The Innkeeper

It was a matter of fact that, from now on, no matter who he met, a part of him would always wonder if the other person was a system user. But excessive suspicion was not only really bad for him, it would actually distract him from locating actual system users since his attention would be spread so thin.

What he needed to do was, keeping in mind everything he knew about systems, maintain a vigilant state for clues. Only if a person behaves oddly or did something out of the ordinary would he consider analyzing the likelihood of them having a system. Maybe this way he would miss out on actual system users, but the fact of the matter was that he had other objectives than just looking for system users, and if he didn't ration his mental capacity, he would fail in all his tasks.

Moreover, once he did identify someone he suspected had a system, his surveillance had to be as discreet as possible. In fact, it would be best if he could spy on them at the Inn. He did not enjoy undertaking unknown risks.

As for what he would do once he was sure someone had a system… that was a decision that would have to wait till the actual situation occurred.

Another thing he had to do was go through the list of people he actually knew, or guests from the Inn, and gauge whether or not they likely had a system.

From his actual personal life, he directly dismissed everyone he knew. There was no point in even considering he had lived too ordinary a life before the Inn to even suspect anything mildly supernatural, let alone someone having a system. Then came his various guests.

In lieu of their insane cultivation levels, Lex wanted to suspect Bastet and Falak but then dismissed the idea. Though they were strong, they did not do anything unusual enough to warrant suspicion.

Next he thought of Marlo. To be honest, just based on how crazy his life had been, Lex wanted to believe he had a system. But if he did, he would not have lived with an injury for so long, nor would he have ignored his son's plight.

Next was Alexander Morrison, but he was just rich and privileged, not crazy supernatural life system users.

Then he thought of Ragnar. The general from the Jotun empire sure had an epic story, even if Lex didn't know too much of it. But, again, he was strong and accomplished, but nowhere near supernatural enough.

One by one, Lex went through the list of his guests. He considered the bodyguard he had during the Midnight games, he considered Loretta's dad, he considered the various beasts he'd met and more.

None of them had done things crazy enough for him to suspect they had a system. However, there were a few things that caught Lex's interest.

Maybe if Lex wasn't sitting in the meditation room, which boosts his focus and concentration, and maybe if he wasn't wearing his thinking cap, Lex might not have remembered, or even considered these few suspicious points.

The first was that the Sovereign Galactic turtle could influence his system. Not only that, the system had 'hired' the turtle on its own. This was much too suspicious. Lex could not explain it and his 'authority' was not high enough for Mary to explain it to him yet.

It came to the point where Lex began to wonder if the turtle had some kind of interference system that only worked on other systems, allowing him to share some of the authority. Still, Lex left some room in his mind to consider the fact that there was much he didn't understand yet about systems, and there could be other answers. Maybe the turtle's race was special and was being treated as such by the system.

The next thing Lex noticed, or rather remembered, was that he encountered a few people his system could not scan. To be more specific, it scanned them, but Lex only got an error message.

One was the bodyguard he had during the Midnight games. This was the only reason Lex still didn't know his real name, and only later learned that he belonged to some race known as the Celestials. The second was his temporary worker, John.

Just the error message was not enough to prove anything, but the error could possibly be explained with the statement that only a system was another system's weakness.

Still, this was not enough to be sure. It was, however, enough to suspect them a little. His bodyguard was too strong, not to mention out of reach, but John was available right at his Inn.

He asked Mary if John had done anything suspicious, but the man had never done anything other than work and often visited the Mystery trial. During the invasion the Inn suffered, he helped out a bit, but none of his performance was too out of the ordinary.

Lex told her to keep an eye on him and let him know if anything popped up.

But other than those two people, he could not even begin to even mildly suspect that anyone had a system. It made sense, to be honest, for if systems were commonplace, then they would not be such a secret.

Lex spent the rest of the day planning his future actions, and how he planned on growing the Inn, as well as becoming stronger.

The next day, Lex was faced with some good and some bad news.

The bad news, predictably, was that a lot of people died. Dino and his wife's entire family was gone, as well as all their friends and everyone they knew from their neighborhood.

The good news was that, since the triplets had several murders take place near their house, their entire family had moved out of fear. They were temporarily living in a town shelter. When darkness fell, they had been protected by the town guards and moved into the underground bunkers, which had been kept well lit using candles and lanterns. When Zagan attacked, the entrance to the bunker had been destroyed, but fortunately they had been resuced before all those trapped ran out of oxygen.

Lex also found out that the Noel family would be migrating a large number of people to rebuild and repopulate Babylon as they said it was a strategic point too valuable to give up. Lex did not comment.

Instead, he turned his attention to Aegis. Fenrir had hunted all night long and the effects had been drastic. Though the pup was completely covered in wounds, he was not deterred. In fact, he started to display a bit of bloodlust that even Lex could feel. Even the look in his eyes became more savage.

The change had been so drastic that Lex stopped the hunt temporarily to let him recover, both physically and mentally.

Aegis was waiting patiently for Lex to give his next request for he was extremely parched and it was not water that would quench his thirst.

"Sit," said Lex, as he invited the man to a private room. "Before we get on to the matter of further payment, would you mind telling me why you were looking for me."

Aegis showed signs of struggle for a mere moment before he shamelessly betrayed his father.

"Old pops wanted me to go and get your cultivation technique. He told me to agree to whatever price you wanted, so long as you agreed to hand over the True path cultivation technique."

Lex raised an eyebrow out of curiosity. There was a lot to unpack from that one simple statement, but he didn't want to divert his attention from his quest for now. He had only 2 days left and he had to use them wisely.

"For the next part of the payment… tell me about yourself."

"Myself?" Aegis repeated, surprised.

"Yes, tell me about yourself. About why you started drinking in the first place. Tell me in detail, don't skip over anything."

This time, Aegis struggled a bit longer. The look in his eyes was of one who did not want to look back at life, of one who had suffered immense torture and struggle. His eyes were a well filled only with pain, and now someone had asked him to bring out that pain, one bucket at a time.

Still, the struggle did not last long. He gave in, and with a deep, depressed sigh, began talking.

"I started drinking because… life was just too damn boring. It's just… it's just, so so boring. When I was a few years old, maybe 6 or 7, I heard someone mention that old pops was really strong because he cultivated the True path. I looked at the cultivation technique and, after a few days, learned all of it and began cultivating even in my sleep. Then I heard Kraven were very strong, so I went to kill them, but then I killed so many that old pops came and stopped me. I heard girls were…"

"Wait wait wait wait," said Lex, suddenly freezing. "You're saying… the King actually prevented you from killing too many Kraven?"