A round around town, Part 2

The job paid well. Most work involving magic did, and we got additional benefits and money than the norm for spellcasters of the same level due to the potential danger and discomforts of our work life. Not that that was the only reason I took it up, mind you. Part of it comes down to the fact I was never bothered by the idea of fighting as a part of living. But getting to know the Wild World directly was nice, and fighting was enjoyable for me, so long as there was no killing involved. Most of the time we're asked to fight something the Pact of Union keeps things bloodless on both ends, after all. I still wouldn't recommend trying this if you can't handle getting hurt, hurting others or walking through forests for days straight, on some occasions. Though by then I really enjoyed that kind of life. 

After we finished the necessary paperwork, Senshin and Sowanar picked up some baggage that they stored in the building. Since he would be working with the association, our knight chose to leave some of his gear there, instead of the inn he and the sister were sleeping in. Some of Nalfimiria's things were also there, but according to her most of her gear was in one of the temples. Not that we would need to visit it. As she put it, once we had a fixed location they would be delivered through special means. Likely they would just be teleported there. Why bother carrying items the normal way when you could teleport around at will? 

I also would be very surprised if the gear belonging to a sister was ever to be trusted to normal storage spaces. Even if everyone knows they have means of tracking them, occasional attempts at stealing Guiding Eyes still happen. It's possible there would be people willing to try to break in just to try to study how it all works, when there are no Path Tracers putting it all to use. As respected as the sisterhood was, bringing around things beyond the comprehension of anyone else kind of attracted that sort of curiosity, even if it was a known fact you couldn't get away with trying to steal from them. 

The sisterhood's Artifacts are literally priceless, after all. Buying them normally is impossible, and more or less everyone knows they're thousands of years ahead of everyone else in magical engineering. And while the Earth Towers and Azure Line trains are always open for visitors, the gap between them and what normal people can accomplish is too large for anything useful to be learned from observing their functioning. Almost every mage alive knows how an Earth Tower functions. It's just an obscenely massive application of levity infusing, among other things. The problem is figuring out how to generate enough magical essence to pull a feat like that off. In theory, the armor distributed through the sisterhood is a much smaller example of these same principles. Thus why it is considered an easier method to try to study Lady Telphilicallys's techniques. These sets rarely ever were offered as studying material, though. And as far as most who saw them is concerned, it's just a case of extremely potent enchantments being applied to metals that are already magical in nature. Whether there actually was a secret or it was simply Ascendent level magic at work, people weren't even certain of. 

That bit of explaining aside, after leaving there we went on a little track so that each of us could get our stuff. Everyone was somewhat near to the guild, being that Chiaisei and I were the farthest away from it. Looking at the boys carrying most of their belongings through the streets almost made me pity their backs as well. Of course, I knew they likely had some significant training in infusing, so this likely wasn't that big of a deal for them. I mean, Nalfimiria even took charge of lugging around part of their gear, so there was also that bit of help. Not that I pitied her, by the way. I was pretty sure I could climb on her back atop all of that baggage and she still would find the task easy. 

Still, after a quick round of picking stuff up, we all were loaded. I was the lightest one in the group by far (With the exception of Nalfimiria who only had her cloth bags on their stay), so I was helping out Chiaisei with her things (Unlike Senshin the amount of travel bags she had with her was easy testament to the fact she just moved to a different region). From there, the plan was to head for a homing office around the zone of our choice. We pondered on the inn-hoping lifestyle for a few minutes, though quickly figured the group was in a good enough position for a fixed stay (And that neither of our princesses had an amount of belongings compatible with that kind of living.) And since there was a district specifically meant for low level mages in that city, that decision wasn't a difficult one to make. It was bordering the massive natural park we mentioned before, and as that place had been adapted for training wizards, it equally made sense to keep them near it and normal people further away. 

From then, once we began the process of looking for a permanent stay, the idea was to go to a nearby hotel and camp out there until we found our spot. During that time, the guild wouldn't be sending jobs our way. Looking for a place to live technically counted as preparations for the unit, so technically it already counted as work. Like with the unit search, though, the wait ended immediately. "Sowanar's boss might have had a hand in this as well." I didn't bring it up, but it looked like both Chiaisei and I had been thinking about it. Either way, when they began the description of the open spot it kinda became clear why it had been available. 

