The magistrate stared at the small, cylindrical object resting in Ryan's open palm with the profound, unsparing suspicion of a regional compliance director inspecting a blatantly fraudulent expense claim. The lacquered folding fan hovered mid-air, its decorative silk tassels trembling slightly as the official leaned closer to examine the strange, smooth white plastic and the tiny metal clip bearing no recognizable mon or ancestral seal. To the stern-faced bureaucrat of the merchant ward, the mundane ballpoint pen was clearly an alien artifact—a contraband item of impossible synthetic manufacture that defied every established trade register and guild guideline.
"This," the magistrate pronounced, his voice dropping into the resonant, gravelly register of a man used to extracting confessions from recalcitrant suppliers, "bears no mark of the imperial mint, nor any stamp of the honorable lacquer guilds. Explain its origin, clerk, or answer for the unlawful acquisition of state-restricted goods." Two guards shifted their weight on their wooden sandals, their staves clicking against the cobblestones in a rhythmic cadence that sounded suspiciously like an audit timer ticking down.
Ryan offered a faint, patient sigh, adjusting the strap of his canvas messenger bag as if he were simply trying to clear up a minor billing discrepancy with an obstinate accounts payable clerk. With the practiced calm of an events coordinator explaining why a vendor's delivery was late, he clicked the pen's plunger twice—click-click—and politely suggested that if the magistrate had a formal grievance regarding office stationery allocation, they could always file an inquiry with the regional administrative committee, provided they managed to submit it before the morning commuter rush entirely congested the district.