The evening air in New York was crisp and refreshing, a stark contrast to the chaotic adventure Geralt and the others had experienced earlier in the day. After an extensive shopping trip—one that had left Geralt, Vesemir and Liam visibly drained. Thus at the end, they decided to take a stroll through a quieter neighborhood beside Central Park before heading back to Stark Tower. The city skyline shimred under the streetlights, a mixture of old-world architecture and modern glass towers blending into a strange harmony.
The streets were calm, but the unfamiliarity of it all put him on edge. He wasn't used to such towering buildings, nor the strange tal carts—cars, as Liam had called them—that lined the roads. The soft hum of distant traffic was constant, yet this part of the city felt oddly peaceful compared to the chaos of Manhattan's heart.
Then Geralt's sharp hearing picked up sothing strange. A tallic clank, followed by hushed whispers. Then another sound—sothing scraping against tal. He turned his head slightly. A parked car sat in the shadows of a streetlamp, and beside it, three n were hunched over, one of them fiddling with the door handle while another worked at the keyhole with so kind of tool. Their heartbeats were elevated, quick and frantic—not the rhythm of casual pedestrians or soone simply getting into their own car, as he had seen before.
Sothing was off.
Geralt stopped, causing the others to pause as well.
"What is it?" Ciri asked.
"Those n," Geralt said quietly, nodding toward them. "Their hearts are racing. They're trying to break into that tal moving cart."
"That's stealing." Liam casually replied. He wasn't that surprised to see such a scene, but he did find it a bit odd seeing it in such a high end neighborhood.
"Seems like it," Geralt replied.
"I still don't get this whole car thing, but isn't that illegal?" Keira said as she had co to realize that the laws of this world wasn't like the laws of their world. There were actual laws that was enforced.
"Very," Liam muttered.
The three n seed oblivious to their onlookers. One of them muttered a curse under his breath as he failed to pick the lock. Another looked around nervously before trying to force the door open with his hands. The third, a stocky man in a dark hoodie, kept watch, scanning the streets.
"Should we do sothing?" Triss asked, frowning.
"Normally, the authorities would handle this," Liam said. "But it's not like we don't have the ans to stop them."
"Leave it. We are in foreign lands." Vesemir, as always being the caretaker, replied. Thus they everyone turned to Liam for his opinion.
"What?" Liam was confused. Nobody replied but Liam could tell that Geralt and Ciri were itching to just jump on. Geralt wouldn't care about what had happened as people around were assholes in general in his world. But in this world he had witnessed sothing novel and different.
People here were friendly to the point where he felt overwheld at tis. The number of tis he had been complinted by the waiters and waitresses, the shopkeepers, the salespersons, even normal folks that they had walked by. Many of them would just throw a complint at them.
Geralt and Vesemir were even asked what kind of contacts they were using in order to have such great eyes, prompting Liam to provide them with shades so that people wouldn't judge Vesemir as he looked a bit old now.
Geralt had never felt those emotions, if at all that was possible, in his long life. He felt that such kind of world would never exist but Liam coming to his life had actually changed his view of normal people in general and this world wasn't bad at all. And now that so people had co and wanted to taint this place by the sa filth that he had witnessed in his world, he was a bit enraged.
And also because he was exhausted by all the shopping and needed to let the steam out.
Geralt took a step forward. The robbers, still focused on their work, didn't notice him at first. Ciri and the others stood back, watching in amusent, while Vesemir sighed, already knowing how this would end.
"Hey," Geralt called out, his deep voice carrying through the quiet street.
The three n jerked their heads up, startled. The one working on the lock dropped his tool, while the lookout instinctively reached for sothing under his hoodie. The third, a wiry man with a nervous twitch, took half a step back, sizing Geralt up.
"This your car?" Geralt asked. The na car seed jarring on the ears of Liam coming from Geralt.
"Mind your business, middle aged man," the stocky one growled.
'Middle aged man? Was that an insult? Who insults like that? Use fucker if you want to insult soone.' Liam thought.
"Middle aged man?" Geralt flexed his fingers, rolling his shoulders.
The three n exchanged glances before the stocky one sneered and pulled out a knife.
"You should leave before I kill you."
"I was hoping you'd say that." Geralt smiled. The man lunged, stabbing toward Geralt's gut. Fast. Sloppy. Amateurish.
Geralt sidestepped with ease, grabbing the man's wrist mid-motion and twisting it sharply. A sickening pop echoed through the street as the knife clattered to the ground. The stocky man howled, clutching his now-useless hand, but before he could react further, Geralt slamd his fist into his gut. Air exploded from the man's lungs as he doubled over, only for Geralt to grab the back of his hoodie and hurl him against the car hood with a tallic thud.
The wiry man cursed and rushed forward, throwing a wild punch. Geralt barely moved—he leaned just enough to the side for the fist to miss, then delivered a brutal elbow strike to the man's ribs. The wiry thug let out a strangled gasp, staggering back, but Geralt wasn't finished. He grabbed the man by the collar and drove his knee into his stomach before tossing him onto the pavent.
The last man hesitated.
"Still want to try?" Geralt raised an eyebrow.
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