Sun Jiao turned around from his 'comrades' in disgust.

There were other problems when it came to trying to steal from a Liberomancer, but he didn't feel like explaining himself to people who couldn't understand them.

Most Liberomancers, though wealthy, did not carry that wealth with them in actual coinage. Most of their money was tied up in investments: either in assets, or in grimoires which they had read and memorized, which obviously they could not steal. Some of them even used paper money in the form of treasury receipts, which they would cash out at another Liberomancer's Guild - so taking that was useless too.

As for whether or not they had actual grimoires on hand, even if they could steal one, despite the fact that grimoires were valuable - where would they sell it? Questions would naturally arise as to where Sun Jiao had gotten something say, like a Rank Two grimoire, and so no Liberomancer would buy from them - that or, they would have them arrested whenever they tried to sell it and return it to its rightful owner. Or just hand it over to the Liberomancer's Guild as a stolen grimoire and be richly rewarded for such. It was a point of professional courtesy that Liberomancers did not support such black markets for grimoires, which made them extremely difficult to run.

Not to mention crimes against Liberomancers, even if they were just minor crimes, were taken much more seriously. Especially so for Rank Two or Rank Three Liberomancers. Sun Jiao knew of stories of peasants who had gone 'missing' who turned out to have been murdered, but since they were isolated incidents involving random villagers only a cursory investigation would be launched before the authorities would just throw their hands up in the air and say 'case closed.' But if a Rank Three Liberomancer so much as lost a Denarius, they would turn the entire capital upside-down just to find it.

The risk to reward ratio was completely skewed - and not in their favor.

Yet, even as Sun Jiao thought this, his gaze went over their current place of residence - it could at most generously be called a shack, which was one of the few remaining standing buildings in what had formerly constituted a village. Now, the village was little more than a heap of abandoned wooden rubble. It seemed that what remained of the former residents had abandoned any intent to rebuild and had simply merged with another village further away.

Not all villages had been as lucky as that of Granny Qi's - many of them had not been alerted of the dryad tide in time, or were not fast enough in getting to safety. Some of those villages had only a handful of survivors, most of whom had chosen to join other villages in the rebuilding effort or taken up jobs within the cities they had fled to.

Either that, or become members of groups of pickpockets and thieves like theirs.

The shack had been filled with rats at one point - but most of them had been hunted down and eaten by his gang when times had been lean. There had been a time when they might have been able to fish up something in the nearby streams but the dryads had depleted the fish during their invasion.

His stomach growled again - and he got up and walked out the door of their hideout.

"Alright, let's scout out where you saw this man," he said. If it was a Rank Two Liberomancer, it could still be worth the risk to possibly nab anything that lay unguarded and run away as fast as they could.

Who knew when they would find another mark? They could very well end up getting no traffic for the next few days, and they would all be ravenous then.

Yes, it was risky, but an empty stomach will drive a man to do many desperate things. Even someone like Sun Jiao who would've otherwise known better.

In the ballads he had heard when he was younger, bandits lived in caves surrounded by gold and wealth, feasting on their ill-gotten gains while they enjoyed the company of a dancer or two while villages quaked at the mere whisper of their names.

What were they in reality? A bunch of losers sleeping on the floor of an abandoned shack, who went more nights than not on empty stomachs barely placated with water, and with little more to their names than the tattered clothes on their backs.

Sun Jiao had a skill that was quite useful in this new occupation of his - [Night Vision]. Naturally, while walking in the middle of the night, a normal person would need a light source - but this had the twin drawbacks of alerting others to your presence, and also, it would mean that whoever was carrying it would be blind to anything outside the radius of the light.

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

There was no issue with [Night Vision] however, and it was to this skill that his gang owed the majority of their success too. They could sneak up on people without them even realizing they were being watched, and grab anything that seemed valuable, before slinking back into the woods, with most people none the wiser.

"Alright, is this where he was?" Sun Jiao asked. Unfortunately, he was the only one with this skill, so his comrade had to squint and wasn't sure where they were. There was also the annoying fact of the man tripping over what seemed like every other root on their way to this place. "[Create Flame]," he intoned. "Does this place look familiar?"

