The Innkeeper

Chapter 2211: Growing terrors

To be honest, Lex had been living for four years with minimal usage of his mind, existing in a state similar to autopilot, but for his body. His understanding of the Masterless technique had improved drastically during this time, but he still felt like it was going to take him a long time to actually master it.

Thus, when he sensed the danger, although he reacted as quickly as he could manage, the sudden increase in awareness disoriented him - after all, most of his mind had been focused on the technique for so long that he forgot what it felt like to exist normally.

Lex, appearing as the Innkeeper, focused his attention on the creature in front of him. He’d been about to use the Butter Knife to attack him because he didn’t want to risk it, but the moment he’d targeted the odd beast with the Butter knife, it reigned in its aura, thus granting Lex some time to observe it.

He didn’t care about the creature’s race. Whatever it was, it was not unique enough to arouse his interest anymore - at least under these circumstances. No, what attracted Lex’s attention was that the assailant had an aura of a Dao Lord, or maybe Demi-Dao Lord on it, but the aura was rapidly dissipating, like a balloon losing air.

Lex also couldn’t detect any signs of spirit from the beast. It was like it had a soul and body, nothing else, operating only through a mix of its body’s remnant instincts.

Lex immediately formed a few theories. Could this be someone who failed a Dao tribulation? Or maybe their Dao Heart collapsed, or maybe they were a Demi-Dao Lord who lost control of their power for some reason.

Lex did not have too clear an understanding of Dao Lords just yet, though he no longer minded that as much. After all, as his Dao Body grew stronger, and as he himself grew stronger, he could explore the way forward himself.

In fact, as he looked at this wild beast, he somewhat regretted that his true body was stuck somewhere else, as he would have loved to face it in combat. He had a vague feeling that... he might actually be able to do it.

Or maybe he would just die.

After reigning in his aura for a few moments, the beast once again lost control, this time focusing its attack towards the Innkeeper.

Without hesitation, Lex used the Butter Knife, already strengthened using a single Dao material. He hoped it would be enough, because recharging the Butter Knife would take weeks!

The guests, the weak and the strong, the smart and the stupid, all watched with awe and wonder as the Innkeeper struck with a mere Butter Knife. It vanished, disappearing into space, and taking with it the beast’s entire aura.

Lex, internally, was surprised. He assumed that the Butter Knife would attack via karma. It had done so before, and it was tremendously strong. But no, this time, it attacked via a law Lex was entirely unfamiliar with, to the extent that he could not even recognise it at all, or give it a name.

The attack just... disappeared. The aura, the power, the destructive force, and even the leaking Dao, they all just vanished. They were not vaporised, not disintegrated or teleported elsewhere. Everything simply ceased to exist once he attacked with the Butter Knife, leaving even himself stunned.

The only thing that remained was the corpse of the beast that attacked, falling over like a lifeless shell.

Lex teleported the body away, and then turned his attention towards all the guests.

"My apologies for the inconvenience. This issue has been taken care of, I hope it does not negatively impact your time at the tavern," he said with a soft smile, before fading from view.

Z and Little Blue did not return, as they had been forcefully sent by the Innkeeper to get a full body scan in case of injury. Messing with anything related to the Dao was not a joke. Although they seemed fine now, he would take no risks, to the extent that Lex even told the turtle to go take a look at them and check for any lingering dangers.

Meanwhile, Lex retreated to his office, and used his awareness to listen to what all the guests in the Dream tavern were talking about. Just because he couldn’t recognise the law didn’t mean that others would fail to do so as well.

It came as no surprise to him that most of them had no idea what had happened, and yet they accepted such a thing quite easily. It would make less sense if they could see through the Innkeeper’s actions.

Some, however, had certain speculations.

"Was that the law of Hollow?" asked one of the Celestial guests, deep reverence filling their voice. "Like, the actual law of Hollow? Not Void, or Absence or Emptiness or any of those other laws?"

Though he asked the question, the others didn’t know what to say either.