The place was basically the equivalent of barracks to independant mages. For one, it was a house, so that in itself would normally add some taxes that are really unnecessary for us. The layout of the place was kinda what made it stick out, though. So, two floors, 9 rooms, a balcony. The first floor had five rooms, and the smallest was an armory, which seemed really secure based on the description (it used a magical security system). Not like you need that much space to keep gear, if it was for few people. But as I will mention later, the place predicted a massive unit would be making use of it, thus why it not only had a ton of space for weapons but 12 different armor racks ready (There were a few more that weren't ready but instead in parts for assembling.) The pantry was the second smallest, and it kind of doubled down as the laundry as well. It was then connected to the place's kitchen. That thing was massive, and it also had a massive fridge. Why, you ask? Likely because it was expected to prepare the meals for up to ten people at once. Again, the recurring issue of that place. There was a living space separating the two halves of the floor (kitchen and pantry on one side, the armory and bath on the other). Kind of compact, yet definitely big enough to house a table meant for five or six. 

The last room there was the bath. And it was big. There were 3 showers, 10 bathing sinks and an internal pool on it. Basically, it was meant to always have enough space for a more normal sized group. There was also a changing room leading to it. And since we are on a big streak, let's cover the second floor. There were four restrooms in it, as well as the mentioned balcony, however they were normally sized. The bedrooms, though? They were biiiiiiiiiig. Not the princess sort of big, with a bed that occupied twice as much space as the whole room of a normal person. If the barracks analogy wasn't good enough yet, those rooms had a lot of bunk beds. There were floor mats stored in the wardrobes for the rooms, in case you somehow needed more space, but even without them, counting each bunk bed as two, there was room for twenty people to sleep in that house by default. And there were reserve bunk beds! The rooms weren't even as cramped as they could be in the pictures we were shown. BIIiIIIIiIIIIIIIiIIIG HOUSE! Even the garden on it was big, as it was more or less meant as a training space for the big inhabitants of the big house. Honestly, I was surprised there weren't any ogre sized beds in that place. Guess they wouldn't be compact enough, and making bunk beds* for ogres would be terrifying.

(*Then again, the normal beds were made to be capable of compacting themselves together. Just in case you needed to get the room even more compacted than usual. BIG!) 

Back to the barracks comparison, because that place clearly was meant for a group of anything between 15 to 30 people. Not only that, but the street it was placed on had multiple houses in the same style, and that was the biggest variety. What's the issue? Well, mages that are looking for housing typically only plan on living with their unit. And guild units rarely grew above 8 members. Seeing the issue? You would need to share that place among multiple units to make full use of it. Not exactly the kind of choice just anyone would make. Living with up to five people can get messy as it is, ten or twenty is another matter entirely. And sure, I'm confident there were people willing. Besides, if that place was being occupied by multiple units, it was entirely possible the place wouldn't be fully inhabited most of the time. It would also mean there would always be someone there to look over the place, so no risk of it getting too dirty during work days of it being vacant. Still, you might have realized a big gamble on this presumption. 

Namely, would you sign up for a place like that if you didn't already know at least 15 people who wanted to share it with you? It was planned for 20 inhabitants, after all! I don't think you would, would you? For one, there is no guarantee you will find enough people to share it with to make the taxes over it reasonable. Though most importantly, living with someone else can be difficult, as I mentioned. The more you have, the messier things can get. And twenty people sharing a place is a lot. Do you know 20 people you would be willing to share a house with? Because I certainly didn't! And I was pretty sure I was far less demanding in regards to that than most others. This shit would be madness, not only because trying it would be nuts as is, however also because it presumed you could find 3 or 4 more groups of mages that were willing. Hell, I wouldn't be surprised if previous inhabitants of the place had taken in normal people or civil mages, just to try to make the price for that thing easier to handle, despite the fact the whole structure clearly had been created to house spellcasters. 

