Debuff Master

Chapter 522

“What did King Siegfried say just now...?”

“Marquis Keitel is the Perverted Thief...? What in the world...?”

Everyone was bewildered by Siegfried’s sudden accusation.

However, Siegfried did not waver despite the reactions and approached the marquis.

“You’re quite smart,” Siegfried said with a smirk.

Marquis Keitel looked completely bewildered as he asked, “P-Pardon me? Y-Your Majesty, what do you mean by–”

“Hey, come on,” Siegfried waved his hand and cut him off. Then, he sneered, “Why are you feigning ignorance like an amateur?”

“But I have no idea what Your Majesty is saying...”

“Really? You have no idea?”

Duke Randoll interjected, “Your Majesty, are you accusing Marquis Randoll of being the Phantom Thief?”

“As you can see, yes,” Siegfried replied nonchalantly.

“Hmm...” Duke Randoll looked at the marquis. Then, he looked back at Siegfried and asked, “If I may, how did Your Majesty come to that conclusion?”

“Who knows?”

“Pardon me...?”

“I did not come up with this, neither am I an artificial intelligence like AlphaGo[1] capable of thinking that far ahead.”

“Alpha go...? Who might that be, Your Majesty?”

“Ah, there’s someone like that. A very smart person.”

“Eh?”

“Anyway, he is the Phantom Thief,” Siegfried said with a shrug. Then, he pointed at the marquis and added, “So you better arrest him first before he pulls anything funny.”

Siegfried\'s words had just echoed throughout the hall when...

Vwhoosh!

Siegfried moved at near supersonic speed past Duke Randoll and appeared in front of Marquis Keitel. He grabbed the marquis’ clothes and used a technique he learned from the Grappling Master, Leonid, to slam the marquis to the ground.

Bam!

Marquis Keitel was slammed so hard to the ground that the tile beneath him cracked open.

“Y-Your Majesty! Was that the Grappling Master, Leonid’s technique just now?!” Duke Randoll exclaimed out of shock.

Funnily enough, Duke Randoll seemed to be more shocked by the fact that Siegfried used the Grappling Master’s technique rather than the fact that he just slammed the marquis to the ground. Well, the duke’s shock was understandable, as Siegfried was freely using the techniques of three of the Five Star Heavens.

Duke Randoll shook his head and exclaimed, “N-No, I mean, is Marquis Keitel really the Phantom Thief—?!”

The duke stopped mid-sentence and staggered. “Ugh...!”

Thud, thud, thud...

He wasn\'t alone, and the knights guarding the Hall of Immortality collapsed one by one like dominos.

“W-What happened... Ugh...! K-King Siegfried... I cannot keep my eyes open—” Duke Randoll shook his head and tried to stay awake, but it was to no avail.

Thud!

He reached his limits. He endured the drowsiness longer than the knights did, but he succumbed to it in the end and collapsed.

“Oh? Even Duke Randoll?” Siegfried muttered out of shock at the sight.

Who would have imagined a Master could be sent to sleep just like that?

“Wow, you’re quite good,” Siegfried said in awe.

Then, Marquis Keitel slowly got up even though he was slammed so hard to the ground that the tile beneath him ended up breaking.

“What? You’re fine?” Siegfried asked with his eyes wide open this time.

“How did you know?” Marquis Keitel—no, the Phantom Thief asked. Then, he grimaced and grumbled, “You’re smarter than you look. I thought you were a buffoon when you fell asleep as soon as the briefing started.”

“What? Who are you calling a buffoon, Perverted Thief!” Siegfried retorted while clenching his +13 Horse Fly.

“What? Perverted Thief?”

“Yeah, that’s you! Pervert!” Siegfried exclaimed. Then, he smirked and added, “Otherwise, why would you live such a difficult life? You should sneak around like a rat if you’re a thief, but why would you go around warning people that you’re going to rob them? If you’re not a pervert, then what are you?”

“You’re picking a fight with me right now, aren’t you?”

“Can you remind me who started it?”

“Shut it and tell me how you found out. How did you see through me? Are you really smarter than you look?” the Phantom Thief growled.

“Are you curious?”

“Very curious.”

“Oh well, I guess there’s no harm in telling you,” Siegfried said with a shrug. Then, he proceeded to explain how he came to the conclusion that Marquis Keitel was the Phantom Thief.

