2 - Starting from stealing gold

The first step of the plan was to make money.

A heaping metric ton of mortal cash, gold, and more gold. Enough to make the king jealous.

...Ok maybe not that much. But enough that I wouldn't have to worry about money for a while.

I didn't know what purchases would be required on my journey, but I felt somrwhat disgruntled about the idea of living like a miser.

After all, I was now the esteemed owner of a mystical treasury and a magical treasure compass, like some kind of fairy tale.

I deserved to live pompously. Right?

Right.

The plan hedges on the unique characteristics of the golden key.

You see, when I so much as brushed the golden key up against something, even for a mere moment, and willed it to transfer the thing into the treasury, it would.

I found this out after a round of testing.

Testing it on living creatures as well, it worked just the same. Insects, squirrels, I even tried it on the guard dog's at the nearby nobleman's estate.

Speaking of, the Valender house. They were a viscount family, not in decline, nor doing awfully well. Middle of the pact, by all regards.

But, they wouldn't matter too much as I would be leaving my employment with them very soon. I couldn't exactly stay, could I?

Before leaving, I thought I ought to do them a service and, hehe, take the burden of precious gold off of their shoulders.

Who knows when an evil thief might come along and steal it from them? I'll just safeguard it for them for a while. In secret.

I was that thief, you say? Nonsense, don't belittle my dignified name with such slander.

I am an upright middle class citizen.

Walking up to the gate of the estate, the guards were already familiar with my face, so I was able to enter with no problems.

Nearing the door to the manor, I saw a maid walking by, seemingly idle and without work for the day.

It was someone I knew, a maid by the name of Vanessa.

As I called out to her and walked towards her, I couldn't help but evaluate her in my mind.

'Hmmm. A 7'

Mind you, I may have been born lowly and only lived a humble life so far, but I had already been in contact with the young misses and ladies of 2 noble houses. Moreover, in the barony, as a butler in training, I was often brought around to deliver messages to neighbouring estates.

As such, I had already gotten used to the beauty of nobility, and my standards were higher than the average peasant or common man of this era.

Of course, it should also be said that a 7 is by no means a bad score.

Vanessa seemed to notice my gaze but didn't seem to mind it, asking if I needed something.

"Could you tell the lord of the house that I wish to speak with him about an important matter?"

"An important matter?"

"Yes. I plan to be leaving my employment here soon."

"Leaving? Why might you do that? Is the pay not enough? You must know, Mr. Godrich, it isn't good for common people like us to be too greedy."

"Thank you, Vanessa. I will keep that in mind. However, I'm afraid I can't tell you my reasons as they are quite personal."

"Oh."

Vanessa looked a tad dissapoonted by the clear indicator of where our relationship stood, but it had to be this way.

Let alone that I wasn't interested in her from the start, even if I was, it was a different story now. I was going to become the richest and perhaps most powerful man in the empire, perhaps even the continent.

I couldn't lower myself to marry a small viscount's maid.

Well, perhaps I could actually, but I wouldn't!

I wouldn't.

Vanessa went off to inform the lord while I stayed behind in the front gardens.

It had to be said, it was a beautiful estate.

If one were to look at it from the second floor of the manor, the bushes would take on an exquisite pattern, the many different flowers serving to add color to the green and grey background. Grey being from the ground, of course. I probably don't need to point that out, but I will.

As I strolled around, taking in the view of this place where'd I'd been employed for the past few years, I found myself questioning if what I was about to do next was ok.

These thoughts lingered for a while before dissipating. Morality shouldn't be underestimated. The impulse to evil has been the undoing of many men. Nonetheless, knowing when taking the moral route is the suboptimal choice is an important trait, one I'd like to think I had nurtured quite well.

Hearing footsteps behind me, I turned around to spot the lord of the territory, viscount Terry Valender.

There was nothing of note about Terry, besides the moderate fat on his body and his sharp eyes.

He was an intelligent man, good to his subordinates, and was honestly a pleasure to serve under. I wouldn't have minded staying here as his son's tutor for the rest of my life, after his son was grown would come his grandson to tutor, and so on. Nonetheless, the strings of fate toy with people like an instrument.

I speak sentimentally, but keep in mind I am actively holding in my excitement to begin my new life, which is going to start by robbing this man.

I'll have to be sleek about it, since he isn't a complete moron, unfortunately. That also means I can't rob too much. I'll take just enough to get by for a few months. That much is nothing for someone like him.

"Vanessa told me you don't want to work here anymore?"

"It is not that I don't want to, lord Terry, but I have a certain pressing matter that's come up. I'm afraid I can't stay, nor do I plan to be coming back anytime soon."

"I see. Well, that is unfortunate. Would it be too much to ask what this pressing matter of yours is?"

"I'm afraid it would be, my lord."

"..."

Seeing that I was serious, Terry nodded and asked me to follow him. We were going to his study.

