The Innkeeper

Chapter 2315: Deadend

"You jinxed it," River said as he looked beyond the limits of the Guest House;s formation. "You just had to- dammit, let me at least complain in peace!"

The sound of River’s roaring was drowned out by the sound of hundreds of attacks smashing onto the Guest Houses protective formation, shaking the building’s very core.

A little over two years ago, during a shared, tender moment between River and Pearl, she’s said that if an army of immortals ever came for her, she’d fully expect to find that River would be there to protect her.

Well, as River looked out at the hellscape around their humble guest house, he could not help but recall what Cliff said about flags. He had explicitly stated that making analogies while referencing unrealistic, challenging situations was known as raising a flag. Once a flag was raised, they’d have to deal with the situation sooner or later.

At the time, River thought that it was yet another one of the strange and weird things he would occasionally say - especially since Cliff followed up that explanation by informing River that he did not, in fact, believe in flags.

Well, if flags weren’t real, what was going on outside their humble inn? The previous attack by an Immortal and some Nascent Soul cultivators had failed. They had questioned the Nascent Soul cultivators as well as the immortal, so they knew that no one else was aware of the attack. Theoretically, they were safe where they were.

However, the news about the attack must have leaked, or someone must have found out somehow, because this time a few dozen Immortals brought with them an entire army to attack. There should be no escaping this - at least in ordinary circumstances.

River shook his head, and then went down to the basement where Pearl, Karev and all the other workers were waiting for them. At this point, it was basically impossible to determine if any of the other workers had betrayed them and they weren’t really interested in finding out, so all the other workers were also restricted by the formation.

He ignored the rumbling of the formation as it experienced countless attacks and stepped onto the teleportation formation in the basement.

"I’m telling you, trigger a tribulation and kill all your enemies with it," said Cliff for the hundredth time since they had been surrounded. "It’s a very effective way of establishing dominance."

Neither River nor Pearl bothered to respond to him. Even if they had agreed to attempt to reach the Earth Immortal realm within three years, they weren’t crazy enough to listen to all of Cliff’s advice regardless of how wise he was generally.

The teleportation formation activated, undetected to any of the countless immortals outside. The reason was, naturally, because Cliff had told Pearl what to do. On her own, she could never have created a formation like that.

Once the teleportation ended, the workers were sent to a safe place away from them, while the three of them were sent to a safehouse that the young couple had established long ago.

"On a serious note, though, whatever you guys do, Karev needs to undergo his tribulation. No matter how you hide, he will continue to attract more and stronger enemies regardless of his location."

Lex did not bother explaining to them about how carrying a greater destiny was a double edged sword. If he didn’t grow strong enough fast enough, the burden of his own destiny would kill him.

Fortunately, all three of them had planned to undergo their tribulations soon so that they could ascend to the Greater World together.

"I’ve activated the formation’s self-destruction sequence. That should keep them off our trails for a while, and maybe even hurt them a little," said Pearl as she looked around their safehouse to make sure they were all fine.

"It won’t work," said Cliff lamely. "Since they’re making such a big move, your only option is to grow stronger, ascend to the next level, and find out exactly what is happening yourself. I recall the alliance paid close attention to the rules. Maybe once you’re in their domain again, they will give you protection again."

In truth, even within the Upper Battlefield, there were regions where the Alliance exerted its authority. In fact, the alliance was the one that was supposed to be stopping immortals from acting here which meant that either they were aware of what was happening and were supporting it, or someone had temporarily diverted their attention, keeping them from finding out.

Either way, growing stronger was the only option left to them.

Over the next few weeks, the group prepared, and then decided to undergo their tribulations altogether. They were not next to one another, but were in their own individual spaces that Pearl had prepared.

The reason that River was able to undertake the tribulation as well was because he had gained a special paladin inheritance when he had passed the test, while Pearl had gained special resources that strengthened her foundation and helped her reach her limits.

Everything started off just fine, with all three of them triggering the tribulation at the same time. The formations Pearl had prepared to protect them and hide their tribulations were also working just fine.

Unfortunately for them, none of that mattered, for their enemies were one step ahead of them.

Cliff, watching everything, just shook his head. He had told them to just kill all their enemies with the tribulation, but they wouldn’t listen. Now their enemies had set a trap for them all. As much as he could guide them on how to avoid Immortals, how could a few formations be entirely foolproof?

As the three tribulations were triggered, an army of death warriors charged towards them, not only to attack them, but also to increase the strength of the tribulations to force them into a dead end.

If these guys were motivated enough to provoke even the Oolin, then how could three humans escape so easily?

Lex stretched his legs and watched the show. Maybe, if he was feeling up to it, he would help. But if he did that, the tribulations would become even stronger due to his interference, so he would need to act outside the radius of the tribulations.

Well, he’d see how things went.