The Innkeeper

Lex spent the next few hours peacefully cultivating in his room, but discovered that it was much harder for him to lose his sense of time like before. Previously, Lex would get lost in the feeling of cultivating, especially since he could feel himself grow stronger.

But now that he had tasted how it felt to cultivate atop a dragon, normal cultivation no longer enticed him as much. This was especially because his gains were measurably greater whilst atop the dragon.

Eventually, his thoughts could not help but veer towards his family. His parents were a lot more formidable than he assumed. They did not just have the backing of a powerful family like the Williams family, but also had tremendous individual strength. If that was the case, he really could not imagine what reason there could be for them to keep him out of the loop.

He sighed, then stopped thinking about such matters. To be entirely honest, he no longer even cared what their reasons were. He had completely moved on from it.

There was, however, a single thought that occurred to him, one that he did not contemplate for long since there was no way of verifying it. On the entire planet Earth, it seemed that he was one of the most unique beings, if one did not count Bastet or Falak. His connection to the Origin realm and the cultivation world was much more complicated than even he ever realized. Given that, and the fact that there were about 8 billion humans, and countless billion other animals, the chances that *he* specifically would get the system by accident were too low. It was almost as if it were by design. After all, unless his family continued to ignore him until he died, it was destined that his life would be extremely eventful.

Whatever the case, whether it was concerning the system or his family, he put it aside. These were matters he would consider in greater detail when he was stronger. As for his family…

So he had family problems, what was the big deal? As a millennial, that came standard for him. He let his thoughts wander on other things for a while.

Lex could easily deduce that the tournament he had been invited to was some watered down, basic version of the upcoming Champions tourney. As the Innkeeper he already had an invitation, but knowing that he as Lex had one as well felt nice.

He suddenly had the urge to compete between his two identities. As the Innkeeper he had many advantages, but as Lex he had very few connections or affiliations. He was more or less developing his Innkeeper identity regardless of whether he wanted to or not, but his own identity was really lagging behind.

Originally he didn't care about it, for he did not have a complex about his identities. Whether he was called the Innkeeper, Leo or Lex, all of them were him. Sure he behaved differently when exhibiting each identity, but even that different behavior was a part of him. But the idea of competing seemed… interesting.

If that was the case, how should he compete? As far as fame went, both Lex and the Innkeeper identities had various levels of fame across the Origin realm. Then it came to connections and influence. As the Innkeeper, he had all of the Midnight Inn at his disposal, and had connections to various Dao Lords.

As Lex, he had that connection to a mysterious man who was much stronger than anyone he had ever met, but that was not a connection he could really leverage. In that case, the best of his connections were a few Earth Immortals down in the Crystal realm.

The main difference was that as the Innkeeper he would not need to do anything, and everyone would come and find him. As Lex, if he wanted to develop his connections and influence, he would need to be more proactive.

Was this really something he should waste his time on? It wasn't as if he had only a few things on his plate.

After considering it for a moment, he decided that he would not go out of his way to do anything, as he had his priorities set, but since he had the time and energy, he might as well make the most of it right now.

He stood up, no longer content to cultivate without his 'Dragon Cultivation Mat'. It seemed he had been in the wrong for blaming his fate for always getting him into trouble. Now that no trouble had come his way, he was a little bored.

He stepped out of his room and began to stroll the streets with his hands in his pockets. Although there were no streetlights, many of the plants around him gave off a gentle, bluish-green light that not only illuminated his path but gave the entire town an entirely different vibe from during the day.

The streets were not empty, and seemed just as busy as they were during the day. The only difference was that everyone made sure not to make too much noise, staying as hushed as possible.

Feeling like he had entered a storybook, Lex walked the streets and took in inspiration from all that he saw around him. At night, the Inn was usually illuminated by the sea of floating lanterns in the sky, but it wasn't a bad idea to incorporate bioluminescent plants here and there. Of course he could not add them randomly, as he used to do back in his early days in the Inn.

Instead, he would find suitable locations where the lanterns don't shine. That way, at night, different areas of the Inn would take on different shades.

Lex smiled as he walked among the crowds. It seemed that he was most comfortable when he was around large crowds of people. Getting a system focused around having lots of guests really suited him.

His casual, simple stroll slowly led him to the heart of the town, and then through it towards the outer boundary of the town on the other side. This entire time, he had been following the path outlined by his instincts. Something interesting was waiting for him this way.

A few minutes later, once Lex had left the proper path and ventured into the grassy wilderness, he discovered an elf laying flat on the ground, panting and heaving as if he had run the longest marathon of his life.

The moment the elf saw Lex, surprise and fear flashed in his eyes and he froze. He seemed to have given up on life, and was waiting for an inevitable horror to descend onto him.

"I guess I shouldn't be asking if you're alright," said Lex as he squatted down and summoned a bottle of recovery pills from his spatial bangle. The pills not only sped up the recovery of spiritual energy within the body, they also helped eliminate some physical fatigue. They were very generic pills, although he had them in the best possible quality available, and were some of the many items he took with him on his excursions now.

He had come a long way from only carrying a few gold coins and a couple of weapons whenever he visited a new planet.

"These will help you regain some of your stamina," Lex said as he held out the bottle. "I'm not sure who you're hiding from, but I assure you, I have nothing to do with them."

"Wait you… you don't recognize me?" asked the elf, his voice filled with equal amounts of incredulity and a sense of being offended.

"Should I recognize you? If you're someone famous on this planet, I only arrived a short while ago so I haven't really had the time to get acquainted with the local culture."

As Lex spoke, he looked out towards the horizon for any sign of the elfs pursuers, but there was no indication of them for now.

"Is someone trying to harm you? I was under the impression that this was a very safe planet," he commented. Powell had told him that there was a formation covering the entire planet and that the Tilaiyans took security very strongly.

"Harm me? That's the understatement of the century!" said the elf despondently as he swallowed one of the pills and handed Lex the bottle back. "That old geezer is trying to get me married! A single interplanetary incident with the princess of Astoria, and now I have to 'take responsibility'. What 'take responsibility'? All I did was flirt with her a little bit and use her authority to enter the Field of Sacred Grains."

The elf was grumbling, but then suddenly realized that all his energy was entirely recovered! A moment ago he had been completely spent, yet now he was as fit as a fiddle.

"What kind of pills did you give me? Even I've never had something like that."

"So you're someone famous on this planet, and you're getting married," Lex mused, ignoring his question. He had too many of such pills he had taken from the emporium so he never really considered them too valuable.

"Based on my luck, I'm guessing… you must be the heir of this place, right?"