Limitless Path

They reappeared on Earth in their home Hall after a large number of teleports, Beth feeling like the endless chain of teleports to get anywhere was really damn annoying. Maybe by the time she was somewhat into Ascended, she could use her Ideal to teleport without wanting to pass out right after. Maybe she could even take her team with her by that point, but taking other people along was a whole different ball game than just moving herself.

"That's always such a pain," Terrimane complained after Beth's new Hall Master got done personally verifying them.

"Too bad we don’t have an Exalted that could just instantly move us here," Beth said slightly sarcastically.

"Yeah, it's too bad," Terrimane agreed. "Where the hell is Mortaine when you actually need him?"

"I was talking about you," Beth clarified as they went up to their suite.

"Oh, not me," Terrimane disagree, shaking his head. "My Ideal and powerset would be terrible for trying to move people. I'd likely just blow everyone up. Except maybe you, but still…"

"Well, that doesn't sound great, so never mind," Beth said, retracting her earlier complaining just like that.

"Uncle Terry is like that," Sera said, giving Terrimane a faux sweet smile. "Lots of boom and bang, not a lot of direct control."

"I'm pretty sure that was vaguely insulting," Terrimane said as they entered the suite.

"What do you mean, 'vaguely'?" Beth asked.

"Anyway, where's this mana?" Terrimane asked, bypassing the byplay.

"Just checking if anybody's in residency first," Beth said, looking around the suite. A few quick messages confirmed that nobody was present on Earth other than them, though the team was ready to reassemble now that the visit to Sera's family was mostly done.

"Let's get this troublemaker dropped off, then," Sera said on seeing the confirmation that they were alone.

"Let's grab the cruiser," Beth said, leading the way out of the building, noting that they passed by an awful lot of people in the hallways. It had been years and years now, objective time, since Earth's integration into the wider universe, and all those years going by had fundamentally transformed the place. The CRA had become a rather popular destination and Beth could easily see why; just two golds as an entry fee, which wasn't all that much in the grand scheme of things, and one got access to all kinds of services and benefits, even if what a Copper Emblem could access was limited. On top of that, the CRA had cheap housing, food that was practically free, and was a gathering place of the strong. Of course it had an attraction to anybody who was even a little interested in becoming stronger or bettering themselves.

They had 'parked' the cruiser in orbit right before they left, Beth figuring it was a lot safer off-world than it would be on the ground somewhere, and not because of the chances of beasts finding it. The ship had some really tough defenses, but all a thief really needed to succeed were two things; time and access. Putting it somewhere where only the CRA Senior Enforcers had any hope at all of getting to it let Beth have much better peace of mind about teleporting thirty jumps away without any of their team left to watch the extremely valuable item. The cruiser was fine, much to her relief, and landed in a field just south of their home Hall with no issues. She saw Terrimane eying the ship after it landed and gave him a solid kick, cratering the ground and sending him flying to the other end of the open field. It wasn't enough force to even damage his clothes, but it sent the message, and he was more circumspect about the magnificence of their cruiser, or so Beth thought of it as.

Thy took off for a very short flight, considering the cruiser was much more limited in they didn't want to cause issues with moving too fast through the atmosphere, that short flight wasn't at even a fraction of their top speed, but it still took no time at all. They landed just to the side of the mound where they had found the array that was gathering or generating or manipulating other mana into holy mana to then forge sacred mana. Apparently, no one had stopped by since they had last been there, or they had just briefly stopped and hadn't been able to figure anything out and simply moved on. Beth could tell just by the fact that as much sacred mana was wafting off the top of the hill as there had been the first time they discovered the oddity. Terrimane was rubbing his hands together and grinning before they even landed, clearly more than well-pleased with the mana that he could already detect. As soon as the ship was down and the hatches could be opened, he was out the door and into the hill. Since he had been moving at Exalted speeds, true Exalted speeds and not just the very pale imitation that Beth could do, all four of the girls lost sight of him instantly.

