House Building

It was here! The forums were flooded with posts hyping the update. Along with the posts came an influx of players logging in! With so many players logging in at once the servers nearly crashed, however this was anticipated and some last minute tinkering barely saved them.

Akiol joined the mass and logged in. The first thing that was apparent was the increased amount of NPCs walking down the streets. Every one of them having their situations. A woman in a yellow dress held a child's hand as she walked down the streets. A man dressed fancily took pity on a poor soul and handed them a few gold coins. It was hundreds of times more lively. Giving birth to a whole new atmosphere into the game.

Akiol cheerfully greeted a few of them, many returning the greeting in kind. Maybe they were nice naturally, or his Title helped out.

A notification appeared, someone pinged him in the group chat. As he opened it he already knew who it was.

Yielya: @Akiol

Yielya: I am waiting for you at the Adventurers Guild. We have a job to do!

Akiol: I'm on my way.

He closed the chat and made way to the Adventurers Guild. As he entered he saw NPCs joking amongst themselves, laughing loudly.

Yielya popped up near him, "Let's go."

Akiol chuckled, "Why are you in such a rush?"

Smacking her lips she replied, "Why aren't you? All the good houses are going to be taken by Guilds if we don't hurry!"

The two walked through the streets browsing plots and homes. Plots were blank pieces of land, giving the players a blank canvas to build their homes on. The costs of materials and labor for the building would be large, astronomical for some. Prebuilt ones were much cheaper, however renovating could prove more expensive than building.

As they browsed Akiol asked, "Why are you so frantic about owning a house?"

"It's very inconvenient to use teleport scrolls just to meet up you know. Besides, it's always nice to come back to a home." Yielya answered.

"Then what are you looking for in a house?"

"Good question. We need a large one, preferably two stories. For all six of us. Top story should be personal rooms, bottom for occupational purposes and other miscellaneous reasons. Perhaps we could have a basement for storage as well."

Akiol raised an eyebrow, "You're quite interested in this aren't you?"

Yielya nodded, "I am not going to lie, owning a home seemed to speak out to me. Even if it's in a game."

"Is it because of before?"

"I. . . I'm not sure, the person I took over was into home renovating. Maybe that came into play. However, we didn't have such a place before. I think it would be nice."

Akiol nodded and didn't ask further. In their past life they were akin to nomads. Moving across the lands, having no place to settle down. It wasn't like they could afford to anyway. It took a toll on the party. Akiol agreed that a place for all of them would provide more mental benefits than in-game.

Akiol stopped at an intersection, he spotted a decent plot in the corner of his eye. He tapped Yielya's shoulder and pointed towards it. When she saw it her eyes lit up.

They walked over and an interface appeared. It held the basic information and costs of the plot.

<Medium Plot>

<100x60 square feet>

<200,000 Gold down payment. 2,000 weekly billed. (Bill may rise as more construction is on the plot)>

<Do you wish to buy?>

Akiol whistled, "It's quite expensive."

Yielya urged him, "I can help cover the costs, this is large enough!"

Akiol grinned, "I can cover the down payment, the costs of building something isn't something I can afford."

Akiol wasn't bluffing, since the large amount of dungeons the party did he owned quite a bit of money. This sat in his pocket since he found no use of purchasing new equipment like most players. Now it seemed to be in use.

"Hold it!" Someone shouted.

Akiol turned towards the voice. A very well equipped individual walked forward, "That plot is for Baron's Tea!"

Akiol hadn't heard of the guild. Since he was unaware of someone else could buy a plot while it was being viewed he hurriedly purchased it. His once very wealthy self becoming a common folk.

The man walked up to them, "I ask that you kindly leave. Baron's Tea has eyes on this plot. I can offer a bit of gold for the inconvenience, though I am sure you may not be able to afford it."

"Oops, I already own it though." Akiol halfheartedly apologized.

The individual frowned and turned towards the plot. They must be able to see it was purchased since the individual turned back to Akiol and immediately began negotiating, "We can offer you more gold for the plot. How does two-hundred-fifty-thousand sound?"

Akiol put his hand forward to calm the individual, "I intend to own it, I have no plans on selling it."

The individual grew desperate, "I ask that you reconsider!"

Akiol smiled, "Thank you for the offer, but my answer remains the same."

The individual stopped, hesitant. Then seemingly coming to a conclusion they spoke, "Then I am sorry for the inconvenience. I will be going on my way."

Akiol was genuinely surprised at the response. Every guild he had encountered was haughty and confident. Not hesitating to flex their position to pressure solo players. It seems he found one that was different.

As the individual left Yielya sighed, "If only Pierced Moon was like that."

Akiol agreed, Baron's Tea gained a somewhat respectable reputation in his eyes.

Now that the individual was gone he returned his attention to the new interface that appeared after his purchase. It required a few things from him. First a Plot Name, then a Plot Reason.

The name was simple. Akiol called it Home of Six Lights. Next was the Plot Reason. Despite the strange name it was just the purpose of the plot, whether it be housing, a shop, or whatever the choice was. Akiol then was greeted with a Home Partnership interface.

