It's Safe, Mr. Shida

“Close your eyes and count to one, everything won’t begin unless you do it. Ready? Ok, here we go.”

“Three.”

“Two.”

“One.”

8PM, Tokyo was wet again. At the lobby of the Nippon National Bank, the manager scrambled to arrange his staff on the front door. Mr. Shida was coming. About ten minutes later, a black limousine halted to a stop just before the front steps. The glowing orange barrier surrounding it shrunk, then a door popped open. Out came a dwarf, face riddled with scars and hands calloused. At the front, a tall orc unfolded himself from his seat and surveyed the staff. His eyes glowed an eerie red, scary enough to make the entire staff tremble. Once he was satisfied, his eyes returned to normal, and he gave a nod to the dwarf. The dwarf in turn grabs the handle and opens the door. Inside the dark limousine was a skinny elf dressed in a white suit. He snapped his finger, and a translucent disc appeared just above the door. It repelled the rain and left a dry spot underneath it.

“Mr. Shida,” an employee said in the pouring rain, “to what do we owe the pleasure of your visit today?”

The elf did not acknowledge him. With his bodyguards behind him, he continued walking to the front door. The panicked employee went after him. Passing the main doors, the guards and the entire clerk staff all stood and bowed to him. Again, the elf paid them no attention. His eyes were set on one thing: the vault.

“Where’s the manager?” he said flatly.

“I would be representing the manager tonight, Mr. Shida, my name is-”

“Where’s the manager?,” the elf repeated, not moving his eyes from the vault.

The employee's heart was racing. He cleared his throat and straightened himself.

“Sir," he said making sure that his voice was clear, "we regret to inform you that Mr. Hiroma has already left the building. We are under strict instructions to not contact- “

“Call him,” the elf said.

“Sir,” the scared employee approached the elf, “the manager is celebrating his 40th anniversary, if you would like I can notify him first thing in the morning.”

There was no response nor any reaction from anyone, there was only the sound of the rain outside. The elf glanced to the side, signalling the orc behind him. He approaches the employee, his presence completely covering the much smaller man. With one swing of his fist to his stomach, the man crumpled with pain on the carpeted floor.

“Call him,” the elf said in the same tone.

The employee gives a shaky nod to the clerk some distance away, and she runs to the phone.

A little while later, when the rain had died down, a soaked man burst through the front doors.

“Tadano!” said the fat man, “this better be important.”

The employee did not say a word. He merely gestured the manager to the elf sitting in the lounge.

“Mr. Shida,” said the man surprised, “I’m sorry, I didn’t know it was you.”

The elf, now sitting on the lounge, gently placed the cup of warm tea on the table. He takes a deep breath, and takes off his white leather gloves. He placed it neatly on the table, and stood to greet the manager. In an instant, the elf’s hands glowed and the manager, who was several meters away, was thrown to the wall and held up several meters high by his neck.

“Can you count, manager?” said the calm but frenzied elf. The manager couldn’t speak. His windpipes were being crushed. Having no response, the elf tightens his grip on the manager’s neck. He repeats his question.

“Yes,” the manager finally gargled out.

The elf moved his arm and the manager slid across the wall to just in front of the vault doors. The guards beneath him looked on with sheer terror.

“How many guards do you see there, you fat pig? How many?!”

“Four."

“I could easily crush all of them with one hand,” the elf said, “what in your inferior brain convinced you that this was enough?”

The manager did not respond. Mercifully, the dwarf placed his hands on Mr. Shida’s shoulders. The elf got the message, and relaxed his tight grip. The manager came crashing down some distance away. A folded sheet of paper threw itself to the floor in front of the heaving manager. It was mostly empty, except for a sentence in the middle: “We will get your precious scroll. You will help us, elf. xoxo”

Even as he was struggling to breathe normally again, he couldn't help but chuckle at that idea. Impossible, the manager thought to himself, simply impossible. Four guards, sixty CCTV cameras, fifty barriers and seals, four meter thick enchanted reinforced steel, three guardian spirits, and a team of mages and perimeter guards constantly monitoring the area for even a hint of something wrong. Not even Mr. Shida himself can get through the vault. Only a god, a powerful god even, can do it.

“Impossible, sir,” the fat man said with an uneasy chuckle. He stood on his feet and gestured to one of the clerks behind the table to bring him a tablet. “We have successfully repelled almost all attacks on the vault since the great war. Even if they somehow managed to break the barriers and pierce the door, they would have to face the spirits that lay inside. Those god-forsaken spirits have never been defeated in a thousand years and are under our complete control. All those defenses are constantly monitored, tested, and improved. Mr. Shida, nothing can get through it.”

The manager shows Mr. Shida a live camera feed of his precious scroll inside the vault. Indeed, it was still there in its glass box on a pedestal. The elf’s eye was glued to the screen. He inspected every inch of the pedestal and every detail of the glass box on it. To him, this scroll was everything. Everybody knows that piece of ancient paper is worth a lot of money. The idiots amongst the city elites only see it for what it is: a scroll worth over ten billion yen. It was a commodity to them, like a painting or an ancient artifact you’d hang on your living room to show off to your guests. Shida knows more though, he knows why it was worth so much in the first place. It was magic, of course, a powerful one. It was a magic that he needed fast, but as of now, couldn’t decipher.

“Open it,” he murmured, “I want to put my own seal on it.”

The manager hesitated. The process of opening a vault with that much security was complex. But a quick glance from the elf and the approaching bodyguard of his quickly changed his mind. The manager gave the signal to the guards. Two of them went to the two control panels on either side of the door. In parallel, they held their engraved metal cards to the panel which burned and sizzled, leaving a copy of the engraving on them. Another of the guards went to the black telephone and told the mages and security team to deactivate the protections. Slowly the fifty magical seals began to unwrap one by one. Once that was done, the totems inside which carried the guardian spirits were temporarily sealed. Finally, the heavy door started its slow opening sequence. The whole process took ten minutes.

Once it was open, the guards went in to make sure the traps were fully deactivated. The automatic lighting system flickers on, revealing locker after locker of invaluable trinkets, artefacts, and gemstones. Standing alone at the farthest edge of the vault was the pedestal with the scroll on it.

One of the guards upon seeing the others enter safely, walked to the manager to notify him.

“The vault is now open and safe to-”

“Sir!” a voice shrieked from inside. Everybody‘s head snaps to the vault. For a while,  nobody dared move, not even Mr. Shida. The orc, annoyed by the suspense, marched his way to the vault, pushing all the guards aside. There, he also froze. The manager wiped away his sweat with his handkerchief, and decided to check it out himself. He didn’t need to go all the way, though. Even from the entrance, he could see what was wrong.

“The scroll,” the manager shuddered.

“It's gone.”