"Sir, it just doesn't make sense." Said a man, panicking as he held several documents in his hand.
"What do you mean?"
"The trade deals with the nearby kingdoms; they have been completely ruined. It's a complete mess."
"How so?"
"I-I'm not sure, but it seems like the nearby kingdoms paid a lot of money for the usual items that we trade to them. But when I say, a lot, I mean a lot," he said, now visibly sweating.
"Get a hold of yourself, man. Now tell me, how much more?" said the other man in the room, his superior, who was seated behind his desk, sipping on a nice cup of tea.
"Ten times the amount"
Tea, of which the man proceeded to spit out upon hearing that.
Ten times could almost seem like a small amount. But with the coin that kingdoms traded in already being a ridiculous amount, increasing that by ten times that amount was insane.
Confusion hit the superior official's face, once he wiped off any lingering tea, as he looked at the man trying to explain the situation. "Why would they pay that much. They should be able to recall how much the previous deals were. They have trade agreements detailing their previous purchases. It's never been that high."
"That's-that's what I told them. But, according to the other kingdoms, they never paid that amount. They are saying that we did something and are trying to steal that coin from them."
"That makes no sense. They sent the document in with the figures, yes. You have the copies there, I take it?"
The man holding the paper rubbed his hand against his trouser leg before handling the documents, not wanting to get them covered in sweat.
"Ex-exactly, but while the documents show that this is the case, the kingdoms are denying they offered that much," he said, dropping one of the documents in his floundering.
"How did this happen? Are they just trying to trick us in some way…or was there some terrible mix-up in the Merchants Guild?" his superior said, looking up at him, hoping for an answer to this mystery.
"We don't know, sir. We are currently looking into it. I'm waiting for the original documents to be pulled out of storage."
"Good, good, hopefully they will shed some light on this."
"What do we do with the kingdoms. They are threatening to cancel all current trade deals until this is sorted out."
The official could only hold his head and rack his brain to figure out how to placate them till they got this mess sorted out.
"How could things go so wrong?" He wondered to himself.
All the while, the perpetrator of this had just started her work again, unaware of the turmoil this man was dealing with.
"I don't get it. What is happening?"
One of the clerks was standing at his booth, holding his head the same way the official was.
All around him was a flurry of activity, as the clerks dashed around trying to sort problems.
For some reason, everything was going wrong, and pretty much all at the same time.
Merchants were coming in personally to complain about problems with the trades they had been a part of. Normally, they would send a worker or someone of similar station, but no, they were coming here themselves, which was not a good sign.
For all of them, they had various problems with their purchases. Issues with the colour of materials, receiving the wrong items and the size of the order…all manner of things.
Almost everything that could go wrong had gone wrong.
Just when they thought it was over, having managed to deal with one merchant, another merchant would come in with his entourage and a mean look on his face.
"No, not another one."
When the first man came in, everything was handled calmly. That is, until they found the merchant's documents not matching what they had in the Guild.
And it got even worse when every merchant after the first came in thinking they were the most important merchant around. Which of course meant they had to be served first.
But so did every other merchant, which just led to a cacophony of raised voices, as well as pushing and shoving.
The peacekeepers stationed within the Merchants Guild had to step in on more than one occasion in order to break things up and get them all to calm down.
The whole situation was a mess, and no one could figure out what happened. The documents are magically scanned so they can keep a record and use it to handle the trade.
How were they different to the original documents?
One clerk was being admonished by a merchant for his incompetence, as if it were all his fault. It got to the point that he could not take it anymore, and just blew his lid. He accused the merchant of doctoring his original document after the scan, and trying to cheat the Merchants Guild
That quickly went down like a lead balloon, leading to the clerk having to take a time out as he rubbed ointment on his face for the newly acquired fist mark he received.
That's not to say the merchant got off easy. He was very quickly taken to the guardhouse for his own time out for having assaulted a man.
While it did worry her that such a thing had happened, both of the men were fine, and Oriana moved past it, just being happy that she was here to experience it all as she came in for her next day of work.
Especially when things got worse.
"What do you mean by that?" Said a very imperious-looking merchant to one of the clerks.
"It's-it's what the agreement states."
"Yes, you said that already. But why pray tell would I be selling things that I do not have?"
"I do not know, sir."
"No, you don't, do you. If you had a mind that could, maybe you would not be behind that counter. Now, please contact your manager. I am eager to speak with him."
"Her, you mean."
"What"
"Never mind, I'll just go get-"
The clerk didn't manage to finish his sentence before he practically wet himself as he dashed into the back rooms of the building.
Funny thing was, Oriana saw another man following behind him with pretty much the same expression.
Oriana just smiled.
And she continued to do so, even when things somehow went…right for someone.
"I'm sorry, sir, I-I don't quite understand."
"Neither do I. Had I known you had such works, I never would have bothered asking for those boring paintings."
"What paintings are you referring to?"
"The ones of Sir James Kraven, of course, who else. You know he saved my life once. I looked up to him so much that I thought having pictures of him in the house would give me something to aspire to. As well as a way to venerate him as a hero, and thank him for saving me," said a man who was very clearly noble. And thinking back to the trade deals she had messed with, she realised that this noble was a Marquise, so quite a high-ranking noble at that.
"The wife was not so enthused as you can imagine." He said solemnly, "Especially when I pulled down her portraits and replaced them with Sir James Kraven."
"Err…I would think so, yes," the clerk just said under his breath upon hearing that.
"But when you sent me those pictures of him, at first I was mortified. Seeing him in such embarrassing moments, I thought I would be doing him a disservice by hanging them up."
"But the more I looked at them, the more I realised that they humanise him. He is still a great hero, but seeing him as a human feels so enriching. He is no longer in a league of his own. It is possible that someone, anyone, could become the next Sir James Kraven."
"Also, after we sorted out where the pictures of her could go, my wife found that she really enjoys the one where he slips on ice and ends up face-first in a nest of acid ants. The painter for that one did some brilliant work."
With the Marquise's rant over about his hero, he then went on to talk about how his relationship with his wife was stronger now, with their love of the paintings he had purchased. Even more so with his wife wanting to get into painting herself.
All the while, as the Marquise spoke, the clerk slowly drifted away. Slumber took over as he lost the will to listen to the man any further.
But even then, he could see his fellow clerks running around and realised his day could be a lot worse.
"So, thank you again. I will be sure to put in another order sometime in the future. I could even see if there are paintings for some of the other heroes. That would be interesting to see as well."
"Ah, yeah…sure. Thank you for your patronage," the clerk jumped, as he woke up to see the Marquise off.
And with that, the Marquise walked out of the Merchants guild as the only happy person that day.