“That’s the full floor plans to the Royal Palace,” said Sun through a mouthful of bread. “Plus—a catalog of all the best shit they’ve got!” She swallowed, then grinned. “Not bad, eh?”

“How did you manage this?” said Gerard, frowning in consternation. “I was under the impression all documents pertaining to the auction were closely guarded.”

“‘Closely guarded?’ That old setup?” Sun scratched her head. “I don’t know about that. I mean they put signs pointing right to their government offices! And they have windows looking out into the street with only, what, four layers of defenses?”

She was munching on another breadstick already. “Pshhh. All it took was some grease, rubber, a good route and a few well-timed Jingu bonks. It was harder stealing from the market! Oh. Speaking of—got a towel?”

Gerard produced one instantly, as though it’d been hidden up his sleeve this whole time.

“Why thank you, mister Gerard!”

“Of course.”

She started vigorously scrubbing. Meanwhile, Dorian picked up the catalog.

He frowned at it. “This is the official catalog?”

“No. It’s a copy—wrote it myself! Same with the floor plans. I mean we wouldn’t want them knowing stuff was gone this close to the Auction, would we?”

“…This is all food.”

About forty items scribbled out, a few—‘Sacred Cow Jerky,’ ‘Golden Apple,’ and ‘Koi Caviar’ triple underlined. And he dearly hoped those wet spots on the page weren’t drool.

“Well of course I wrote the important stuff first!” said Sun, waving a dismissive hand. Crunching sounds as she took another giant bite. “Turn the page.”

“Ah.”

This was more like it.

“Godking Kinzo’s Millennium Elixirs,” breathed Dorian, eyes shining. “I had a suspicion they’d be here.”

“What’re those? Do they taste good?”

“Is snacking all you think about?” said Dorian, exasperated.

“Yes.”

“…No, they do not. They’re quite foul, actually. They’re foul from the moment they’re brewed, and only get fouler the longer they sit. And each one is left to ferment in a cold cellar for 1,000 years.”

Sun instantly lost interest.

“I was not aware Kinzo sold his elixirs to the public,” said Gerard. “He once confided to me he considered them works of art.”

“Oh, he does. But his estate does not. His sons were always greedy little bastards. And since Kinzo died centuries ago they’ve been offloading dad’s prized possessions.” Dorian grinned. “‘Priceless!’ they call them. Yet they somehow always manage to find a number to put on them. An astronomically high one. Almost as much as the bounty on my head, I imagine!”

And they were still well worth the price. A Millennium Elixir was the Master Alchemist Kinzo’s signature elixir, a concoction whose recipe and formula only he knew. It took 1000 years to brew, and granted 1000 years’ worth of Bloodline.

Bloodline powers were simple. They went by Base 9. Dorian was currently at Base Form as a dragonoid, with a bloodline quantity of 5.0. He hadn’t even scratched the surface of what his Bloodline was truly capable of. It took 9.0 quantity to hit First Form. Then ninefold that, 81.0, to hit second form, and so forth. On average the typical Bloodline beast gained only 1.0 quantity per year…and on average the typical Bloodline beast leaned on their Bloodline for the vast majority of their powers.

Take that panlong they met in the Swamp! That thing had incredible speed and immense durability—and its acid could melt diamond. Those were all Bloodline powers. It had taken Dorian’s all-out effort, plus a broken hand, just to bloody the thing’s nose. That thing was likely Third Form, i.e. over 729.0 Bloodline quantity, and thus over 729 years old.

If it had been Fourth Form Dorian would not be alive right now.

With just one of Kinzo’s elixirs Dorian could skip directly to Third Form. And though this list didn’t specify just how many there were, it was common for elixirs of this sort to be sold in batches of six or twelve.

With six of Kinzo’s elixirs Dorian would be Number One under Empyrean!

Hells—maybe he could even give Gerard here, a top ranker Empyrean, a good fight.

Most of the other stuff didn’t suit his Dao, or his Bloodline, or his build. There was a Tail Technique. A few fascinating Fire/Darkness manuals that might be worth picking up, stuff to drastically boost his Yama’s Chains and his Fist Techniques….

All secondary, all bonus. He knew what he wanted most of all.

“Might we also heist that one, sir, if poses no great inconvenience?”

Gerard pointed at a name sat in the middle of the list—‘Two-Petal Lily.’

“I’ve never heard of it. What’s it do?”

“It has a few rare uses in powerful elixirs…but my interest is personal, sir. The Two-Petal Lily is among the Pali Realm’s most endangered species,” said Gerard mildly. “I should like to preserve it in my garden, please.”

“…So long as it doesn’t mess with the rest of our plans, you do whatever you like.”

“My thanks.” He bowed.

“Done?” said Sun, hopping up.

“Just about.”

“Awesome. Now for the fun part—how I plan on getting us in!”

***

They all crouched around Sun’s map. A giant bubble looped around the floor, the infamous wards of Ur.

“There’s only one way through the wards,” said Sun. “Can’t break ‘em from the outside. Can’t tunnel under! They’re curved above and below the Palace. Seems like the only way in is in.”

To Gerard—“Can you get us entry tickets?”

He pursed his lips. “It will be… very difficult. Tickets are linked to their owners’ identities, and resale is strictly forbidden. This is a very high powered auction. Even if I could—ticketholders will be thoroughly frisked and inspected at the gates, much like those entering the front gates of Ur.”

“Thought so.” Sun munched thoughtfully on a carrot. “Okay. So that was the low-hanging fruit try…here’s my actual plan!”

And she pulled out a scroll twice the size of the map, and unrolled it.

