Chương 583: Limitless Path Chapter Six Hundred Five

"I take it Zane's not back yet?" Beth asked Fallon with a slightly quirked brow.

"Oh, no, he'll be gone for some time. You were back much faster than we had initially thought," the griffon said, shaking his head.

"It will take him a couple years to handle his business."

"That seems like a long time for a Manumitted," Sera commented.

"Yes, well, his circumstances are a bit unique," Fallon explained.

"He doesn't just guard the gate to the Maze, but oversees the Delvers, which can sometimes mean quite a lot of traveling. Beyond that, he has been restless lately, and I suspect it won't be long before he does another Delve himself. He is, after all, approaching the peak of Manumitted; a single Delve would bring him rather close."

"What's that like? Rebirth two-fifty or something?" asked Beth.

"Not quite; Manumitted lasts until attempting rebirth two hundred," Fallon replied, running a hair through his thick, white mane of hair that tended to stick out in odd tufts.

"It really is too early for any of you to consider, even you, with your Ideal already," he continued, pointing at Beth for the last part.

"But, what needs to happen is that one needs to understand their Truth, and yes, I did say Truth with a capital 'T.' It's something that you can't really start working on yet, even with an Ideal, so you shouldn't put too much stock into it. It leans on some of the understanding you need to become a Manumitted, that Oneness we've discussed just a bit before. If you don't understand that, then you're missing some of what you need to understand a Truth."

"But, a Truth is still like an Ideal; it's something your develop and that lets you become the stage beyond Manumitted?" Val asked, though it sounded more like she was clarifying something she already knew.

"That's correct," Fallon nodded.

"You refine your Truth, which creates a fully fledged domain; it's possible to suppress that domain, but hardly anyone does, as it's not really thought worth the effort. What that means, though, is that anyone that you can feel influencing or affecting space around them in a large area in some way is rather likely to have finished their Truth.

Because it creates a domain, it will incorporate some elements of a person's Ideal, and it will also draw very subtly on both Mana Physique and the level one hundred power, either Presence or Humanization. A Truth wraps everything up together, though they are all distinct elements still; more on that would be too much to go into for you lot right now."

"And that makes a person, what, whatever's beyond Manumitted?" Sera asked.

"Yes, that's correct; that's the simple part," Fallon said.

"You have a truth and, just like an Ideal, you can move to the next stage. An Ideal lets you do the fiftieth rebirth and become Exalted, while a Truth lets you do the two hundredth rebirth and become an Absolute Authority. People sometimes just refer to them as Authorities, and they're fairly rare, even in the wider universe. If you think about it, Zane and I are the only two Manumitted in the Milky Way, and we are very much exceptions that prove the rule in many ways.

I won't really speak to Zane's truth, but out of a galaxy of many trillions of sapient beings, there are two Manumitted, one of which might become an Absolute Authority in the next thousand or so years, and as I said, we're standout for this galaxy. If Zane and I had relocated elsewhere or not pushed as hard even after attaining our current status, the Milky Way wouldn't even have two Manumitted, let alone one approaching the lofty heights of an Authority."

"And how long does Authority extend?" Beth asked, intensely curious.

"It's an even longer journey than getting to it," Fallon replied with a mischievous grin.

"Absolute Authority lasts all the way until the peak of rebirth number four hundred and ninety-nine. Upon successfully complete rebirth five hundred, which requires things I won't even mention now, a person then has the lofty appellation of Eternal. There are few enough of them around that I doubt there are any in our super cluster of galaxies at the present moment. Even if I'm wrong about that, there's likely only one at the very most."

"A goal to aim for, at the least," Beth said, grinning as a few of the others rolled their eyes at the comment.

"We should head out, if Fallon is done with us?" Sera said.

"Far be it for me to keep you. Time, after all, is of the essence," he said, Beth rolling her eyes at what she was sure was supposed to be a time-related joke.

"Then let's get back home," Beth said to the team gesturing for them to get up and moving. They bid their farewells to Fallon, who simply gave them a nod before suddenly vanishing, as if he had never been there in the first place, and the group made their way to the teleporter. Something about the way Fallon and Zane could just disappear was very odd, as Beth couldn't sense the kind of fluctuations that most teleports would create, but it was a puzzle she would have to chew on a bit some other time.

