-Groucho Marx

Kim and John elected to stay in the Barrier for a few more hours, alternating between the onsen and the surrounding resting and bathing areas, trying to keep their body temperatures from soaring while still letting the elven wine slowly ebb out of their bodies.

"You should have seen your face after your second bottle," Kim said, grinning as she pushed a finger into John's chest while he dumped a bucket of deliciously hot water over her exposed body. "You're quite fortunate that elven wine is just as weak as normal wine… or I'd have had to stop you before you regretted everything."

"Maybe not everything," John teased, as he leaned forward to plant another teasing kiss on Kim's wet cheek. The once distant Slayer seemed far more open to the affection, accepting the gesture before elbowing John in the chest.

"Your hormones aside, you haven't even begun to experience the aftereffects of **** yet… believe me, in a few hours you may yet wish our climb had been that much shorter," Kim chastised, though the smile was clear on her face.

"How many times have you done this, anyway?"

"As many as I wished, so long as I had a willing partner I trusted with my life," Kim said, baring her teeth only slightly as she leaned into John and licked along his collar, sparking tingles across his skin that nearly sent him into spasms.

"N-no, not that," John said, laughing, "I don't care about that. How many times have you gotten drunk?"

"Ah, well… a Slayer should always be ready for combat, of course," Kim said dismissively, filling her own bucket from the nearby tap. "I do not often have such chances to relax as this, and I usually feel far too selfish to indulge in self-pleasure… no matter what method that is achieved by."

"I get that," John said slowly, shaking his head. "I feel pressure to constantly level myself and improve, and I have had the ability to pull back into my private world at any point. I feel like I'm letting people down if I'm not constantly working on self-improvement. Even farming these pebbles for Tricia's access key has felt a lot like I'm just wasting time… I have to remember why I'm doing it, and how much it means to Tricia, and even then I worry it's only because I know her so closely."

"The burden of doing what is right is often greater than the guilt of doing nothing at all, or worse, giving in to the easier path of selfishness and self-concerns," Kim said sadly, shaking her head. "You will find your own path, of that I am sure the more I come to know you, John."

"Thank you, Kim… that actually means a lot to me."

"I should hope so," Kim said, one last grin crossing her features. "Now… we should return to the world at hand. I fear both Moira and my father shall be preparing to tear us apart for leaving them alone so long."

"I hope that we always have such dedicated guardians," John said.

The two of them phased back into reality a few minutes later after drying off at last. Surprisingly neither Moira nor any representative of the Order was awaiting them; John took full advantage of the Order's lack of foresight to wish one final goodbye to Kim, then vanished into his private world. Although Kim herself had long since stopped showing signs of intoxication, John was pretty sure as he vanished from the old world that he heard Kim shouting at him for leaving her alone to deal with the Warden's potential lecture.

John only chuckled as his personal Barrier world faded in around him, knowing the worst Kim would likely face was a proper tongue lashing from the over-zealous Warden and her followers. Instead of dwelling on those things, John focused his gaze on his home, now fading into view, and smiled as he set off for home. Even from where he stood he could see most of his lovers toying with the Nekos out in front of the house, each of the newborns making their own way around the expansive playground. John smiled at the sight of his children, eyes wide with pride as he took in the sight. In the corner of his vision, his newest creation, the first unique plant of his own making, stood strong - in fact, it had several new blossoms, no doubt the hard work of his loves during his absence. Tricia's drones churned around it furiously, scanning and re-scanning. John wasn't too surprised to see she'd at last found the plant, but he hoped she would keep John's ever-growing ecological system a secret from Moira for a while longer.

"Mastah, you're finally back," Seras said as he approached, peeling away from the Nekos just long enough to wrap her arms around him. John returned the gesture warmly, laughing as he pulled the vampiress into him.

"Sorry, the 'conversation' I had with Kim turned out to be a little bit more than I was expecting," John said only half-apologetically. Seras' eyes widened with glee as she pulled back, clapping her hands together and leaning in conspiratorially toward John.

"So you gave it to 'er good, eh? Made the prissy lil' girl feel what it's like to take a hard one?" Seras cooed, rubbing along John's sides before he could even explain. The Gamer was reduced to laughter as he lightly pulled her hands away, shaking his head.

"Honestly? She kind of… surprised me, let's say," John teased, nuzzling himself into Seras' neck. The cool, pale, and yet unbelievably welcoming skin of his vampiric lover felt astounding against his own.

"You keep that up an' I'm gonna insist on a round two, I don't care if your dick is limp from all that wine," Seras growled, running her fingers through his hair as he started to gently nip at her neck.

"You could smell that, huh? Guess I shouldn't be surprised. I did save a bottle for you guys, honest."

"I could smell it when ya came in, but Lerianna was also pretty miffed," Seras said, quirking an eyebrow. "She was mumblin' to 'erself but it kinda sounded like she was angry that you tried to get 'er drunk and then flirted with 'er."

"That doesn't sound like either of the things that happened, believe it or not. I'm really curious what's up with her, but… I guess we'll find out eventually. Pretty sure we can keep ourselves busy until she opens up."

"We talkin' literally or figuratively? I can prob'ly talk us into the latter," Seras offered, pulling her arms around John's waist.

"I was thinking figuratively, for once," John chuckled, shaking his head. "No need to rush her into sharing. Like I said, always plenty to do around here. I see you guys have been taking care of the plant while I was gone?"

"Yeah, turns out tha' you don' need too much energy when you're dealin' with a buncha babies," Seras said, chuckling as she gently tousled the back of her hair. "We kinda took turns givin' all we 'ad, while the rest of us dealt with the kiddos."

