In Oukiwa, there was a law that the heads of convicted thieves were worth as much as the heads of Class-C monsters. Since that law was passed by the council, robberies have decreased stratospherically.

“I’m not dropping everything,” shouted Luke. Even knowing the strict law against thieves, the half-wolf was unwilling.

“Why don’t you want to let go? Nothing is worth as much as our lives.” Matthew shouted.

Luke hesitated to say why. ‘Maybe because I have a cursed item with me and many trinkets of value?’ At that moment, the young half-wolf believed that the tiara was one of the items Matthew had already told him could be worth a lot.

The three Class E adventurers were running down the parallel street, which made the trio of children thinks about jumping to the other street, but there were two warehouse guards there.

The three knew that that conglomeration of buildings would end up in the Municipal Market Square and there would be guards against the city itself there, which would make escape impossible.

Knowing this, Luke braked and said: “Stop, we’re heading for a dead end.”

“And what do you want to do?” Meredith said breathlessly. She was desperate. “We have no other option.”

The half-wolf, without saying anything, stretched out the big bag to The Fearless and The Sagacious.

“W-what? W-we’re not leaving you behind!”

At this moment, Matthew as leader understood what Luke wanted to do and took the bag, which weighed down on the thin boy’s shoulders.

“Meredith, Aunt Yoelona didn’t nickname me ‘The Dark One’ for nothing. You know that.” Luke was not going to sacrifice himself; he was going to free his friends.

Meredith, whose red hair was short at the time, looked down and nodded. “Meet us in the usual alley.”

Luke looked at the fire-haired girl with confidence. “Now go.”

Fearless and Sagacious started to run back in the direction they came from, but Luke continued to run towards the direction of the plaza.

The Guards and the Adventurers thought about turning around as well. However, when the half-wolf raised his fist with the tiara and the glare of the sun hit the blue jewel, the glow turned the whole area blue for a few seconds.

The greed of the three adventurers and the two guards warned them that that tiara was worth more than anything that might be in the bag or any reward that might be paid by some thieves.

Getting what he wanted, The Dark One stopped running and jumped into one of the alleys that lay between the buildings. Although he knew he could escape if he threw the tiara among the pursuers, Luke was not willing to do that yet.

Confident as he was, Luke jumped from the 20-foot height and fell into a large trash can. When he raised his head, he already saw the pursuers running toward him, with extremely frowning eyebrows.

“Drop it, brat!”

“No! Throw it to me! I’ll let you go!”

Neither group was going to let Luke get away with this, and he knew it.

The half-wolf waited for them to approach and used the limited space in the alley as leverage. Also taking advantage that the guards were outnumbered and unarmed, he propelled himself up the wall and leaped under them.

The adventurers, in their haste, pushed the guards away, who fell to the ground.

However, when Luke thought he had just gotten rid of two pursuers, as he appeared on the street he ran into two other guards against the warehouse, who started running towards him.

The half-wolf kept the tiara in his pocket to stop it glowing, and propelled himself upward, aiming to reach the sill of a second-story window. He made it, but now there were seven pursuers in all. Climbing as proficiently as he could, he reached the rooftops again in a few seconds.

‘Shit… if it was only three, I could try to hurt their feet and run away afterward, but against seven it’s impossible.’ The child was also already starting to get a chest ache, which made his situation even more difficult.

Luke knew that his only chance to escape would be in the crowd at the City Market. So he ran through the roof to get there. However, the child didn’t imagine that all this running would have alerted many people and so would the blue glow.

Near the streets of the Market, the pursuers were slowed down by wagons passing by and carrying goods, and this allowed Luke to jump off the rooftops into a dark alley.

Since he was wearing a hood, the child believed that his face would not be recognized if he removed the cloak he was wearing.

The City Market Square was crowded with adventurers going after the Quest Board. On this board, anyone could offer rewards in exchange for service, but first, they needed the Guild’s approval to do so. It wasn’t the best of places for a thief to be, but it was still better than fighting seven men.

Because of the beautiful, gigantic fountain in the middle, and the huge number of stalls and tents, Luke knew he had arrived in the City Market. Since there was not even a sign of the pursuers, he believed he had managed to escape, took off his hood, and sighed with relief.

“Uff!” The half-wolf’s chest hurt so much, he could have sworn he ran for hours.

Blending in with the crowd of merchants, adventurers, and all sorts of other people, that child managed to escape without getting hurt. The adventurers arrived late at the square.

“Aaah! Did he run here?”

“I don’t know, that little pest was fast.”

“It was a boy, no?”

“No, I think it was a girl. The body was pretty.”

“Urgghh! You’re sick man, it was a kid.”

It took a few minutes before Luke could reach the poor part of Oukiwa once again. However, two streets before he reached the combined alley, the half-wolf sensed that stares were peeking at him.

Although it was afternoon, the streets were too empty, and everything was so quiet that he could hear his own footsteps, this was not normal even for the suburbs.

Since he didn’t want to compromise his four friends, Luke put on the brakes. “You guys would rather silence people’s groans of hunger than let me get away with a little money, wouldn’t you?”

From the shadows of an alley, a giant man stepped out. His armor glistened against the sun and turned a color similar to his orange cloak. “I am alone, I just want the tiara. If you give it to me, everyone will be happy.”

——

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