The skill that let an assassin vanish had, due to its obvious power when used against players, only a very short duration. A running person reappeared only a couple paces away, well aware that they couldn’t hide their reappearance in such an open space.

Normally, a thief wouldn’t dare steal in such an open area with a good overview, but the temptation must have been too large.

Bloody didn’t wait for any of his friends to say something. He was already running, cursing non-stop, when Dead Rabbit snapped out of it and hurried after him to catch up.

“We have to go after them”, Little Droplet called out to Ice, patting him on the back once before following.

Both Bloody and Dead Rabbit had good agility stats. Obviously there was no catching up to them for the two mages, but they tried their best not to let them out of their sight. The easiest sign of where they were going was Bloody’s loud and increasingly angry cursing, next to the visible path they were cutting into the larger growing crowd.

The moment the NPC guards figured out that the one affected was a Foreigner, they didn’t get involved. While they interfered with fights, it was rare for them to help out with a thief unless one of the involved parties was a citizen.

“Huh?” In passing, Blackstone saw Bloody rush past. Ice stopped next to her, catching his breath and leaning on his knees while Little Droplet continued running. “What happened?”

“My… staff…” Ice wheezed and pulled a face.

Further up ahead, the thief was attempting to get rid of his followers by using his skills. Darting ahead or to the side, lowering his presence, causing a mess by pushing over people.

Bloody jumped over a fallen NPC that shrieked nervously, completely focused on the dark-clothed figure in front of him.

Whether it was pure fury or just the difference of a ranked player compared to a common thief, Bloody managed to catch up bit by bit. What the thief lost in speed whenever he had to decide on how to move, Bloody didn’t. He jumped up onto the roof of the stalls, running over them and ignoring the shocked screams of the owners.

When he jumped down, right in front of the thief, the player spit out a curse in shock. The thief tried to break, but ultimately ended running right into the beastman, who grabbed his collar, kicked the other’s legs away and threw him onto the floor face down.

“How long did you do parcour again?” Dead Rabbit wheezed, coming in only seconds later.

“A year”, Bloody snarled as he dragged the player to the side.

Stealing was easy when players left their things unwatched, but Haven also wanted to give the players a chance to get their things back. After all, if another player just logged out or refused to give the item out of their inventory, it would be impossible to get it back.

To deal with this issue, Haven had a simple system.

In the background, the owner of the system was divided into owner and possessor. Ownership was kept track of by the AI; sales, trading, renting and similar actions would update the current possessor and owner. Unless there was an official intent of the item being permanently given over, the ownership would not change in the background.

When stolen, the ownership of the item would stay with the original owner for 48 hours of the possessor’s ingame time. In this time, the item would have a sort of protective aura, making the thief unable to give it away or hide it somewhere. That meant, they had to keep it on their body or inventory.

Friends and party members of the owner could take the item back by force if it was out, or in the case of it being in the cash inventory, demand a PvP duel with the item on line.

Thieves also couldn’t log off while being chased and 10 minutes afterwards. if they did, they’d automatically drop the item!

Well.

Thieves had enough advantages. There had to be some way for a player to get their item back.

Besides, Haven didn’t really like thieves very much. That was why it wasn’t an official job, either. They were simply assassins that decided to turn against other players.

Bloody lifted the dazed player by the collar and pressed him against the wall. Teeth bared like a wolf, he looked just about ready to rip out the player’s throat. With a dark, snarling voice, he closed in on the thief. “Are you going to give it back? Or do you want me to beat you up until you’re willing?”

The thief looked into the furiously blazing eyes and smirked. He spit forwards.

Dead Rabbit sucked in a breath, then took a large step backwards.

What Ice saw when he finally reached the corner with Blackstone and Spiderlily in tow, were Little Droplet and Dead Rabbit standing at the edge of a rather reddish circle.

In the middle, the thief was screaming for mercy as he was beaten into mush. The staff was lying on the side.

Ice sighed softly to himself. “Bloody.”

The beastman’s ears turned to the voice. Lips pressed together, he stopped his work to turn towards Ice.

The mage could see how the emotions in Bloody’s eyes had switched from anger to something like awkward guilt. He let the thief fall, wiped a hand on his pants and picked up the staff. Trudging over, he held it out to Ice with a lowered head.

“I got it back”, he mumbled, ears pressed down and tail hanging low. Hopefully Ice wouldn't think of him as violent because of this episode. It was just, it was hard for him not to get angry when someone took something belonging to Ice. He didn't like it.

Ice took it back. A small wave of relief went through him at having it back - although he wasn’t too attached to his items, he still didn’t want to lose them like this. With a quiet voice, he gave his friend a small smile. “Thank you.”

The elven mage didn’t like conflict with players or NPCs, which Bloody was well aware of, but he had still run after the thief and beaten him up.

It couldn’t be helped. He couldn’t stand the thought of someone taking away Ice’s belongings.