The Innkeeper

Emperor Jotun reappeared at the Inn, to once again deliver a message to the Innkeeper. For some reason, he had become the dedicated messenger between the Henali and the Innkeeper, at least as far as current matters went.

He was hoping that this matter would conclude soon, after all, not only did he have his own matters to tend to, but he also did not enjoy constantly antagonizing a Daolord. He understood well that even if the Innkeeper was disgruntled, he could absolutely decimate his empire, but would at most get a slap on the wrist, symbolic punishment at most. That is what it meant to be a Daolord.

Let alone something as insignificant as the extinction of a minor empire, even in all out war between Overlord civilization, the actual death of a Daolord was rare.

Just as he was about to head off towards the Innkeeper's office, he noticed something strange. He did not need to use his spirit sense to be in tune with his environment. Due to his cultivation realm, the universe around him itself spoke to him. As such, he immediately noticed an extremely hostile emotion circulating between the Inn's workers, concentrating somewhere in the distance.

He only needed to look in the direction to see hundreds of Inn workers surrounding three rhinocentaurs, with Luthor alone taking all three of them on. He did not know the context, and quite frankly he did not care. His attention, instead, was on Luthor's bloodline. A single glimpse was enough for him to understand its complexities, and the laws working behind the scenes.

Although he had not seen it in action before, he had read about it in the Sephore family records. Anachronistic Ignition…

Suddenly, he felt a hint of anticipation. He longed to see the Inn's performance on the battlefield. He had a feeling, a premonition, that it would be worth witnessing.

A notification from the Inn suddenly distracted him. In a few days, there will be an auction…

*****

Lex looked over the list of items he was accepting from the emporium in return for a couple drops of elixir. As it happened, he unwittingly discovered some items that would help him immensely.

Such as a cultivation technique that was available only to the emporium VIPs. It was called God's Eye, and it was to be used in conjunction with the Fancy contact lenses. Once the two were paired together, the effects… Well, it was sufficient to say Lex was impatient to witness it for himself.

He also discovered some items which would help in the upgrade of the Butter Knife, not to mention he found some incredibly valuable ores which he planned on keeping for his own personal use to make weapons to use outside the Inn.

He found some treasures he thought would be useful for himself and some for his workers and Inn. Besides those, he collected 5 items which could minutely influence certain laws.

However, besides all these, the thing that Lex took the most was information. He took the highest levels of knowledge on the civilizations inside the Origin realm, the top races, the history of the realm itself, valuable treasures, items and phenomenon.

Out of all of that, the thing that Lex was looking most forward to was the complete cultivation realm guide for all races inside the Origin realm. It wasn't quite complete, but it had all the pertinent information on all the important races inside the realm.

He could help but peak at the break up of the cultivation realms inside the Origin realm, at least as per human standards.

According to what Lex knew, humans who did not cultivate were considered to be in the mortal realm. That was apparently a misconception. They were merely referred to as baseline humans. It was instead, the entire first few realms which fell under the category of mortals.

The sequence was:

Mortals or base humans

Body tempering

Qi training

Foundation realm

Golden Core

Nascent

All of these were the mortal realms of cultivation for humans. These were followed by the immortal realms, which were Earth Immortal and Heaven Immortal. The realm after that, which was the peak natural realm in the Origin realm, was actually based off of, and inspired by a certain humanoid species that existed. As such, the realm's name coincided with the name of the race: the Celestial realm!

Just reading the name gave Lex goosebumps, and filled his heart with a dreadful pressure. It felt like he had encountered something he was not qualified to know. It felt like an entire race of unimaginably powerful beings was suddenly aware of him. It felt like…

Lex snorted, and channeled his spirit energy, causing the feeling to dissipate. Lex had even looked Daolords in the eye, he was not afraid of simply gaining some knowledge.

In fact, at this point, even Regal Embrace gave him a warning. Sometimes foreknowledge was not good for his cultivation. The snort was a reply to that prompt.

Besides all of that, Lex also accumulated 1 million emporium credits to use in the future. Truthfully, if he had time, Lex could get himself a better deal, but time was exactly what he was short of. It was better to take a small loss and hurry up than quibble over small gains.

With the meeting done, Lex promptly collected several small bottles which would be able to contain the elixir and exited the emporium. Even Powell noticed his rush towards the end, but didn't comment on it.

Lex teleported to the Inn and quickly scanned it. John was still in his deathmatch, and Lex could do nothing to interfere with that even if he wanted. But the other three were still at the Inn, and were in fact being beaten up by Luthor.

The Innkeeper's trusty assistant still looked like he was in perfect condition, mostly because he kept using his bloodline to send all his injuries and fatigue into the future.

Lex nodded, but then donned his Leo persona and teleported over. He did not talk, discuss or deliberate. He straight up kicked one of the rhinocentaurs into the ground, forming a massive crater!

His sudden appearance had taken everyone by surprise, but he didn't have the time to wave at the audience. Seeing that a single hit with his immense strength was not enough to incapacitate them, Lex immediately entered his Berserk state!

He ran forward, the push of his legs forming small craters in the ground where he stepped, and smacked the other rhinocentaurs down to the ground. In his heightened emotional state, Lex performed a move he had done once before and quite enjoyed. He grabbed one of the rhinocentaurs, and used its body to begin smashing the other two!

At this point even Luthor was startled by the absolute barbarism, but then grinned and joined in.

The rhinocentaurs were tough foes, and could take on dozens of enemies in the same realm at the same time. They could not, however, take on an impatient Lex and an incensed Luthor.

In less than a minute, the foes were defeated. Pulverized would be a more apt description, but the details weren't so important.

"I will be interrogating these three myself," Lex told Luthor. "The Innkeeper already knows their motives, so you don't have to be concerned. I'm just going through the motions."

Luthor was a little upset that he wouldn't get to question the three himself, but it was alright. More importantly, he couldn't go against the Innkeeper's wishes.

As for Lex, of course he would not let anyone else question them. The secret about systems was too great. Maybe one day it would be common knowledge at the Inn, but for now he wanted to keep things quiet. More importantly, one of them even had a system of his own which Lex was looking forward to absorbing.

Ah, it was so tough to decide. Should he upgrade his system first, or absorb more elixir? Just kidding, the elixir was a time sensitive matter. It took priority, for now.

Just as Lex sent the three rhinocentaurs away, he received a notification. It was not the system penalizing him for assaulting his guests who had not broken the rules - he'd already gotten that one.

Instead, he was informed that Alexander was looking for Lex urgently. The emperor of Jotun had also arrived, and was once again requesting a meeting. Also, one of the children in the kids area of the Inn had proposed to another child there, and they had taken an oath of a ten year engagement, which had incensed the kids parents who demanded to speak with upper management of the Inn.

Lex could not help but sigh. Whichever identity he took, he was always in such demand. Being important was such a hassle.

Lex teleported away, leaving the encirclement to break up. Gerard approached Luthor and the two fell into a discussion, the contents of which were unknown.

Inside the Innkeepers office, a projection of the Innkeeper appeared. Elsewhere in the Inn, Lex appeared just out of sight of Alexander and walked forward.