With a little guidance from Lia’s memories, finding a suitable farmhouse for us to take over was relatively easy. We had considered going back to the Apple Gate Farm, at least for a night or two, but ultimately, decided against it. Meeting Chantalle’s parents, with her no longer being Chantalle but Carnelia was simply uncomfortable for her, while I could see how horribly wrong things could go and, given my various traits, titles and general social ability, would go. It was one thing to meet them for an hour or two but a longer meeting? That was simply a bad idea.

The building Lia showed us was one her parents used to have quite the business with. Apple Gate Farm’s primary product was, unsurprisingly, apples. Most of them were sold directly, simply as food items but that worked only for those picked directly from the branch and without blemishes or deformities. Anything that was picked from the ground or not within rather tight quality standards for visual perfection had to be discarded. Or had to be sold to become something else, either to be turned into applesauce or into cider.

The primary cider producer of our region, who also used to buy all the discarded apples from Apple Gate Farm, used to own the buildings we were standing at now. We had chosen this building for its cellar. Apparently, cider needed a relatively temperate and dark place to mature and instead of using a large-scale electrical refrigerator, this place simply used a deep and reasonably massive cellar. While we couldn’t be certain that the cellar had survived the change and the earthquakes undamaged, it was our best bet for a perfectly dark place, secure from any and all sunlight.

But before we could make the buildings and their cellar ours, we needed to make sure that no survivors were already living here. Otherwise, we might accidentally kill them all, as I was planning to flood the entire area with my life-draining fog, simply to clear out any pests that might have made their home here. I had no desire to find out there were plus-sized bugs living inside the walls, or rats or any other critters.

There were far too many species that I could imagine turning into dangerous menaces after being empowered by the system. It all came down to a question of scaling, how did the system enhance an ant's ability to lift multiple times its own weight, if the influence of the system increased the ant’s weight by ten times? Would that mean a critter the size of a poodle could lift a car? It wasn’t really an image I wanted to contemplate, and just one of the many factors that made me grateful for the change coming during winter. If it had been spring, or fall, with swarms of mosquitoes and similar bloodsucking insects buzzing around? It might not have been me who created vampires, but a magically induced mutation of one of the many diseases transmitted by insects.

Shaking my head, I pushed the images of swarms of giant insects, all out for blood from my mind, happy that my mist was a quite suitable weapon to deal with such pests. I made a mental note to look into turning the mist into a semi-permanent effect, a sort-of enchantment that I could power daily, to maintain a barrier against intruders. But first, I had to secure our new lair.

The last approach was for me alone. Sure, Lia had made great progress with her stealth, but when I pushed my magic to its current limit, I was still quite a bit better. The difference might be mostly academic, I doubted that anyone else could actually find either of us in the dark, but it was there and so she stayed back, together with Silva and the dogs.

For once, I didn’t just push magic into my enchanted cloak, using its effect to blend into the darkness, but I also used a five-rune formation, tying Shadow, Darkness and Concealment together into another powerful effect that I layered on top of the concealment from the cloak.

I could hear Lia’s breath hitch when I simply faded from her senses, despite her best attempts to perceive me. Given that I hadn’t actually moved and was just a few steps away from her, her reaction brought a grin to my face. Sadly, I was somewhat certain Silva could perceive me, or at least could detect my scent, but it might simply be the scent that lingered from my previous presence. But I couldn’t be sure, maybe I could test it sometime later.

Moving forward, I moved through a small gap in the fence, easily getting to the rather interesting building. It was a mix of modern and classical, the wooden framing seemingly out in the open, between white-washed panels, painting the image of a medieval, European farmhouse but the doors and windows were far from medieval, they were easily as modern as anything I had seen before. Thanks to my training with Mrs Wu, I even noticed multiple well-hidden surveillance cameras, but given that everything electric had fried during the change, I wasn’t worried about those.

Half of the building seemed to be designed as a house, a home for the family living here, while the other half, from what I could tell, was filled with various metallic machines, likely where they made their cider. A small distance away from the house, I noticed a ramp going down into the earth, an entrance to the cellar Lia had described, probably to allow access to the finished cider, so it could be loaded onto trucks for delivery.

Sneaking around the house, I listened for any noise coming from within, peeking into the ground-floor windows to look for movement or the tell-tale glow of Shattered eyes. With each window I looked through, my confidence was rising, This might be the place to stay, at least for a while. Ultimately, I would still have to move on, simply because I needed more than levels to revive Sigmir, but getting a lot of levels, and crossing the first divide, those were my immediate needs.

Once I achieved those, I could begin considering how I got my beloved back, given that even the Grandmother had been unable, or unwilling, to pull Callisto’s lover from the beyond, instead having her wait for the cycle of reincarnation to turn. For me, that was no option, not only did I lack any guarantee that Sigmir would reincarnate on Terra, I also rejected the idea that she would be a new person, no longer my Sigmir. Maybe someone who could become my Sigmir again, but not my Sigmir. So, waiting for reincarnation was no option for me. There had to be something else, but what, I currently didn’t know.

Soon, I managed to circle the building and was as confident as I could be that nothing human-sized had entered since the change happened. That meant, unless the people inside had simply battened down the hatches and completely sealed themselves in, nobody I should care about was inside. Still, it wasn’t impossible that they had, so more investigation was necessary.

Picking the backdoor’s lock, in full view of a surveillance camera, felt a little strange but luckily, the lessons Mrs Wu had given me were up to the task. It took me almost twenty minutes, and a bit of magical cheating, but finally, the lock opened with a soft click.

Opening the door just a little, I was immediately greeted with a scent that turned my previous confidence into a certainty. There was no way anyone living would have kept the house sealed while the stench of decaying meat was getting this heavy, it was bad enough to make me gag, even with my robust stomach.

I didn’t even try to taste the air for any magical influences, I simply took a step or three back, and started to create my usual runic formation, conjuring up the mist of confusion and death. Channelling Astral Power into the runes, the mist started to flood out and only my control pushed the cloud into the crack I had left open, flooding into the house.

I wasn’t sure how much space or how well the seals were, but I decided to err on the side of caution, keeping the spell going for almost half an hour, easily long enough to thoroughly cleanse the place.

Once that was done, I called in the others, though given that the stench inside lingered, as well as some minor after-effects of my spell, nobody wanted to enter just yet. Instead, I held my breath and moved through the building, ignoring everything but finding my path to the main door. There, I opened and escaped outside, before daring to breathe again.

With a channel open between both doors, I began calling on the wind, happy to use the element I had spent quite a bit of time training in. Setting a runic formation right into the open door, I simply let my Astral Power flow through the house, pushing out all the unpleasantness until finally, the building was clear.

Now, we just had to deal with the source of the stench, open up the cellar and make the place our home. By the looks of it, getting it all done by the time dawn rolled around would be a challenge, but at least we didn’t have to roll up at Apple Gate Farm, still drenched in blood from feasting on the cattle. I had a feeling that wouldn’t go over well.