Chương 58: Swashbuckling

With a grumble the man made his way back to his desk as the doors closed behind him and the rattle of the chain locking it shut began.

"This blasted tally is useless if they never read the ledgers anyway." He complained as he sat back down and opened his book. As he dipped his writing device in a small jar at the edge of the table he paused. Blick watched the man through the crack between crates hidden in the gloom of the room. That was when he remembered that emptying the crystals dimmed them. There were five crates and now two of them were obviously empty of mana. He had expected more time. He should have been in and out before the man returned.

But now he was squatted behind a crate while the man stared directly at it. The man slowly placed his writing tool back down on the table and stood. He walked over to inspect the crates. Blick scrunched his body as close to the other side of the boxes hoping to not be noticed. The bird in the window flapped its wings in some way and the man spun around locking on the large creature just casually siting flicking its beak through some plumage.

"Fucking mana beast stealing our hard earned resources!" He yelled. The bird started at the sudden noise and flapped its way into a rafter above Blick. Probably in an attempt to be closer to its protection while staying out of reach from the loud human shouting. The man shouted several times for the guards while grabbing random bits and throwing them at the bird as it hopped from rafter to rafter. Blick was not sure what exactly to do while he heard the doors unlock and burst open.

He peaked through the crack between crates as the two guards ran into the room taking in the scene of this whiny man throwing chunks of stone at a bird in the rafters.

"Don't just stand there, kill the damn thief of a bird! I'm going to go wake the carpenter to block those damned windows." He shouted at the two while picking up his book and storming off. The two guards looked at the bird chilling in the rafters now that there were no rocks being thrown, then at one another and laughed.

"So that's how the damn thing got so big. It's probably been sneaking a crystal here and there for months to get so big." One of them said. The other responded with a small slap on his partners arm.

"Go get your bow. We need to bring it down. You think it's the same one from that mess this morning?" The man laughed a bit more as he walked away to get his bow.

"Hope so, the hunters were pissed. Even went and talked to the boss about it for some reason." The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. When he left the room Blick slowly raised his hand and started drawing in mana from the crystal in the box he was hiding behind. If he had to wait he would be doing something. While he consumed the crystals one at a time the other man sat on the table and swung his legs and started whistling a tune.

He wasn't exactly paying attention as he expected the only other creature in the building to be the giant bird up high. Hopefully that meant Blick could get away. The issue was how to make sure the bird followed. It already wasn't comfortable in the building and he was planning on entering the mine. As the bowman walked back through the doorway the bird squawked recognizing the weapon. Blick grabbed one of the smaller crystals he could hold in one hand and slowly move to the edge of the crates.

as the man raised his bow and aimed up into the rafters several things happened at once. The man sitting on the table caught sight of Blick moving around the crates and throwing a crystal, the bow welder was caught off guard as his companion jumped from the table and shoved him to the side launching the arrow into a random beam. The bird took flight headed to Blick for safety in its panic. And Blick crashed into the man who was turning back from shoving his partner.

Before he got his arm up to block, Blick threw a reinforced punch into his face sending the man over the top of the table. Then Blick pivoted and kicked the man on the ground in the back of the head as he tried to stand. As turned back to the crates the bird landed on his shoulder with an odd squawk and Blick lifted one of the untouched crates with reinforcement and ran into the tunnel he assumed was leading to the mine.

The bird flapped a few times and squawked a lot more as they entered the darkness carrying a glowing box of rocks. Blick got irritated and growled at the bird in an attempt get it to shut up.

"Arrrggg" Nearly an hour after he left the two guard to deal with the bird, the annoyed man returned with three slaves carrying ladders and spare wood slats. He paused swing the two men out cold, one lying on his stomach in front of his table, the other on his back with half the tables contents spilled on top of him. He walked over and stood over the one on his back and gave the man a nudge with his boot.

"Wake up you fool." As the man stirred awake he grumbled a response before the annoyed man asked "How did you get your asses kicked by a bird?"