***

His suspicion started with the first explosion east of the Palace of Beauty. He deduced that the Phantom Thief had already infiltrated the palace after realizing that the bomb had been set beforehand.

There was a high chance most people would assume the Phantom Thief had somehow snuck past the tight security and detonated the bomb, but Siegfried already knew through the Night Stalkers that there was nobody in the theater when the explosion occurred.

“Are you telling me you figured it out just from that single explosion?” the Phantom Thief asked with a hint of disbelief in his voice.

“There’s more,” Siegfried replied, shaking his head.“The duke said you don’t kill people, right? What should you do if you don’t want anyone to get caught up in the blast? You\'d pick the places the guards wouldn\'t even wander into, control the amount of explosives required, and memorize the patrol path and timings.

"A no-casualties attack would be impossible without such information. A slight mistake in the timing could end up with the soldiers getting caught up in the explosion.”

“That’s quite clever of you,” the Phantom Thief was in awe of Siegfried’s detective skills.

“So I asked myself: how much influence does this person have to be to know the patrol timing, path, and location of each soldier? Also, this pervert has to have free access to all areas to freely install the bomb in four different locations around the Palace of Beauty,” Siegfried said with a finger on his forehead.

“Very influential,” the Phantom Thief replied with a smirk.

“If you narrow it down, then there aren’t that many people, right?”

“But I don’t think that’s enough to guarantee that it’s me. Security has always been tight around here, and anyone could have infiltrated as one of the security officers.”

“There were two more crucial hints.”

“What are those?”

“The first was that the explosion was too obvious. Well, that was really the biggest giveaway.”

“How so?”

“It was so obvious I started wondering why you would do something so silly. Then, I replayed it in my head and thought otherwise.”

“What do you mean?”

“The explosion. That wasn’t a smokescreen,” Siegfried said. Then, he smirked and said, “That was your escape plan, right?”

“...!”

“It seemed like a diversion tactic, but you were opening up your escape routes to be used later, right? You planted the bombs in all four directions so you could choose which one to use later on, am I correct? Well, that made me think that the culprit was already deep inside the Palace of Beauty—right here in the hall where the Portrait of Evil Ghost is located. Why? Because all other high-ranking security officers are at the scene of the explosion.”

“Amazing...” the Phantom Thief could not help but acknowledge Siegfried’s detective work. To think he would deduce everything and see through the plan in such a short period of time...

“You looked as lazy as a donkey, but your insight is truly scary.”

“What? Lazy as a what?!”

The Phantom Thief flatly ignored Siegfried’s outburst and asked, “But what is the other hint? How did you know I’m not Marquis Keitel?”

“Ah, that one? That’s the easy part. Can you subdue Duke Randoll and disguise as him? Come on, the answer’s too obvious.”

“Correct...”

“But what about the other knights, you ask? All of them arrived from the capital today. Can they come today, plant the bombs, get back to their post, and act as if nothing had happened? Nah, that’s impossible.

"Besides, the empire isn’t stupid. They would’ve chosen the knights by random at the last minute to prevent something like this from happening.”

“You’re correct again.”

“But the most important thing...”

“And what is that?”

“This,” Siegfried took out a monocle from his pocket. Then, he showed it to the thief and said, “This thing is an artifact called Inzaghi’s Clairvoyance. It allows me to see the entire area and everyone in it.”

“...!”

“I was certain Marquis Keitel was the culprit, but I didn’t have any concrete evidence. So, I decided to use this just in case, and voila! Marquis Keitel was not in the Palace of Beauty, but there you were, the Phantom Thief! You\'re inside the Hall of Immortality!”

Siegfried’s deduction was very good, but he did not have any concrete evidence to back up his claim. Thus, he decided to use Inzaghi’s Clairvoyance to test out his theory.

“Things could’ve been easier if I had used this earlier, but I wasn’t sure whether the Phantom Thief was already here or not, so I decided not to waste this and just watch from the sidelines. Then, I decided to use it once the parts of the puzzle started falling into place.”

“This is the first time.”

“Hmm?”

“This is the first time someone has caught me. I have carried out thousands of heists, but not a single person managed to find me. You are the first.”

“Hehe... Geez... If you say it like that, then–”

“Don’t act all embarrassed! It’s disgusting!”

