The Innkeeper

Chapter 2237: What else do you need?

It didn’t take long. To be exact, three days later, the Humanoid Alliance sent over all the resources to Lex. At the same time, they requested for a tavern to be established within the Humanoid Alliance headquarters within one of their primary realms since using Velma’s tavern was inconvenient without moving her.

Lex obliged by organising a delegation of workers and sending them alongside the Humanoid Alliance with a deployable tavern. Using his workers, over time, he’d be able to form a connection to the Humanoid Alliances main realm as well. Slowly but steadily he was beginning to expand his reach.

Lex could have expanded this deal to include more benefits - he knew he could have. The reason he decisively chose to avoid more benefits was because he didn’t want to distract himself with thoughts of profit. At the moment he was in a precarious situation, so he was totally focused on resolving it safely.

At the same time, he didn’t know who his opponent was, or what their goals were, which is why his requirements from these allies had to be broad yet effective. Simply forcing them to speed up the evacuation was the best case scenario. After all, the whole reason Lex was in this mess to begin with was because his people had been kidnapped. As long as they were safe within the Inn, he could return to his realm and not be bothered by what was happening outside.

Moreover, there was clearly something incredibly dangerous going on in the Dream realm. A battlefield for Dao Lords? The thought of it was enough to spur Lex to give up all profits for a quick escape. This was absolutely not something he could get involved with.

In fact, while Lex continued to search the Dream realm using the Red Moon Devil as his persona, he also began making strategic moves to make it clear that the Midnight Inn would soon be exiting the Dream realm!

As soon as all the workers were retrieved, the Dream tavern would shut down for the foreseeable future.

Lex also decided to stop taking a part in the war, and focus on developing a safe, neutral place for trade. By sending his taverns to various realms owned by powerful organisations he could form deals with, he could create an environment where the Midnight Inn could survive without the need to use the keys.

While doing all of that, Lex did one more thing as well. He summoned Mary’s projection to the cabin on Midnight mountain. Since she never listened in on his meetings with Dao Lords, she had no idea that all the ingredients for her new body had already been gathered. What had taken the two of them so long, only to be faced with little to no success, took the Humanoid Alliance three days to accomplish.

They didn’t even question why the Innkeeper wanted such simple things - they just thought that the Innkeeper was being considerate. After all, an uneven transaction would make them indebted to him, and with his control over karma, that was a very dangerous position to be in. This way, they could avoid that debt!

Lex was seated outside the cabin, looking out at the scenery of the Inn when Mary arrived, looking somewhat relieved. Ever since Almira disappeared, she had always felt Lex was very tense and not in a good mood which is why she was less likely to tease him.

Now that he had finally called her on his own, especially to his favorite cabin, she was hoping he was feeling better. If he had found Almira and the others, then he would have just announced it rather than calling her here, so she knew it wasn’t because of that. Still, she expected that it would be good news.

"Well, well, well, look who decided to show up. You’ve been quite busy lately, so how come you had time to visit today? Did something happen?" she asked, looking at Lex.

Continuing with the theme of not immediately replying, Lex looked at Mary, dressed up like a railroad worker. This may be one of the last times he saw her in her projection form.

"Come with me," he said, and led her inside where a massive, golden treasure chest lay, appearing quite dramatic. He nodded his head towards the chest, telling Mary to take a look inside.

The projection raised an eyebrow, but did as she was told. She touched the chest to get a sense of what was inside, and found hundreds of items in perfectly contained isolation boxes. Moreover, these weren’t random items, but were items from the list she’d given Lex a long time ago for her clone.

What’s more, Lex hadn’t stuck to just the list. He’d added something on his own.

"Is this..." Mary began to ask, filled with disbelief. This was too sudden. She was fully prepared to wait at least another century or two before the resources could be found, but now they were all in front of her.

"What else do you need to start making a new body?" Lex asked. "I assumed that, like everything else cultivator related, the process would take centuries or even several millennia, which is why I asked for a small, self contained Time accelerator in the shape of a containment pod. You can create your clone inside to speed up the process."

Mary had, of course, noticed the pod but didn’t know what to say at all.

"How did you suddenly get your hands on all this?" she asked in a daze.

"I made a deal with the Humanoid Alliance," said Lex. "They provided most of the stuff. If you need anything else, let me know. The situation outside the Inn is getting quite dangerous, and I have a feeling that we’re being targeted by someone. It’s best to develop your new body as quickly as possible. Then I can work on removing your soul from the system and allowing it to enter the body. I’m sure that adapting to a new vessel will take a while as well, so I don’t want to waste any time."