Kay accepted the pouch of money and thanked the guild employee before walking over to Eleniah, who was waiting nearby.

“Done?” She asked him.

“Yeah, paid in full.” He held up the pouch and jingled it. “I finally have enough.”

Eleniah smiled back and him. “Then lets go buy an enchanted flask.”

Kay led the way back to the same enchanting business that they’d originally gotten the quote from. With this last job he’d finally saved up enough gold to purchase the enchanted flask that came with a spatial enchantment to make it bigger on the inside. One of the jobs he’d completed with Eleniah’s supervision in the past few weeks had actually been for that enchanter, and she’d agreed to knock off a portion of the price of the flask off in lieu of payment. With the payments he’d saved from his adventuring, the money he’d made selling the random junk from Earth, and that discount, he was able to afford it.

Kay and Eleniah chatted about inconsequential things as they walked the few minutes to the store.

As they rounded the corner Eleniah frowned severely. “That doesn’t look good.”

Kay looked over at the store, and saw a group of people standing outside of it, almost blocking the entire storefront. “Who are they?”

“Graceful Success. Human supremacist group out of Nelam that’s been trying to push the Adventurer’s Guild out.” Her frown got deeper and deeper the closer they got.

“They’re what?” He vaguely remembered the name from somewhere, but that goal sounded completely idiotic. “The Adventurer’s Guild could crush them easily.”

“They’re trying to degrade the Guild’s contract with the city. They could hypothetically push enough that the city asks the Adventurer’s Guild to leave.”

“That still sounds nuts.”

“It isn’t the smartest thing.” She agreed.

As they made it to the front of the store, one of the all-human group stepped in front of them. “Are you looking to use this store? You really shouldn’t.”

“Why is that?” Kay asked, trying to keep his tone civil. A group known to be racist idiots blocking people from shopping at a specific business? That didn’t sound like something Kay cared for.

“There are much better enchanters in the city. In fact, Enchanter Guilmar is only a short distance from here, and he’s fantastic!” The young man smiled cheerily at them.

Kay glared at the idiot. Fantastic. I’d bet money this Guilmar person is either one of them directly, or a supporter. “That’s nice, but I have some business with Enchanter Dorine, so excuse me.” He went to step around the man.

The guy shifted in front of Kay and put his hand on Kay’s shoulder. “Listen friend, you really should shop somewhere else.” He leaned in close and whispered. “The enchanter here actually has the audacity to hire animals, and then act all affronted when we treat them like they deserve.”

Kay’s patience evaporated. He gave the man a wide, friendly smile, and the man smiled back. Then Kay leaned in close. “I’m not your friend.” He whispered, his voice cold and his eyes flat, the smile still on his face. “Now get your fucking hand off me, and move out of my way.”

The Graceful Success member jerked back from the menace in Kay’s voice, and Kay took the opportunity to shoulder past him.

He made it a foot closer to the door when someone else got in his way again.

“Hey, hey, hey. What’s this?” The new person stuck their arm in front of Kay.

Kay sighed and looked at them. It was Coultron, the same rude man who’d tried to get Kay to head back to the city with him.

“Well, well, well. If it isn’t the Outworlder!” Coultron spread his arms like an actor during an important monologue. “How nice to see you again! Are you trying to go in here?” He pointed at Enchanter Dorine’s shop.

Kay kept his response short. “Yes.”

“Now, now, now. You really shouldn’t do that.” Coultron’s smile turned brittle.

“Thank you for your opinion.” Kay started walking again.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa!” Coultron stiff-armed Kay’s shoulder, knocking him back a step. “I really, really, really have to insist you shop somewhere else.”

Kay stared down at the slightly shorter man. His blonde hair was almost white at the ends, and he looked like some kind of noble or rich kid in his shiny armor.

“It is my duty, as a ranking member of Graceful Success.” The blonde moron continued, “To keep citizens of this great city from getting scammed by disreputable businesses.”

Something about the smarmy racist made Kay want to grind his teeth. No, not something, his entire being was pissing Kay off. He hadn’t had a lot of exposure to open racism back home, he’d seen oblique, hidden shit, the kind of thing that seeing and hearing had made his skin crawl, which was just as evil. He’d never experienced this level of absolute bullshit before.

Before Kay could say something potentially inflammatory regarding Coultron’s lack of intelligence and poor choices, the sound of multiple metal clad feet marching down the street cut him off.

“What are you people doing?” A voice demanded.

The crowd of Graceful Success people that had been gathering around Kay pulled away a bit, and Kay saw a group of guardsmen marching towards them, with Captain Armis in the lead.

