The Innkeeper

It took many hours for Marlo's private jet to near the destination. Once the pilot let them know they were 30 minutes away, Larry, Marlo, and the few others who were on the plane began to gear up and went over their various plans.

For the most part… the only plan was to follow Marlo's lead. However, the exit strategies were thorough and well planned out.

There were three exit strategies that had been decided early on, and they would only attempt the subsequent ones if the first one failed. Through one of the Guild rooms' most reliable new shop run by Chen Lee and his sister Lily, they had gotten their hands of teleportation talismans.

Since Marlo had an unusual fondness for using talismans, that was exit strategy number one. If the use of the talismans was successful, they would be teleported to some place random within a 1000 miles (1609 kilometers). There were a number of pickup sites that had been decided and they could make their way to the nearest one afterward.

The second strategy involved a number of vehicles that had been secretly planted by Marlo's men near the prison. If, for any reason, the teleportation talisman failed, they would have to make their way to those vehicles and escape that way.

The third strategy, and the one that was most desperate, was to make use of the Inn. If, for any reason, strategy one and two failed, they would enter the Midnight Inn. The Inn had a new set of rules regarding teleportation, and if where they teleported from was a region they were not authorized to be in, they would be teleported to the nearest region they were authorized to be.

This was slightly unreliable due to the randomness of where they could exit. It was sure to allow them to escape the immediate confines of the prison, but they might end up still close enough to the prison once they came out to be targeted.

"Wait, why is the pilot exiting the cockpit?" Larry suddenly asked as he looked towards the front of the plane. Since there was only one pilot, the plane was left unattended!

Instead of answering Larry, the pilot gave a knowing smile, and started putting on a parachute!

"You ready to make an entrance, kid?" Marlo asked with a mad grin. "As I recall, I never finished your self-defense classes, right? Let's treat this as a field trip for an advanced class. Keeping with the logic that the best defense is to kill your enemy first, we will now go over the use of various kinds of penetration techniques when facing a well-defended fort."

Larry had a strong suspicion about what would follow, and due to his new strength, he wasn't really afraid, but… he just sighed and stopped thinking at this point. Thinking would probably hurt him more than help him now.

Marlo opened the emergency exit and jumped out of the plane, followed by the pilot and everyone else. Larry morosely followed. A few moments later, the private jet went through the illusion formation and crashed against whatever was behind it, resulting in a shockwave that was much stronger than a plane crash should have resulted in!

A few seconds later, the illusion formation failed and showed Larry the result, allowing him to suddenly reach a conclusion. The plane they had been riding… had been lined with explosives!

*****

With a sharp, electronic wail the massive spider Lex was fighting finally crashed and exploded! He had to erect a shield around himself to protect his clothes from the flames. The fight had been fiercer than Lex had expected.

Thinking that he was facing a machine and that it would be weak against electrical attacks, Lex had once again relied on using the array he used to summon lightning bolts. Unfortunately, while the spider was indeed a machine, it was not built based on engineering from earth. It did not run on electricity, and none of its internal components, whatever they were, were sensitive to an overload of electricity. In fact, the spider had only become more energized after suffering from the attack and started shooting its lasers much faster.

Avoiding those had been extremely annoying. The thing was, no matter how fast Lex moved, he could not compete with the speed of a laser. The only thing he could do was use his intuition to move out of the laser's trajectory before it even fired - which was easier said than done!

He had only been able to avoid approximately 20% of all lasers, even with the forewarning. The problem was, the spider was actively aiming at him, even if he was moving. Even if he suddenly changed his trajectory, the spiders would continue to aim at him even as he moved along his new path.

He had to rely on various shields and defensive techniques to avoid having his clothes damaged. All the while, he had to retain focus on the arrays he was forming and make sure that he didn't ruin them.

Imagine being required to code a piece of software in the middle of a war-zone, threatened not only by the incoming artillery but also being vulnerable to his computer suddenly blowing up if he so much as used an unnecessary semicolon, let alone writing faulty code. That was literally what Lex's experience was.

Fortunately, his newly enhanced multitasking skills ensured that he never lost focus on his arrays. It took a few different tries to take down the spider, though. Lex's usual reliance on elemental damage, such as the use of fire or lightning, seemed not to work. In the end, he actually discovered how to defeat the spider by accident.

He had spent so long knowing that his defense was strong but his actual strength was weak, that he had forgotten that he had recently undergone a huge boost in strength! After the Lotus had recently remade his body, his strength had grown so much even the Host Attire couldn't perfectly help him regulate his strength.

On top of that, he had undergone a growth in his realm. Suffice to say, Lex could now pack a punch. It was through sheer coincidence and perfect timing that Lex had to block one of the spiders' legs using his arms after the lasers broke through Talk to the Hand. Instead of being pushed back by the attack… Lex crumpled the spider's leg as if it was paper.

It was only afterwards that he recalled that he was actually strong. Defeating the spider suddenly became extremely easy once he changed his tactics, though he was slightly disappointed that his arrays hadn't been as useful.

Next time, he told himself as he climbed to the next floor.