Night fell on Adria. In the square before the Pure Flow Cathedral, Antonio—who had been wearing a look of disappointment—was momentarily stunned by Oliver’s words. Surprised, he turned to Oliver.
“They didn’t erase the sigil? How could that be? If they were going to steal something like the Crown of Emmanuel, there’s no way they’d forget to wipe the marker,” Paul said in astonishment.
He knew that a relic like the Crown of Emmanuel, belonging to the Church, would undoubtedly bear a long-term Beacon Sigil. The thieves should have been fully aware of this fact, so why wouldn’t they remove the sigil?
“Well… maybe they forgot, or maybe it’s because we used a deep-engraved beacon on the Crown of Emmanuel. Ordinary methods wouldn’t erase it easily, so perhaps they tried a regular approach that simply didn’t work?” Oliver guessed thoughtfully.
Antonio, however, spoke up directly.
“That seems unlikely… The thief was Crimson rank. Someone like that wouldn’t forget something as critical as removing a sigil. As a Crimson-rank thief, he should have some means to remove a deep-engraved sigil. I doubt it’s a case of ‘it didn’t come off.’ There must be some deeper reason behind this…”
Antonio murmured with a furrowed brow. He was starting to sense that the theft he’d just experienced was far more complex than it appeared.
He fell silent for a moment, lost in thought. Oliver, standing nearby, couldn’t help but ask.
“Er, Your Excellency Antonio, the sigil is moving rapidly southeast. Should we pursue or not?”
Antonio paused, setting aside his doubts momentarily. After steadying his resolve, he answered.
“We pursue. We’ll head to the port and board the Surging Tide at once—full speed ahead! the Crown of Emmanuel is a spiritual pillar for the people of Adria, and we can’t afford to lose it. We’ll chase them down.”
Antonio issued these orders emphatically. In Adria, the Church maintained a military port where a massive fleet had just returned from escorting pilgrims. That port wasn’t only staffed with numerous Church military Beyonders, but also stocked with specially outfitted high-speed ships.
Fearing the possibility of a trap, Antonio decided to bring all the high-speed vessels and a squad of Church navy Beyonders, combining maximum power with top speed. As the Church’s reputation was at stake, there was no way he would let such brazen thieves escape.
…
Late at night, upon the Conquest Sea.
Merging with a shark soul, Garib took on a half-shark form and sped through the water. With the shark’s characteristics, plus the power granted by third-stage Chalice enhancement, he swam incredibly fast. Neither ordinary fish nor ships, nor even birds flying overhead, could match his pace. Yet despite that, Garib didn’t dare pause for even a second.
Faster… farther! Garib’s only thought was to put as much distance as possible between himself and Adria—to escape from Antonio. He had to get beyond Antonio’s detection range before the Crimson-rank Archbishop emerged from the Netherworld. A Crimson-rank Lantern Beyonder could perceive an entire metropolis within their sphere of awareness, so Garib swam tirelessly, pushing himself to the limit, determined to break free of Antonio’s reach.
Garib had suffered considerable injuries during the battle in the Netherworld. Although he was a Chalice-auxiliary Beyonder, his self-healing abilities weren’t as robust as those on the Blood Shade or Holy Mother paths. Consequently, his wounds had yet to fully close, and he had no chance to focus on healing. He could only grit his teeth and bear the pain while he swam, his blood mingling with the seawater.
He swam on and on, continuously. Boosted by the power of Chalice, Garib had spent several hours in the ocean. Logically, he should have now escaped beyond Antonio’s range of influence. Yet even so, he dared not slow down, refusing to let up until he was absolutely certain he was safe.
He pressed on relentlessly, not stopping until the moon had slipped beneath the western horizon, dawn light tinted the sky in the east, and finally the morning sun rose over the sea and climbed overhead, illuminating both water and sky. Only then did Garib’s speed gradually decrease, exhausted from swimming at top speed through the night. Even a third-stage Chalice enhanced would find such a prolonged effort hard to bear. Garib’s muscles screamed with fatigue.
At that moment, an island emerged on the distant horizon, thick with green foliage under the morning light. Garib’s spirits rose, and despite the pain racking his body, he forced himself onward. A few minutes later, he landed on a deserted beach.
Once ashore, Garib canceled his soul possession, releasing the shark soul and sealing it back into a bone fragment. He staggered along the sand, gasping for breath. After some time, he slumped against a tree trunk, sitting down to rest—utterly drained.