For now, they made their way back to the mansion, happy to take a short break and rest before the group reconvened in the living room, a place containing enough varied chairs and seating that even Bjorn didn't need to deploy one of his personal chairs.

"So, what is our plan going forward?" Val asked, giving Beth a raised eyebrow.

"Well, we have at the very least three short term goals, though you might say they stretch a bit more to mid-term than short, but let's talk about where we are for a minute," Beth said with a nod.

"First, we need to keep rebirthing, as we just talked about with Fallon. I know it's a grind and that we're already strong enough that we can focus on some other stuff, but the sooner we get to at least Ascended, the more possibilities open up. Besides that, we have a couple goals that I have in the long-term bracket that require us to be way stronger, including deeply exploring the Eternal Depths.

You all heard Abigail; even going in at rebirth twenty would be a bad idea, and there's several things we need to do in there. At least four, if I'm tracking things correctly, and possibly more."

"Alright, so getting to rebirth twenty, at minimum, you view as priority one for our short term goals?" Andrea asked to clarify. This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

"Yes, unless people have objections or other thoughts?" Beth answered with a nod.

"I think that's fine, if a bit boring," Sera said.

"Leveling is fine," Bjorn grunted.

"Whatever we do is fine; I will continue poking at my Mana Physique while we move forward," Adam added, Beth convinced he was lost in his head thinking about Mana Physiques about ninety-nine percent of the time. Still, he did fight and explore with them, so she couldn't really complain that his distraction was all that detrimental to the team.

"As long as we have some time to gather supplies and craft," Kris added quietly.

"That's right! We need to do so much alchemy!" Neph exclaimed joyously, bouncing on the couch next to Kris as she held an arm up and cheered.

"I'm sure there will be plenty of time to work on our professions," Beth said with a smile and slight shake of her head.

"Okay, what's goal two?" Val asked.

"Goal number two, at least in my opinion, should be working on our CRA Emblems," Beth said.

"I want to go as far as I can, though I know some of you don't want anything more than a Gold Emblem, which is fine, but those of us that want to advance through the ranks so look at trying to get our Platinums soon. Well, we should start working on them, as I understand Platinums are a lot harder and longer of an ask to get than Gold or Silver."

"Platinum is very time consuming," Bjorn added.

"It took us almost a year to get Gold Emblems, or something close, though I did it before I joined with you. I would expect, even with this team's strength, that we will take about five years to get Platinum Emblems, for those interested."

"Ugh, count me out," Andrea replied immediately.

"No way I'm working on something like that for five years, just to get to boss around newer Gold Emblems? And have to do even more chores for the Association? No thank you, not for me."

"Well, that's good, we should take a count," Beth said.

"We should try to figure out now who is at least tentatively interested in still progressing their Emblem and who doesn't care. I will be working on mine, obviously, and Andrea is clearly out. Who else?"

"I'll continue," said Sera.

"I'll continue," Bjorn said with a nod.

"I'm fine as it is," said Adam.

"No thanks," added Kris.

"I don't need a better Emblem," said Neph.

"Okay, so that's only three interested so far. That leaves Blood and Val. Thoughts?" Beth said, turning to the two where they were both occupying the same seat with Val sitting in Blood's lap.

"I will continue, though I'm not sure I want to work on that right now," Val said.

"It would do well for us to have more rather than less people with the Emblem. It would also benefit my family if I got into the upper echelons of the CRA. I'm just a little worried about the timing. I guess you can put me as the only one in the tentative group. I intend to do it, just not sure if I want to focus on it right now."

"Regardless of that," Blood said, giving Val's waist a squeeze, "I'll work on mine right now."

"Okay, so the final count winds up at four yeses and one maybe?" Beth said, glancing around the room for confirmation.

"Looks like it," Sera agreed with a nod.

"Okay, item two done," Val said.

"What's your third short term item?"

"Money," Beth put succinctly.

"Money?" Val asked.

