Elthairon Ars-Dhahabi paced inside one of the rooms of his family mansion. With his father still on his sickbed, still fighting against an unknown plague that had robbed him of his ability to maintain the household, Elthairon effectively had free reign to do what he wished with the family’s finances, assets and property. He had paid the three brothers quite the substantial amount to take care of what he had thought would be a minor issue, even going so far as to deck them out in expensive armor that boosted their speed and let them float across the ground at a sprinter’s pace; yet even this was not enough to deal with that black ship’s champion.

“Damn fools! To embarrass me like that! The absolute gall of that whore, too… She and the rest of that trash don’t deserve to live! I was going to be merciful, but now…”

Elthairon continued to rant and rave for another thirty minutes or so, all while the servants on the other side of the door to his room, of which included a mix of Tieflings, Dwarves, Humans and Beastmen, all of whom were wearing some rather… revealing clothing, braced themselves for what was to come. Elthairon had bet quite a great deal of his family’s assets and wealth on what Elthairon and his cronies had assumed was a sure win, yet the results of the fight were the opposite of what they had expected. They had, each of them, bet at least 70% of their total net worth on the result they had hoped for, yet the tables had turned and now the winners were coming to collect. Elthairon’s servants were hesitant to approach their liege, for how were they to tell him that his cronies had all fled Ars-Saihar with as much as they could take with them?

Worse still, those who had come to collect were now almost certain to take what had been denied to them by the flight of Elthairon’s yes-men from Elthairon himself! While slavery was illegal in the Sultanate, that did not mean that a ‘slavery that is not technically slavery’ did not exist. Debtors would lose everything, and that was including their ability to choose their own profession, their own living standards, their wages, their partner and their ability to leave the job they were assigned to.

Certainly, they were, under legal code, not slaves, but they would be slaves in all but name. They would be as many African Americans in the South were after the end of the American Civil War; forced to live on a plot of land and unable to advance economically as every single coin spent went straight back to the one who effectively owned them without legally owning them, their debt to their corporate masters only ever increasing and forcing them to stay put or risk criminal prosecution.

With the highest yes-men, all of whom were just as bad with money as the only Elf who ruled a Family in Ars-Saihar, in Elthairon’s entourage having bailed on him and having left him to face the collectors alone, Elthairon and everyone else in his mansion were now at risk of becoming perpetually indebted to the ones who would keep them under their employ. Having realized this, many of the staff in the manor had fled, either taking what they could or just heading for the hills with the clothes on their back. Some had been apprehended already, others were ignored and still others were now trapped along with those who didn’t flee inside the walls that surrounded the Ars-Dhahabi family estate.

Those who waited for Elthairon to calm down did so because of one critical thing that they were aware of. The Ars-Dhahabi estate had secret passages that could, in times of emergency, be used to flee the city. These tunnels had not been used in ages, but odds were that they were still there. Unfortunately, only Elthairon, his infirm father and his deceased mother and siblings knew where the escape tunnels were and how to access them, so waiting for the last heir to stop ranting and raving was the only option right now.

But, as chance would have it, Elthairon calmed down and opened the door.

“What do you want?” he growled, still quite visibly peeved at the recent turn of events.

“My master,” said a Tiefling woman with deep red… everything who was dressed in an overly skimpy French Maid outfit, “the collectors are here. They want what was wagered and more.”

“…. And more?”

“Yes, sir.” responded a Dwarf in a butler outfit with assless pants. “Your comrades turned on you, taking much of what they owed with them as they fled the city. They want you, as the head of the family that they were a part of, to pay what your companions owed.”

“That! That’s outrageous! How dare they?! After everything I and my family have done for these people, they turn on me so quickly?!”

“My lord, if we stay, they will storm the manor!” exclaimed young woman with the tail and ears of a red fox. “Most of the guards have already either left or have been incapacitated by drink or by despair. There must be a way out of here!”

Before anyone else could speak, the sound of explosions rocked the manor and all eyes looked out a window to see the fine marble wall that kept the riff-raff out be reduced to crumbled chunks. Shortly after, a small army of debt collectors surged through one of the gaps in the wall and began to apprehend anyone they could. Worse still, the guards tasked with safeguarding the manor either were cut down, ran or simply surrendered, with most of them taking options two and three.

As the truth of his situation came at him, Elthairon’s countenance shifted from anger to shock as the sudden realization that he had effectively lost everything hit him. Perhaps he was not so dense as to not see reality after all?

“I haven’t lost yet…” he murmured, moving into his room and taking a few magic stones from a drawer. He then proceeded to place the stones in a few small and inconspicuous alcoves, and then he and all the valuables in the entire manor vanished from the interior, exterior and grounds of the place. This escape method did not include the staff, however, and the ones who had attempted to find a way to flee with their employer were left horrified at the knowledge that they were left to face the music while their employers got a golden parachute.

Even before the debt collectors took the last person as collateral, they were enraged to discover that the only other thing left of any value on the grounds was the structures standing on them. Everything else was gone and no one had any idea where it all went.

…

A hooded figure stood in a dark ally in the middle of the night. He knocked thrice on a wall, which opened and let him in, with those within leading the figure to a small room with but a single candle to light it. The figure sat down and the flame went out, only to relight itself and reveal another shadowy figure.

“What’s the job?” the second figure asked, their voice completely monotone, androgenous and unremarkable, not allowing anyone to identify their gender, age or point of origin. The only thing that you could use to identify them were the distortions in their hood which allowed one to know that there were the horns of a Tiefling underneath.

“The black ship and its crew. I want them gone. Deader than death itself and lost to the world. I want them all sent to the next life, and I want their damned ship sent to the bottom of the waves.” Said the first figure.

“Do you have the payment?” the second figure asked, their eyes shining under the dim light just enough to allow them to be seen as opaque orbs of solid black.

“Already sent.”

“Good.” The second figure said, their sharpened teeth shimmering under the dim lighting like the Cheshire smile of a cruel predator. “We’ll strike in seven days. Now get out of here.”

“Gladly.”

The first figure was escorted out of the branch office of the Dark Guild and was left to his own devices. He pulled back his hood and sneered at the night sky, his pointy ears twitching as the brisk night air flowed over them.

“You’ll see.” Elthairon said. “You’ll all see… I always win in the end.”