"Um, maybe…"

"What do you mean maybe?"

"Well, Boss, it's just kind of hard to tell when it's so dark out…"

"I should've known this was a dumb idea the moment it came out of your mouth…"

"Wait, Boss, I think that's it - over there!"

Sun Jiao followed the man towards a clearing.

Yes, there was a man there, sleeping in a hammock nestled between two trees.

Was there anything valuable though? He could see a small sack near the hammock, but that was it.

Again, this was the issue - would this man be carrying anything worth stealing that they could sell? He might have some coins on him, but they couldn't shake him down like they might've with one of their other victims.

At the very least, there should be some provisions to tide them over for a few days.

"Wait here," Sun Jiao said to his companion as he crept closer. He did not see any sign of a bear, and with this large of a clearing there was no place that such a creature could hide. So it must have been a summon…

Should he risk going closer and grabbing that bag?

He crouched down and began advancing slowly while keeping his guard up all the while. He managed to cover half the distance without incident when he suddenly felt something grab his leg.

Before he knew it, he was suspended by his ankle, ten feet off the ground.

Sun Jiao had a memory from his childhood - about when he had lost a toy of his under the flooring of a house. He had found a crevice from where he thought he could get it back, and as he put his hand down there, he had withdrawn it nearly instantly in pain as it felt like someone had taken a needle to it. A spider had made its nest there - and he had had a slight degree of arachnophobia ever since.

Suffice to say, he did not take being brought face-to-face with the Tyrant Arachnea, who was wrapping him up swiftly in multiple layers of silk with an efficiency that was nearly as monstrous as its form very well. It was a sight made all the worse by his [Night Vision], which ensured that he could see every grotesque corner of the creature even in the dim light.

"AIYEEEEEEH!" he screamed, no longer caring if he was caught. If he was caught, so be it - it was better than being devoured!

The sound of screaming woke me up, as well as a tug on my mind from the Tyrant Arachnea. I got out of my hammock, and nearly tripped while getting out of it because I was still wearing my helmet and it had slid over my eyes. [Unobstructed Sight] would not help me in that scenario as it couldn't see through physical objects.

When I readjusted my helmet and could see what was happening, I saw someone who had been caught up in the Tyrant Arachnea's web, and there was someone else in the distance who was running away as fast as they could.

This had been around the area where that lizardman I had met had said he had been robbed, so when I hadn't been able to find a nearby village I had decided to take some precautions before setting up camp here. I was wearing my leather jerkin and helmet even as I slept, and I had decided to set up the Tyrant Arachnea, even though it was a Rank Three summon, so that it could set up a defensive perimeter around where I was sleeping. It had also been able to make me a hammock and a heavy blanket nearly as tough as my leather jerkin.

I had been slightly hesitant while doing so because it meant that my only use of a Rank Three summon would be consumed for the next twelve hours after it was gone, but I ultimately decided to go for it given what I knew about the area.

And clearly this had been the right choice.

"AIYEEEH! GET AWAY FROM ME!" came a scream from the person who the Tyrant Arachnea was currently wrapping up in silk, a task that it had almost completed within a matter of seconds after which it dropped down and deposited the man at my feet.

I felt another tug on my consciousness - it was asking if it should follow the other man who had run away. I considered it - but ultimately decided against it.

Unlike when I was back in Granny Qi's village, I wasn't surrounded by the safety of the village walls and the other villagers, and that was when Liberomancers were at their strongest - when they had sturdy walls to hide behind after casting spells.

With the Tyrant Arachnea out, I couldn't summon another creature to take hits for me if I sent it far away and it turned out that there were other people waiting near the road or on the other side of the clearing to ambush me. And with the absence of a physical barrier in a clearing like this, I really needed a summon to take hits for me if something happened.

"Who are you?" I asked him. The man looked like he was from Chipker, though much of his face was marred by the tears and snot that coated it. The Tyrant Arachnea had wrapped him up tightly from the neck down, leaving just enough slack in the threads to let him breathe.

"I… I'm a Liberomancer too! Please don't kill me!" he yelled out.

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