Limitless Path

The man in front of the counter turned to her as she emerged and looked at her with slightly widened eyes, though Beth wasn't sure if that was because of the ever-faithful Blood just a step behind. Beth simply nodded at the man perfunctorily and made to leave, but he interrupted her with a quick "Wait!"

"Something I can help you with?" Beth asked calmly, using Identify on the man.

Tomas Long, Level 0 Human.

"Are you also one of these aliens?" he asked, his eyes narrowing.

Beth rolled her eyes, entirely unimpressed by the man, especially with Tazeen standing right there, knowing now the elf could likely level New York State in just under a few minutes. "No, as a matter of fact, I am not 'one of these aliens,'" she replied, crossing her arms as she glowered at the man.

"Well, listen, you can't be working with them. See here now; they invade our world, put buildings where they've no right to, make crazy monsters. I'm telling you, we can't be having them just do what they please," the man seemed like he was starting on what would be a rather long tirade and Beth was not amused.

"I think I can make decisions for myself just fine, thanks though," she replied, turning to walk away before his rant got into full swing.

"Now see here, you can't just ignore me like that. Kids need to learn to respect their elders," the man continued stepping toward her. As he moved to take a second step, Tazeen was there, simply appearing in front of the man as if he'd always been standing there.

"I advise, sir, in the strongest possible terms, not to attempt to assault an emblem carrying member of our order, particularly not in our Hall," his voice was still entirely calm, but he radiated such an extreme sense of danger that even Beth started sweating.

The man was having a far worse time of it than she was, his face gone very pale as he instantly became soaked in sweat. He stumbled back a step, but seemed to find his courage or, more likely, was simply so unperceptive that he didn't understand what the sense of danger he had felt actually meant. "Listen here, you can't just go around threatening people like this. There're laws in this country. You can't just take people's land."

Beth literally facepalmed, not escaping the notice of the man, who turned to her again. Before he could start in on her a second time, Tazeen made a gesture and the man disappeared. "You didn't kill him, did you?" she asked the elf with a raised eyebrow.

"No. He has been banned from entry into any CRA establishment for one year, barring his involvement in any dispute case we arbitrate," Tazeen replied, before suddenly disappearing from next to her and reappearing behind the counter. Lyrissa had gone back to what she was doing, looking at a screen hovering in the air in front of her. Beth suspected, knowing what Lyrissa was like, that she was watching the intergalactic equivalent of cat videos.

"If you intend to leave the Hall for the night, be aware that man is only barred from the grounds," Tazeen said to her, resuming his at-ease stance.

"Thanks Tazeen. We'll be quick getting out of the area," she replied.

"Safe travels," he said, nodding at her.

"Come back soon, little sweetheart," Lyrissa purred, looking up from her monitor.

"Oh, I'll be back, hot stuff," Beth said before turning and leaving the lobby.

Hot stuff…what the hell am I saying? Who says, 'hot stuff?' she thought, shaking her head as she climbed on Blood outside the lobby.

The two of them loped around to the right, heading to the northern side of the building. As soon as they were roughly lined up, Blood activated Swift, and the two of them shot off. Luckily for them, or maybe luckily for the man, they didn't run into anyone until they hit the highway that ran in front of Beth's neighborhood. They emerged from the woods to see a car passing them heading east and north. Beth watched the car speed off into the distance before directing Blood westward.

It didn't take the two of them very long to arrive in front of the neighborhood, quickly crossing the highway before circling around the eastern side of the development. They arrived back at the Bell house with the sun just starting to touch the horizon, a little early in Beth's opinion, but really not too bad. There wasn't anyone outside, so Beth headed into the mudroom, leaving her boots on the floor and gloves and sword on one of the several shelves.

She headed into the kitchen first, her number one priority, lamenting the fact she hadn't stopped to check out the eateries in the CRA Hall. Something for tomorrow, or whenever she was there next. She found the kitchen empty, proceeding to start pulling out snacks and heating leftovers in the microwave after giving Blood a bowl of water. She didn't know where the rest of the family was but expected they would show back up within a couple hours.

