As the night began to turn to day Marcus woke up from his sleep and turned his head to look at Lilia and saw that she was still in bed curled up like a caterpillar in a cocoon.
Smiling lightly Marcus got up and took out the potable tub he had purchased, filled it with water before heating it with his fire magic.
Once the water was good and warm Marcus slipped into the tub and began thinking about what he needed to do.
'First, we need to head to the kingdom's office of land management and pick out the estate I was awarded when getting my title, and once that is done it has been a long time coming but I need to deal with Poulsen. After that I can find a good school to enroll Lilia in and then start learning how to forge weapons and armor.'
With his basic plan outlined Marcus finished washing himself off and then turning ethereal letting all of the remaining water on him fall off.
Once he had finished with his relaxing bath Marcus went over to Lilia who was just now groggily waking up and told her to get ready to leave soon.
In just over thirty minutes Marcus and Lilia were ready to go and leaving their room walked down stair and left the room key with the receptionist before exiting the Cozy Respite.
Back on the streets of Boreas, Marcus and Lilia headed to the stable where they had left Blitz and picked him and their carriage up.
After attaching the harness to Blitz, Marcus and Lilia sat down on the coachman's stand and began heading towards their destination.
Marcus knew that the office of management was within the inner wall of the city and figured that once he was there, he could ask for more detailed directions.
However, what Marcus did not expect was the amount of time it would take to reach the inner wall.
After traveling for nearly three hours Marcus was finally able to see the inner wall which stood around fifty feet tall.
'I thought Loursend was already too big, but this place really takes the cake. If only the streets were less crowded I could have gotten Blitz to go faster, but there are so many people moving about that at best we were able to move at ten miles an hour.'
While lamenting the long travel times from place to place within the city, Marcus and Lilia finally made it to the gate separating the inner and outer city.
Approaching the gate, a couple of guards immediately stopped them and asked for their identification and a seven gold entry fee each.
However, when Marcus took out his silver plate ID the two guards bowed their heads and said "Sorry we did not know you were a titled noble, you are free to pass into the inner city with no charge."
Nodding his head at the guards Marcus then put on his brightest smile and said, "This happens to be my first time entering the city and I was wondering if one of you could give me directions to the kingdom's office of land management."
The two guards seeing Marcus' smile began blushing slightly since in his Irene form, he looked quite attractive, and his smile could melt the coldest hearts.
Quickly the first guard regained his senses and abruptly said, "Of course Lady Baronetess, this humble guard would be more than happy to lead you to the kingdom's office of land management. If you would just give me a minute to fetch my horse, I will take you there."
The other guard looked at his friend like he had been betrayed since he was also planning to offer to lead the beautiful baronetess but had been beaten to the punch.
However, before either of them could make another move a loud and commanding voice echoed out from the gate.
"What are you two slackers doing, stop trying to pursue someone above your station and get back to your post."
Turning towards the voice Marcus saw a woman in full shining plate armor was walking towards them and she was holding up a young boy by his shirt.
She then walked right up to the two guards and dropped the boy and said, "Get back to your post, this boy nearly slipped in without paying the entry fee. If you two do not step up and do your jobs properly I am going to have you replaced."
The two guards then gulped before running back to their post and praying that their commander was not going to be too harsh on them.
The commanding woman in full armor then looked at the boy and said, "You scram, and next time I see you trying to sneak in you will not get off so easily."
The little boy with a face full of fear scurried away as quickly as he could since he did not want to be sent to the mines or sold as a criminal slave.
The woman then turned her gaze towards Marcus and said, "Sorry about the trouble just now, I will have someone else lead you to your destination since those two knuckleheads should have known better than to abandon their posts."
The woman then whistled loudly and a young girl that looked about the same age as Marcus in his guise as Irene came running out from the gate.
Looking her over Marcus could see that she was dressed in light leather armor and had two swords on her belt.
The young girl soon arrived in front of the commanding woman, saluted, and said, "You called for me Dame Harthen."
Nodding her head Dame Harthen said, "Yes, and now I need you to lead this Lady here to the office of land management."
The young lady quickly gave a slight bow indicating that she would do it and then turned towards Marcus and said, "My name is Clarisa Hall, Dame Harthen's knight apprentice and I would be happy to show you the way."
Nodding his head Marcus responded saying, "Nice to meet you Clarisa, my name is Irene Geist, and this is my sister Lilia, we will be in your care."
Clarisa seeing Marcus' laid-back demeanor began smiling since she hated dealing with stuck up and stuffy nobles, and then said, "Follow me, the office is a bit of a ways away, but we should be able to get there within the hour."
Clarisa then turned around and walked through the gate waiting for Marcus to follow her.
Following behind Marcus finally passed into the inner city and could immediately see a stark difference from the outer city.
First, the streets were much more sparsely populated maybe only being about a hundredth as crowded as the streets of the outer city.
Marcus also noticed that the people were dressed much nicer, and the quality of the buildings had vastly improved.