Home Partnership was for the other residents of the home. Akiol had full authority over the plot and could authorize or blacklist whoever. He immediately tried to set the whole party to Co-Owner. However only one other individual could be set to this.

So Akiol set the party as roommates except for Yielya, for he put her as the Co-Owner. Finally it provided a list of house blueprints and the costs of building. While there was some incredibly cheap options, and the house quality matched the price, there was a Custom option.

So he asked Yielya's opinion.

"Custom of course!"

So he picked Custom. A few warnings popped up. However they weren't too important. So Akiol clicked away, as he did he was transported into a unique area.

This was the construction creator. Similar to Wrock's skill creation. The area was grey, save for a blue outlined box. Akiol read through the given tutorial and understood how to operate the room.

The outlined blue box was his plot space, a reference to the max width, length, and height of his choice building. By simply thinking he could created walls and roofs. Once he was confident in his choice it would turn into a blueprint. He could then take the blueprint to a proper construction shop and organize the labor and material costs for the construction.

He noticed an option to invite the Co-Owner and didn't hesitate to use it. Shortly Yielya was transported to the space. Her face filled with excitement.

She skimmed through the tutorial before closing it out, "Alright I get the basics. We gotta make a building then."

Akiol nodded, "You're the one who wanted this, so I won't stop you."

Yielya cracked her neck, "Don't worry about it, I got an idea in head already."

She got to work, walls and floors began to sprout from the floor. Windows and roofs followed shortly. Akiol couldn't see inside but he heard the sounds of the lightning quick construction being built and tore down.

Akiol sat down and waited patiently, to the side he noticed a number going up and down crazily. It took a moment before he realized it was the material cost of the building.

There was something agonizing about watching only a price going up and down. So he pushed it aside and meditated.

This went for five hours. While Yielya had an idea in her head seeing the result in person caused a sense of dissatisfaction. Causing her to rebuild the place several times over. Akiol patiently meditated during this, time flowing past.

Finally finished Yielya called Akiol to see the final product. He stood up and opened his eyes. What he saw was a manor, to say the least. The house's exterior was made of a red brick. In the middle was a set of double doors. A window was above it, along with four windows on each side, coming to a grand nine windows on just the front.

(Author Note: If you're looking at the house from the front, the door is facing south.)

"This is the front, I left some space at the edge for plants or something." Yielya explained. As she did a flowerbed sprung up and decorated the gap. Within a moment it was taken away.

She beckoned him inside and Akiol followed. Inside was empty, but it was still large. A decent sized clearing was in the middle, walls made the room its own area. Directly left and right from the entrance was a set of doors. Next to the doors was stairs facing north, leading up to the landing.

The floor and stairs was made of a dark colored wood, complementing the red brick.

With a wave of her hand Yielya spawned a set of couches and decorations. The couches were in the middle in a ring shape, an opening facing the entrance door. A table stood in the middle, with various end tables next to the couches. A chandelier hung from the ceiling to brighten the area. A rug covered the blank spot between the couches and the doors.

Yielya beckoned to the area, "This is the main area, a living room if you would." She removed the decorations and went through the west door.

"I am still a bit indecisive on this. So let me know what you think."

Past the door was a hallway, two of the windows were on the left. On the right was a wall with two doors.

Yielya gestured and the room was decorated with a few rugs on the floor, some glowing torch-like structures on the walls and curtains for the windows. She pointed at the doors, "This is what I can't decide on. I don't want to build an open room if it's going to be for something like potion making. But I feel like a open room for something like a kitchen would work."

Akiol thought for a moment before an idea struck him. He tore down the doors and replaced it with a larger opening, except the top was rounded into a half circle. Akiol made door there, with the top part being glass.

He showed the space with and without the doors, "If you make it like this then you don't have to decide. Just place or remove the doors as you please."

Yielya stopped him and experimented with the idea. Making a kitchen in one of the rooms and such. After a few minutes she nodded, "I like it, the east hallway is similar to this one. So we don't need to go there."

She removed all the decorations except the doors and moved back to the center room. Up the stairs was another hallway, it went across the house from the east to the west side. On each side was three doors, "These will be our rooms. The fact there is six of us made it easy for me."

There was no windows on the south, east, and west walls. For those walls would be surrounded by the other buildings and was unnecessary.

Yielya went back downstairs and gestured underneath the stairs, "I wanted to make a cellar, but that costs are larger than I thought. On top of that I don't think we need storage for anything yet."

"So we're done?" Akiol asked.

Yielya dusted her hands, "Yep! The decoration will have to be discussed with the rest. For now we have the main building."

"Alright then, let's get the blueprints and pool our money."

Akiol mentioned the money because he eyed the price of the building, it was over 800,000 Gold! He wasn't sure if they had enough Gold to pay for the building.

However he still created the building into a blueprint, he stored the scroll in his inventory.

"Alright let's call the others."