The Insider System

Chapter 91: In progress Pt.1

Lake had just passed the store he had marked yesterday, and while he still thought it would be a good place to hit it was still open, so he moved on. It seemed the only places that had already closed were the ones that no one would want to steal from. He was sure even they would have something he could steal.

...

Lake had found a cluster of a few stores with good stuff, and found a place to watch all of them. He figured after a while of walking around that being able to see so many at once was his best chance at finding somewhere to break into, and it seemed he was right.

One of the jewelry stores just had its last person leave and with no guards showing up Lake guessed they had a magic alarm system. Jumping on to its roof after activating Mute, Lake punched a hole in the roof tiles then retreated.

He figured the door would also set off an alarm if he opened it, so he was going to dig in through the roof but first he wanted to make sure they hadn't thought of the possibility already. When no one showed up to see what was going on he got back onto the roof.

Lake wasn't just digging in a random spot either when he was using Mana Vision he had seen most stores had a small amount of items that gave off mana in the back of their store, Lake assumed it was the good stuff that they had locked up for extra protection, and Lake was digging right towards it.

Once he had removed enough of the roof for him to enter, Lake used Mana vision one more time on his surroundings just to make sure no one was rushing towards the store. With nothing but normal foot traffic passing by Lake stuck his head in to see what he had dug into.

He was guessing they had an unused attic because there was no light coming from the space he had made an entrance into. Seeing nothing in the attic, Lake dropped inside, and positioned himself over the mana sources. Prying up the wood, and making sure that none of it dropped down, Lake looked down to see a medium sized safe.

Lake didn't think he could carry it out of here in his satchel, so that just left him opening it to take the stuff inside. Lake could also go to the front of the store to take the less valuable stuff, but there were windows so people would see him in here. The safe was in a back room, so no one would see him trying to open it.

Using Burglar Alarm to see where the owner was, Lake fell into the backroom next to the safe. When the owner didn't move after him being inside for a while, Lake knew he was ok to start on the safe. Not even trying to inspect it, Lake used Decrypt on the safe and a few seconds later two formations were lit up in Lake's eyes.

One of them was a formation that increased the safe's strength, but Lake didn't care about that one. Moving on to the next one expecting it to be the way to open it, Lake found it was just an alarm that went off if the safe was damaged or moved.

With there not being anything stopping him from inspecting it Lake Lake used Critical Eye and found his skill was showing him the thin space between the door of the safe around where he would assume the latch would be.

The reason Lake thought this safe had a magic method of being opened was it had no obvious handle or keyhole so he thought there would be a password to make it open, but it seemed it was a trick. The keyhole was hidden to make people think that, and give up on trying to open it without force, setting off the alarm.

Lake got his eye closer, so he could see into the crevice better. He didn't really have anything he could slide in there, so he wasn't sure if he should just give up and move on but he decided he should try one of his new skills first.

Lake hadn't tried it out because he wasn't sure how to use it. Thinking "Detector, key for this safe." Lake looked around and when he didn't see anything happen he wasn't sure if it was because he hadn't used the skill right, or if it was because the item wasn't in range.

Lake decided to give up on opening it now and got a good look at where the owner was. Then he memorized his name and left heading towards where the mark was. The mark from Burglar Alarm disappeared as soon as he was outside but he was hoping Detector would show him something once he got close to where the owner was.

Their house seemed to be only a few streets away and Lake was where he thought he should start looking for them. Stopping someone walking out of a house, Lake said. "Do you know where Ry Ander lives?" The person barely glanced at him before saying. "No" and walked away.

They were lying though, so Lake stopped them again. "Where does he live? Where does he live? Where does he live? Where does he live?" The person seemed to realize Lake wouldn't stop until he got an answer, so they said. "Right there."

It seemed Lake was only a few houses away. Thanking the person, Lake got closer to Ry's house and once he was right next to it he saw Detector finally do something. It seemed it's range was only about 15 ft at the moment, but that wasn't what Lake cared about.

He had found the key for the safe, so now he needed to get it. Lake wasn't about to bust in and fight this guy and his whole family, so he just marked the house with the plan of coming back later when it was time for people to sleep.

Going back to the area the jewelry store was in, Lake Looked around for more empty businesses he could break into while he waited for night. Finding a decent looking potion shop Lake decided there was no point in robbing his own guild, so he moved on.

His next option was a clothes store and with his mana vision he couldn't see anything good, while that didn't mean there wasn't, he didn't feel like doing all that work for cloth. The next place seemed to be a pawn shop, or maybe a store of curiosities, because when he looked through the window he saw all types of things. He couldn't really see anything that didn't look like junk, so he moved on once again.

...

Lake finally found something he wanted to break into, a weapon shop, the only problem was it had a guard. Lake saw the guard through the window as he walked by, and it seemed this place was owned by the Blacksmith guild because they were wearing the same armor as he had seen when he was there earlier.

The sun had been in the process of setting when he had found this place, and he had waited till it did because there was now less light, and people. Lake was going to try to break in because there was only one guard and he moved around from room to room, so if he timed it right he should be able to steal a few things before the guard noticed.

Lake activated Mute, and jumped from where he had been watching the place onto its roof. He planned to go through the roof again because it was the one part of the building the guard wouldn't notice if he broke it to get in.

Breaking a small hole in the roof, Lake checked to see if it had alerted the guard somehow. Seeing no reaction, he started breaking chunks of the roof off until the hole was big enough for him. Poking his head inside while looking at the guard using Mana Vision Lake still saw no reaction, so he looked at what was in the attic.

Unlike the jewelry store there were actually things in the attic this time. Stacks of wooden crates Lake wouldn't be surprised if there were more than 50 of varying size and shape. Thinking he might have just hit the jackpot without even needing to go downstairs, Lake lowered himself in.

Even if he jumped there would be no sound, but he was afraid of dust falling from the ceiling downstairs and alerting the guard, so he was going to move slowly. Walking up to the first crate Lake pried the top off to look inside. Rows of swords were packed into the crate. There were 20 of them, and Lake was about to lose his mind until he looked closely.

They already had price tags on them that said 9 gold, and they were all the same cheap crap. It made sense that cheap stuff would sell in bulk because there were a lot of new adventures that would need a first sword, and this cheap one would be all they could afford.

Lake guessed whenever they sold a cheap item they came up to the attic to get the next one that would be on display. To confirm he walked over to the next closest crate, and pulled the top off to see wooden bows like the one Stan had let him have.

These were even cheaper than the swords at only 5 gold. Lake put the two tops back on and decided to go downstairs to get something worth his time because at 5 gold a bow Lake would have to make 20 trips from here to the alley to make 100 gold, if they would even take it, and he thought he could do much better downstairs.