So, as you might expect, finding people to fill up that place was tough for the agents overseeing the region. And most of the people they did find didn't occupy it for very long. At most points in time, they would fail at finding people for all houses of that type. And as much as it was clear the idea never had been good by that point, there was enough of a need for that niche so that remodeling them felt like a waste to this office. Or at least remodeling all of them. Especially since with the location of the place - right in front of the park, just close enough to occasionally hear the occasional explosion from the training space - probably wasn't ideal for taller buildings*. Instead, as of then they wanted to offer some initial discounts for occupants of that place.

(*That, and the pain it would be to remodel the whole building, as it was pretty big.)

There was no guarantee we would find additional people to share that place with, but for the first two months of usage of it we would get a discount for the taxation for the occupied space. It wouldn't be quite as low as a room that was actually fit for 5 people (and a bird) though it was still a pretty big cut. They even allowed us to split the initial quota for a longer period of time. Not that it was needed. While we were discussing it, our pink elven bank offered us a more elegant solution. Namely, she would pay the settling bill and the rest of us would pay her back slowly, with no fees. Some of us could also pay their share from the start (without much repercussions), so we didn't even need to take too much of Nalfimiria's wallet*. 

(*Remember the comment I made about her having enough coins in her purses to sign up to a house with live money? Yeah, she didn't simply buy our slot upfront, she did so with physical coin. Apparently the wallet she had with us was just a small portion of what she was keeping in her storage with the sisterhood. I had never seen so much cash being traded around without an actual bank involved up to that point.) 

—I'm starting to think you're even richer than I imagined you were. — I commented, after the transaction was mostly over. 

—Of course! My allowance doesn't come just from my parents, but from an even older mommy, yes? — Upon hearing her, I decided the only proper way to deal with that suggestion was to pretend I didn't hear anything and avoid prodding the topic in the future. 

Preview into our sister's fetish aside, even with all of the benefits, I was surprised by how cheap the place ended up being. Especially since they agreed to having Finarkzir sleep in it as well (In parts because the place was bordering on the natural park. Also, having Finarkzir nearby would reduce the odds of her needing to hunt for sustenance. Best not to release a magical beast into a normal animal environment if it isn't needed). And sure, we got a mixture of both the benefits for the location, the support for the association and a pink elven bank who liked giving fee free loaning. Still, the initial registration fees didn't even hit a total of 1400 Tralglyr. For a place that size, I was expecting it to reach the 2000 line at least, even with the benefits. And like, sure, this was the majority of the money in a month of work for one of us. And there really weren't a lot of jobs where you could be expected to make 300 in a work week before even reaching your twenties. 

"Though with the additional space… The old gang has yet to choose a fixed place of their own. Even if I split up from these guys, I could always try that. Maybe that's too optimistic, regardless." I couldn't help but think of that out, as we finished the deal. I thought it would be too intrusive to bring it up right at that point, however. With a little more time, that would be another matter. As we were taking the keys and registering the address for the place (so that we would make an in person verification before finishing the print entirely), a different matter was brought up by Chiaisei. 

—So, about the bath. We all could fit on it at once of course, but well… I haven't shared baths with many people for a very long time. I don't think I'll be very comfortable with trying it. Or at least not at first. — She explained. I already knew this, still figured it was a good idea to mention it to the others as soon as possible. 

—Right. It took her 2 days to grow comfortable enough with me for us to share a bath. Those days were mostly just me, she and Finarkzir, though. So maybe it will be a bit more this time? — I asked, making sure not to presume too many things about my girl. She was strangely shy sometimes. Every time we shared a bath she spent almost all of it flushed, and I was sure it wasn't the water either. She never heated it up to that sort of point. 

—Yes, but maybe a few weeks in this case. Circumstances truly were special during our introduction. 

—Speaking of, may I ask never to share a bath with my lord as well? She can be… Difficult. To ignore, mostly. 

—But of course I am. Not sure if it was your intent, boy, but I'll definitely take it as a compliment. 

—That's what I meant, of course. It's just that… We have certain protocols, and in the present situation the shared bath might make one of them harder to fulfill, based on experience. 

—Ah, of course. Though I'll admit, this makes it sound like provoking our shining knight is far easier than I figured. What a shame, I thought direct contact with your boss must have immunized you to the charms of women by this point. 