After cooking some of the meat from the boar kill in the oven for Blood, she finished off what she was eating and cleaned the place up. Moving up to her room, she showered and changed into another set of clothes before grumbling at the full hamper. Grabbing it in one hand, she hoisted it up behind her back with ease and carried it down to the room in the basement set up for washing clothes. She simply threw a couple packs of detergent in and dumped the hamper contents in after, hitting heavy wash and then start before carrying the now empty hamper back to her room.

Beth was suddenly at a little bit of a loss, not sure what to do. It was still a little early, but she didn't really have enough time to go hunt. She also didn't want to put her soul under too much strain using the gate again so soon, and the thought of playing video games didn't really appeal. As often happens with indecision, she found herself in the living room watching TV.

She sat on the floor with her back against the loveseat, her arms around Blood's neck as they stared at the TV. It seemed like the TV was mostly fine for now, though she had some guess that it would need something like what Jaq had done to her phone before too much longer. Thinking about it, that might not really do much, since all the equipment all the way from where the signal originated to her house would need upgraded or replaced, so she just decided to enjoy it before it went away for a while.

She changed the channel over to the news, and she watched a report on the current state of affairs. The news anchor seemed to be focused and serious, likely having already started to adapt after over a week of the new order of the world. They were currently discussing ways to get help from the military in case of emergencies. It seemed local police and law enforcement were stretched more than thin trying to keep up with helping and protecting people, and many countries had their entire militaries running 24/7 to provide relief. The report went into some of the reasons to be used in calling for help, which gave Beth an idea of just how bad things were in some areas.

It seemed there weren't as many places that had strong organization prepared for a big emergency, or a Beth on hand to help deal with problems. The station brought up photos of a number of towns that were practically ransacked, multiple dungeons having spawned nearby with nobody taking care of them. It was a stark contrast showing the real value of the work Beth and the other girls had been doing with fighting the monsters. It seemed the wolves and the ants would have continued to multiply to a point where they clashed with each other at the boundary of their territories. Of course, that boundary would fall in the center of the development where Beth lived, meaning level one to three ants and wolves would have eventually been swarming the neighborhood.

It wasn't all bad news, as the national station then began discussing a few heroes that had emerged in the wake of the upheaval. Men and women who had stepped up to the plate much like she had, fighting monsters and growing stronger, defending towns or even cities from encroachment.

A number of these people were discussed, including a quick section at the end showing an entire team working together fighting what looked like giant praying mantises. The team even appeared to include two casters, one firing lightning much like Soph, while the other threw fire with almost reckless abandon. Even after only a little more than a week in this new world and a day training with Baelvyr she frowned at the display, seeing a lot of holes in the team’s stances and general cooperation. It looked like it would take a long time and lots of hard lessons to get most people up to snuff.

As the anchor transitioned into a segment about the food supply and the efforts of the U.S. government to assure continued production and distribution, Beth heard the back door open and several people enter. Getting up while turning off the TV, she and Blood padded back down the hall to see who was coming in. It turned out to be the rest of her "team," the girls all dirty and worn.

"I thought there wasn't going to be fighting today?" she asked, giving them a critical eye.

"Yeah, there wasn't. Then people trying to start on extending the fences got attacked and we were turned into guards by Zack," Kim replied huffily, tossing her sword on a shelf before stopping and staring at Beth's new blade. "What the hell is that?"

"New sword. Should work better than the last one," Beth replied with a shrug, though she was grinning a little.

Kim picked it up, grunting slightly in surprise at feeling the weight, before she pulled it nearly a foot out of the leather sheath. "The hell is this? You got a copper sword?"

"Yeah, it's not just copper, it's called mana copper. It’s copper that’s been infused with a ton of mana, making it even stronger than steel," Beth explained.

"Could you get us stuff like this?" Sabs asked, examining the blade along with Kim and Soph, the latter of whom clearly lacked the interest the other two melee fighters had in the weapon.

"Well, yeah, probably. It's just, it'll be expensive. I couldn't get anything for a while," she replied, tapping her chin.

