The Innkeeper-Novel

Chapter 864 Studying space

?864 Studying space

"The Blink Module's failsafe has been automatically activated. The space in front of us is too unstable to facilitate teleportation," Cirk said as he read out a report.

Though, at this point, Lex did not need Cirk to tell him. With his affinity for space, he could feel how it behaved in this region. He found that calling 'unstable' might be incorrect. Instead of feeling fragile or unstable, it seemed 'stretched'.

"Activate the Kelvaha Specter talisman," said Lex, not letting his observation distract him from the matter at hand. "How long do you think it will take until we reach them?"

"The Blink Module did not get us as far as I had hoped. Now it all depends on how quickly the talisman can help us move. Until I experience it, I cannot say for certain. But, if I were to make a guess, based on the information you've given me about the talisman, I'd say eight more hours." ɴᴇᴡ ɴᴏᴠᴇʟ ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀs ᴀʀᴇ ᴘᴜʙʟɪsʜᴇᴅ ᴏɴ N(o)vᴇl(ꜰ)ire.nᴇt

"Eight more hours…" Lex repeated as he mused to himself. The space in this region was extremely unusual. Normally, Lex would not be confident enough to determine what was unusual and what wasn't, but he had recently bought a manual for space affinity from the emporium that he had been studying.

With not much to do on the ship, Lex occupied his mind with various things. He practiced his swordsmanship, but that was not enough to completely occupy his thoughts. So, at the same time, he perused the manual.

There were no techniques or anything as such in the manual, as it firstly focused on what 'space' was, and how spatial affinity worked.

According to Lex's perception, space was naturally the area within a realm. For anything to exist, it had to occupy space. When discussing how large a monument was, or the distance between two points, one was discussing space. It was impossible for a thing to exist and not occupy space.

As such, the concept that space could bend, move, or even tear created somewhat of a conflict in Lex's mind. How could something exist in the 'Void' behind space? Moreover, what was even the concept of something being 'behind' space?

It was too unusual, but Lex accepted his ignorance as the cultivation world was too vast for him to completely understand. He knew he would eventually find his answers.

The manual seemed to shed some light on these questions, to an extent. But… the theories that the manual elaborated on were abstruse, even for Lex. Understanding them meant changing his outlook on reality in a very fundamental way, which was easier said than done. At least for the moment, Lex was not able to wrap his head around those concepts.

Even if he mentally accepted them as true, understanding how they worked and considering its ramifications was beyond him - not to mention that Lex did not necessarily believe everything he read.

For the moment, instead of blindly accepting what the book wrote, he decided to study the matter more himself later on.

Basically, according to the manual, 'space' was actually a manifestation of the superposition of the multiple planes of existence, such as the physical plane, spiritual plane, soul plane etc. Since space itself was made up of these components, it could naturally be broken down, have its composition altered, or manipulated as pleased. Moreover, everything that existed did not exist in 'space' but instead existed in time, with space being a simple coefficient of time itself.

The theory, which was in actuality just a brief overview of a much larger explanation for space and reality, continued on to elaborate further, but all of it was beyond Lex at the moment.

Instead, there were other parts that he understood more of, such as the behavior of space, or what caused it to be unstable or stable.

Even then his actual understanding was minimal, but it allowed him at least to differentiate between unstable and stretched. It seemed as if someone or something had stretched space in this region to blanket over something, thereby hiding it from being accessed or viewed.

Of course, he could be spectacularly wrong about that. He was still a beginner at this. But, oddly enough, his instincts which had slowly begun to be less useful as of late, seemed to indicate that his theory was right.

He looked out of the cockpit into the infinity that was outer space. They had already used the talisman, and were traveling in a manner that eluded their comprehension. Their surroundings seemed to be changing each moment, like a sequence in a badly edited video rather than passing scenery. Clearly the talisman was in use, but Lex felt no different.

Cirk, who was navigating, may be feeling the true effects of what using the talisman was like, but Lex did not distract him with questions right now.

The pilot had to ensure that they reached their destination timely. The talisman would not last forever, so they either had to make the most of it, or reach their destination before its effects elapsed.

He turned his gaze back to the manual and began reading. He wanted to fully understand everything he could about space so that he was ready to face whatever obstacle he faced when he reached BGY-987.

Although a lot of time had passed, the anger he had been harboring had not dwindled. In fact, due to the long time, it had only grown stronger and more overwhelming. But his firm control over his mind, practiced to control the sword in his soul, kept that anger in check.

Soon, it would be time to let it loose. But not yet.

While Lex was studying, and the battalion was fighting for their life, a group of devils suddenly teleported within the Midnight Inn.

They exchanged no words, and instead began to spread out silently, as if they had a clear purpose in coming here. No one seemed to find anything amiss, after all, a majority of the guests at the Inn were devils. What could be so different about this group?