Chapter 670: No Convenient Exit

Nari marched the thief across the Sixth’s freight court with his bound wrists tucked firmly under her elbow.

"The buyer expects one person, you know," he muttered, eyeing the crates stacked along the loading dock.

"He gets one person," Nari purred, ears flicking toward the street gate, "plus the very pretty girl who arrested you."

"Your sister arrested me."

"My sister chased you, and chasing is just fancy jogging, so the arrest is officially mine."

A crackle came through the seal in her ear, and Rumi’s voice followed it with zero patience.

"I heard that, the public exit’s clear, so try not to die while stealing my credit."

’Two days of cake and speeches, and finally somebody wants to buy stolen paper.’

The court was a square of cracked flagstones, ringed by loading docks, crane posts and wagons parked for the night. Earlier that morning she walked every corner, chalking four marks where her pins would need sound, unbroken stone beneath them.

The buyer stepped out from behind a grain wagon with a guard shadowing his left shoulder.

He wore a clerk’s coat over a fighter’s build, and the guard carried a short axe beside a battered buckler.

Behind them, two faint shimmers hung in the dusk, one by the crane post and one beneath the wagon.

’Two route mouths in plain sight, so the third is the one he actually trusts.’

"You’re not the courier," the buyer said, eyes dropping to the chalk beside her heel, "and that mark isn’t a child’s game."

"Nope, I’m the one arresting you, so let’s keep this nice and—"

He lunged before she could finish, coat flaring as his hooked knife came straight for her throat.

Nari shoved the thief down beside a wagon wheel and slipped the cut with an inch to spare.

"Stay there, or I’m sitting on you next!"

The axe came in low from her left while the hooked knife hunted her right, pinning her neatly between them. She ducked the axe, kicked off the guard’s buckler, and spun out across the flagstones toward her second chalk mark.

"Rude, I wasn’t done talking!" she yelped, both daggers out now, tail lashing behind her.

The buyer swapped the knife to his other grip, "You were done the moment you chalked my court."

He came again, faster than any clerk deserved to move, and the knife’s hooked tip snagged her left sleeve hard. Nari tore free with a rip of cloth, slashed his knuckles, and gave ground toward the third mark on purpose.

The guard swung wide, and the axe bit splinters from a crate where her head just was.

"Missed," she sang, dancing back another step.

"Pin her!" the buyer barked.

’Three marks, two men, and no third mouth yet, come on, show me.’

She hit the fourth corner as the guard charged her front, and the buyer finally stopped chasing her in circles. He slapped his palm against the crane post’s base, and a hidden third shimmer tore open right behind her shoulders.

His hand reached straight through it, fingers clawing for her collar from a place she should not have to watch.

"There you are," Nari breathed, planting both feet on sound stone.

"No Exit!"

Four pins flashed up at her chalk marks, and every route mouth in the court went dark at once.

The shimmer behind her snapped shut, spitting the buyer out onto the flagstones beside his own guard.

"Sixty seconds," she announced, rolling her shoulders while the boundary hummed in her teeth, "and that includes me, so nobody’s leaving."

The buyer stared at the dead crane post, then at her, and his face went very ugly.

"You sealed yourself in with us," he sneered, "are you stupid?"

"Little bit," she admitted, "but I’m also the one who wanted this."

’Rumi never stays put for anyone, so this kind of fight was always going to be mine.’

They rushed her together, axe high and knife low, and the narrow space left nowhere to retreat.

Nari stepped into the buyer instead of away from him, letting his reaching hand close tight around her left wrist. She twisted with his pull and spun them both, dragging his outstretched arm straight across the guard’s already falling axe.

The haft cracked down on the buyer’s forearm, and his scream filled the whole court.

"Forty seconds left," Nari huffed, shaking out her wrist.

She hooked the guard’s buckler aside with one dagger and smashed the other dagger’s pommel straight into his axe hand. The axe clattered across the flagstones, and her knee drove into his gut while his helmet met the wagon’s side.

The guard slid down the wheel and stayed down, breath wheezing through his teeth.

The buyer clawed for his dropped knife with his good hand, and Nari kicked it under the grain wagon.

She pressed her dagger against his collar until he went still, "Twenty seconds, so do you want to spend them bleeding?"

"No."

She bound his wrists with his own coat belt while the count ran down, and the pins faded on time.

Nari hauled the thief up by his bound wrists, "See, I told you he’d only get one person."

Rumi landed in the court a heartbeat later, hair wild, looking from one moaning man to the other.

"Seriously, you trapped yourself in here with both of them?"

"You’re mad you didn’t think of it," Nari teased, pulling a folded sheet from the buyer’s coat.

The paper named a stripped road station on the old northern route, with payment promised from a settlement past it. Rumi read the notes over her shoulder and frowned at a place no Crown map from this year bothered marking.

"Somebody lives out there," Rumi muttered, tail going stiff, "and somebody’s paying for that folio."

---

Hajin lounged on the manor’s kitchen bench with the broadcast running, a cup of tea going cold beside his elbow.

"Hold on, you sealed yourself in?" he yelled, nearly spilling the cup. "With an axe guy and a knife guy?"

"For sixty seconds," Nari said, perching on the table’s corner, "and I finished with twenty spare."

"That’s insane, that’s completely insane, and holy shit, I love it!"

Loccy poked her head in from the pantry, "Did the bad guy at least have snacks on him?"

"Just a knife and terrible manners," Nari sniffed.

"She stole my arrest first," Rumi grumbled from the doorway.

Nari stuck her tongue out at her sister, "I improved your arrest."

[ Nari | EXP gained: 2,000,000 | 6,000,000 / 37,500,000 toward Wing Five ]

[ HearthKeeper: She locked herself in with both of them and still came out first. ]

[ IronVanguard: Sixty seconds, no escape for anyone, and she called the count aloud. ]

[ ashley(mod): Reminder, chat, Nari’s fight reached us only through her spoken report. ]

Laughing, he opened the System shop and scrolled until he found the scheduled practical resupply for the week.

He tapped the resupply listing with a lazy grin, "Dressings, food and wash kits, since somebody keeps scraping her wrists on bad guys."

[ Earth package | Twenty staple-food packs | 500 credits ]

[ Earth package | Ten dressings | 200 credits ]

[ Earth package | Ten wash and comfort kits | 300 credits ]

[ Purchase confirmed | 1,000 credits deducted from spendable funds ]

[ Wallet total | 5,249,985 → 5,248,985 credits ]

[ Relief reserve | 5,000,000 unchanged | Spendable | 248,985 credits ]

Sealed boxes thumped onto the kitchen floor, and Vella appeared to claim the dressings before anyone else touched them.

"Wrist first," she ordered, tapping her spoon against Nari’s table edge until the sleeve came up.

"It’s a scrape," Nari whined, holding the arm out anyway.

"And scrapes turn into fevers when idiots skip the wash," Vella said, already unrolling the first dressing.

Hajin passed food packs to Loccy and wash kits to Rumi, then found both twins suddenly draped across his arms. Nari curled against his left side while Rumi took his right, and the pair purred until his ears turned warm.

"Okay, okay, you’re both amazing, so stop squeezing me before my arms fall asleep."

Nari smirked against his sleeve and slid the buyer’s folded instructions across the table toward him.

’A living road town past the newest Crown map, and somebody there wants our folio badly.’