Dear Diary,

  The day started like any other: weird customers, weirder items, and my never-ending struggle to avoid getting scammed. Then a man walked in holding what looked like an old piece of Imperial paper money.

  “It’s rare,” he said, smoothing the faded bill on the counter. As if I didn't know! “Produced during the reign of Emperor Darius the Golden.”

  I feigned a lack of interest but inspected the bill carefully. The parchment was brittle, the ink faint but ornate. It certainly looked the part. “How much are you asking?” I said, pretending I was fighting a yawn.

  “Thirty gold.”

  Thirty gold for a slip of paper felt steep, even if it was historical. I countered with twenty, and after some half-hearted haggling, he caved. As he left, I congratulated myself on snagging a collector’s item for a decent price.

  An hour later, another customer—an ancient-looking goblin—came in and froze when he saw the bill displayed on the shelf. “W-where did you get this?” he asked, pointing at the money like it had insulted his family.

  “Bought it this morning,” I said. “Imperial currency, rare, original.”

  Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

  He looked at it closer, completely astonished, then snorted. “Rare MY BONY ASS. Original? Not a chance. That’s a forgery.”

  The words hit me like a bag of cursed grain. “What?”

  He leaned in, pointing at a tiny scribble in the corner of the bill. “See that mark? That's not the right signature. Whoever sold you this played you for a fool.” The goblin guffawed.

  I was fuming. Twenty gold for a fake? That was the kind of scam I usually catch before the ink dries. The goblin left, still laughing. Just as I was contemplating whether to curse the bill and re-sell it, a third customer strolled in—a young elf (no older than a hundred twenty years, I reckon) with ink-stained fingers. She spotted the bill, gasped, and snatched it off the shelf before I could stop her.

  “This is incredible!” she said, holding it up to the light.

  “Incredible?” I asked, my voice dripping with sarcasm. “It’s a fake.” I'm not usually this honest and forthcoming, but the fact I got swindled has soured my mood.

  The elf grinned. “Not just any fake. Look at the signature here. Don't you get it? This forgery was made by Sebastian Valtor, the famous painter!”

  The name rang a bell. Valtor was an eccentric artist whose works were full of subtle critiques of the Empire. His work had become highly sought after since his passing last year.

  “This is one of his earlier pieces,” the artist continued, running her fingers over the parchment. "This is worth at least two hundreds, maybe more!" She wanted to add something but then realized that she should've kept her mouth shut and bought the bill while I was still under the impression that it was worthless.

  So there you go, I’m now the proud owner of a Sebastian Valtor original, and I’ve learned a valuable lesson: sometimes getting scammed works out in your favor.

  Yours in profit,

  Garren