The paperwork has been processed, my check cleared, the deed has been transferred, the blueprints were acquired, and I am currently searching for a construction company to demolish and then rebuild the house.
Unfortunately for my plans, all of the construction companies I have spoken to say that the demolition and construction will take a minimum of 18 months to demolish and then completely rebuild and connect to local utilities. Even worse is that most in all likelihood it will come out to around thirty months . Now, admittedly, I could probably speed that up by a small amount by just demolishing it myself with my magick. But that will probably only speed it up by a couple of months, so I'd still be stuck living in my trash bag apartment for at least another year.
If only I were experienced enough in Ars Materiae, then I could just do some ritual to fix up the house. Don't get me wrong, I'm great when it comes to simple material to material transmutations, but when we get to alloys, multi-materials, and complex shapes? Thats outa my league.
Now, could I theoretically transmute each and every small bit of the house until it's in working order? Yeah, if I wanted to spend months going over the house and transmuting each wire and pipe manually.
As I'm coming to terms with the fact that I'll either need to stay in this crapbag apartment for another year or two, or find a nicer apartment, my avatar chimes in, for the first time in threeish weeks since my awakening.
"Artifacts." The windy voice of my avatar speaks into my head
"Artifacts, huh… I guess with the proper ones, I could maybe manage a mass repair ritual. Any preferences?" I mutter out loud, both to myself and my avatar
Instead of responding with the voice on the wind, my avatar responds with images of the desired artifacts.
One is an ancient hammer with a Lemian symbol of Hephaestus at the center, surrounded by faded Greek lettering; the other is a white marble ceremonial keystone with a gilded symbol of Hephaestus that is, again, surrounded by gilded Greek lettering. I called the keystone ceremonial because it is currently sitting on a pedestal instead of serving its purpose as the keystone of an arch.
Once I get a good sense of the appearance of the desired artifacts, the images shift into the location of the artifacts. The hammer is sitting in a vault in the Smithsonian's Human History Museum, which should make for a decent first heist. Though admittedly, it might draw the attention of the feds and maybe Wonder Woman if she's not busy with things more important than a museum robbery.
The location of the keystone is a bit of a problem. It currently sits on a pedestal in the center of a Themeycrian temple dedicated to Hephaestus. That is gonna be a massive pain to break into. I gotta get onto the island, which I believe is magically warded against men, and then get to the temple without being seen, and then steal the stone from a pedestal right smack dab in the middle of said temple.
By the thrice great, that's gonna piss off the Amazonians and Wonder Woman, and maybe the Justice League. Really gonna bring the heat down on me, assuming I don't make like seven layers of disguises and fake identities.
But I mean, I can deal. The fact that Themyscira is such an openly magickal place should make any magick that I can currently use perfectly coincidental and accepted, while the isolation of the nation should leave me relatively safe once I escape the island.
Okay, so…planning, I got to plan the heist. I should probably start with getting accommodations in DC, preferably near the museum. Then I'll have to get my hands on the blueprints of the museum, though I doubt I'll be able to just buy 'em from the local library. Probably gotta get them from the Library of Congress…if that's a thing people can do?