Coultron smiled and turned towards the guards. “Well, Captain, we were just-”

“I’m trying to get into this store and this lot are trying to stop me.” Kay talked over Coultron, interrupting whatever bullshit he’d been trying to spout.

“Really?” The captain turned an angry stare onto Coultron and his compatriots. “Why is it that I’m not surprised to find Graceful Success doing something like that?”

Coultron drew himself up. “Captain, that sounds like an insult! I’ll not stand-”

“I don’t care.” Captain Armis pointed down the street. “Leave.”

“Now, Captain, we’re just-”

“Let me repeat myself.” The captain grabbed the shaft of his mace and drew it a few inches off his belt. “Leave.”

The Graceful Success group left, scowling and muttering as they did.

Armis watched as they left, his hand never leaving his weapon until they were out of sight. He turned to look at Kay and Eleniah, a thoughtful expression on his face. “Coultron and his guildmaster think that because they have one councilor backing them up that they don’t have to pay attention to the city’s laws. They haven’t been doing anything like this before now. It might be time to show them the error of their assumptions.” He opened the door and held it. “After you.”

They walked inside, and Kay and Eleniah waited as the guard captain spoke to the workers and Enchanter Dorine about Graceful Success. It turned out that before they’d started trying to intimidate people into leaving, they’d come into the shop and made vague threats about people who “worked with animals that thought to much of themselves”. Enchanter Dorine had gotten pissed and literally thrown them all out with her magic. When she’d seen them start forcing away her customers, she’d called the guard. She’d also recorded the entire conversation, including the threats, with her magic. Captain Armis took a copy of the recording on a small glowing crystal, a small smile on his face as he stared at it.

As he left, the captain paused in the door and looked at Kay. “There are… conflicting political goals coming to light in this city. Some of them are…” He paused and seemed to think over his wording. “Some of those goals appear to be centered on or involving the actions of Graceful Success.” He paused again, then shrugged. “Be careful.” He gave Eleniah a slow nod, which she returned.

Kay stared after the captain as he left, then moved his gaze to his teacher. She shook her head slightly, and he nodded.

They concluded their transaction with Enchanter Dorine in just a few minutes, the same fox beastkin worker handling most of the actual interaction, with the enchanter hanging around the front muttering insults towards racists who would dare come into her store and threaten her wonderful apprentices! Halfway through her diatribe her rant turned into a litany of praise about each of her apprentices, and how dare those useless fools try and make anyone think differently! By the time they left, with the enchanted blood-flask on order, the young beastkin woman was blushing almost as red as her hair.

Kay glanced at Eleniah as they stepped outside, but she shook her head again. They walked back to the house in silence.

Kay waited until they’d made it inside and sat down before asking. “So…?”

Eleniah stared at him, her finger tapping at the table as she thought. Finally she spoke up. “It’s nothing for you to worry about right now, but the reason that the Adventurer’s Guild had me come to Tumbling Rapids was to look into Graceful Success. There’s been some rumors spreading around that there’s more to them than just an attempt to remove the Guild and take their business in the city. While it’s not my forte, I have some skill in looking into shady things, so they asked me to come check it out. I’m still looking into things right now.”

“Can you go into more detail?” He asked.

She thought about it, but eventually nodded. “Graceful Success is an Adventurer’s Guild copy out of the Kingdom of Nalem.” She glanced over at Kay.

He nodded along. The Adventurer’s Guild was the most powerful, widespread, and oldest guild of it’s kind, but that didn’t mean that there weren’t other organizations that worked as a combination middle-man for dangerous jobs and service provider to adventurers. The Kingdom of Nalem, Kay remembered from Eleniah’s geography lessons, was a larger kingdom to the west of Tumbling Rapids, with their territory bordering The Rapids’ along the Itiel, the western river of the two that split from Garcall lake.

“There’s been word that they might actually be a front for Nalem itself. Nalem would love to have The Rapids as part of their territory, and people have started to think that Graceful Success might be one part of an attempt to convince Tumbling Rapids to agree to be annexed through socio-political manipulation.”

Kay sat there and absorbed the idea. A country known to be incredibly human supremacist absorbing a large, multi-cultural trading hub. “That doesn’t sound good.”

“No, it doesn’t, which is why the Guild sent me to look into it.”

“Can I help any?”

Eleniah smiled. “Not at the moment. Maybe in the future depending on how things go, but not now.” She stared into space for a moment more, then smacked the table. “Anyways, don’t worry about it for now. Time to test out your first enchanted item!”