StarGate

As the end of the day approached, Nellya with her group and a few other larger groups approached the counter.

"Boss, do you have any plan in creating a small camp around the portal? If you do, we'd like to stay overnight in the gate to continue exploring." She explained as the others around nodded their heads, listening to the conversation, proving that their goals were the same as hers.

"Well, for the moment, creating a camp is difficult since I personally don't have anyone to take care of it." He explained with a shrug of his shoulders as it was out of his hands for the moment. "However, if you wish to stay on the celestial body, I have no problem except that the portal will be closed until tomorrow morning." He continued as he had no problem with staying there as he knew he would be able to open the portal the following morning without a problem.

"In that case, our group will stay overnight and we will build our own camp if you don't mind." She said as she had obviously already prepared as some of her men went outside, coming back with various construction materials to create a temporary shelter and a few dozen more.

"No problem, just make sure not to block the portal." He nodded as there was no downside for himself. However, if they were about to stay on the other side, he would have to perhaps create his own shelter or safe zone to allow for more explorers to stay on the other side. At the same time, it would allow the gate to have a better defense once he lost control of the gate and allow for better defenses against the monsters.

"Here's the money." She said as she handed over 108,000 Bym which was the price of her and her 49 subordinates to stay on the celestial body for 24 hours.

While it might sound like a huge waste to stay in the celestial body even when not exploring, there were in reality many benefits.

Not only could they explore whenever they wanted, they could also build their own camp to store the gathered supplies, allow people to stay at their camp for a small fee and even meditate in the otherworld. It was well known that celestial bodies had different amounts of natural energy. However, with the incredible population of this world, the natural energy was quite lower compared to other stars of the same level. As such, training on Proteus would, according to his previous experience of visiting the portal, grant about a 20% boost to their training.

While low, multiplying it for fifty people granted quite the improvement and would allow their forces to grow stronger quicker.

With the first one paying, two other groups joined in as well, allowing him to gain an extra 129,600 Bym for sixty people.

A few moments later, the three groups left through the gate with their own respective materials. From what he gathered from their talks, they would be creating a combined effort to help each other. After all, compared to medium-sized organizations with over a thousand members, their low-number was a weakness should they encounter a large number of enemies or even explorers from the other two gates amongst which one was still unfound.

With the groups leaving, he finally closed the portal as everyone left the shop, smiles on their faces as they either improved in their training or found enough resources to pay for the day's work.

In reality, there were four types of people who entered the portals to celestial bodies.

The first were the explorers who wished to explore new lands and make money in this way. Oftentimes, they would turn to ressource collection and fighting monsters once the exploration was done.

The second were the associations who entered gates for the money and to strengthen their forces. Both goals were inclusive. While they would first aim for the more accessible and valuable resources, killing monsters and training were by no means something they completely discarded as the first allowed them to survive in such a dangerous world all the while allowing them the opportunity to enter more dangerous portals.

It was well known that the more valuable resources were in the more dangerous locations and as such, each association and groups focused on these goals.

The third group were the civilian groups. Those who prefer not to become stronger and instead trained in their own common profession to collect tier 0 ressources. Those groups would be interested in entering the portal once it was cleared of danger and had enough resources for collection. The iron ores and oak trees would be their goals once the danger disappeared.

Finally was the fourth group. They were civilians in search of a thrill. Whether civilians who wished to explore another world and pay explorers to assure their safeties or students from explorer's schools who would be visiting a relatively secure portal to show them the world behind the town walls.

Every year, schools of the town would hire a few reputable explorers and enter a selected portal to visit a celestial body. Their criterions were simple as well. A safe and controlled portal, relatively small to prevent errors and some non-dangerous but still non-ignorable environmental dangers. Active volcanos or flowing magma were obviously not something they intended their students to go and see. After all, they preferred not having any problems in their excursions. Instead the cave of illusions was especially perfect for them since it would allow the students to experience danger in a controlled environment.

As the shop closed and the portal closed as well, Lux happily stretched as he knew that most of his money problems would be gone for a while. With over 300,000 Bym, he couldn't help but grin. Being a space wanderer was especially useful for money making. Of course, he would have many places to spend money in the future but for the moment, with only 30% of the map to explore, a gate to find and one or two environmental dangers, he didn't need more than a hundred thousand Bym as rewards. Instead, it was now time to think of setting up his shop properly.

However, the first goal, transforming the building into a level one gate shop, was still unreachable as he would need a total of a million Bym.

"Let's set aside the upgrades for a while, I can wait for a few days." He decided as he let go of the thought of improvement as he went back upstairs to eat and meditate in peace.

—

Opening and closing the gate over the course of the night, he finally stopped at two in the morning. With a small nap of four hours as meditation helping him get over the needed eight hours of sleep, he woke up at six, ready for the day.

Washing up, he completed some exercise before finally readying himself for the shop's opening.

{Gate Creation - Proteus}

Making the portal appear exactly at eight, he unlocked the door.

With a large group once again arriving at the door, he habitually started to send people in the portal after having them pay.

What originally took him half an hour now took him up to an hour simply with the high number of explorers who wished to explore a new type of gate. Sending them all in, he welcomed the group of customers who came directly from the gate, having spent the entire night on the other side.

"Good morning, how was your time in the portal?" Asked Lux, showing a small and simple smile.

"Good morning, it was pretty good. We collected a lot of resources in our free time and some of our stronger people left yesterday night to explore the remainder of the map, we should have some information later in the day." He explained before turning to the real reason he had approached Lux.

"As we are about to make some investment in our base in the otherworld, we would like to know for how long you will be able to keep the gate activated." He directly stated his purpose as compared to other groups whose space wanderer belonged to them, this one was completely another party.

"At the rate it is going, I will be able to keep the portal open for another three weeks without a problem." He replied as space wanderers were indeed able to guess how long they could control the gate. Of course, the status of the celestial body was extremely specific but giving a smaller timeline to the explorers would at least make sure that they didn't lose too much once it got out of his range and would make sure that they each got out beforehand.

"3 weeks? It's not much." He muttered under his breath, a look of contemplation on his face. In those three weeks, not only did they have to collect as many resources but they also had the goal of clearing the tower.

It was well known that clearing a tower was needed to be renowned as a real and public force. In this world, strength was the most important and even people like the baron of Nielty had a large force under him. After all, being able to clear the towers in their own territory was the most important and while most of them would be taken care of by other local groups, protecting the towns and villages under his command was something he had to do as a noble as otherwise, there would be no point in being a noble with no territory under him to pay taxes.