"I am alone, I just want the tiara. If you give it to me, everything will be fine."
Luke, who at that time wasn't capable of listening to people's heartbeats yet, didn't dare to believe in that man with the macabre smile.
"Come on, come on. Don't back down, hehe. I don't want to hurt you, you know that. I just want the tiara."
"What's so special about this thing?" Luke asked, suspicious.
"Besides the beauty?"
"Yes, besides the beauty."
"You must already know... It's not a normal tiara."
"What does that mean?"
"It was found in a Dungeon, kid. But do you know about the particularities of Oukiwa Dungeons? No, no. You must not know. The Dungeons of Oukiwa are predominantly mines."
"And...? How is that related to the tiara?"
"Mine Category Dungeons have no relics, and a curious fact about that tiara... it was found on a Secret Floor in the Sheltered Halv?y Dungeon, which means it may be a cursed relic."
Luke felt that man was telling the truth, but his instincts still declined to believe in what this Adventurer said.
"Why was it in a merchant's warehouse then?"
"Because he is a dumb seller, who bought it at an auction and doesn't know its real price and usefulness."
"You are willing to trade it for how much?" Luke opened his belt pouch and took out the tiara, which had a faint glow in the shadows.
"Trade it? HAHAHAHA You still don't understand what's going on? I'm here buying time and you've fallen like a duckling. I can't blame you, you're just a kid."
At this moment, Luke jumped back and grabbed the dagger hidden in his boot.
Seeing this quick reaction and the angry look in the half-wolf's eyes, the man in armor could only applaud him.
Clap! Clap!
"You are a very interesting boy. Who knows, maybe I'll take you and the tiara, how about that? Hahaha Just kidding! You're just a disgusting half-beast. If you eat a Monster Core, you'll probably die."
Luke ignored the homey's taunts because he wasn't afraid of him. If Luke was fast enough, he could just run away from the alley where his friends were, and everything would be fine.
The man couldn't be much faster than him in that armor; that's what Luke judged. When he was ready to do just that, he heard:
"Huf... why do you have to be annoying? You can bring her." The man in armor gave the order to someone behind him.
Then, Luke saw two shadows coming out of the same alley where the man come from. One of these shadows was large, and the other was smaller.
When the sound hit them, Luke saw that the smaller shadow was his pink-haired friend, Sarah. But he did not recognize the man who had a knife at her neck.
The Sympathetic One, which was Sarah's nickname as she was friendly and sweet to everyone, was teary-eyed and had a scary look. Since Sarah was alone, at that moment, Luke already deduced that the worst had happened to Shiro, The Protector.
" Bastard..."Luke, who was usually always calm, said to the man in armor. "I'll give you the tiara."
"Hahaha! I said you had no negotiation." The man spoke proudly and stepped forward to take the tiara from the half-wolf's hands.
"AAAAAAH!" Luke saw in slow motion Shiro appear from the alley on his right and crash into the man who was holding Sarah a hostage. BOOMP!
" WHAT?!" The man in armor turned back, surprised.
Luke ducked down quickly, picked up the knife he had dropped on the ground, and threw it at the orange-clad man's face.
To react to the half-wolf's attack, John summoned a Sword-type Weapon of Panspermia and managed to block the dagger.
Tiim! The clang of the blade-to-blade encounter showed the guy that those kids were not messing around.
"AAAAAAH" Shiro shouted as he punched the other man incessantly. However, his punches soon stopped having any effect.
"Pick her up and run!" The half-wolf shouted to Shiro.
The teenager didn't hesitate to follow Luke's commands, so he pulled Sarah by the arm and placed her on his back.
Luke threw his old cloak at the man in armor, which was instantly cut off to buy a little more time for both of them.
"Kid, give me the tiara."
Convinced the thing was too worthwhile to hand over for no particular reason, Luke began to run. To him, that thing could be worth tens of gold coins, no... hundreds! That tiara could secure Sarah's dream of owning a flower shop and Shiro's dream of having a stall in the City Market.
For these and other reasons, Luke ran among the alleys of the Lower City; he ran like crazy.
Nevertheless, with his keen ears, he knew that there were now not just two men chasing him, but almost ten.
'They were just playing before.' Luke thought, enraged.
When the footsteps moved away, Luke knew something was wrong. He groped his pocket, and there was nothing. Somehow, he had let the tiara fall out of his open pocket while running frantically.
Following his own footprints, he found a spot where they met up with the footprints of two other people and headed down a smaller alley.
"Ungh—Ahn..." The half-wolf heard a low moan coming from that alley.
When Luke looked down the alley and saw Shiro crying, with a knife stuck in his shoulder and another in his thigh, Luke's eyes widened, and he ran to his friend.
As soon as the big boy saw Luke, he took his hand out of his mouth and stopped himself from blocking out the sound of his crying. "I couldn't do it, Luke. I couldn't protect her. Ugh..."
"What happened to you? Where is Sarah?"
"I couldn't... she saw a blue glow in an alley, and she knew it was precious immediately. It was a beautiful tiara. Relieved, that we had managed to lose the men and also that we had found something, she smiled at me... But the next second, I saw she fell apart in midair."
"Fall apart? What do you mean? What are you talking about?" Luke knew she had picked up the tiara he had dropped.
"It turned to a shiny dust, and the wind blew it away, ca-"
At this moment, Luke hugged him while he blamed himself internally. "We'll find her; she's not dead. That tiara, she's special..." Luke's ears twitched when he heard the footsteps of the pursuers again. "Come on, they're in the area. We have to go to the alley."
"No, go first. I'm too weak to walk. Go get Matt's help to carry me."
Knowing that he wasn't strong enough to carry the huge Shiro, Luke obeyed and sneaked silently to the combined alley. However, when Matthew, Meredith, and Luke returned to where Shiro stood, there was only an immense pool of blood.
That day changed the lives of the three gang members, and after many years of searching, the trio was sure that both Shiro and Sarah were already dead, there was no clue left for them to follow.
***
'That smell... it would be impossible not to remember.'
For that reason, it was certainly a wonder for Luke to finally have found Shiro at the Strogueher Mansion in Vasconcelos after he had even given up hope that he was alive.
Even though it had been ten years, Luke could recognize the salty smell of one of his best friends even if he didn't have a nose.
"Shiro!?" Luke questioned incredulously as he looked at the huge man in armor in front of him.
"Luke?" The Protector, which was Shiro's nickname, also seemed to recognize The Dark One, as a huge smile appeared on his face, and his eyes sparkled with happiness.
______
Discord for illustrations of the characters:
https://discord.gg/qz2vDAn7Kb
The source of this c𝐨ntent is freewe(b)nov𝒆l