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Limitless Path Chapter Three Hundred Six
🕑 Added 2024-10-08 17:00:04 +0000 UTCBeth examined the core for a moment before shrugging and throwing it in her necklace. Her new senses proved to be rather fine, as she was just barely able to detect a slight ripple when she used the necklace, showing that there was some property of space or spatial mana being affected. She put that aside for later, making sure nothing changed in the room after she had taken the core, before turning and heading back out down the hallway, bumping into Blood partway down.
"The weird…stuff, disappeared," Blood said.
"Yeah, there was a single room with another object in," Beth explained, pulling the core out to show Blood.
"Are you thinking…?" Blood asked tentatively.
"Why not?" Beth asked.
Blood just sighed in response before turning and leading them back out of the tunnel, taking them back through the room where they had found the rather impressive teleportation cube. They eventually made it back to the still fairly dirty entrance, finding that nothing else had come close in the meantime. The ship was still parked in the clearing with no sign that anything or anyone had come by and tampered with it in any way. Beth led the way onto the ship, the ramp extending and the door unlocking at her approach. It was rather nice the door was keyed to her, though it took a minute of investigation to figure out it was keyed to her mana signature, which was very hard to precisely duplicate. She could also give permissions to others, which she gave to Blood as soon as she figured out how the main system worked.
"You think we ought to, I don't know, figure out how this thing works before sticking a weird blackhole into it?" Blood asked after they managed to find the engine room on the bottom floor.
"Nah, sounds boring," Beth replied. "Besides, weren't you just the one talking about how I could tank a planetary collision and be fine?"
"Well, it's not…not true," Blood said quietly.
"Look, what's the worst that could happen?" Beth asked before quickly saying, "That was rhetorical. Don't answer that."
"Just do it already," Blood grumbled.
Beth pulled the second item they had just obtained from her necklace, surprised when the ship prompted her as soon as the object was in the engine room.
Legacy Core detected. Integrate?
The prompt hovered there for a moment, with the ability to answer yes or no. Beth didn't think much of it, simply selecting yes and watching as the spatial core levitated from her hand and was drawn into the engine, seamlessly merging with the ancient piece of technology. There was a pulsing, like a slow heartbeat of a giant, before thick black lines spread out from the engine, shooting across the entire ship. The lines persisted for a while, shooting out straight before fragmenting into ever smaller lines, suddenly diverting at precise right angles. Even in the engine room, they could observe a noticeable change in the ship, with the walls and floor looking slightly different. As the change completed, they left the engine room to explore the rest of the vessel.
The first thing they noticed was the change seemed to have increased the quality of the entire ship. Everything was just a little bit better, from the very walls to the furniture to even the ship's capabilities, everything had improved. The ship's capabilities was what had gotten the biggest boost, as they found when they investigated the bridge and found the changes in the displays and readings. Having the ship lift off and start moving, Blood found it was noticeably faster as well as more agile, the ship now capable of extremely quick turns even while traveling at quite high speeds. It also appeared the armaments had an upgrade, though they hadn't had need to test the weapons or armor before, so it was a bit hard to judge just how much stronger they were.
After Blood had had plenty of fun flying the ship around and even testing the weapons, a set of large mana cannons that produced quite a powerful blast, Beth directed her to return to the capital. They had the great fun of going through what passed for the air traffic control, which had not been affected in the least by the furor with the governor. After they got through the barrier and assigned a landing pad, Beth firmly determined to always land far out from the cities and pack the ship up to not have to go through any of that again. She packed the ship up and put it in her necklace as soon as the harbor master's assistant appeared and told her the prices for keeping her ship parked. Not that she didn't have money, but she was absolutely not willing to pay the kind of fee they demanded when she could just store it in her necklace. She also took great pleasure in the surprised look of total shock on the assistant's face when her ship folded up and disappeared.
