Limitless Path

With the paperwork all done, which had taken a little longer than Beth thought, they were given keys to the house. Like Beth had assumed earlier, they could use digital keys to access the front and back doors, as well as the gates in the perimeter wall, and they could either share the key, or a temporary version, with anyone with a communicator. The house was also registered to them in the governmental databases, which meant their claim to the property wasn't really questionable, and also meant that they were now registered taxpayers. Yay.

Beth was hoping that that was all wrapped up, but as she had just been pondering, and Sera pointed out, they were lacking in anything but appliances and a couple basic pieces of furniture. They would need chairs, rugs, couches, a full dining set for the large dining room, silverware and utensils, cooking equipment such as pots and pans, beds, dressers, nightstands, end tables, decorative pieces, and possibly a lot more. It really also depended on how they were going to decorate and what they were going to use some of the rooms for. Beth wasn't sure they needed even one office, let alone multiple, and she didn't really know what they would do with several of the empty rooms on the first floor, but she supposed they could figure it out with time. For now, it would be a good idea to hit up a couple places, starting with getting beds. They could do a bulk order from a place that had really nice beds and get them delivered and set up before seeing about getting the kitchen and dining room squared away. Once they had comfortable places to sleep and they could take care of cooking and sitting somewhere nice to eat, then they could start filling everything else in. They also needed to grab some wood from somewhere, as the manor had several fireplaces and Beth would like a small stack of logs to use in said fireplaces. They back patio even had a metal rack that was meant to store a cord or so of wood in it, so they had somewhere on the property to keep it.

"Beds first," Beth said to Sera, sharing her thoughts on the process.

"I can recommend a store for beds and one for other sundry furniture," Illiem said, as they hadn't left the conference room yet.

"Sure, send us your recs," Beth said. "I'm surprised you don't have something to sell us there."

"We don't really deal in furniture," Illiem said, waving a hand dismissively in what Beth was learning was a common gesture of his. "If the piece of furniture is extraordinary in some way, either through historical significance or by giving the person using it a boost of some kind, we might dabble in it. Then again, I rather doubt such important and bespoke pieces are what you are looking for; certainly not for every room in the house."

"That's true, we just want some nice mattresses and bedframes that we can set up in the bedrooms, nothing crazy fancy," Beth responded.

"We do, however," Illiem said before they could leave, "sell top-of-the-line training equipment, including some equipment that, quite frankly, puts the CRA equipment to shame. If you need anything to furnish the two training rooms on the estate, do not hesitate to contact me. I can arrange for the very best of the best for you."

"Thanks for the assistance, Illiem. I'm sure we'll be talking again soon," Beth said, giving him a nod before leaving.

"Good to meet you," Sera added, also giving him a nod before following after Beth.

What followed on from that was two days of shopping, the two using the rest of that day on checking Illiem's recommendations and getting orders placed. They used the entire next day to shop for much of what else they would need, securing plenty of furniture and other essentials. They even got soap and bathing products for all the bathrooms, which is something Beth only realized as they were most of the way through the second day. Turned out, outfitting not just a house but a full mansion, almost entirely from scratch, took a lot of time, planning, and effort. They did get much of what they ordered delivered, which included people moving the furniture in and setting it up just where they wanted it, but that still left them with a lot to do. More purchases always seemed to be popping up over the next few days, but at least Beth was getting a good idea where both nearby stores, and the highest quality stores, which weren't necessarily the same thing, were located. She also made sure to get enough food to fill the very large refrigerator and freezer, plus plenty of stuff for the pantry and cupboards, though she made sure to get a lot of stuff that could stay good for months or years. The pantry was itself enchanted to help extend the shelf-life of the products stored within, but Beth knew that they likely wouldn't be using the manor as much as would require a full pantry. Likely things were going to be sitting in there for years at a time.

She hadn't really expected the whole ordeal to take so much time, but they made sure to get most of what they needed ready for other people to move in. Beth also knew that her team and any others she invited over would have storage items or powers and would have their own things that they needed, but it still didn't do to be a bad host and not have whatever their guests needed available. That meant another trip out to get towels and cleaning supplies, something that they had just totally forgotten initially, followed by a second trip to grab some more serious drinking options, including plenty of hard liquors and booze. Beth was sure they were forgetting stuff, but they had the house mostly furnished, food, drinks, cleaning supplies, extra towels and cloths, extra clothes and bit of fabric just in case, and even a few miscellaneous things like decks of cards that might come up. There was more they would need to get, but she also knew that they couldn't get it a hundred percent right, especially when the two of them were so used to living out of their spatial powers and not using what was in a house around them. They would just have to play it by ear and hope that things didn't go too off the rails.

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That meant it was time to go get the team, who she was sure were enjoying the slightly long break, given that they often tried to keep up with Beth in working like dogs. She didn't force them to do anything, but the whole lot was a self-motivated bunch and would go hard just to improve, let alone if they had somebody to chase. Or even compete with, as the case may be, as she knew that some of them were very serious about outdoing each other. As long as it didn't cause friction within the team, which had so far not been a problem at all, other than Veren, who they had just accepted was an ass, she was fine with people within the team competing. Trying to build a better Mana Physique, trying to reach Grandmaster first (Veren didn't count), trying to get a skill to Diamond or Mithril first, and so on and so forth. Beth thought it was a bit of healthy competition that the others would work to race each other, though she also made sure they weren't taking unnecessary risks. Not that she was really one to speak on that subject, or perhaps it was because she could speak on that subject authoritatively that she kept an eye on it.

