The Guild Of Shadows

Master Thief

""Many years ago, the world faced what has gone down in history as the most chaotic days in human existence.

War ravaged, countries fell, destruction followed by every nook and cranny, all seemed lost, and people had already given up on life itself until...""

A silhouette of a man in his thirties could be seen raising a longsword high in the sky before charging towards demonic-looking creatures.

"A hero appeared and brought an end to the chaos. Sadly, that wasn't until most of the population of the world at that time was destroyed.""

He stood atop a pile of creatures as he shouted his battle cry.

"His final words before he vanished were"

"When the six authorities have bonded, Ragnarok will rise once again."

"He was the first artifact user."

The man disappeared.

A woman was revealed to be reading from a book titled "Last Days of the Old Era" before closing it and placing it back on a shelf amidst other books.

She seemed to be in a library.

She was clad in red armor like a knight and had a cloak hiding her face. She had blond hair dropping to her back.

"Lady Irene!!" A man came rushing towards her, holding a newspaper.

"Shhhhhhh"

She pushed her index finger on her lips and shushed him, gesturing that they were in a library and not the only people there.

He looked around, perplexed by the many unfriendly eyes glaring down at him, making him bow his head down a bit to say, 'I'm sorry for the intrusion; it won't happen again'.

He began to speak in a low tone.

"Milady, a crypt has been sighted near a border town in our territory; there is no artifact energy coming from it though; it seems to be a village-level crypt!".

He finished and raised his head to be met with the heart-stealing face of his commander, Lady Irene.

A woman of few words and many actions, she is also the district commander of the Regrah District, the neighboring district sitting between Hondah and Geria.

She truly was a woman that every man could only dream of having.

This young woman in her early twenties began to speak for the first time; her voice was as calm as the summer sun.

"It says it appeared right in the middle of one of the routes leading to Hondah from here; maybe it has something to do with the prison incident from last week."

She paused a bit.

Since it was a low-grade crypt, it's certain to dissolve on its own.

"Justin, deploy a few men to scout the area and make sure no one enters for their own good; there's no need to raid the Crypt."

The man named Justin, who was her right-hand man, received a message on his phone, which made him drop the phone entirely before nervously speaking.

"Co-com-commander! The crypt has been upgraded to B-Rank!!"

A few moments ago...

In a dark forest along the path to Regrah, Krystal and Grover were staring down at a portal that suddenly appeared in front of them.

"Woah, this is the first time I've seen a crypt portal."

Grover awed.

Krystal and Grover were on their way to Regrah to meet up with an old associate of Grover whom he claims was an expert crafter and would make an emblem for Krystal.

'Solemn! We can finally become a full-fledged guild.

"It is a low-grade one; it probably has no artifacts in it."

Grover interrupted Krystal's thought, only for him to enter another trance of thought.

Krystal did not even make a nudge as he stared blankly at the portal, as if he could hear a voice coming from the other side.

He started to move his hand as he reached out for the portal while trying to take a step forward, only to be stopped by the master thief.

"Hey, what do you think you're doing?" Grover grabbed Krystal's arm.

"That's dangerous! We don't know what's on the other side of this portal.""

Krystal, on the other hand, snapped out of his daze, only to push Grover back and swipe his hat.

"Argh! What do you do that for? You little pun-"

The hat started to glow a faint yellow light in resonance with the portal as it came closer to it.

Grover was shocked at the strange thing that was happening to the hat his dad gave him and his that before that and so forth.

"Krystal! What did you do?"" He grabbed him by his collar and made a face with his other hand.

"You couldn't feel it because you can't use seismic sense; from the looks of it, this is not an ordinary hat.".

Yes, unbeknownst to Grover, his hat was an artifact, and it is currently undergoing its first awakening by siphoning the energy from the portal.

He explained it to the thief.

There were three main ways of obtaining an artifact.

The most common way was by raiding a crypt.

The second and rarest was selected by an artifact.

The third way was by inheriting a family heirloom, an artifact passed down to generations of relatives if they were alive, and in this case, the Hat of Lupin artifact.

The Gentleman Thief, who sorted out justice by breaking the law in the old world country of France, his most noticeable feature was the hat he wore, which is now in the possession of his descendant, Grover Starr.

"You are saying that all this time I had an artifact, and is it that hat?"

Grover asked as his eyes lit up in excitement.

"I'll be able to use abilities similar to yours then."

"Yes and no," Krystal interjected.