He wasn't all that hard to find, however, as he was exactly where they would have to go, standing by the array in the chamber far underground. Beth had some memories of fighting through a lot beasts to get there and then in the chamber to access the array, but there was nothing but a few bloodstains around. Fresh bloodstains. Well, that was what happened when an Exalted really got serious about something; likely Terrimane had killed every beast in the whole tunnel system in just an instant and either vaporized the corpses or just tossed them all in some spatial storage. While spatial storage items and powers were rare, they wouldn't be hard to get for someone like the old dragon, and some of the skills that gave spatial storage could grow to the size of a planet and beyond. Hell, Beth's reliquary was the size of a small planet, and total space was not at all what Zel had been going for when he first made the damned thing. It wouldn't be a surprise to encounter an Exalted with a storage power that could scoop up a couple thousand beast corpses and drop them in a corner without even making a dent in available space.

Terrimane himself was standing just outside the array and studying it intently, sending little pulses of mana into the air and muttering to himself. Beth wasn't sure what he was talking about, but he seemed fascinated by the array, and spent a long time making observations before he did anything. To Beth's mild surprise, he pulled out a box that looked like it was made of beat-up old sheet metal and opened the lid, though that wasn't the surprising part. The surprising part was when the box managed to perfectly suck all the sacred mana out of the array without tampering with or altering the array in any way, at least that her novice eye could tell. Once the last little particle of sacred mana had been sucked up, Terrimane closed the box with a satisfying click and a big smile on his face.

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"You don’t mind if I make off with this array, do you?" he asked, eyeing them.

"I consider it that we sold it to you. Honestly, I thought you were just going to take the whole thing or take it apart in the first place," Beth replied with a shrug.

"The mana is the first priority, but the array would prove quite useful," Terrimane said. "There are a lot more places that produce holy mana than sacred mana, thus my quandary, and if I can move this array without breaking it, a big 'if,' then I can set myself up my own personal mana farm. It's a rare type that I haven't needed until recently, so it would be extremely valuable for my projects."

"Well, we have no need of it right now, and we can always get some mana from you if we need any," Sera added. "Right, uncle Terry."

"Yes, yes, you can have some mana if you run out," Terrimane said with a sigh, making the strange metal box disappear. "Now, I've got to see about setting up a catching array and layering a warding seal. Hmm, if I just use a temporal shift seal to grab the whole area…"

"Let's leave him," Sera said as Terrimane trailed off. "He's a skilled enchanter, but moving something like this isn't easy even if you're the one that set it up in the first place, which he certainly isn't. This might take him quite some time."

"You guys head back. I want to watch and see if I learn anything," Val replied, waving the others off.

Blood was tempted to stay with her girlfriend, who she stuck close to most of the time, but she lost out to the thrill of flying the ship, if only for a short time. Well, they didn't have anything extremely pressing to do, so she could maybe sneak off with the cruiser for some time in the pilot's seat without anybody else bothering her. Or, that was the plan, anyway, until they returned to the Hall and their suite to find an unexpected guest waiting for them. Beth really should say an unexpected guest for so soon, but she had known that others would be showing up from time to time and had counted on this person being back at some point as well.

" 'bout time," Baelvyr grumbled as the three of them entered.

"Well, good to see you don't mind a little B-and-E on the weekends," Beth replied a bit sarcastically as they found places around the living room of the suite and sat.

"I 'ear ya've been a bit busy," Baelvyr said, leaning back in a chair that he had clearly brought himself and resting his hands on his prodigious gut.

Beth leaned forward and punched at Baelvyr, shooting a thin stream of white flame at him that he blocked with a strange, flickering aura that Beth wasn't able to recognize at all. It could have been a special skill, it could have been an item, or it could have been a manifestation of his own Ideal, it was just very difficult for her to tell, particularly given Baelvyr's incredible skill at, well, everything. He did give a small grunt, which for him was like a chainsaw going through a gravel pit, and raise one thick eyebrow far above the other. Beth had been hoping for just a bit more reaction out of him than that, but he waved her away.

"Ya got yer Ideal all sorted. Welcome to the club, girlie; ya just gotta live long enough to see it put into practice," he said.

"Well, I can use it now," Beth said.