"I’ve never felt the true law of Hollow before, so I’m not quite sure," responded another Celestial. "It’s quite rare to directly use one of the eight ruling laws without depending on one of the Relational laws linked to them in some manner."

While he said as much, in truth it was effectively impossible to use one of the eight ruling laws without triggering some kind of resonance with the other laws formed from the ruling law itself.

Hollow. That made sense. Lex thought about the law, and everything related to it. Concepts such as death, the void, vacuum and so on were all derivatives of the law of Hollow. Maybe what the butter knife had used was not the law of hollow, but the law of ends, and endings. That was a possibility, right?

He wasn’t sure, so he kept on listening in on his guests until he finally stumbled upon a conversation he was very much interested in.

"Was that the sign of a failed Dao tribulation?" asked a peak level Celestial to one of his companions, fear and doubt reeking from his body.

"Yes, and no," responded the senior. "To be exact, the failure began before he could even summon the tribulation. Just the attempt to summon the Dao tribulation shattered his Dao Heart, leaving his body and soul as empty vessels for the residual energy summoned from the Dao tribulation. That is why the energy leaking from his body was so inconsistent in strength and quality. That is the one step on which a majority of all those who attempt to enter the Dao realm fail."

A deep, solemn silence filled the room where the group of adventurers sat and contemplated what had just been talked about.

"How... how can we prevent such a thing?" asked another of the Celestials. "I... I don’t even know how to form a Dao Heart. How am I supposed to make sure that it’s up to the task?"

The one teaching them, their mentor, snorted.

"Even those on the very top of the Dao Affirmation list cannot guarantee that they’ll be able to survive the Dao tribulation. If there was any fixed, guaranteed way of overcoming the tribulation, wouldn’t all the powerful forces of the universe start mass producing Dao Lords? This is something you have to find your own answers for. If you lack even the courage to do that, then you better give up now and enjoy life as a Celestial immortal. Your chances of reaching the Dao realm at that point are practically 0."

Lex looked towards the corpse of the enemy who had just attacked the Inn. Was this really the body of someone who had tried to attempt the Dao tribulation? Why did it seem so unimpressive?

Since he didn’t have an answer, he once again continued to listen to all the guests speaking, yet none of them seemed to have an answer. Lex paused, and after making sure that the Butter Knife was once again recharging, decided to withdraw his consciousness once more.

He needed to get done with the Masterless technique as quickly as possible, and for that, he didn’t want to waste even a second.

Now, since the threat was dealt with, he could return to focusing on that. If his help was needed again, he would be forced out of autopilot mode, so it wasn’t like he was leaving the Inn entirely undefended.

However, the true threat had not been dealt with. Rather, it had just started to reveal itself.

Within the Dream tavern, Anita sat in meditation, controlling over 100 million undead summons, all scouring the Dream realm, searching for her husband and daughter.

In truth, she had not started out with this many summons. However, over the past few years, her strength had grown tremendously as she once again focused on cultivation. For decades past, her focus had been on her family, which had caused her growth to stall.

Now, motivated by the disappearance of that very family, her cultivation exploded at truly remarkable speeds. But cultivation growth was not enough to describe the extent of the growth of her power.

If Lex had focused on her at all, instead of quickly returning to focus on his technique, he would have discovered that even he would have felt a faint level of danger emanating from her body.

Among her many summons, one of them stumbled into a ravaged part of the Dream realm - one that looked like it had suffered from a great battle so intense that the Dream realm itself had not yet recovered from it. Or perhaps, this was just one, exceptionally terrifying dream.

Within that chaos, the summon saw a beast, terribly hurt, that looked like a werewolf centaur. Its body was incomplete. Or rather, the dream itself was slowly disintegrating to form the body, making it bit by bit.

Anita immediately realized what was happening. The Dream realm, or perhaps somoene in the Dream realm, was using dreams to try to summon a dead Dao Lord. Someone was attempting a very high level of necromancy, but with the goal of actually bringing back the dead instead of just a summon.

The werewolf-centaur opened its eyes, and Anita’s summon was destroyed.