Good luck with your new business partner! Roger leaves laughing, the door falls shut behind him, dust swirls around the wooden frame, and the image of Xirgan, beet-red from anger, is reflected in its colourful glass.

The old shop is cramped with antiques of all kinds, many have braved more years than the store itself that has been handed over throughout the generations.

Xirgan has taken to his post as the new owner barely a year ago, with his parents now being too old to take care of a business so labour intensive, with its stock always in need of care and restoration.

Things went fine for the first 6 months, old and new buyers would stop by regularly, and obtaining new wares was effortless enough for someone like him, who has grown into this trade from birth to now.

Then the king has proclaimed a rise in taxes for native shop-keepers, claiming it would attract those from beyond the portal to open stores in their kingdom, by lowering their taxes far below that of other regions. Of course, someone has to make up for the loss.

Standing before his certain ruin, Xirgan is one of many who took the official's offer to become partners with a businessman from earth, sharing his shop and earnings for the same low rates these people would get.

He has never met the mysterious man that is supposed to arrive today; all he knows is that he's one of the rare settlers, those who won't die even if they stay in Thevia for more than 9 days.