""You see, there are several types of artifacts, each with its own unique abilities relating to the name behind the artifact. Like yours now, it's bound to have thief-like abilities to make you an even better thief, and since it is an heirloom-type artifact, your affinity with this artifact will be very high, and you can use it without having any mastery of using Anima.""

"Ohh," Grover said, listening attentively like he was in a class.

The portal started growing bigger and sucked the hat in, catching Krystal and Grover off guard in the process.

""That thing ate my hat! Give it back!!!"

Without a second's thought, Grover jumped into the portal, and Krystal tried to follow, but before he could jump...

An arrow was shot in his direction, which he caught with seemingly zero effort.

"He caught the arrow, ma'am!"

On the other side of the portal...

"Ouch!"

Grover fell hard on his behind and mumbled as he picked himself up.

He dusted himself off and looked ahead towards the scenery in front of him. The place he was in wasn't very big.

He was in a dark modern-world showroom with security lights beaming all over, but what caught his attention was his hat that was on the other side of the room.

He plopped down at the recent turn of events.

Whenever a crypt bearing an artifact appears, two things are usually confirmed:.

One is that there would be a test or puzzle to see if the raider was worthwhile enough to bond with the artifact.

But this case was different.

Heirloom artifacts bond with their owners without them having to undergo any series of tests; the fact that Grover had to take a test meant that the artifact didn't deem him worthy.

Lupin's Hat belonged to a masterclass thief and strategist; it might not like the idea that its newest owner was a lowly fraud who was easily duped and caught so his. Anima's affinity with the artifact dropped before Krystal could awaken it.

Anima is known as "self-force," the power within every single living organism.

It was first discovered eight hundred years ago as humanity's last stand in fighting off the control of the artifacts.

An artifact can either be controlled by using anima to make it bend to its owner's will.

Or by using Affinity, matching certain conditions depending on the type of artifact to be able to use it.

In Grover's case, he had to be a master thief and gentleman.

""Oh great! I have to get past these security lights if I want my hat back."".

He retorted as he rolled up his sleeves, ready for action.

Back outside...

"He caught the arrow, ma'am.".

Justin was reporting to his commander using the communications he was wearing.

Krystal, who was just about to go after Grover, is attacked by Justin and his artifact, Apollo's Bow,

"My apologies, but you and your cohort are under arrest by the order of my esteemed commander for illegal trespassing in a crypt."

He aimed his bow again, and this time a golden, radiant arrow formed as he released his grip, and the arrow flew towards Krystal.

Krystal rolled out of harm's way, but before he knew it, his opponent was nowhere to be seen.

"Up here!"

Justin jumped high up. From Krystal's perspective, Justin was blocking the sun as he readied for another attack.

"Sun purge!"

He shot an even brighter arrow that moved faster; this time Krystal could barely dodge it completely. The arrow brushed through his shoulder while he was dodging, and a sudden jolt of pain struck him.

"Arghhh"

He checked the spot where he was hit, and it was burning.

"This is my artifact's power!"

Justin explained to the now-on-knee Krystal as he readied another attack.

"Even a slight brush can cause severe pain equaling a 3rd-degree burn. Now surrender, and I won't have to hurt you any further. My commander is a merciful person. I'm su-"

Justin couldn't believe what he was seeing.

'A monster...'

What he saw was a dark aura above Krystal as the burning wound he gave him vanished.

He stood up and faced Justin with dreaded eyes that looked like the eyes of a wolf, ready to attack.

Krystal called upon his shadow as it wrapped itself around his arm, forming spikes. The aura intensified further, making Justin quiver in fear.

"You have one chance..."

He said it in a cold and dark voice, unlike the cheerful manner in which he normally speaks.

"Run".

Justin plopped down and stumbled while getting up and running as far as he could.

'I have to get the commander; this guy is insane!'

He quickly changed his mission after witnessing a wild, angry beast.

As he gradually vanished from the scene in the direction of the district, Krystal reverted to his normal form and turned towards the portal.

"Now, let's go save Grover."

He spoke cheerfully and jumped into the portal.

"Huff... Huff. Huff, just a little bit more.""

Grover had finally made his way to the hat after numerous attempts to maneuver through the laser beams.

It seems that if he touches a beam by even a hair's length, he'll be teleported back to the starting point.

After hundreds of retries, he finally got his hat back.

"Yessssss!!".

He bawled in excitement as he took the hat from the display stand.

Then...

CLUNK!!!

He tripped the trap that was placed on top of the stand where the hat was placed, and the walls of the room started to move.

"Oh sh*t (- -)"