It looked like a pack of manic children had taken to the paper with charcoal. There wasn’t an inch of legible text on the paper. Lots of lines, though, and circles, and underlines, and scrawlings atop scrawlings.

“…Why are all your plans this convoluted?”

“All plans should be like this! Plans are like recipes. You have to get all the ingredients in just the right portions and apply just the right steps—one-by-one. You have to think of everything.”

“That’s not a plan,” snorted Dorian. “That’s a house of cards. One thing goes wrong and the rest all crumbles!”

“Well that’s why you have contingencies!”

“Contingencies in case each of your dozen-odd steps go wrong?”

“I mean you can’t get everything,” said Sun hastily. “If shit is really burning you bail! Then you try a new plan.”

“A little too rigid for my taste,” said Dorian. “A good plan should be simple. Lightweight. Flexible. A framework that can adapt at any moment.”

“Well I’m doing the planning for this one. You agreed! So shush!” She smacked him with her bread.

“…Fine.” Dorian spread his hands, amused. “Lay it on me.”

“Well—it’s not done done, mind you. It still needs a few days to marinate—there’s still something missing... anyways! Here’s what I’ve got now.”

She pointed to a cluster of words scribbled atop words, crossed out and looped over. It looked like a toddler’s drawing of a tornado. “Can’t impersonate a guard, official, or a janitor. It was my first idea. They’ve all got badges, and they all go through the same identity-checking wards as the guests do. Those things strip all cloaking magics and do straight soul-checking.” She tongued her teeth in annoyance. “Gross. So that’s off the table! As for distracting the guards and sneaking in—can’t do that either. We’d have to get past the wards regardless, which are like a force field covering the whole fuckin’ Palace! Even underground! And this—”

She pointed to another column of graphite destruction. “Was my try at figuring out how to disable the wards. Turns out they’re all powered from the inside, so we can’t even qi-bomb them. Nasty little engineering trick.”

“So what is it you propose we do?” said Gerard.

“There’s two options.” She waggled two fingers. “One—bribery.”

“We don’t have the money for that,” sighed Gerard. “And it would be… exceedingly difficult besides. You would not be the first, nor second, nor hundredth who’s thought to try, miss Wukong.”

“Yeah, figured. Two…I sneak in, tweak the wards from the inside to accept your auras, and you two waltz in through the front gates!”

“And how exactly do you plan on sneaking in?” said Dorian.

Sun paused. “Okay—stay with me—this is going to sound a little out there…”

“More out-there than clogging a lava chute at 10,000 li depth with lava whale carcasses?”

“Oh these aren’t even in the same Plane!”

“Oh, I certainly hope so.” Dorian actually smirked. “We’ll need out-there if we’re to pull this off, runt. They’ve seen everything in-here a dozen times over.”

Sun chewed on her lip, as though she couldn’t decide whether or not to go through with it. Then she shrugged. “Okay. So. The wards won’t let anyone without the right soul signature in. And everyone who tries to enter gets checked and double-checked down to their socks. But the wards don’t stop inanimate objects, do they?”

“You mean to cloak as an inanimate object, miss?” Gerard raised a finger. “I suspect you may be underestimating just how powerful the wards’ anti-cloaking properties are. They are beyond pervasive. Even if there were some way to store you in an Interspatial Ring, those wards could still probe the pocket dimension.”

“No, no!” Sun waved him off. “I mean to be an inanimate object!”

“What.” said Dorian.

“Dead! A corpse.”

“…”

“You’re going to need to give me a little more,” said Dorian dryly.

“I need to be alive moments before I meet the wards. Then I need to be dead as I pass through the wards. And alive again on the other side. How do we do this?” She raised a finger. “You get a jiangshi, or some other kind of vampire, to bite me! And then kill me. While dead, I’ll undergo vampirization! And then, on the other side, I’ll be revived—vampirically—as a walking dead. And then take a vampire bite antidote—which you will commission at the Alchemist’s Guild, by the way, Mister Gerard—reverse the effect, and boom! Wards bypassed!”

Gerard and Dorian both stared incredulously at her. She seemed very pleased with herself. But that also could’ve been because of the carrot sandwich she’d slapped together while talking, and was now happily wolfing down. Hard to say.

“That is the stupidest plan I have ever heard,” said Dorian.

At the same time, “That is simply inspired, Miss Wukong.” Gerard tapped two fingers to his palm in a little clap. “Well done.”

Now Dorian was staring incredulously at Gerard. “You can’t be serious.”

“Why not?” Gerard arched a brow back at him, like he was returning Dorian’s serve.

“…I mean…”

“The vampirization process is a neat loophole,” said Gerard. “It suspends the soul outside the body—as the body is dead—and it promptly snaps back into its new body once the reconstruction is complete. At a technical level I see no issue with it.”

"It was that," said Sun, "or kill me and get a necromancer to revive me on the other side. But that's just impractical."

That was where she drew the line?!

Dorian was silent for a moment, brows drawn tight, prodding at the idea in his mind.

Then he smirked. “Alright. Assuming we go through with this—”

“Yes!”

“Assuming,” he stressed. “That’s just getting through the front gate. How do you plan on doing the actual heist?”

“Yeah that is the tricky bit,” said Sun. “Floor plans is one thing, but they don’t exactly keep a list of all the locks and spells they’ve got on their treasures in some unlocked drawer. And I mean that literally, I tried really hard to find stuff! As far as I can tell only the top-level folk running the auction would know that.”

“So after we get in we’re blind.”

“Yup!” She paused, as though to let the thought sink in. “Err—I was kind of hoping you might take over from there...”