A few questions about some things that confuse me a little bit

[Azamagon]

So, a couple updates ago, we got these changes:

• Individual items no longer need to be fortified, but instead Hamish and Berna's stations can be fortified to bring items from Zone 1 into Zone 2
• Equipment you buy will now start at the level of your best piece of equipment in that slot, up to that item's pre-fortification level cap

Most of my gear (but not all) is at level 9. But... 

• Whenever I buy something new, they are at level 4. I assume this is the level which is the "item's pre-fortification level cap"?
• What on earth are fortifying ingots used for nowadays? I still use the regular material to upgrade gear up to level 9, but have hundreds of ingots which are only really ever-so-slightly used for boss weapon upgrades now.

Is there something I'm missing here? Am I supposed to upgrade their stations in some way I have simply missed?

Any help to my ease my confusion would be appreciated!

[Kacpert25]

Ingots are also used to upgrade weapons above lvl 10, which are then upgraded using Teffressence Container Gem.

So at the moment, ingots are used for three things:
-Upgrading NPC Stations
-Upgrading boss weapons
-Upgrading others weapons

For now, this is not much, but in the future, ingots probably will gain more applications. 
Perhaps even in the next update.