The Innkeeper

Lex spent many hours planning out the upcoming event. As it turned out, holding a three month long festival was harder than it seemed. Many of the ideas he had could easily fit into just the first month, so not only did he need to find ways to stretch them out, he had to think up more ideas as well.

Still, he had thought up the basic structure of how things would proceed and made room to include any ideas that he had at the moment. Yet planning out everything was only the first part. He sent the preliminary schedule of events to Mary, and had her distribute it amongst the workers so that they should also know what to expect.

Moreover, a monumental task was placed before the Planning department. With them, Lex shared a more detailed version of the upcoming festivities and told them not only to design the decoration for the Party village for the event, as well as the other areas which would be included in the festival, but had them do research on other popular festivals on the Henali portal.

It could not be denied that he was heavily influenced by earth’s cultures and traditions in everything he did, and he did not blame himself for that. But it was now time to make an effort to step away, not only to be more inclusive of the norms of the Origin realm, but to understand how he could cater to them better.

By the time he was done, it was already late into the night, not that had any effect on the thriving nature of the Inn. Whether the Inn was lit up by the bright, artificial sun or illuminated under the soft yellow glow of the sea of sky lanterns, the guests were constantly on the go.

Some were dining with friends, others were gambling at the colosseum, while others still were using the Inns services in ways Lex never could have imagined.

Children were waging an endless war against the bunnies at the daycare area. A Krab-man and a lonely desert farmer girl were falling in love by the lazy river. A patch of sentient grass and its older brother, a vine that extended under the entire Inn, were spying on different guests, learning about the universe. In a giant, floating sphere of water that Lex had created above the colosseum, a host of aquatic beasts were playing a game they called Blitz-sphere. It was basically underwater rugby.

It was very soothing to watch, and Lex took a few moments to enjoy it. The Inn had grown massive while he was in the Crystal realm. He had been deprived of enjoying its subtle nuances, and only now that there was no impending chaos did he take a moment to take it all in.

But, unfortunately, a moment was all he really had. He was a busy man, and the Inn wouldn’t run itself. Well, actually it would, but Lex still had work to do.

“Tell me about the giant that wants to meet me,” Lex said to Mary. “You didn’t explain what happened.”

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“Afterwards it began asking Qawain a bunch of questions, mostly because it did not understand most things. It did not know what the universe was, so when the Inn was introduced as a hotel for the universe, it was confused. So when Qawain started explaining to it what planets, star systems and galaxies were, it immediately asked if it was possible to meet the owner or creator of the Inn. It was very adamant, so far as declaring eternal servitude if the ‘owner’ could grant him a wish.

“I’m not sure what this wish is or what it wants, but a massive creature like that is hard to ignore. If he becomes an employee he could be very useful, at least I think so. But it really depends on what it wants. Based on how it’s been behaving, it seems like the creature is just beginning to learn how to use its body. If I had to guess, I would say it’s a newborn, and if that’s the case, it’ll be even easier for it to get adjusted to the Inn.”

Lex nodded and scanned the creature, only to receive a surprise!

Name: *&%error%&*

Age: *&%error%&*

Sex: *&%error%&*

Cultivation Details: *&%error%&*

Species: *&%error%&*

Midnight Inn Prestige Level: 1

Remarks: This guest looks like he’s really hard-headed!

After a very, very long time, Lex encountered another guest with various errors showing up when it scanned them. Lex’s leading suspicion was that people who had errors were actually system wielders.

If that was true, then this would be an amazing opportunity for Lex to ascertain the truth about it – if Mary’s guess about it being a newborn were true. He hadn’t forgotten that system wielders could steal each other’s systems to strengthen their own, the way he had done. If that was the case, this could also be a trap.

But inside the Inn, Lex feared no traps, so to him, this was an important opportunity to learn the truth. If he could prove the error message was the sign of a system user, he would have finally discovered a way to discover system users.

After making sure to calm down his thoughts, Lex teleported over. His confidence did not make him overlook the fact that when Mary told him that only a system was another system’s weakness, it worked both for him and against him. He was fully cognizant of the fact that anything could happen when facing a system wielder, so he entered his overdrive state before teleporting over.

While it looked like Lex was going for a simple meeting, he was going over with a mindset ready for war.