The Innkeeper

The ever constant breeze was blowing gently over and around the rocky creature. The meadow where the creature sat in meditation was far away from the populated areas of the Inn, and so was devoid of the hustle and bustle of the populace. Instead, only the sounds of nature accompanied it.

Though the creature did not technically have ears, it could hear any sound that touched its rocky body. So it was not an exaggeration to say that it listened with its entire body the sound of the rustling grass, the whisper of the wind, the flapping of birds’ wings and the cooing of the many doves that sat all over its rocky body.

The creature did not have skin, yet it was very sensitive to the cool clouds that swam past its body. It did not have a nose, yet it could smell nature around in ways that it did not realize. There were other senses the creature had not had in its previous life, yet he felt them now. He felt the peace around him, felt the beauty awash him, felt life itself giving him a new chance that it had never even imagined. Yet for all the fortunes it had, how could it get over, in a single moment, all the lingering attachments of his previous life. With its eyes closed, it could remember clearly the summer days it spent in its previous life that were nowhere near as comfortable as the meadow it now inhabited. Yet it would trade this comfort in a single beat of a heart it no longer had, for the company it had kept in those days had been lost to it forever.

In this field it had seen flowers of immeasurable beauty, yet the creature only recalled a spring it had once spent in a dirty village, pretending to be a commoner alongside the princess who he was sworn to protect. Even beaten and battered by the ordeals of life, with dirt on her face and sweat on her brow, she was more beautiful than any visage the universe could offer.

What was the point of a second chance, when he was still attached to his failures in the first one? How could he satisfy the demands of the system that gave him new life, when the pain of defeat filled every fiber of his being?

Again and again, its last moments in its previous life played in its mind. The nation was at war, the enemy was close at hand, they had prepared for battle, but everything went wrong too suddenly. Lu Bu had appeared to kill the princess within the safety of her own home, the guards were all dead, chaos had erupted. The creature remembered holding off the enemies to allow the princess a chance to escape, yet a blade had run through his heart, piercing him from the back.

What had happened? Who had betrayed him? What became of the princess? For all the strength and might this new body contained, the creature suffered only through an anguished lament that it could not shed tears so that it may express some of its pain.

“I was told you wanted to meet with me. I hope this isn’t a bad time.”

A voice cut through the silence of the night, and with a jolt, woke the creature from its desperate thoughts.

When the creature opened its eyes, it saw a man in the air in front of its face, as if he was standing in the clouds. His voice had not startled the creature despite its suddenness, but rather, woken it up from its depression and washed it clean of the negative emotions that had a hold on it.

Seeing that the creature was not responding Lex continued.

“Oh, I suppose I forgot to introduce myself. I am the Innkeeper, the owner of this humble establishment. I hope you have been finding your stay at the Inn to your liking.”

The creature shook its head forlornly and said, “I cannot enjoy much of anything right now.”

“Oh, is something wrong?”

The creature did not reply immediately and only looked at the Innkeeper, a mental struggle going on in its head. It was not inexperienced or stupid. It knew that some things should be kept to itself. But it was desperate, and that desperation slowly overwhelmed the parts of its rational mind that told it to keep its secrets close to itself.

“The universe… it really is… too big.” The creature finally said, letting out what Lex could only assume was a sigh and not what it seemed, a gale.

“I do not understand it. Nor do I understand this form,” it said looking down at its rocky arms. “It is beyond me, and what I thought was possible. Yet I am alive and in need of answers. I was hoping that you, as someone who wields enormous strength and has created something so grand, could provide me with some answers.”

Lex looked into those earnest, rocky eyes. This… was not what he was expecting. Even though the shape was different, in those eyes he saw a pain that was all too human.

“I can only say that I will try my best to answer your questions. If your questions are sensitive, would you like to go somewhere more private before we have our discussion?”

The creature nodded, and before it could get up to move, Lex teleported both of them to his office.

During the Midnight games, Lex added a feature to the Inn that allowed creatures that were massive to shrink down in size automatically when they tried to enter buildings, so that they too could use all the Inn’s facilities. Otherwise, if Lex had to recreate every facility for every sized being it would end up being quite tedious.

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“This… is my second life,” the creature began, getting right into the thick of things.