"At a fraction the power ya could call on when you get past Ascended and likely for a tiny amount of time," he said with a dismissive snort. "But still, it's a great accomplishment, and one less of ya little twerps I gotta worry about gettin' over that hurdle. I see the rest of ya've made some progress, too. Where's the rest of the rabble?"

"On their way back from various places," Sera said. "But Val is down with uncle Terry at that place we found sacred mana a few years back."

"Oh, that little brat; I'll hav' ta go box 'is ears a bit when I'm done with ya lot," Baelvyr said, and it honestly took Beth a second to parse that he was talking about Terrimane. "Anyway, I got somethin' for ya punks, if'n ya got a bit free to handle all that runnin' around right now?"

"I mean, we were just going to focus hard on leveling," Beth said with a shrug. "We all got Mana Physiques, even Neph, the bee girl, and we just need to get some more levels under our belts. Sera even got a Physique that basically makes her immortal, so you don't have to worry about her not having enough time to realize her Ideal, either."

"Mmm, watcha get, girlie?" Baelvyr asked, leaning back and tilting his head up at Sera.

"Dragon Ruler of Iron Stars. It's a Diamond-level Physique that focuses on Endurance and outlasting everything," Sera said.

"I know similar stuff; Diamond-level is excellent, even considerin' yer advantages," Baelvyr said. "Anything else ya got that I need to know?"

"We all hit Master, but I think you knew that," Beth said, seeing him nod in response. "Uh, we, that is, Blood, Val, Sera, and I, did the Grand Palace."

"Damn, that squirrely little cheapskate opened it up for ya lot?" Baelvyr grunted.

"Weird to hear someone describe my dad like that," Sera muttered. She then said, "Yeah, there were two groups that came in with big payouts, and the other clans were willing to contribute to get their heirs and a few other promising candidates pushed through."

"I take it ya lot won? Don’t tell me ya couldn't beat a couple lizards and random grunts e'en with yer power?" Baelvyr said.

"We won, and by a landslide," Beth said with a haughty tilt to her chin. "Got tier seven and tier eight skills as rewards."

"Huh, you actually pick somethin' good, girlie? Didn't get a tier eight for punchin' mountains flatter'n normal or somethin', didja?" he said.

"I did not get a skill for punching mountains," Beth practically growled, making a lance of energy from her skill appear and punch towards Baelvyr's head. The ogre casually reached up and caught it, even though Beth tried to detonate it, which didn't work for some reason. He examined the energy in his fist closely for a few moments before grunting and squeezing down, crushing the attack into nothingness.

"Celestial and spatial. Ain't what I woulda picked for ya, but it'll do just fine. Space is fine for ya, just wouldn't've leaned into the whole celestial thing, even though I know ya really like that punchy skill ya got," he said.

"Well, okay, but I had limited options and limited time. I think this is a damn good skill, and it has stuff in the description already about seeing through illusions and some other good utility," Beth argued, defending herself.

"Look, tier eight skills are rare'n tier ten beast cores and twice as strong. I ain't sayin' ya made a bad call, per se. I'm just sayin', with yer build, I woulda prolly gone for somethin' pure space. Didja have that as an option?" he said.

"Yes and no," Beth said, though she shook her head side-to-side. "I had a tier seven skill that seemed really strong that I considered for a minute, but I just didn't think it was as strong, nor as versatile, as the tier eight skill. I just really couldn't pass up the tier eight skill for anything else, even something that was deeper into my specialty. Besides, I do just fine with celestial, thank you very much."

"Sure, sure, ain't a great loss one way or the other. I can count the number of people that have a tier eight skill on both hands. Well…maybe I need a couple toes, too, if'n we're talkin' about the whole Milky Way, but definitely not more than that," he said. "Tier nine is the real beast; I have suspicions, but I don't know for sure anybody that has somethin' at that tier. Think yer little Manumitted buddies are the only ones likely to really have somethin'."

"Enough about my skill choices," Beth said then. "What did you come here for?"

"Ah, right. Got a job," he said. "It'll involve punchin' a lot of important people, likely really hard. Ya think that sounds interestin'."

"Sign us up!" Beth exclaimed, eyes gleaming.

"After you explain more," Sera said in an exasperated tone, pushing Beth back down in her seat.