The Phantom Thief ended up screaming after Siegfried started blushing and scratching the back of his head.

“Huh? But you were praising me just now, weren’t you?”

“Yes, I was, but seeing a lazy donkey like you act all embarrassed... It’s disgusting.”

“Y-Your personality is more rotten than I thought...”

“Anyway, I had fun listening to you. Ah, don’t worry about them. I used a strong sedative, but their lives are not in danger—well, they will struggle with migraines for a few days, but that’s about it.”

“Are you saying goodbye?” Siegfried tilted his head and asked. Then, he smirked and sneered, “Hey~ Are you going to throw a smoke bomb and escape? Come on, that’s too cliche.”

“Hmm?” the Phantom Thief raised a brow in response.

Siegfried smiled and said, “I can’t let you do that, right?”

The moment he said those words...

“Halt!”

“Phantom Thief! You are under arrest!”

“Don’t move!”

Hundreds of knights and soldiers completely surrounded the Hall of Immortality.

“I... got tricked...” the Phantom Thief muttered. He acknowledged that Siegfried outsmarted him. He thought he was the one trying to stall for time by asking about Siegfried’s deductions, but it turns out Siegfried was the one actually stalling.

“But this isn’t enough to catch me,” he said.

“Huh?”

“I have already stolen what I need—three days ago.”

“Eh?” Siegfried narrowed his eyes in disappointment. Then, he grumbled, “Tsk... I thought you were a thief, but you’re actually a con artist. You already stole it, yet you put on this whole show? Phantom my ass, you’re just an attention seeker. Yeah, why don’t you call yourself the Attention Seeking Thief?”

It was then...

Chwaaaak!

A wire shot out from the sleeve of the Phantom Thief toward the ceiling.

C-Crack...!

The wire broke through the ceiling and created a hole big enough for an adult to pass. It turned out that the ceiling had already been broken in advance and had been covered with a thin material as a disguise.

The wire pulled the Phantom Thief up, and he escaped through the hole.

“Oh? You’re trying to run?” Siegfried grumbled with a smirk while looking at the hole.

“Kyu! What are we going to do? We need to catch him before he escapes!” Hamchi exclaimed.

“Escape? Who’s gonna escape? I’m going to catch him anyway, so what’s the rush?” Siegfried said with a shrug.

“Kyu? How are you going to catch him? He already got away!”

“Relax, I put a tail on him. How can I lose him when I can see where he’s going?”

“Kyu?”

“I’ll actually be grateful if he escapes to his hideout. Hehe!” Siegfried said before jumping up to the ceiling and into the hole the Phantom Thief disappeared into.

***

One hour later, the Phantom Thief went to a village a short distance away from Artiur and snuck onto the roof of an inn in the village. He proceeded to take off his disguises, such as his clothes and wig. Then, he stripped his skin made out of special material and shed it like a snake, revealing the true identity of the Phantom Thief.

The moonlight shined down on the Phantom Thief, who was a beautiful woman wearing tights clinging to her body. Yes, the Phantom Thief was not a man but a woman.

“I almost got caught... Phew...!”

She climbed down the roof and entered through the window to get to the room she had rented out for a few days.

“Hold on... Would it be better if I got caught? Today\'s incident is going to damage the Phantom Thief’s reputation. Tsk...”

The Phantom Thief was infamous for sending out notices before carrying out "his" heist, and "he" would make a fool out of those trying to protect whatever treasure was going to be stolen.

But what would people think if they found out the treasure had already been stolen and the Phantom Thief was just acting as if "he" had stolen the treasure on that day?

Her reputation would suffer irreparable damage! The legend of the Phantom Thief would be smashed to pieces, and she would be treated as just another thief instead.

Perhaps it was better if she let herself be captured...

“No,” she shook her head. Then, she gnashed her teeth and growled, “I’d rather stop being the Phantom Thief than get caught by that lazy donkey–”

It was then...

“Hey, why do you keep calling me a donkey?”

The Phantom Thief felt her heart stop when she heard the voice from right beside her.

She turned to her side, and there he was—the Lazy Donkey was sitting on the chair with his legs crossed while looking straight at her.

1. AlphaGo is an AI developed by Google to play Go. More info here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AlphaGo ☜