“Huff… huff…”
Panting heavily, Garib finally had a chance to recover after swimming for so long. Pain coursed through every muscle. He sat there for over half an hour, catching his breath and waiting for some of his strength to return. Then, gazing out over the endless sea, he reassured himself that he must have fled far enough to evade pursuit.
“Whew… I should be safe now… I wonder how many of Salim’s people managed to escape. We’ll need a long while to recover from all of this. I never expected that old codger Antonio to show up like that! How did he even learn about me?”
Such were Garib’s thoughts. He had intended to get his divination tool now, and then raid a Scriptorium ruin in April. But after this mess, he suspected he’d lost many loyal subordinates, leaving him unable to muster a sufficient force for any expeditions into the ruins for quite some time. He would need a lengthy period to recuperate and prepare.
“Still, despite all the mishaps, I managed to secure the item. As long as I’m alive and keep it close… everything will be fine…”
Garib was thinking along those lines when he turned his gaze to the bag hanging at his waist. Inside it lay the spoils he had risked so much to steal—Azam’s most tempting legacy.
Staring at the bag, Garib, who had just caught his breath, decided to open it for a look. He took the small bag into his hands, undid the opening, and peered inside, taking out each artifact one by one.
A chalice, earrings, a dagger, arrowheads… As Garib inspected each item, he carefully evaluated it. Being a veteran treasure thief, he possessed a certain level of appraisal ability, allowing him to identify an artifact’s cultural origin and approximate era.
From what Garib could recall, although he had never actually seen Azam’s divination tool, he did know it was excavated from North Ufiga, and it should therefore belong to the North Ufiga cultural sphere. Azam’s donations were mostly from North Ufiga. Yet as he examined these artifacts, Garib noticed very few items that looked North Ufiga. Instead, most pieces appeared to belong to Ivengard culture.
As he scrutinized the bag’s contents, Garib’s brows furrowed slightly. Just as an uneasy feeling began to stir within him, he finished sorting through everything—except for a small bundle wrapped in cloth at the very bottom of the bag.
Seeing that small cloth bundle, Garib grew even more perplexed. Wondering why his young subordinate had gone out of his way to wrap something separately, Garib picked it up and gave it a closer look.
With curiosity and unease rising in him, Garib unwrapped the cloth—and the moment he saw the glow emanating from within, his eyes widened in shock.
Removing the covering revealed a shimmering crown in the signature style of the Radiance Church, giving off a faint glow visible to the naked eye. Fashioned from tightly intertwined strands of lustrous metal, the crown’s front featured a large, translucent diamond that glinted softly in the sunlight.
“This is… the Crown of Emmanuel!”
He nearly dropped it in surprise, blurting out the name. He never imagined that his young subordinate’s bag would contain something like the Crown of Emmanuel, a Church treasure that would undoubtedly be imprinted with a powerful Beacon Sigil. Wherever it was stolen away to, it would be tracked.
That’s definitely not something to steal!
“Why? Why was the Crown of Emmanuel in here? Didn’t I say to only take Ebony’s items? I never told them to steal this thing!”
Garib stared in astonishment at the crown in his hands. At first, he assumed his subordinate might have succumbed to greed, aiming to profit while also gathering the Ebony donations—and thus recklessly stole the Crown of Emmanuel. But on second thought, he realized the situation was more complicated. This entire mission had been riddled with oddities, from Antonio’s unexpected reappearance to the sudden involvement of an item that should never have been stolen. Garib felt as though he was being deliberately set up. A growing suspicion told him he had fallen into some grand conspiracy.
Watching the crown in his hands, Garib’s frustration mingled with excitement. Just then, he noticed another item beneath the Crown of Emmanuel, a small white card. Leaning in for a closer look, he realized it bore a short note in Ivengardian.
Upon reading the card, Garib’s breathing grew uneven, his pupils contracting. After several tense breaths, he hissed out a single name through clenched teeth.
“Thief… K…”
Realizing he had been outmaneuvered, Garib struck the tree beside him in fury, snapping it and sending it crashing to the ground. He threw the Crown of Emmanuel onto the sand, intending to escape immediately. He had never planned on stealing the Crown of Emmanuel in the first place, so he hadn’t prepared any method to erase its sigil. His only option was to keep running, lest the Church catch up.
Yet just as he rose to his feet, he spotted a despairing sight in the distance.