"What are we talking about, expensive? Hundreds of dollars or something?" Kim asked.

"Uh, no, Kim. We have a new currency now, remember. And to answer the question, that sword plus the new boots and gloves cost me twenty silvers. I was actually given ten silvers to help cover it by an instructor at the place I went, so even though I could pay for it, I really owe somebody half," Beth answered a little sheepishly, shifting her weight from one foot to the other.

"So, we're poor now?" asked Kim with a raised eyebrow.

"Well, yeah, that's just how it is," Beth replied with a nod.

"We can worry about it later. I need a damn shower," Sabs interjected, walking into the house, not forgetting to brush against Beth as she walked by.

"Yeah, she's right. Wait, where's Soph?" Kim asked, eyes narrowing.

"Looks like you were too slow," Beth chuckled. The two younger sisters shared a bathroom, which would clearly be occupied right now. "You could use mom's."

"Nah, all my stuff's in ours. I'll just wait. If she takes an hour, I'm pulling the door off the hinges and throwing her out," Kim grumbled, heading back out into the yard with a pair of tennis shoes on instead of her boots.

"You need to borrow my shower?" Beth asked, turning to Sabs.

"Yeah, sure. Got a shirt I could borrow?" Sabs asked in return.

"Yeah, anything in my middle drawer. It'll be like a dress for you," Beth replied, nudging the smaller girl with her elbow.

"Yeah, I get it. Short jokes are really original," Sabs said with a roll of her eyes as she headed in to make her way up to Beth's room. Beth, in the meantime, made her way out back and joined Kim at the left table in the backyard.

"So go over the day," Beth said to Kim.

"Forget us, we just killed a couple level ones and twos. Whatever you and Blood got up to today was probably way cooler," Kim replied, waving off their day's efforts.

"Sure, I guess. Blood and I ran to the CRA Hall that's nearest here, apparently the White Hall," Beth proceeded to start filling Kim in about the Hall, but was interrupted only a couple minutes in by Sabs joining them. "That was quick," she commented.

"I didn't want to spend too long in there," Sabs said, looking a little red, likely just the heat from the shower not dissipating yet. Or not… Beth thought with a little smirk. "What's that look for?" Sabs huffed.

"Nothing. Nothing at all. I might as well wait, Kim, sorry. I don't want to have to talk about this ten times today; you know mom and dad at least will need every detail," Beth said with a sigh.

"Talk about what? Your day today?" Sabs asked.

"Yeah, I just started telling Kim a little, but when you walked out, I realized I'd have to start over anyway. Might as well just tell it once," she replied.

"That little ass is so inconsiderate. Can I just borrow your shower, Beth?" Kim asked, turning to Beth with a little bit of a hard look on her face, eyebrows lowered and a gleam in her eye. Looks like Soph was in for some trouble whenever she finally finished.

"Yeah, no problem," Beth said with a wave toward the back door, Kim hopping up immediately and heading into the house with a "Thanks!"

"So, how was your, uh, day?" Beth asked, turning to Sabs beside her.

"Boring as hell. We killed some level ones. I think Soph managed to blast a super powerful wolf, all the way at level two," Sabs replied, rolling her eyes.

"Well, I don't think things are going to get any easier. Don't dismiss the easy days now, we might not get many of them later," Beth said, her expression turning more serious.

"Is this something you learned today?" Sabs asked, worry evident in her voice.

"Well, sorta. But you can just tell from observing, too. The amount of mana is increasing over time, and monsters are getting stronger. It's gonna get worse before it gets better," Beth replied.

"You're kinda scaring me." Sabs said.

"Not to be mean, but you should be scared. We've got people trying to build a fence to keep this neighborhood safe. That's just not going to work; well, not the way they're doing it now. What we've been doing is what's really going to work, at least in the short term. We're already in a better position than a lot of people though. And I'm here; I'll make sure you're safe," Beth responded, placing her right hand over Sabs' left on the table.

"That's, uh, that's good to know," Sabs said, her skin, having just recovered, now flushed again.