—Can I avoid bathing with her as well? — Senshin asked, to no one's surprise. Based on some of his previous speeches, I imagined avoiding shared baths with someone he might be into were a practice he was used to. Too used to to try to break out of it when dealing with someone like Nalfimiria, at least. The law prohibited her from seduction or active advances on us, but teasing was perfectly legal, as we had seen demonstrated already. 

—Sure. Taking turns with a bath that large sounds a little silly, but whatever. We probably don't have the habit of using it around the same hours, regardless. — Nalfimiria said, as it looked like I was the only member of the group willing to share a bath with her. 

—What protocol is he one about though? …And just how did his boss grant him immunity to women again? — I was a bit hesitant on making that question. It sounded an awful lot like our guy had to play along with some pretty weird kinks if I understood what she was suggesting. 

—Oh, I wouldn't know. Just heard she likes teasing, far more than I do. Figured someone of that preference might have fun if they worked with someone following this protocol so strictly. 

—And that… — Before I could ask anything else, Nalfimiria raised a hand, before a thought communicator seemingly appeared in it. There was then an attempt from her part to form a one sided connection to me, despite not having mine equipped (one of the functions the sisterhood's communicators had that normal ones didn't). Chiaisei then asked to listen into the message as well, before Nalfimiria's thoughts quickly took shape in both of our heads. 

—Knights are suggested never to make any sexual advances on their boss or the one they're currently assigned to, unless explicitly invited to do so. Makes sense, in a way. This obviously doesn't apply here, but I can imagine the slight potential for this backfiring on their end, if it was stimulated. Boy is taking that rule rather literally, though. Seems like anything short of a direct verbal invite or suggestion from me would count as violating those rules in his eyes. And whether he knows this or not, that isn't a legal option for me. In this context I doubt I could even get a fine for it, but I'm not about to violate international law for his convenience. Especially not when I know the local courts probably would try to cover for me. Of course, there is a easy out of the situation, though the boy seems to like the current distance between us, and pulling him closer without giving him an order might be hard to pull off immediately. So for now he likely asked for things like this as a means of avoiding any chance at tempting himself. Leaving myself clearly open for other's interests doesn't count as older influence in the first place. — The message was long, however it barely took a second for it to be transmitted. Any delay that might have happened probably did so on our end as well, since I was sure the act of communicating that much wouldn't take a lot of effort or attention for someone at the adept level. 

After that point, we were led to the house we would be residing in itself. We used a carriage of the office for it, since the buses or trains likely wouldn't be very welcoming to people carrying so much baggage. Both to verify it, get the keys as well as finish the contract. Things had been just as regulated, so we took the place shortly after arriving. In all, the process barely took two full hours. Combined with the walking, talks, the paper work at the HQ and the travel itself, the morning had been spent, though overall it still took far less time than any of us expected. Lunch likely would come late, but before anything we decided to take a look at what we were lacking at the house at that point. 

The basic day to day spell engines¹ were mostly there. The fridge, dish washer, washing machine and various cooking units. The temperature control devices, both for the baths and rooms. There were some bed sheets and similar stuff there by default. They wouldn't be the most comfortable, however since both of our princesses had their own in their baggage, that wouldn't be that big of an issue. The various conjuring devices also were in working order, even if that particular group likely would be less dependent on them. There was some base furniture for the place, namely three tables and some chairs, yet not exactly the most fitting for our group's size (The table in the living room was too large for a group our size. The ones in the kitchen were far better fit for five people.) The place was also well cleaned, and there had been enough cleaning gear in the storage for us to keep up with those duties as a group. They even had a conjuring device set on making brooms and cleaning fabric, in the case for a bigger clean up. 

