31st August, Nobles' Borough, Peral Kingdom.
It was around 9 A.M.
At that moment, a blonde-haired girl with azure blue eyes stood at the entrance of a three-storied white mansion and held a unique silver pocket watch in her hand. On her side stood a black-haired girl who wore normal linen clothes and looked at the mansion full of awe.
"Damn, even with Abium's Noble seal, it cost us 1500 white gold coins to buy this Cerise Villa," Helena grumbled.
Meanwhile, Aliza looked nervous and asked while glancing at the surroundings.
"Why is coachman Orson taking so much to get that steward?"
Soon, she sensed a few malicious eyes were monitoring their movements and became anxious.
'Who are they?' She became alarmed inside and turned her gaze towards Helena.
"They must be Count Tibal's lackeys. Don't worry about them. They are nothing but small ants." Helena said casually and soon smiled as she saw a luxurious carriage moving towards their direction from the left side road.
The carriage soon stopped in front of them, and then a muscular black-haired man, around thirty years old, walked out of it. He wore a narrow-sleeved black linen cloth, same-colored pants, and black shoes without heels. He had deep blue eyes, a thin mustache, an oval face, and a monocle on his right eye.
"Sorry for making you wait here, Miss Helena.'' That man said while bowing his head, giving Helena a golden key.
''No problem, Steward Rick.''
Helena waved her hand and caught the golden key. After that, she arrived in front of the mansion entrance gate and opened the gate with a click. Her action also attracted a few nearby mansion guards' attention. Many guards and even some servants walked near the mansion to gather information about the new owner of this Cerise Villa.
With a loud screech, the two-meter-tall Iron Gate opened and revealed an empty yard filled with dried trees and plants to everyone's eyes. With a glance, anyone could tell this mansion garden was not maintained properly by the previous owner and looked like a barren, empty land. Helena's azure blue eyes scanned the yard and soon landed on the fountain at the center.
'Haa! At least the water supply is still working.' She muttered inwardly while taking out a pouch full of seeds and tossing those seeds in different directions.
After that, she took out a different brown seed and tossed it into the fountain. Seeing her action, everyone, including Aliza, became puzzled. But everyone's eyes widened when that brown seed made contact with the water.
At that moment, they saw that seed germinated rapidly and grew into a large vine plant.
Within seconds, multiple vine branches appeared from the single stem and crept in different directions. After that, those vines' branches began to act like water sprinklers and started springing water everywhere!
In the next few moments, the whole dried yard completely became wet, and the other seeds Helena tossed earlier began to germinate rapidly.
Seeing this strange magic, everyone who came to gather information about the new owner was shocked.
'She is a Druid!' That was the first thought that crossed everyone's mind. Even Aliza became dumbstruck and felt awed.
Within five minutes, the barren land changed into a garden filled with beautiful plants and trees.
Without minding others' shocked gazes, Helena turned her face towards Rick and spoke,
''Hire two footmen, one laundry maid, one Head nurse, One Housemaid, one gardener, one butler, two housekeepers, two chefs, and four guards. Hire those guards as temporary ones.''
''Okay, Miss Helena.'' Rick adjusted his monocle and nodded his head solemnly.
''Two hundred white gold coins should be enough for yearly maintenance, right?'' Helena asked while calculating everything in her mind and gave a bag of white gold coins.
"It should be more than enough, Miss Helena," Rick said with a nod.
After that, Helena and Aliza began walking into the large mansion.
It was a two-storied mansion. The house's interior was focused around a large central hallway serving as the main avenue of traffic and entrance area to the adjacent rooms. The hallway flows into a large, wide staircase that provides the main means of egress from the house's entertainment area to the second floor's private rooms.
Four formal rooms with sixteen-foot ceilings, pocket doors, fireplaces, and tall windows form the building's main block. The predominant colors were dark with tan and gold highlights, contrasting the original interior trim painting of ashen pinks, tans, pale blues, and black detailing.
This combination of colors was repeated throughout both floors of the house. On either side of the main doors were smaller, longer versions of the colored glass windows. The doorknobs, plates, and hinges were brass with raised Eastlake-style ornament.
Helena and Aliza walked into the central hallway with awed faces and started to do their jobs.
Meanwhile, Rick began to hire all servants, and within two days, the whole two-storied mansion became lively.
On the other hand, Helena sat on the table in the study room and fixed her gaze on the green ring Abium had given earlier.
Without delay, she sent her spirit power into the ring and tried to find some clue about this ring.
Suddenly, she felt that a mysterious invisible force came out of the green ring and entered her mind.
The next instant, the chirping sound of birds that echoed from the outside yard went silent. She tried to move her hand but soon got stunned as she noticed that her whole body was moving slowly.
No! Her mind began to think faster!
The next moment, she noticed that her whole spiritual power drained completely, and she even felt a sharp headache.
Without delay, she retracted her spiritual power and soon noticed that everything had returned to normal.
'What the hell was that?!' She stared at the green ring with a bewildered face and became stupefied entirely inside.
'This is definitely not a normal artifact.' She thought to herself and let out a deep sigh.
Then, she shifted her attention toward the green-colored essence hidden in the ring and touched it using her spirit power.
The next instant, the strange green essence disappeared from there and reappeared in the depths of her mind. At the same time, it began to release some green mystic power into her body and started strengthening her 'Nature' affinity!
At that moment, Helena felt some strange energy entering the world tree's leaf and started merging with it!
Before she could check what was happening, a sharp pain assaulted her.
It lasted for a few seconds and then vanished.
At the same time, Helena checked her body in a hurry and soon got shocked as she noticed many changes in her mind and body.
She felt the connection link between her soul and the World Tree's leaf became denser.
Simultaneously, all her nature spells suddenly underwent some transformation and ranked up one by one.
'I became an Official Druid!' Her eyes widened.
She stood up in shock and looked at the green ring with confusion.
'I can also feel some changes in nature affinity.' She furrowed her brows and quickly walked out of her room. Then, she went to Carriage House and asked Orsan to drive the carriage towards the adventurers' guild.
Soon, the carriage left the Cerise Villa and moved to the Adventurers' Guild.