Beth led the way across the city, the airport being on the outskirts and to the side opposite the CRA Hall. As they were walking, Beth nearly ran face first into a slightly tall man, though that put him only around Beth's height, quickly apologizing. He was wearing some sort of cloak that he had pulled up over his head, and Beth didn't get any sense of danger from him, though that didn't really mean a whole lot. Just as she was about to continue on, he stopped her and asked a question in a deep, calm voice.
"My apologies, young ladies, but I was wondering if you had a moment?" he asked.
"Maybe. Depends on what you want," Beth replied coolly.
"I'm afraid I'm rather new here and was looking for a specific place," he explained.
"Oh, well, we're not from around here ourselves, but maybe we can help," Beth said, crossing her arms and giving the man a skeptical eye.
"Ah, well, I was looking for an establishment known as the Blue Rose. You wouldn't happen to have heard of it?" he asked hopefully.
"I've not only heard of it, I've been there," Beth replied with slightly narrowed eyes. "But that's an exclusive bar that you need a membership to enter."
"Ah, fret naught; if you can show me to the bar, I can get in," he replied in a bit of a relieved tone.
"Sure," Beth said with a shrug, turning to lead the mysterious man to the bar. She had quite a good memory at this point, and was able to rather easily navigate the city just by that alone. It didn't take very long to lead the calm man to the Blue Rose, and he proved true to his word, showing the attendant at the door something that cause him to let them in immediately. Beth wasn't able to catch what it was, but judging by the look on the attendant's face, it was something that marked the strange man as rather important.
Rather than do anything unusual once inside, the man led them to a corner booth, similar to what Val had, and ordered a drink. Beth didn't see any reason not to join him, as the Blue Rose offered an incredible selection of both booze and food that was hard to find anywhere else. Beth ordered something dark, heavy, and very expensive, at least by normal standards, though it didn't really put a dent in her wallet. After they had been served and were comfortably drinking, she turned to the calm man to continue their conversation.
"So, what's your name?" she asked as she sipped her drink.
"Most just call me Zane," he replied calmly.
"And why did you need to find the Blue Rose?" Beth asked as she observed the rest of the bar.
"I came here at the behest of an old friend. Should just be a quick bit of business, but I'm also trying to not make a huge scene, as I'm sure you've surmised," he answered with a note of humor in his voice.
"Yeah, we're doing work for someone else right now," Beth said with a sigh before finishing her drink and signaling for another.
"Well, I wouldn't exactly call this work, but I sympathize," Zane replied with a chuckle.
They continued to talk a bit as the evening wore on, Zane content to watch the bar and ponder, not intent on acting on whatever favor he was there for. Trouble was attracted to them, or him, however, as a group approached their table as it turned to night. There were five men that Beth didn't recognize, all of them looking to be middle-aged, though that could mean anything from them being thirty to five hundred and thirty, depending on either how powerful or rich they were. All five of them were skinny, with none of them quite being as tall as Beth or Zane, making them look not particularly intimidating. The fancy, foppish, unwieldy clothes and lack of obvious weapons or armor didn't do anything to help in that regard, either.
That bit was important as what they immediately tried to do was throw their weight around, apparently thinking they were some kind of hot shit. The middle one started by saying to Zane, "I don't think I've ever seen you around here, friend. And you're with the two who managed to get in based on that fool kresnik's recommendation."
"I don't think we did anything to you, friend," Zane replied coldly, though he maintained a very high level of calm. "I think we're just here to enjoy our drinks in peace, if you don't mind moving on."
"Well, we do mind," returned one of the other men. "The Blue Rose is a very high-class establishment, and we can't have just any riffraff coming in here and stinking up the place."
"So, what, this is an attempt to…intimidate us into leaving?" Beth asked, exchanging an incredulous glance with Blood. "I didn't think stuck-up assholes like this were actually real."
"Oh, we're going to make you regret those words," the lead hoodlum returned again with a frown.
