MatchlessMinion shifted quickly to serious thief mode after hearing ShinZing's explanation of ZipZing's situation. He advised from Shinichi's screen, "Just stay quiet until he stops looking for you. See if you can't find anywhere that I can appear without making a splash, even if it's a ways away."
Danika nodded silently, and spun ZipZing slowly, looking for the most likely place.
Shinichi grinned at her. He told MatchlessMinion, "She is."
She blushed and said aloud, after checking that she had her phone voice input muted, "The shore is really muddy looking, I think it would make sucking sounds with every step. Any ideas? Maybe the best place would be on top of the crane?"
"I guess I'd be pretty surprised if a giant chinchilla dropped out of nowhere onto my back," Saaki commented, "but it would make staying quiet kind of pointless wouldn't it?"
"The other cranes do seem kind of wary around that one from what I've seen of her screen, maybe if he was in that nearly invisible thief mode they'd just think the crane was having a fit of some kind?" Shinichi suggested.
"Hmm…" MatchlessMinion paced while thinking for a few minutes. "You'll have to come back in and make me lighter, and invisible. My blending skill won't work on a live target. It would be like when you smacked into me in the government office."
"I guess you could make the Crane blend in as long as you are touching it then?" Danika questioned.
"Not if others are actively watching it. But it won't take me long, your invisibility spell should be enough," MatchlessMinion said decisively.
Danika searched around ZipZing for somewhere to lay the stone so that she could enter it.
Shinichi watched her, and complained, "This is frustrating, I don't have any decent stealth skills yet, so I can't offer to just come out and hold it for you."
"It's fine," she assured him, and wedged the stone, still in its harness in-between two reeds.
A moment later ZipZing appeared in her garden, just as Saaki announced, "Food's ready, luck with the heist!" The genie vanished.
"Ready?" Danika asked.
"Ready!" MatchlessMinion assured her.
Danika cast her two spells on MatchlessMinion and then spun and exited the stone. She snagged the stone's harness, and cast invisibility on herself while activating her stealth skill. Then she zipped over to the marked crane.
"Now," she announced.
MatchlessMinion presumably popped out of the stone and landed on the crane. They couldn't see him, only the bird's reaction.
"They're here!" the crane screamed.
The reeds along the shore rustled as what looked like a group of scruffy bandits burst into view. They began tossing nets at every crane in sight, while Danika stared in shock.
The crane who had swallowed their stone suddenly coughed violently, but none of the others paid any attention to its distress. The scene dissolved into chaos.
An enormous ripple of motion spilled outward as birds flapped and cried out before launching themselves into the air. Amid it all, a small dark grey cat picked its way disdainfully across the muddy shore.
A heavy splash sounded close by, and a strange divot appeared in the water at the crane's feet. Small invisible hands snatched up the handful of stones the crane coughed up before they had time to sink into the muddy water.
One of the band of net throwers tossed accurately toward the crane they were targeting, but the net landed on the invisible chinchillamin standing in the water instead, as the crane flung itself sideways. MatchlessMinion was completely exposed before the short invisibility spell even had time to wear off.
Shinichi looked at the chaotic scene on Danika's phone and turned back to his own screen. His pixie exited the stone space, and zipped over to slice the net free with his tiny blade.
"They have pixies!!" screamed the crane as it stumbled away and finally launched itself into the air.
"Pixies!?" gasped the closest of the scruffy bandits. He actually took a step backwards.
Danika didn't bother to renew her invisibility spells, instead she triggered her Dazzling skill and flew upward, drawing the gazes of both cranes and bandits. The little cat on the shore narrowed its eyes, but it also watched her for the moment ShinZing needed to get MatchlessMinion free of the net.
She dropped the harness with her stone space, and MatchlessMinion caught it as neatly as if they'd planned the maneuver, and then vanished.
ShinZing scooped the harness out of the water and shot upward with a bang that made even Danika turn and look. A broad ripple flashed across the water like something had just smacked it hard from the spot he'd launched himself upward from.
"Bounce skill," he explained, "seemed useful."
"Get inside," she replied sharply, "and I'll teleport back!"
He vanished at the peak of his narrow arc into the sky, and ZipZing caught the harness in her little dragon claws and teleported to the mark she'd been keeping on Shrubbery's tree. The little cat made a strangely familiar gesture as she vanished from view.
Danika cursed sharply as ZipZing arrived in the quiet dryad's garden. Shinichi turned and raised an eyebrow. "I think that cat marked me!" she explained.
"I didn't get our stone either," MatchlessMinion announced from Shinichi's screen. "But what we got instead is pretty interesting."
Danika stuffed the harness and stone under a bush and grumbled the entrance word. Nothing happened. After a moment she re-enabled voice input and repeated it. Shinichi didn't say anything, but his lips quivered as ZipZing appeared on his screen.
MatchlessMinion held up a stone that was a strangely translucent yellow, like a piece of solidified honey, or the purest amber that she'd ever seen.
"What is that?" Danika asked.
He pointed to four grey pebbles laying on the dragon print shaped stone seat. "Something that makes those look like ordinary rocks," he said with a smirk on his little rodent face.
Danika wanted to shake him. The pebbles looked like they were ordinary rocks. "What are those then," she asked with false sweetness, and gritted teeth.
"Unpolished diamonds," he announced smugly.
Danika blinked and looked at the pebbles again. They still looked like ordinary grey rocks.
"So…" Shinichi prompted, "what does that make the yellow one, oh master thief?"
Danika glanced up at him from the corner of her eye. The phrasing was probably a reminder for her, that the chinchillamin had all the skills he needed to identify treasures like these accurately.
"It says it's 'The Philosopher's Stone'!" MatchlessMinion announced triumphantly. "And it appraises at over 20 million coin. I've got to tell my sister! Hah! Be right back!"
He didn't lay the stone beside the raw diamonds, he stuffed it into his own inventory before vanishing. Danika couldn't really blame him.
"Why does SaltySiamese need to know?" Shinichi asked after a moment.
Danika struggled with how to explain, and then suggested, "If Naoki had found it, wouldn't he rush off to wave it in your face?"
Shinichi hugged her and grinned as he replied, "Oh, but probably he'd be shoving it in Toshi's face first though."