Far out on the horizon rose thick plumes of smoke, and beneath them the shapes of multiple naval ships became visible on the water, speeding toward the island.
Cutting across the waves, three relatively small, streamlined Church vessels surged forward at high speed. Each was powered by prohibitively expensive mystical engines crafted by the White Craftsmen’s Guild, burning spiritual storage resources to produce formidable propulsion.
On the deck, Church naval soldiers stood at the ready. At the bow of the leading ship stood Antonio, his bishop’s robes billowing in the sea breeze. As a Lantern Beyonder, his vision had already spotted Garib’s horrified face on the island.
…
Back in Adria.
Night gave way to day, and soon Ivengard’s “Pearl of the Northern Conquest Sea,” a famous tourist city, welcomed another morning. Seabirds called overhead as local citizens and visitors alike stepped out to begin a new day’s work and sightseeing. The Pure Flow Cathedral, a major tourist destination, was greeted by its first wave of morning visitors—who immediately noticed something amiss about the cathedral today.
Police tape and officers—that was the scene at every entrance to the cathedral plaza. Whether street or bridge, each was guarded by someone. The plaza, typically bustling with the daily activities of Adria’s citizens, was completely sealed off, no one allowed in. The given reason was that the plaza was undergoing extensive renovations, making entry impossible. For the people of Adria, who had never seen such measures taken before, it caused quite a stir.
A renovation so extensive that they seal it off with police and admit no one? Come on, who would believe that?
All over town—on street corners, in alleys, and in restaurants—people were buzzing about what might have happened to the cathedral plaza that it would suddenly be placed under lockdown. Rumors spread in every direction: some speculated that there had been a massive gang fight, resulting in dozens of fatalities, referencing the loud noises reported the previous night. Others claimed they had seen numerous Church personnel freely coming and going through the blockade, and surmised that a famous nun from Adria had gone missing near the plaza, prompting a citywide search.
Among these accounts, the most sensational and widely circulated was the claim that the Crown of Emmanuel from the Pure Flow Cathedral had been stolen—and that the culprit was none other than the famed Thief K recently mentioned in the newspapers.
That rumor stemmed from some insiders at both the Church and an insurance company in Adria. They whispered that, yesterday morning, both institutions had unexpectedly received a flood of letters and postcards stating Thief K’s intention to “admire” Adria’s treasured Crown of Emmanuel. Since the postcards arrived in such large numbers, the front-desk staff, who were used to dealing with ordinary people, couldn’t handle it all. Consequently, not only did some regular employees see them, but so did clients and patrons who had come by for business or donations.
Subsequently, the Church and the insurance company demanded that these employees and patrons keep the contents of the postcards a secret. Yet, owing to the number of people who had already seen them, the story quickly leaked.
In practice, “keeping a secret” went along the lines of “I’ll tell you, but don’t tell anyone else—and don’t say it was me who told you.” So, before long, the news got out.
Initially, many people didn’t believe the rumor. But once the square was cordoned off this morning, the rumor’s spread skyrocketed, overshadowing all the other speculations to become the most prominent story.
The reason was simple: the light from the Crown of Emmanuel, which the people of Adria were accustomed to seeing on top of the church every day, was now nowhere to be found. Peering through telescopes, they saw only the tightly closed roll-up shutters of the little rooftop loft. For Adria’s residents, that was highly unusual.
With the glow on the church roof having disappeared, many saw this as confirmation of the Crown’s theft. Everywhere, people discussed Thief K—the legendary figure whose nerve and skill were said to be equally formidable—and the fate of the Crown of Emmanuel. One such place was a certain restaurant.
At noon, in a window-side seat in that restaurant, Nephthys—garbed in a purple gauze dress—sat at one end of a table, glancing around at the patrons busily chatting about the latest events. Looking slightly anxious, she turned to Dorothy and spoke.
“Um… Miss Dorothy, could you make your calling cards a bit less conspicuous next time? Maybe just send one or two to specific people, rather than distributing so many…”
“How could I keep it low-key? If I only send one, whoever receives it might dismiss it as a joke. That’s why I send more, to ensure that someone higher up in the hierarchy takes it seriously.”
As she spoke, Dorothy took another bite of her noodles, then turned back to Nephthys and continued in Prittish.
“After all, for people in this world, the idea of sending a calling card before stealing something is too far-fetched. I need to let them gradually acclimate to this ‘legend’ style, wouldn’t you say, Miss Thief K?”