"Well, I appreciate the effort. Hopefully with this plant and enough cooperation, we can hit a point where we can sustain ourselves here… I think we're getting closer, but I still like having so much fast food available," John laughed.

"Just go ahead an' let me know when you wanna have us eatin' nothing but grass and fruit for sustenance. I'll escort myself out before you close the door," Seras chuckled, shaking her head. "I won't be around for that kinda sadness!"

"I think if I had to give up fried chicken for safety, I'd rather go to war," John laughed in agreement. "Our preparation is a long way from finished. Another reason I feel safe giving Tricia a way into our world… she's not likely to show up for dinner."

"I can see you smirkin', but if she tries to steal our dinner and your affection, she's out on 'er ass," Seras swore, grinning as she continued to tease along John's body. The wine still coursing through his veins gave him just enough numbness to push past the obvious display, smirking as he pulled away from his busty vampire lover.

"Nothing could replace you or anyone else here, Seras," John assured, rolling his eyes. "Go ahead and keep playing with the kittens. I need to access one of the drones and see about selling some of our leftover materials, for after I form this Portal Stone."

"I believe I told you it was known as an Auric Sphere, an enchanted rock which-"

"Portal Stone, got it," John said dismissively, waving away the Evellyn window that had popped up in front of him. "Anyway, go ahead and do your thing, Seras. I need to talk to Tricia about the Abyssal Auction."

What John had hoped would be a relatively simplistic matter ended up being far more of a pain than he originally anticipated. Tricia insisted that John not try directly linking up the Abyssal Auction's site or app through their connection, saying it could weaken or expose the barriers between worlds. Instead, she set up a webcam with a through-put on the touch screen that let John see and use a computer back at the Order Manor.

"Right, so let's see what these sell for," John mused to himself, eyeing his inventory. Since Evellyn had assured him that these stones existed normally in the world, he was hoping he might have finally found something that he could put out on the Auction, now that he had enough to make the stone. A little extra cash would actually be nice - if he made enough, he might even finally be able to buy some new gear from the Auction itself…

"Okay, so I can farm a couple of these a day and- holy shit, they're a million a pop?!"

John's eyes were wide as he made his little outburst, staring with glee at the screen. Tricia's face cut in a moment later, leaning in with a disapproving glare on her face.

"Due to the fact that a physical separation is required, you are still very much present in my lab. I am leaving audio on in case you need my attention or assistance, so please try to keep your exclamations a bit more manageable, John."

"S-sorry. Didn't realize these things were so expensive."

"Hm? Oh, yes, materials which can hold mana and be used for enchantments or to power more advanced magical objects are quite valuable, especially to newer enchanters who cannot attune objects to innate mana or wielder mana, as well as to objects which must function for long periods without user interaction… these are relatively poor-quality stones you're looking at, so they only fetch such a low price as you're seeing here."

"Low?! I mean the jewelry was one thing, but come on-"

"Indoor voice, John Newman," Tricia chastised, shaking her head. "Using magic makes achieving high political, social, or economic status a mere trivial matter. Mundane currency is, as such, all but useless to high-ranking mages, and even the lowest of illusion users can amass a sizeable fortune in a legal, if not entirely ethical manner. To say that prices are inflated would be an understatement. Most objects of at least a moderate worth are conducted in transactions of Mana Gems. They are not a fiat currency; they have value all their own, should one choose to break them down to use as a fuel source. They also are relatively difficult to create, given the level of magical or technomagical prowess required to solidify and condense mana into the form of a gem, so there is never an abundance of them that would result in a significant devaluation even if you ignored their practical uses."

"Interesting. Well, I'll have to wait until I'm back in the mortal realm to sell these off, then?"

"Indeed. The Abyssal Auction picks up any goods placed for sale immediately - it would be troublesome for them if they found you in a place they could not access, and deeply concerning if they somehow managed it."

"Agreed. I'll wait until I get back, then. Thanks for the help, Tricia!"

John signed off shortly after that and stared at his inventory. He eyed the latest of his growing stone hoard, imagining the millions of dollars he technically had just sitting around in his inventory. If he sold all of them, Tricia would never know, right? And John could buy himself some new gear, some better ammo for Seras, a few new teas, that ring for her…

John arced through his menus in a flurry, mashing through his enchantment menu and opening up the template that Evellyn had set for him. John was many things, and selfish was occasionally one of them, but he'd already put off the Portal Stone once before. John Crafted the combined form of the tiny magical pebbles together and then immediately applied his Enchantment before he could delay any longer. Thankfully, the rest in Kim's personal Barrier had helped to restore John's missing mana from their long day of Barrier grinding - that and the repeated levels that he'd been gaining, now up to level 11 after the final burst of high-level Barriers massively upped his experience gain.

Portal Stone
Rare Object
An item which can transport the user between the New World and the Old World at a small mana cost. As the stone was created in the New World, its anchor point has been set as John Newman's last location in the Old World. After initial use the stone will always return to a world at the same point it left it. This stone has a permanent one-hour cooldown, but can be re-enchanted with a higher level of World Shift. Mana Cost: 250

"Ouch. That's actually pretty high, good thing this isn't for me. Pretty sure Tricia's gotta have a ton of mana with how much she's constantly improving her mind and mana."

John stowed the item away, happy the temptation was gone for now. He'd have plenty of time to worry about money later, and now he had a pretty reliable way to farm it. Plus, it wasn't like he didn't still need to grind out some levels. A few more hits on the golems at different levels on their way up the chain wouldn't be so bad.

And now… John could finally do something to help one of his friends. In a bigger way than just having their back in a fight. John smiled at the realization, and the feeling of making a difference.

John liked it. He had to say, now that the moment was really here, it was everything he'd hoped it would be, and more.