Peek: The Merchant's Guild (Patreon)

The Merchant's Guild is one of the few guilds whose members can boast being better traveled than most adventurers, as their primary interest is in shipping and investing, moving goods and money from place to place.  The Fourdock Guild is located near the edge of town, having moved there after the sea trade was slowly strangled by Hullbreak Harbor.  Much of the town's exports came from the sea dungeon, and when it stopped allowing delving, trade suffered.

The new dungeon, however, is starting to revive trade.  It's not a sea route, but a land route can still bring in barrels of gold.  The Guild complex contains several warehouses, designed to hold various different things to export; from lumber and other raw resources, to potions, weapons, and other things adventurers crave.

In the main office, a halfling with red hair goes over the ledgers for her Guild, her tanned brow furrowing as she makes plans for the upcoming year.

Elaina Silverwheat is of mixed emotions about this financial year.  On the one hand, dungeon exports have given her one of her best years to date!  The locals have been making excellent good from what the new dungeon has to offer, and have been gaining more levels to further increase the quality!

On the other hand, her little secret of a town is starting to attract eyes from the kingdom at large, and even from those beyond the borders.  And that's not to mention the trouble with whatever specifically happened earlier today with the docks.

The adventurers have been saying it was an attack from Hullbreak, but haven't said too much else.  Listening in around the dockside houses, though, it sounds more serious than that.  The citizens were evacuated, but not by the city.  The dungeon and its dwellers helped get people out of the potential path of destruction.

Sure, they had seals from the Dungeoneer's Guild to make it official, but even a glance shows that the official mayoral seal was conspicuously absent.  If the Mayor isn't prepared to handle something like that, how can she expect he's prepared to keep her trade routes safe?!

Sure, the fine artisans can sell to the local adventurers and people just fine, but there's only so much gold to be found in seaside.  If they want true prosperity, they need to be able to export, and a single sacked caravan could ruin people, not to mention the lives lost in an attack.

And if they managed to sack a shipment from Seaside Forge, or Staiven's Emporium... she doesn't even want to think about it.  She's going to need to start hiring adventurers to travel with her caravans, which could cut into her profits.

Perhaps she should consider selling it as a mutually beneficial arrangement.  She gets a secure route, they get better sleeping arrangements and meals than a drafty tent and rations.  She frowns as she thinks about it.  It'd easily work for the return trip, but the dungeon here is too much of a draw.  What dungeon would they want to travel to, especially with rumors of a new dungeon in the deeps, and Hullbreak probably being subsumed, too.  The Crystal Shield has been growing steadily thanks to the quality of the training they've gotten access to with Neverrest subsumed.

She pulls out her personal ledger and makes a note to invest more into the local fishers and boatwrights.  If they see similar growth, there's a lot of money to be made.  Her musings on how much to invest where are interrupted by a tall and wide troll, his width thanks to hard work rather than easy dining.

"Ma'am, there's news from the Mayor," says Grockly, her head teamster.  Looking at him, it's easy to assume he's simply a dull brute, but behind those sharp green eyes lay a sharp mind.  Packing, stacking, and moving large amounts of things without them breaking is not so simple a job as it sounds.

"Oh?  I'm surprised he's actually doing anything.  His hands-off approach has been nice in the past, but I always took it as a lack of interest in the town."

Grockly shrugs.  "Maybe the attack got his attention.  He's giving a speech in town hall tomorrow, open to the various guild leaders, and whoever else wants to come hear."

Elaina taps a finger on her ledger as she considers that.  She'll go, of course, but she needs to plan out her response to the Mayor's response.  She's enjoyed him keeping his nose out of her business, but she has certainly not enjoyed him ignoring his own business with the defense of Fourdock.  A bribe might be needed to get him to do what he should, or get him to get someone else to do what he should.  It's possible he'll do his duty without needing extra incentive, but she doesn't know enough about him to guess which way he'll go.

If he tries to mess with her business, she might need to forgo the carrot of a bribe, and go with the stick of a threat.  Hostile negotiations aren't anything new to her, even if she came out here to be able to avoid them.  One more wouldn't make much difference, if it comes to that.