Her plan of intensive training via work had gotten off on the right foot, with the crystal mage clearing out just about every mission that had piled up in Hargeon in her absence. She had no doubt more would take their place soon, and indeed she hoped they would sooner rather than later. Maybe next time she stopped by her guild's hometown, there would be more work to do. One thing was certain, she knew the guild would already be completely repaired by the time she came back. The attacking dark mages had done a good number on their architecture, but they'd done little to hamper the spirit of Blue Pegasus, constantly on a quest for self improvement, perpetually yearning for perfection while fully understanding they can never reach it. And in Alisa's case, realizing how they should indeed never attain it. To be perfect means pretty much the same as to become stagnant after all, not a condition she'd wish upon herself or anyone she was close to.
She still had plenty of room to grow, and trying to find it had led her to her next destination.
Here she was at last, the mountain town of Orchidia. She found it a rather lovely, if quaint place as far as the people and architecture were concerned, but disliked the shady nature of it's business envoiroment. She still held Orchidia as one of the most likely places her mother's killers would have fled to after the deed had been done. Nowhere else would let them ditch the stolen jewelry and gemstones quite as fast as they apparently did. Everything that disappeared from her father's shop ultimately vanished from circulation entirely faster than any Rune Knight could track them. Naturally, Alisa had visited in the past in search of leads, but she was always passing by and as such never stayed more than a couple of days, never did any jobs there either. But this time it would be different. Though she had technically already arrived yesterday, she did so late at night and headed straight for the hotel to sleep. She'd need ever second of that beauty sleep as she could get to be ready for the heavy amount of work she had to do today.
Indeed she had several jobs to potentially tackle throughout her time in this city, but only one came remotely close to the amount of pay a mage like her should normally expect. Of course, how much clients paid mages hinged on the difficulty of the job, not really the mage's level, yet higher ranked guild mages could in turn pick higher ranking jobs. Tasks at Alisa's level were hardly ever avaliable, and tasks higher than hers even less so. Hell, she'd never even seen any throughout all her time as a mage, and frequently wondered whether they were simply snatched off the job boards the very instant they popped up. Maybe one day she'd see one of those mythical S-rank requests with her own eyes, but alas, today wouldn't be that day.