"Yeah. We've got a lot of spending coming up, and fast at that point, too. We need to at least have money to rent a place in the City of Mended Dreams, if not just buy one, we need to secure a place on Arbitus Prime for the CRA stuff going forward, and we will likely need to buy and sell stuff, including gear. All that costs money, not to mention our rebirth components, materials for all the crafting people want to do, funds we might need to help other people, and even more besides.

We aren't broke right now, but with all the money we'll need to spend just within a couple years, we might as well be broke. We need to put some serious focus on making money in the next couple years, whether that's treasure hunting, working jobs for others, including the CRA, or focusing on our crafting enough that that actually starts to generate us money."

"I would say that is more a mid to long-term goal rather than short term, but I understand what you mean," Val said.

"I can, to a certain extent, rely on my family for some things, but I definitely don't have an infinite budget, and they can only provide so many materials, which is the big sticking point. We should see if we can do an expedition or join in a larger one; we shouldn't have any problems getting on something like that, considering we are a full team of Enlightened."

"You think an expedition would be best?" Sera asked, quirking one large, beautiful brow at the kresnik.

"What's the difference between an expedition and what we normally do?" Beth interjected.

"An expedition has a known goal in mind," Val explained before answering Sera.

"Yes, I do think it's best. Expeditions usually only take a year, if even that, and because they know where they're going and what they're trying to find or what their goal is, the returns are steadier than just blindly wandering around. If we presented a limited resume to one of the big companies that runs expeditions, we'd be guaranteed what amounts to a top spot.

In fact, they'd been footing tooth and nail over us, as having a team of powerful Enlightened with their own starship along would be a huge plus to any team. You have to remember, a lot of expeditions are led by an Enlightened, and maybe the second is an Enlightened, then the rest of the team is Empowered or even Awoken. Having nine Enlightened halfway through the bracket, all of them able to fight above their weight class, and with their own ship?

People would be fighting to see how big the bonus they could pay us would be. With hazard pay and finders fees for high-value items? Hell yes I think expeditions would be our best money-making options right now."

"Well, that certainly sounds like a solid argument," Beth said.

"Any downsides? Anything anybody can think of that would point to us not doing expeditions in the next couple years to make money?"

"Leveling might be shit," Bjorn said.

"We have the gate," Sera said with a shrug.

"At this point, we're strong enough, with enough powerful connections, that Beth could even reveal the gate and charge people to use it."

"You really think that's a good idea?" Beth asked, tilting her head back to look up at Sera, whose lap she was obviously sitting in.

"Of course," Sera replied, leaning down to kiss Beth's cheek.

"Most Ascended would not really care about a leveling power like that; they all have similar methods, even if they have to pay to use them. And otherwise, what Enlightened, or even group of Enlightened, do you think could take us out. Fuck, Beth, what massive group of Enlightened do you think would be anything more than meat just against you solo?"

"That's a pretty good point," Beth said, tapping her chin as Sera chuckled and nuzzled against her.

"It can also demonstrate our strength," Val added.

"Go on," Beth said.

"We can show that we have a lot of power and potential by having a power like that," Val explained.

"Also, and this is a bit of a devious asshole move, but the first time somebody tries to start shit, to get you to use the power for free or something like that, we just beat them down. People watching you single-handedly clobber an entire group of Enlightened and send them home crying would be a huge reputation boost for the whole team."

"Hadn't exactly thought of that, but I get your point," Beth said, grinning in a bit of a wicked manner.

"Any other concerns?"

"Just to be wary," Andrea said.

"It's obvious, but there's a lot of powerful assholes out there. If we're going on expeditions, especially if we're disclosing that we have someone with a time compression power, we just need to stay alert and watch our backs."

"Noted," Beth said.

"Looks like we're going to be signing up for an expedition. Everyone, make your preparations and get ready based on the idea of that. Our Platinum Emblem group, we should all take a quick trip to the nearest Hall to register our intent and get started. I assume just getting our hands on Platinum missions will be the biggest hurdle."

"For this team?" Bjorn replied with a raised brow.

"Quite likely."

"Then, let's get started," Beth said, dismissing the team with a resounding clap.