Yesterday hadn’t been a good day. Gabriel’s sister was hiding stuff from him and Kupi had told him that she didn’t need help, but he realized that she did need it. Alas Gabriel didn’t support Arabelle on the next day because Kupi had filled his day with training to become good enough at stealing.

First of all, he had to wake up early because “the early thief gets the stash”. Waking up early was an exercise which he’d have to practice, because Kupi had to wake him up this time. By choking him. Not fun, but it was how Kupi trained him, and he’d have to resign himself to his methods of give up on the thief life.

First thing in the morning he’d take stuff from everyone in the convent, Kupi explained. Gabriel didn’t want to do this, he was more acceptable of stealing something small from a single person, like a coin, he clearly disliked the idea of stealing from so many people.

- But that’s why this is training. At some point in your career, you’ll find yourself in a morally complex situation and learning how to act rationally to improve your gains is a needed skill, one which I’m imparting to you now.

And it made sense to think rationally on those situations, but Gabriel didn’t comprehend how stealing from everyone would help him. Kupi forced his hand and Gabriel ended up taking things from everyone, such as hairpins, toothbrushes, combs, coins and many other small things which didn’t cost much money but would complicate their lives until they got a replacement.

Gabriel put all the loot inside a backpack and walked out of the precinct with Kupi, who guided him towards a quiet part of the city and asked him to show him what he got. Looking at the things he stole he looked quite satisfied and said:

- You see I didn’t ask you to steal these things only to learn to think rationally, I also asked you to do this to show you that a good thief can use any materials to steal. You see the things you got here? All of this can be used to increase your net worth.

And Kupi instantly got his hands to work. Changing the shape of the different objects Gabriel had stolen to turn them into peculiar but working trinkets to be used to open locks, distract people or even blow-up certain obstructions. Not a big one, but they were good enough to help pick some locks or open some doors.

- Ok, now take these – Kupi pointed at a certain group of objects – and use them to enter this building right here, behind me. It shouldn’t be too hard; I took a glance at the lock while we came here, and it should take you five minutes tops. Don’t make me wait now – And he patted Gabriel on his back, with enough force to push him towards the locked metal door.

Gabriel instantly started his work, trying to unlock it in any way without being taught anything by Kupi yet. But he had some knowledge on how locks worked and so he had some ideas on how to exploit possible weaknesses to unlock them without a key.

Using the different materials, inserting them in the holes of the lock or hitting it with the objects Kupi had made. Seconds turned into minutes after 120 seconds passed and Kupi looked more and more disappointed with Gabriel, who was getting frustrated with himself as he expected him to meet Kupi’s expectations. He knew about the topic, after all, and being worse than what he had predicted meant that he was a disappointment and maybe would no longer be taught by Kupi.

- Is he really that bad? – Kupi thought to himself – He should have gotten it by now, I mean twelve minutes should be more than enough… He read books about locks, I have seen him, so why is this so hard for him? Is there something more to it?

- Hey, let me take a closer look – Kupi ordered Gabriel, who made his way on the side, but kept trying to unlock it with his arms stretched towards the lock – And take your arms off! I want the full picture, let me work as I want to.

Gabriel complied once more and took his arms and tools off of the security measure and let Kupi do his thing. He looked around the lock, confirming his first impression of nothing strange happening with the lock, but when he looked in the entrance for the key it clicked in his mind and almost silently muttered:

- Those cheeky bastards.

- Wh- what is it? – Gabriel heard it and was curious of what made those bastards cheeky, but also wasn’t sure whether it was going to make him angry.

- You see… - Kupi decided to explain it to him, because he’d probably meet another of these locks in the future - …this lock has a spell in it. But it is inside and quite well hidden. What it does is, in simpler terms, change the combination to unlock this lock.

- But how do they open the door, then? Do they wait until they get lucky? – Gabriel continued asking, seeing that Kupi was quite talkative now.

- Well, that could be a solution, but normally the key is also magical, and it connects to the spell inside to instantly unlock the lock. The lock and key must’ve been personally made by an expert to make the connection unique and prevent copycats from breaking in. – Kupi explained in detail.

- Whoa… that sounds so cool! – Gabriel gasped.

- Yeah, it is very cool – an unknown voice came from behind him and then he and Kupi were knocked out.

A few hours later, location unknown.

Torches hanged on the walls lit up the room where two chairs each with a kid tied onto it and their backs against each other. They were surrounded by three brick walls and a metal one. It was a jail cell and Gabriel and Kupi were locked in it.

Kupi was the first to wake up, but he did so carefully, his instincts helping him control his body not to call the attention of the people that had captured them. But it wasn’t enough, as one of their captors- supposedly – called for someone else, saying:

- One of them woke up! Bring the boss!

And that made Gabriel wake up, makes you think why they didn’t wake them up themselves. Maybe they had tried, and they didn’t wake up, Kupi theorized, but he didn’t know, as he was knocked out by the group of people leaded by the person that was walking the staircase down.

As the individual came down the air in the room got colder and colder, as if the man was emanating cold. When he came into view, they saw a man wearing some colorful clothes, blue hair and a small green cape tied to him.

- Hahaha! So, these are the two children “playing” in my turf! Aww… they look so cute! – The man started talking in a hysterical voice – Ahhh… I haven’t had such a surprise since he took everything from me… - The man turned towards the people of his gang and started pointing at them while telling them – You’re telling me you knocked these two babies out because they were dangerous? Don’t make me laugh! You’re just wasting my time! If I hadn’t had any fun with his you’d all be dead already. But I might let you leave alive if you make this worth it.

The men were already nervous with the situation they had at hand but now with these extra conditions they sweat even more. Some even started trembling, which made both Gabriel and Kupi think about who this man was and what organization followed him.

- Y- You s-see boss… they we- were – one of them started explaining, but the cold man cut him off.

- Talk normally, damnit! I can’t understand you if you start stuttering all over! – And then he threw a knife that cut some of that man’s hair, causing him great fear… He wouldn’t talk again tonight. – And now no one wants to talk! What an awful lot you are. If none of you start talking I’m going to start taking some fingernails off of you…. Now – he pointed at a random burly man – will you tell me what these kids did?

- Yes sir! – He said as his face went pale, but he continued – I wasn’t there present but I heard that they were about to crack one of the specially made locks which would let them into one of our most important warehouses – he said very quickly, making it quite hard to understand, but the boss got the main idea and turned back towards Gabriel and Kupi.

- Oh-ho-ho, so you aren’t the defenseless children I thought you were! – he laughed out of nowhere and then made some creepy movements - Uhhhuhuhuhu this is so much fun! Ah please show me more! – he grabbed both Kupi’s and Gabriel’s chin and pointed their faces towards his. – But I can’t make it easy for you, that’d be sooo boring… So, I’m going to make you try to escape from here in the twelve hours. If you manage to exit safely then get to me and I shall reward you for entertaining me. Should you die, well that’d mean you weren’t good enough.

The man started walking around in circles, massaging his temples, before continuing his monologue.

- Ah, but to make it even more exciting you shall start with nothing! – He turned towards his underlings and ordered them – Take everything from them! – and told Kupi and Gabriel one final thing – Good luck! – and winked at them, leaving through the same stairs.

After everyone had left and Kupi and Gabriel were left inside, tied to chairs, locked inside the prison and under who knows how many floors Gabriel commented:

- So, we met a weirdo, huh.