The Innkeeper

Gerard immediately utilized his bloodline ability as he prepared to absorb the energy from the blast and divert it elsewhere, protecting the Innkeeper and himself safe from harm in the process.Yet the expected shockwave never hit him, and besides the rapidly flowing dust cloud that encompassed him, nothing else approached him either.

The old man did not have time for confusion as he quickly blew the dust away to get a look at what had happened, but was frozen still by what he saw. The Innkeeper, dressed pristinely as ever, stood tall in front of him, showing Gerard only his broad back.

A transparent shield had appeared in front of the Innkeeper, blocking all the debris as well as the shockwave.

Sounds of fighting filled the broken room, as well as tremors from distant explosions, but Gerard was no longer distraught. Instead, endless relief flooded his heart as the greatest pillar of support of the Inn had finally recovered.

If only things were really that simple.

“Gerard, do me a favor,” Lex said, his tone exceptionally cold at the moment. “Bring me a cup of Midnight Signature coffee brew to my office, the strongest cup we have.”

Before the old man could respond, Lex disappeared. But the unusual thing was, the shield that Lex had used to block all the debris was still active. Gerard thought nothing of it, for he never even considered thinking about the Innkeepers abilities or the scope of them.

Yet the truth was, instead of using some system related ability, due to the strong sense of urgency he felt flood him through his instincts, the moment Lex woke up he teleported and used Talk to the Hand to block the incoming blast. That in itself was not strange, for Lex had strong instincts and an equally impressive reaction time. The strange thing was… he never actually extended his hand to put up the shield.

Talk to the Hand was a technique that put up a wife, invisible shield parallel to the palm of his hand. He had managed to improve the technique previously to merge two of the techniques to strengthen the shield by using both hands. Yet now, he had deployed the technique without using his hands at all. Moreover, this was not a simple explosion that he had so effortlessly blocked.

But all of this would remain unnoticed, for to Gerard they were nothing but normal, while Lex himself was in an abnormal state himself.

Physically speaking, his body had reached its absolute peak due to the rehabilitation and nourishment provided by the Lotus. That should have been more than enough to wake him up and help him recover from his coma. Yet when he woke up, he was immediately afflicted with endless visual and auditory hallucinations.

He had to do all of this the very moment he woke up, while responding to the crisis at the same time, which is why he never realized that the way he used his technique was wrong. Moreover, since Gerard only saw Lex’s back, he did not see that Lex’s eyes were filled with an endless mix of colors, his pupils completely hidden behind them.

In his Overdrive state Lex immediately estimated that the momentum of the hallucinations affecting him had not reduced at all from when he was in the assembly, which meant based on his past experience he would only stay conscious for about 2 minutes. Yet there was something different. While his mind was still being assaulted with the same pressure, the rate of his exhaustion had reduced somewhat.

This was the effect of the nourishment the Lotus had given him, but he did not know that. He immediately recalled the effect of the Inns coffee, which reinvigorated the mind for an hour, and asked for it before teleporting to his office.

He needed to understand what was happening with himself, but just as important, he needed to understand what the hell was happening at the Inn!

Due to the strain on Lex’s mind, he was unable to think clearly, so he had to prioritize what he focused on. As a result, he did not notice at all as his emotions were going haywire, and that the weather of the Inn reflected it.

Dark gray clouds filled the previously clear sky, and along with the darkness, they brought down a pressure on everyone that they had not felt before. The weight everyone was feeling on their chest was not one of anger, or rage at what was happening at the Inn. Honestly speaking, it had barely been a few seconds and Lex did not yet fully understand what was happening, so he had not even had the chance to feel those yet.

No, the pressure they were feeling was a magnification and projection of a mild aura that Lex’s body had begun to emit. After all, his body was now mixed with the capability of a 6 star planet to accommodate the laws of the universe into itself in a greater capacity than just as building blocks for its existence.

As if such a change was not enough, his body began absorbing the faintest bit of aura from his hallucinations into itself, manifesting itself as the pressure of the universe. After all, laws were things incalculably distant from Lex at his current level, so let alone control the aura, he should not have been able to perceive it.

In fact, that is exactly what was happening. Since the Foundation which allowed him to accommodate the laws, and the subsequent aura that he was beginning to manifest, were now a part of his body, Lex was as conscious of them as a mortal would be of the individual cells in his body. That was to say, he was completely in the dark about the fact that he was somehow breaking rules that had never even needed to exist because of how impossible his situation was.

It was like a being that existed in the 2nd dimension suddenly being able to influence the 4th dimension, directly skipping the part where he was even able to interact with the 3rd.

Then Lex sat on his office chair and became aware of everything that was happening.