While checking, we had been doing some guidance as well. Completing two full turns would be tough on a day like that, though you take what time you can get. Overall, the house was ready to function. But it felt barren. Which makes sense. The standard equipment for a house was all there, though for the most part the things a person would buy that were optional were all missing. Again, no surprises there. The previous occupiers would have left with their stuff. This meant no tablecloths or anything of the sort. Nothing in the way of decoration. For the rooms themselves at least we could sprinkle them up a bit. The amount of beds meant there wasn't a desk or many drawers in most of them, so for some of our belongings we just left them arranged on top of the emptied beds as of that point. Even then, decorations mostly were done through the princesses' things. As we had agreed to split the rooms* as well, so this meant that even then only one of the rooms would have the occasional sprinkle of more than 4 colors. 

(*Sowanar and Senshin didn't want to deal with the pressure of sharing a room with Nalfimiria. Chiaisei and I didn't really care either way, but since Chiaisei asked to stay in the same room as I was and we didn't want to leave Nalfimiria on her own, the default was to have the girls and boys separated.) 

And though there were cabinets for them, the kitchen didn't have anything in the way of cups or plates*, and in terms of pans and pots there was only one for each of the basics. And sure, nothing that was technically necessary, though cooking with conjured utensils wasn't as easy as drinking from a conjured cup. There was enough variety for conjuring items to where this wouldn't ever be needed. Though you know, it never hurts to have the real things in small numbers. Even if the conjured cups would last a while, you would still need to substitute them occasionally while on a long celebration. Besides, even for someone as cheap as yours truly, sometimes using the real things when eating or drinking made a difference. It makes things feel more special, right? Not that this was the biggest problem even. 

(*Why a dishwasher if there had been nothing to wash? Because installing a dishwasher and the needed essence transmitter¹ for it took a lot of effort. Regardless of whether or not the occupants wanted it, it would be there in case they ever wanted to own this kind of food stuff. And again, it was rare for a kitchen not to at least have real pans in it, those often outlasted the duration of conjured utensils, especially since the heat would make them less stable.)

There were no towels, for one, and this wasn't in the list of things conjuration spells substituted. That, and though there was a small stock of soap for the clothes, as well as the polder in case we needed to clean dishes, it might have been best to already stock up on more of that. Some of the things needed to take care of the garden outside were already there as well, but only if we keep it simply to have grass beneath us during training. Most of all, the pantry was empty. In the city, we shouldn't have an issue going to a nearby restaurant or bar. Though you know, we needed to prepare our meals for travel as well. Which is all to say, shortly after finishing checking up on everything, we decided to start preparing for a bit of a shopping trip. To do so, we checked on our total budget, before listing the main necessities we would have to go through to make that place more inhabitable. Of course, we didn't put everything a house might normally need in that list. We would be living there when resting and all, however in the end that place wouldn't feel our feet's soles anyway near as much as if we were living a normal life. Still, there is a line you need to reach for these things, even if you won't be spending most of your time in your own place. 

With the list made, our budget counted and our path partially decided, we found the nearest carriage for renting and started our trail, after assigning watching the house to Finarkzir (She hadn't appeared for all of us yet, but it's not like we could have brought her around either way, and though Senshin had asked for this duty, unlike the eagle, he had permanent arms, and we naturally would put them to use). For things like supplies, there were places nearby*. Most of the other items on the list worked well enough as well. At most, we needed to go 2 or 3 districts over to find them. That's the handy thing about living in what's effectively a trade point. Finding whatever we needed was just a matter of insistence. 

(*And some parts of the traveling was also made easier since some of the things would be in range to order a delivery from the store. Who received the delivery people, you may ask? The eagle knew how to turn a doorknob, let's leave it at that. She probably would have freaked out a lot of them if they hadn't been given a warning.)

By the time we were done, we were already up to a late lunch. It still didn't take that long to find a place that was serving food. While having our meal, we also discussed what kind of house work we were best experienced in. Sowanar and I could more or less handle anything. Living with your coworkers for some time kinda did that to you. Though in my case, during academy life I had experience babysitting as well, so I was especially well trained for this type of work. Chiaisei could help with basic chores, but she wasn't that used to them. Surprisingly, despite the princess status, the apartment where she grew up was comparatively smaller to the place we just got to ourselves. That, and since a huge chunk of it was dedicated to her parent's* individual studio's and their shared garden, there wasn't a lot of space within which she was asked to help out. Also, not that surprisingly, she was also good with plants. Go figure, she can talk to them. She also said she would try to take care of Finarkzir's resting things on her own, and the eagle didn't bring much more that needed maintenance. I had only seen it a few times, but the man-made mobile nest they had for her looked pretty comfy. Good to know there was no risk of someone else ruining it while tinkering with it. That would have made me feel bad. 