"You know, I don't think Laselle would appreciate having customers like this," Zane commented idly. The five clowns were too stupid to take account of the comment, but Beth's hackles immediately went up, as a little comment Val had made during their night of drinking had mentioned the Blue Queen, the person who owned and ran the various Blue Rose bars. Her first name, Val had mentioned, just so happened to be Laselle, which was neither much-known, even to Blue Rose customers, nor was it something someone would say casually. That meant Zane was not just any random fool, which the door attendant's reaction already pointed to, but now Beth was convinced she had stumbled into a very powerful man on the street in a total spot of luck.
"Trying to name drop random fools you know won't help you here," the middle provocateur said boldly, which had even Blood sigh and take a huge pull of her beer.
"I think I've heard enough," Zane said calmly. That acted as the signal, as the five men all moved at the same time to try to get to Zane and the two girls, but that movement was cut short as soon as it started. With nothing but a gesture from a single hand, the five men slammed into an invisible wall, though that only stymied them for a moment. They all activated their Presences after that, and Beth could feel that all five were each somewhat stronger than she was, though not to an overwhelming degree. A quick observation also showed each of the men had at least four signifiers on their Presences marking their rebirths, with the lead thug having seven. It didn't intimidate Beth at all, as she could get a general feel from the men that they had certainly not done one, if any, true rebirths. They might not have even done any perfect rebirths, going to max level; likely the only reason they had the strength they did was a combination of class evolution and the growing power a Presence obtained through greater numbers of rebirths.
Regardless of how powerful they were, Beth's new friend didn't even care one whit, knocking all five men to the ground with a single gesture from one hand. Not only that, but they were bound to the floor with some sort of invisible force that prevented them from moving, no matter how they flexed their Presences or attempted to use skills. The hubbub attracted quite a bit of attention, of course, with the other patrons of the bar taking notice, as well as the live band pausing their playing to observe. This attention drew a man out of the back of the establishment; dressed impeccably and having a very weighty aura, he walked up to their table, casting a side-eye at the men on the ground before addressing Zane.
"Sir, if you could refrain from violence in the establishment, that would be much appreciated," he said. While his voice was soft, it carried both power and an air of regal command that made others rush to do his bidding.
"If this is how you run a business these days, I'm glad I've been preoccupied for a while," Zane commented airily, ignoring the man as the five on the floor were still unable to get up.
"Sir, not only have you attacked valued customers, but you refuse to see reason. I will have to ask you to leave, and revoke your credentials," the man stated, earning a gasp from several nearby tables. Apparently, being barred entry to the Blue Rose was a rather big deal, enough to shock the other patrons.
"Hmm, I don't think that'll fly," Zane said calmly, still entirely unperturbed in the face of the manager's threats.
"Then I'm afraid I shall have to remove you, sir. My apologies," the manager said, taking action as soon as he was finished speaking. He activated his Presence, a long, flowing robe appearing on his body, Beth able to feel the crushing weight he exuded from half-a-dozen steps away.
"Boring," Zane said, a hint of frost in his voice now. He pointed a finger at the manager and an enormous weight crushed down on him, so fast and powerful that the man was unable to react. Despite having his Presence deployed, he was unable to resist, being driven to his knees before having to use his hands to stabilize himself, lest he be crushed fully flat. Zane did all of this without even flexing his own Presence, let alone deploying it, merely crushing the man with a languid gesture.
It was even more impressive when Beth heard the whispers from the other tables, many patrons breathlessly commenting that the manager was an Enlightened on the edge of reaching Ascended. Despite being someone sitting at nineteen rebirths and with a reputation for incredible strength, he was reduced to kneeling before Zane. The whispers about the marble floor being from a world rated for super-dense mana and how Zane's gesture caused it to crack and shattered reinforced just how powerful the cloaked man was.
Comments
PickledTink
---- "Trying to name drop random fools you know what help you here," the middle provocateur said boldly ---- Probably mean "won't", not "what".
clea24
Well Baelvyr and Mortaine both said Beth would be able to make connections. Looks like they were right.
René Zörnig
Dammit i need double chaps :). Thank you for the chapter
SDCard
Thanks for the chapter! Seems like an interesting guy..