Grabbing just about everybody, apart from Adam, who had gone off for his own relaxation and hadn't yet returned, they brought them to Zephyr Prime. That alone was already a lot for them to handle; Beth still loved just experiencing the planet, even after having been there for more than a week and slightly gotten used to it. The whole time they made their way to the mansion, which was not exactly close to any off-world teleporters, she got to vicariously live through her friends and teammates getting that first time experience on the world. There was still a range of reactions, obviously, as Bjorn remained stoic, Kris was shy and muted, and Andrea was boisterous and loud. The others all fell someone in-between, with Val being the one whose reactions were the most muted, or maybe even disingenuous, depending on perspective, as she tried to be cool, calm, and professional while still noticeably being excited about the planet and what they were doing.

The reactions were much more subdued to the mansion itself, as they all had experienced very luxurious accomodations over the years, though it was a bit of surprise that Beth and Sera had jointly bought it. She was touched when other members of the team offered to reimburse them, as they felt like it wasn't an expense that just the two of them should take on, but Beth explained she viewed it more as her house. Well, hers and Sera's, and that the others were welcome there, obviously, but that it was more than just a base for the team. It was a place, possibly one of a few, that would be a very long term home for her, and others as well, especially Sera, but she didn't need or want any of the others' money going towards the house. She did say that they could buy or bring their own furniture or provisions; whatever they liked that would keep them happy in the house, much the same as when they rented suites together.

It was a new day, with a new base, and a new set of goals, though the goals were really just ones they had been working on but reprioritized a bit. They were getting ready for a rebirth, but they needed to do some farming at this point. They needed items to sell to Seven Lights to bulk up their finances a little bit, and they also really needed to concentrate on the items for Mortaine and Laselle. Luckily, one of those items, well several of those items, they could get through Beth's gate without having to go out and get any other beasts or equipment or anything. Some of them they could get through her gate if they found other beasts or got specialized equipment. Finally, some of it they would just have to hoof it to get, buying details and information from organizations like the Black Ships or information brokers. Beth wanted to kill multiple birds with several stones and start slaughtering one of the two types of beast they had access to that would start fulfilling Mortaine's requirements.

That meant getting the gate setup, and she was thinking about making one of the empty rooms on the first floor the gate room. Honestly, there wasn't really any need to do much, as beasts from within her gate couldn't get out of the gate, no matter what. There also wasn't any kind of limit on how many people could go in or at what times, so they didn't really need a waiting area or anything like that. Still, there was something about having an area set aside, something that was dedicated just to a specific function, that made things just feel better. Speaking of that, she was likely going to turn two of the other empty rooms into rooms for them to work on their crafting. It would be nice to have somewhere in a house they had access to in order to do that, and it would be even better in their mansion, as she could have the gate open to something other than the residence and people would still have workspaces available to them. That actually took care of three of the entirely empty rooms, meaning she really only had to figure out what to do with the fourth one. No need to make it into guest quarters or anything like that, so she was really out of ideas for the moment.

She wasn't out of stuff to do, of course, as they had the gate open to a particular kind of golem that could drop aspected golem cores when killed. They were one of the rare kinds of beast that had a part or piece that was special or secondary to the being itself that could be harvested without a looting skill. Golem cores, as Beth had learned oh so long ago, were rather valuable, even at low levels, and they were not killing any low level golems. The lowest level they were going to be tackling would be level four hundred and fifty, though several members of the group, especially Beth herself, would be fighting beasts at level five or more. The golem cores didn't really get all that much better at level five hundred, but they would contain even more energy, and she was sure Mortaine would appreciate the higher quality goods versus what else the team could get. They could get the higher level cores for Mortaine and sell the lower level ones which were, to be fair, still of a very high level compared to what even a lot of Enlightened would be getting their hands on.

It wasn't a small order, either, Beth needed to be absolutely clear about that, as just for golem cores, Mortaine had asked them to get two thousand. Luckily, they had Beth's cheat-like powers to get that without having to spend weeks, or more likely, many months hunting pockets of golems or fighting for entry to a golem-centric dungeon. The other items on the list were as rare or even rarer and they were required in even greater quantities, so this was not going to be an easy order to fulfill. It was good that most of what they needed could be gotten from Beth's gate, even if they would need specialized equipment for some of it. They could get around the equipment if they had a looting power, which Beth did, but not leveled enough. If her power were at peak Gold or into Platinum, they could rely on it to harvest what they needed from some of the special beasts or monsters they would need to hunt, but Beth's power still wasn't there yet. In that case, they were going to need some special gear, very much like what they had used on the devils so long ago, to be able to guarantee they got the right items.

The whole time, of course, they would be harvesting a lot more than just what was strictly necessary, selling off the extras at Seven Lights and Red Sun. Beth was hoping that they could backfill a bit of the purchase price of the house with that, but she knew that it would really take some big sales to get that kind of money coming in. They were going to need some high level equipment, a few entombed hearts, and possibly more besides to get the kind of money that they had just spent back. Well, Beth wasn't really that worried about it, as she knew they had a lot of options, including time. If they were making a smaller amount of cash, but they did that for a few years, they would still wind up with a lot of money. Even tiny amounts, when lots of those tiny amounts were all pooled together, could add up to a massive amount.