(*Chiaisei's mom was a spell singer, specializing in using sound manipulation alongside her voice, and her dad was a somewhat famous painter. Growing between two high profile artists, I wouldn't be surprised if even the adopted eagle of the family had some knowledge about it. Both of their specialized rooms occupied a decent chunk of their living space, and since letting children help cleaning them had a chance to backfire, Chiaisei's house duties only extended as far as the shared between her and her siblings and the living/ dining room.)

Next up, we discovered Senshin was next to useless. I mean, he could sweep and clean dishes (if doing it manually was ever necessary). But apparently, he had the habit of only asking to take part in housework if it was friendly to guidance back in his place. That, and since he was living surrounded by mages his parents had the habit of blazing through those tasks using spellcasting*, so there wasn't much room for the kids to help in the first place. Not to mention, his obsession with training meant they occasionally allowed him to skip on daily chores, as his time was mostly spent productively either way. 

And Nalfimiria… Was surprisingly not completely useless. Or rather, she fit a very welcome niche as the most experienced cook among us. Honestly, when I had first heard mention of how big the house she was born in was, I was fully expecting it to have the kind of staff you would expect of a royal palace. They had a library and a theater inside their house, to put in perspective (Though both of those were open to visitors almost constantly, in either case). From the sounds of it, she basically was born in a tourist attraction. This wasn't just a matter of our highness being too rich to work normally even. An elven child roaming around to "help" likely would only make the people there more worried. If it was a small place, then at least it would be easy to find her if she got paralyzed. But in a place that large I would be shocked if they even let her go to the bathroom on her own for most of her childhood. With that said, apparently the places she visited the most in the house were her study, the library and the kitchen used to prepare the meals for the people living there. 

—Watching the cooks work didn't cause any headaches when my mind was already exhausted, and learning recipes for food didn't affect my daily limits too much. As a result, I would say I spent a lot of hours between my early twenties and fifties watching them work. Enough to pick up quite a lot about cooking. — Hearing the explanation made it easier to make sense of it. 

You can always count on an elf to have a random talent or two (mainly things they picked up as children, as they didn't tax their minds too much). Most of them went for music or other arts, but from the looks of it Nalfimiria had enough spare time in her hands for some of her childhood that she managed to pick up many more of those than their norm. I didn't count on one of them being of use to us, though, or at least not of so much use. Though don't get me wrong, even if she had never picked a broom in her life I kinda expected her to learn to use it immediately if it wasn't for that. Elves tend to have a very easy time picking up simple tasks, probably due to the experiences they had on similar things in the past. Still, the fact she had an excess in this particular thing would end up really changing our day to day, if she proved to be really good with food. Especially since from the sound of it, collecting recipes at random was a bit of a hobby for her. Nothing quite like living with a chef without any sort of specialization. 

(*The brief stories he told about that sounded really hard to take seriously. Like his dad somehow wiping away parts of the house by creating small tornados that only drew in the dust around them. Or his mom doing chores while using 8 spiritual arms at once. It was good to know I wasn't the only one who planned on training some forms in ways specifically meant to help with all of that.)

With that out of the way, we headed back to the new home after getting over our meal. Unloading some of the stuff from the carriage we rented took some time, but overall it didn't take that much work. Of course, there was also the matter of arranging everything that had been delivered as well as the things with us, though I don't think either of us really wants that to be described in detail. So instead, let's skip to what happens after the home was ready. A get together of the group of sorts, that started with us listing our magical abilities. Ho-we-ver, that will be handled by Senshin at first. After he had spent a good portion of that day occasionally reminding us we should have done that already, I think it's fitting he starts describing the scene. That, and I was early into the line for saying this stuff and we want to show each other's reactions to our spell sets. Anyways, that's it for now, as far as I'm concerned. See you all soon…! Or maybe "write" you all soon? Whatever, bye!