The Dualing Merchants (Solo)

[Mink]

I don't really know how it all began. One day, I woke up to find that everyone in my village was gone. Nothing in that town seemed to indicate foul play. No branches were broken on the trees surrounding my village, No footprints were leading into or out of any of the houses... Or at least not any that belonged to anyone other than my villagers. No doorways were smashed in and none of the small wooden houses in my town were harmed. Everything was in the forest town that should have been there except for my fellow gnomes. They had all seemed to vanish into thin air, which seemed to be just fine by me. I almost never showed my face to the outside world anyway.

Still, you would think they would at least leave me a note or something. Still, with no people in my village, there was no business to be had. I needed to figure out what happened to my villagers, not because I cared but because I had almost no money. Also, if something bad did happen to the villagers, I needed to find out what and why as well as find out why I was spared. In order to do that, though, I needed more money. When I needed money before, I always sold stuff to my friends. Dagnabbit!!! I guess I will have to go to a nearby village to get some business.

Too bad I will have to leave this place behind.

I grabbed up my bag and headed through the forest to find a town that showed some sign of life. The only problem is I had no idea where I was going.

Oh well. What is the worst that could happen?

[Mink]

As I walked through the forest I started to realize that because I never had to leave I never did. I was lost. I didn't have a map and I was already quite far into the forest. If I were to find a way out, the only way to do it would be to keep walking in one direction. No forest can go on forever. So that is what I did. The forest still seemed to go on forever, though. I don't know why, but the forest seemed a lot spookier all of a sudden. A two wolves pounced at me out of nowhere, but the wolf was easily distracted as I took a big juicy steak out of my bag and tossed it back the way I came. As the wolf went after it I ran the other way until I made it to a town.

Finally I could set up a business, but first I had to rest. When you are as small as I am, even a yard of running can be tiring.

[Mink]

I took a nap at the inn for 20 gold and headed out to do business. There seemed to be no end to the buildings in the city. I went back to check the name of the town. I knew that to start my business, I would need a good name for my shop and there was no better place to start looking for inspiration than there.

The signpost indicated that this town was named Trive. I won't bore you with too many details, but while I was trying to think up a good name for my store, I checked out the other shops to find out what was selling well and what wasn't. One storekeeper was particularly rude to me. If I remember correctly, he kicked me all the way out of town as soon as he found out that I was a merchant as well.

It hurt like a bitch, but by that time I had already learned everything I needed to, so I went off to get merchandise for my shop.