Along the way, I began to tap the golden key on the vases in the hall. Not all of them, just one every so often.

It must be said that although it was just a viscount, he was already quite rich. Of course, he has an entire territory under him, it wouldn't make sense to not even have a few measly vases for the halls.

Just these could fetch me a sum, although in order to not get caught I'd have to sell them through an anonymous vendor, but that's for a later date.

For now, we had arrived at his study.

Pushing open the double doors, he brought me inside.

It wasn't a large room, but it wasn't small either. The window oversaw the garden, and their were bookshelves on both the left and right walls. In the center, near the window, was a desk with a chair, and some common things on the desk like a quill and some documents.

"You've been my son's tutor for a while. Tell me if there's some help I can give you before you leave, I'll do what I can."

My heart ached, ah, I really was not a good person.

Oh well.

"Actually, there is one thing."

"Oh?"

"I need some money for my travels. I have some savings, but a little extra never hurts."

"Oh, is that all? No problem, not a problem at all. Follow me."

We walked outside of the study and towards the back of the house. The family vault was located here.

"Lord, why are we at the vault?"

"It's not like I'm carrying many pouches of gold on me at any time, in my own home."

That made sense. It worked out better for me too. I'll be honest, I didn't have a plan to get into the vault originally. I was just planning on taking a few paintings and vases and that would be it.

Don't look down on that, those vases and paintings cost a lot.

Opening the vault, it was riddled with precious armor, weapons, jewelry, some books, which confused me, and most of all, gold.

Tons and tons and tons and tons, fo stockpiles of gold.

Gold coins, gold ingots, chests full of em, all of it.

I guess normally, I could only steal a few coins in my pocket, and even that would be hard with him watching, so lord Terry wasn't very concerned with letting me in here with him.

Indeed, that would be normally.

Now, I still couldn't exactly steal it all, nor could I even really steal much while Terry was nearby. Still, several ingots or so shouldn't be an issue, right?

This might be a good time to mention a little hack with the golden key.

Well, call it a hack if you're rude, I call it a product of my genius, but same difference.

Essentially, I could throw the key.

You get where I'm going with this right?

I could still transfer objects into the treasury even with holding the key. This meant that I could leave the key somewhere, throw it, throw something else onto it, and so on, and all of those would be viable methods to get an item into the treasury.

Moreover, items seemed to become invulnerable for the first few seconds after entering the treasury. Even after throwing an item in with extreme force, it would come to sit on the treasury floor without any damage. It would also not damage any other item already in the treasury, nor, of course, the treasury itself.

In sunmary, this meant I could get away with a lot.

I had also found that noone but me could see the key. This just made things too easy, hehe.

I casually stretched, and during the downward motion of my arms after the stretch, I threw the key off to the side into a chest filled with gold ingots. I willed the key to transfer the ingots touching it into the treasury, and as the chest was far away and he wasn't paying attention to it in the first place, Terry didn't notice a thing.

Soon, I had 10 beautiful, shining golden ingots in the treasury storehouse. I willed the key back to me and it disappeared from where it was and reappeared in my hand.

Repeating this series of actions a few times, always slightly differently to ensure Terry didn't suspect anything, by the time me and Terry came out of the treasury, I had already looted maybe 10% of his entire treasury.

Don't let that percentage fool you, this is the treasury of a viscount. With 10% of its belongings, I might not be as rich as a baron, but I was already close.

Since most of what I took was the top of things from piles, pilea of ingots, piles of weapons, piles of jewelry, it just made the piles look a big caved in at the center. Without expressly remembering what it looked like before, it was impossible to tell anything had been stolen.

Success!

A huge success, more than I could've joped for.

I felt bad for the viscount and his family, but they'd be ok. Me on the other hand, hehe. I was going to be much more than ok.

After all, this was just the start.

After this, the tale of the great heavenly thief who stole and plundered from all the nobles across the land would resound out into the stars!

...As if. I was ok with just this much. If I needed more, there would be ways to get more. This would be enough to last a luxurious mortal lifetime, maybe 2, as long as I wasn't careless or overly indulgent.

Thanking Terry for his good grace, I walked with him to the front entrance. His son wasn't around at the moment, and I told him I really had to get going. To be honest, I was going to miss that little guy.

...

Well, no time to be getting sentimental now. It was one thing before I'd done it, but now, I've already robbed the bloody house!

Extremely successfully even!

So, sobering up and budding my last farewells to the lord and some of the servants, with a staunch gait and eyes looking straight ahead, I walked out confidently of the Valender estate, and made my way back towards my place of residence.

***

Looking at the silhouette slowly receding in the distance, one of the other maids said to Vanessa, "Hey, don't you think Mr. Godrich looked particularly regal as he walked away just now? Like more than usual? It's as though he went from being a noble's graceful servant to a noble himself. Isn't that kind of weird?"

"Perhaps so", Vanessa answered.

"Perhaps so."