The Case of the Giggling Guild

My life had become a prison of relentless competence. It had been a week since that monstrous, two-name plaque was bolted to my office door, and every day was a fresh new hell of proactive assistance. Sir Justus, my paladin-in-residence, had taken to his role as my partner with the zealous fervor of a convert.

He had reorganized my beautiful, chaotic mess of paperwork into a color-coded system. He had replaced my hidden stash of greasy meat skewers with what he called “nutritially balanced holy wafers,” which tasted like sanctified cardboard.

 Worst of all, he had instituted a mandatory 7 a.m. “morning readiness drill,” which consisted of him doing one-armed push-ups while reciting holy scriptures and me trying to muffle my own screams into my nap pillow.

My open rebellion—leaving my boots on the desk, snoring loudly during his tactical briefings, attempting to use his polished shield as a ramen bowl—was met with an unshakeable, serene patience. He saw my sloth not as a character flaw, but as a divine test. My laziness was his holy crusade.

This morning, the torture took a new form. Director Godwin burst in, looking more frazzled than usual, and slapped a new report on my horrifyingly organized desk.

“Emergency dispatch, Inspector!” he announced. “We have a situation at the Tailor’s Guild.”

Justus was instantly on his feet, his hand on the pommel of his sword. “What is it, Director? A demonic infestation? A cursed tapestry threatening to unravel the fabric of society?”

“Worse,” Godwin said, his face grim. “It’s a giggle curse.”

There was a profound silence in the room. I slowly lowered the comic book I had been reading. “A what now?”

“A giggle curse,” Godwin repeated, deadly serious. “The entire Tailor’s Guild, from the master tailor down to the apprentices, has been afflicted. They can’t stop laughing. It sounds harmless, but it’s causing chaos. Seams are crooked, needles are slipping… a duke received a pair of trousers yesterday with one leg six inches shorter than the other! It’s threatening to become a diplomatic incident!”

Justus’s face was a mask of righteous fury. “Laughter, when not born of a righteous victory over evil, is a tool of chaos! A frivolous contagion that saps the will and weakens the soul! We must strike at this insidious evil with all our might!”

I stared at him. “It’s the giggles, man, not the apocalypse.” I turned to Godwin. “Sounds hilarious. Let’s file this one under ‘comedy of errors’ and go to lunch. I’m thinking noodles.”

“Absolutely not!” a sharp voice cut in from the doorway. Auditor Eliza stood there, her black slate in hand, her fiery red hair a halo of disapproval. “A potential city-wide magical contagion falls squarely within this department’s purview. I am very interested to see your team’s rapid-response protocol in action.”

I groaned, letting my head fall onto the desk. My nightmare team-up was complete. I was now trapped on a mandatory field trip with a holy warrior and a tax accountant from hell.

“Fine,” I grumbled, pushing myself to my feet. “Let’s go fight the forces of… mirth. Edgar! You’re on note-taking duty. Try to capture the sheer, mind-numbing stupidity of this entire situation for posterity.”

We arrived at a fine-looking establishment with a swinging sign that read The Golden Thread Haberdashery. From within, we could hear it: a tidal wave of uncontrollable, hysterical laughter. It wasn't the sound of joy; it was the sound of madness.

I pushed the door open. The scene was pure, unadulterated chaos. Brawny, bearded tailors were bent over their sewing machines, their shoulders shaking with violent, helpless giggles. Needles and thread flew everywhere. The guild master, a mountain of a man with a magnificent beard, staggered towards us, tears of laughter streaming down his face.“Inspector!” he bellowed, before breaking down into a fit of giggles. “Thank the gods! You have to help us! It started… hee hee… after we received a shipment of… ho ho ho… enchanted silk from the eastern isles! It’s… BWAHAHAHAHAAAA!” He lost all control, doubling over and slapping his knee.

While Justus tried and failed to perform an exorcism on a pincushion and Eliza attempted to quarantine the area, I made my way to the back of the shop. Just as the guild master had said, a large, magnificent bolt of silk stood in the corner. It shimmered with an unnatural, rainbow-colored light and practically hummed with chaotic, joyful energy.

There you are, I thought. The source code of all this stupidity.

“Stand back,” I announced. The various guild members, still chortling, gave me a wide berth. Even Justus and Eliza paused their futile efforts to watch. This was it, the moment the Max-Level Hero was supposed to solve everything with a single, dramatic move. Time to deploy my go-to for low-level magical annoyances.I extended my hand toward the shimmering silk, a series of complex, silver runes forming in the air before my palm. “Dispel,” I commanded.

A wave of pure, anti-magic energy washed over the bolt of silk. The air crackled. For a second, I thought it had worked. Then, nothing. The silk continued to shimmer. The tailors continued to giggle. The curse remained completely unaffected.Justus looked baffled. Eliza’s eyebrow shot up, and she made a sharp note on her slate. I, on the other hand, was starting to understand. I could feel the nature of the magic now. Dispel. My standard issue, lazy-man’s solution for any dark arts nonsense. It only works on demonic, necrotic, or general-purpose evil magic. This... this isn't evil. It's pathologically cheerful. It’s like trying to kill a puppy with a hug. My entire skill set is geared for fighting Demon Kings, not pathologically happy textiles.

“The curse is not of a demonic nature,” I announced, trying to sound like I’d expected this all along. “It’s a positive-energy enchantment. My standard dispelling magic is useless here.”

“So what do we do?” the guild master asked between gasps of laughter.I looked at the bolt of silk, the source of all this pain. My pain, specifically. There was only one option left for a lazy man who wanted to go home.

“We destroy the source,” I declared. “To stop it from infecting anyone else.”“Destroy it?!” he shrieked. “But it’s priceless Fae silk! It’s worth a fortune!”“Public health takes precedence over your bottom line,” Eliza stated coolly, siding with me for once.

I didn’t wait for further argument. I walked over, placed my hand on the silk, and channeled a tiny, contained burst of pure, destructive energy into it. The magnificent, shimmering fabric didn't even burn; it just unraveled at a molecular level, turning into a pile of fine, inert dust in less than a second.The rainbow-colored hum in the room vanished. The source was gone. I had saved the day.

Except for one, tiny, insignificant detail.

Everyone in the room who had already been laughing… was still laughing.

I stared at the guild master, who was still slapping his knee. I looked over at Edgar, who was still giggling helplessly in his corner. Destroying the source had prevented the curse from spreading, but it had done nothing for those already afflicted. The magic was now self-sustaining inside their bodies.

Oh, you have got to be kidding me, I thought, a wave of profound weariness washing over me. I took out the enemy fortress, but now I have to hunt down all the little soldiers it sent out. This is a logistical nightmare. This means... follow-up work.

We retreated from the still-laughing guild, our mission a resounding partial failure. Back in the office, the mood was grim. Justus was pacing, frustrated that a non-evil force had baffled him. Eliza was writing a lengthy report on our inability to fully resolve the crisis.

I sat at my desk, staring at the ceiling. This was unacceptable. This problem had now cost me an entire afternoon, and it was threatening to infect my tomorrow as well. This was going to require a cure. A potion or something. Something I’d have to personally invent because no one else here knew what they were doing.

An idea—a terrible, lazy, and utterly brilliant idea—began to form in my mind. The desire to never have to leave my office for a field inspection again was a powerful, powerful motivator.