvellous stuff.” Dave moved to another tarpaulin corner and propped it up against a broken training dummy. “These nets, for instance, they’re designed to enlarge and shrink. One size fits all so the longshore workers don’t have to waste time changing nets.” The four thugs were squeezed snugly together now. Each of them going through various methods of escaping the net. One shot a cone of force at Dave but it only knocked him off his feet.

  “Good try,” said Dave, picking himself up from the mess that'd come off the shelf he’d been knocked into. “Not enough. Weird how this universe doesn’t emphasise ranged combat more. Hitting people before they hit you is something of a principle where I’m from.

  “You fucking peasant!”

  “Let me out of this right now or my father -”

  “Hey! Hey, come on. This isn’t funny. Come on!”

  “Friends! Friends! Stop! Shut up! We can’t -”

  The net shrank tighter around them. It was pressing into their skin now, starting to restrict their movements.

  “She’s right, you can’t get out,” said Dave, putting another corner of the tarpaulin between two crates. “Unfortunately for you, this reality doesn’t have workplace safety regulations. And, I’m pretty sure this cargo net will shrink harder than your bones are sturdy. I got the idea when I was in the pub two weeks ago and overheard a longshoreman. Got his finger stuck in the net and the shrinking nipped it right off.”

  “No! No, stop!”

  “I can pay! Mister Booker, my family can pay.”

  “Just let us go, he can pay!”

  “Please, my children! Stop!”

  “You know, I’m part of a family too?” said Dave, flicking a cardboard, double-ended hook into his hand and using it to connect the last corner of the tarp to a prop chariot. “Got a mum and dad who love me. Didn't stop any of you.”

  “We were just going to slap you around a bit. Honest!”

  “Granted,” said Dave. Jumping up to sit on a bench. He leaned forward and rested his arms on his knees. “But while we’re being honest, if Reyer had told you to kill me, you wouldn’t have hesitated.”

  “No-no-no-no-no!”

  “Please, please!

  “Almighty gods, forgive me my sins and protect me -”

  The last just closed her eyes, clasped her hands together beneath her chin and drew shuddering breaths.

  “And, I’m sick of people like you,” said Dave, staring them down. “Anyway, bronze rank industrial machinery isn’t even a quarter of the price of iron rank arms and armour. How about that, hey?”

  The voices had degenerated into a variety of gasps and wheezes as the net closed like a python, tight enough to squeeze the air from their lungs.

  “I guess,” said Dave, pausing for a moment to acknowledge a loudly cracking bone, “I want you so-called nobility to die knowing it wasn’t bravely in battle doing heroic deeds. You’re dying because you tried to bully a peasant. You’re fucking idiots. I even had time to monologue.”

  The crunching started and Dave was careful to watch the whole time. Soon parts began streaming out between the rope mesh like freshly squeezed garlic. He hurried to lift up an edge of the tarpaulin that the blood was pooling towards.

  “Although, honestly, I’d have preferred to just delete you over monologuing,” remarked Dave to the soup of humanoid remains. “This takes too long. And, you might have escaped if you’d acted fast enough. At least two of you could’ve squeezed through the mesh at the start.”

  Dave took a minute to retrieve his now hand-sized cargo net which he cleaned with Grand Mage’s Gravitas and inventoried. Next, he slowly walked in a circle, gathering the corners of the tarpaulin together until he was holding a large sack of assorted body-bits and blood which he tied off with string. Then, he reached back, took the false crystal wash dimensional container out of his inventory, popped the lid and pressed the opening against the sack, letting the dimensional magic grasp it, simultaneously shrink it and suck it into the opening.

  Dave spent another minute putting everything back where he found it, using Library Of The Mind to make sure and Grand Mage’s Gravitas on the mess he couldn’t fix. Then he left the room and walked back to the viewing room, once more reading with wonder the details of the armour Johan would wear for his entire adventuring career.