The Innkeeper

Chapter 2436: The ballads of my glory - Suggested Song: Blow me away by Breaking Benjamin

With pain clouding his mind, anger clouding his judgment, an unquenchable hunger eating away at his sanity and Dragon-Lex’s terrifying gaze causing Daekol’s body to feel a fear he had never felt before, the Sovereign let go of all reason and unleashed everything and anything he had been holding back.

Gravity Crack. Void Eruption. Debt Acquittal. Enhanced rebirth. Memory of Shagufta. Law’s rending. Sovereigns Sacrifice.

One attack after another unleashed itself onto Lex’s body. A Major tribulation punished him from up above, and a terrifying force of nature wreaked havoc on him from close by, but not an ounce of doubt or hesitation flickered through Lex’s resolve.

He could feel it in his bones - the universe was not at peace and something terrible was happening. No matter what price he had to pay, he needed to end this here and now.

With his Sovereigns realm partially deployed, and only two of the eight retributions unleashed, Lex wasn’t fully ready, but he would make do.

"It is your honor, Sovereign Daekol, to push me so far," said Dragon-Lex, ignoring his bleeding body and the storm of attacks ripping at his flesh. "When the ballads of my glory are sung, your name will be mentioned for making me bleed."

Fury filled Daekol’s eyes as he summoned his hammer once more, its body covered in scars and faint cracks, and smashed towards Lex’s face. He’d had enough of his talking.

Yet Lex ignored him entirely. With his right hand he gripped Daekol’s neck, his fingers digging into the neck itself. With his left hand he summoned Naraka and used it to cut into Daekol’s body, forming an effective clamp so that he could not escape.

Holding nothing back, Lex unleashed Golden Inferno right at the Sovereign’s face, burning whatever Sovereign authority he had to spare. The hammer came down, and though it smashed onto Lex’s face with enough force to crack a planet, it could not stop him. It merely rang Daekol’s own death knell.

The brilliant, golden flames shot past Daekol’s face, burning him and everything else it touched, before taking the form of a dragon and turning back to wrap itself around the both of them, forming an egg of glorious molten-gold fire, trapping them both inside.

Around the egg, the Abaddon Inn formed once more, feeding on Daekol’s vulnerable spirit, digging into the cracks that were beginning to form. Above the Abaddon Inn, a red moon shone down its ominous scarlet light, enforcing Lex’s Supremacy in the form of an artificial realm.

Within it all, Lex’s Dao Intentions began to resonate, infecting everything to the point where the Dream realm itself began to change its nightmares to mimic the battlefield where Lex and Daekol fought.

So many Dao Lords were no longer watching the fight, but Ballom could not help and turn his gaze back at the fight.

"Was that... no, it can’t be... that can’t be..." he whispered, but quickly his attention was pulled away.

"Pay attention honey, let’s not die today," said Bridget as she stood behind him upon the Dream Arena.

Nuwa was looking at Lex, but her gaze seemed to be lost in time. Eclipse’s smile widened as she saw something extremely interesting. James, the human pretending to be the Timekeeper, looked at Morrow with a reluctant, resigned smile.

"In our defense, we really tried," he said to the Timekeeper’s cane. "I say we unleash all that Fractured time now."

The cane sighed, and just flew away to the bar.

"You have to wait until the Nexus event or you’ll screw everything up. Now, we can only pray that ’Lex the Bombastic Bazooka’ doesn’t get himself killed."

Outside, Lex had not stopped breathing fire. His grip continued to crush Daekol’s neck. His sword intent kept cutting through his body. The two retributions and Abaddon Inn still tortured all of Daekol’s being.

Unseen and unknown to Daekol among all this was the Karmic Bead which hovered directly above the egg of molten flames, tying itself to Daekol’s karma incredibly deeply. There was also what remained of the Farham Primordial egg shell which had, at some point, appeared atop Lex’s heart. Oh, and the rest of the energy from the Double Yang Disaster Rose poured into Lex’s body, forcing his Rebirth by Fire to awaken.

An ever increasing amount of Dao energy gathered around the area as Lex’s Dao Intentions raged without control. A tremendous amount of pressure built up until finally... something cracked.

James had delayed Lex’s Dao Body tribulation because he didn’t want Lex to be occupied when the Nexus event came, but man proposes and Dragon-Lex screws up that proposal. Whatever ability he used to delay the tribulation shattered from the accumulated pressure of Lex’s Dao tribulations, and Lex’s Major tribulation mutated.

It gathered clouds pulsed, and all the lightning gathered and formed a rainbow colored sphere of Lightning Laws. Then the clouds, as if a massive eyelid, blinked.

The laws of the Dream realm groaned as an entity most ancient, forgotten by almost all appeared within the realm. Its appearance was not slow or gradual - it appeared within the blink of that cloudy eye, and its massive size blotted out the entire realm.

All Dao Lords within the Dream realm looked up. All Immortals looked up. All dreams and nightmares looked up as a memory long forgotten unveiled itself into reality.

The Timekeeper had told Lex that within a Dao Body tribulation, the recipient of the tribulation lives through the memory of a scene many thought was a real event that happened once upon a time.

However, Lex’s Primordial Dao Body tribulation did not bring him into a memory - nay, it summoned the memory into reality. Maybe it was the Primordial aspect of it, or maybe it was because the tribulation somehow fused with his Major tribulation, or maybe it was just because it was Lex’s destiny to get screwed. No one could say for certain what had caused it, for nothing like this had ever happened.

They could only look above at the memory older than even Eclipse herself.

A look of recognition flashed in Nuwa’s eyes as she looked at him - the progenitor of Jorlam, of Giants, of Mountain-men and all such races that boasted both size and power. A being so powerful and so ancient that even the few survivors of the Primordial realm did not know of him.

Eclipse, upon her throne, pulled out her Enigma Pillar and placed her hand upon it, searching through her archives of secrets as she tried to find any hints of who this was. Though there was no answer, there were rumors.

"So that’s him... Pangu..."

Lex sensed the danger above him, but all he could do was raise Daekol’s body above his own to continue using him as a shield. Even now, he did not stop his golden flames.