However, what really attracted Marcus' attention was the massive castle he could see in the distance.
'That must be the royal families castle. I cannot make out its full details from here, but it must be huge. Maybe if I get some free time on my hands later, I will go explore it using my ghost form.'
However, Marcus was not able to think about his ill-conceived castle exploration plans for long, as Clarisa mounted a horse and began quickly trotting away.
Seeing that his guide was getting ahead of him Marcus cracked Blitz's reins and Blitz began running to catch up.
Following behind Clarisa, it took Marcus and Lilia around fifty minutes to traverse the distance to the office of land management.
Marcus looking at Clarisa thanked her for her help and told her that if she needed a favor in the future, he would be willing to help her out since she had helped him.
Clarisa with a big smile said, "I was just doing my job and I was happy to meet a noble that was not stuck up. I wish more nobles would be like you and Dame Harthen. Well, it was nice meeting you Irene, but I need to get back to work so see you around."
Giving her farewell, Clarisa turned her horse around and began heading back to the inner wall where her master was posted.
Now that Marcus had arrived at his destination, he pulled his carriage up to the building and parked it, telling Lilia to wait with the carriage and Blitz while he was inside.
Walking into the building Marcus saw half a dozen desks with a person sitting behind them either talking to other people or looking over documents.
Walking up to one of the unoccupied desks Marcus was quickly greeted by the employee there who said, "And what can the office of land management do for you today."
Marcus not exactly sure what to say simply handed over the letter he had gotten from Aria and allowed the employee to read it.
The employee taking the letter opened it and read it, but the further they got along the more their face contorted into one of surprise and a bit of fear.
Once they had finished reading the letter they quickly stood up and bowed towards Marcus before saying, "It is a pleasure to serve a friend of the grand archmage, however, I will need to go and get my superior to approve of the request in this letter, if that is all right with you Baronetess Irene Geist."
Marcus seeing the employees sudden shift in demeanor could tell that he was walking on eggshells, doing his best be as polite as possible to Marcus even though he would not normally be this carful with just a mere baronetess.
However, the fear of displeasing a friend of the grand archmage had made him put on his best manners, and he was willing to jump through just about any hoop not to catch Marcus' or more importantly the grand archmage's ire.
"Yeah, that is fine I was just told to come here to get the estate that was awarded to me along with the title of Baronetess."
Sighing the employee continued to bow for a few more moments before he rose his head slightly and began walking away headed for his boss.
After just two minutes Marcus saw the employee coming back with middle aged man who was dressed in fancy clothes and had an air of authority around him.
As the man walked up to Marcus, he gave a quick bow before saying, "Greetings Lady Geist, my name is Count Flourensy and I am in charge of the office of land management, it is a pleasure to meet you."
Count Flourensy then grabbed Marcus's hand and kissed it before saying, "If you would not mind, we can pick out a suitable estate for you in my office I am sure that we can find a home that will be perfect for a friend of the grand archmage."
Beckoning Marcus to follow him, Count Flourensy led the way to his office where he pulled out a luxurious seat for Marcus, and then asked him if he would like any refreshments.
Marcus thinking about it for a moment asked for a honeyed tea and the count quickly had a servant go and retrieve what Marcus wanted.
The count once he was sure that Marcus was comfortable said, "So what might you be looking for in a home, there are quite a few currently vacant estates within the capital's inner wall from nobles that could no longer afford them or those that had lost their titles."
Marcus had already thought about what he wanted for quite some time now, but he was not really picky and their were only two things he really wanted.
"There are only a couple of things I am really looking for, one is a large bathtub, and the other is a personal forge."
Count Flourensy was a bit surprised to hear what Marcus wanted since most nobles in this position would make demands about location and size more than specific amenities, especially ones that were not as sought after such as what Marcus wanted.
Nodding his head, the count said, "Very well I will look for a few estates that match your preferences, but I must tell you that it is pretty rare for an estate to have an onsite forge so it may be difficult to find one."
Marcus simply shrugged his shoulders and said, "If you cannot find one that is fine, I can always have one put in later."
The count hearing Marcus' response smiled since Marcus was not going to put up a fit like some nobles had in the past and he then had another employee go searching through some documents to find an appropriate estate.
After nearly forty minutes the employee came back with three folders and handed them to the count who quickly glanced over them before handing them to Marcus.
"Here you go Lady Irene, these three estates have the two things that you were looking for, I hope one of them is up to you standards."
Marcus then read through the three folders looking over the estates finding that overall, each of them was fine, but one of them was far better than the other two.
Two of the estates shown were actually quite small only sitting on ten acres and thirteen acres respectively, and the forges that they had were quite small, along with the main manor only being around nine thousand square feet.
However, the third choice was on over sixty acres, had a main building of around forty thousand square feet, a massive separate forge, and two servants quarters buildings.
'Is there even a competition, did he think I would not just chose this one, it is way better than the other two.'
However, what Marcus did not know was that these estates were chosen based on their price range and this particular estate had some problems.
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