Chapter 2502: Secret of the Cosmic Ascendance Spectrum

"Oh dear, please excuse me. I’m doing some realm renovations these days and gravity has not been behaving properly," said the Innkeeper with a chuckle as he picked up the letter and put it back in his pocket. That was the kind of thing Lex could do to a letter lacking any and all Dao radiation - he could put it in his pocket.

"Damn this gravity! It’s always messing up!" Romulus said with the strongest indignation in his voice, as if gravity were an old sworn enemy.

The Innkeeper merely smiled and handed Romulus his business card.

"I understand that you’re in a very tense situation, so I won’t pressure you. You just arrived back inside the universe, so take some time to get settled. Maybe we can talk again after everything is a little more calm," said the Innkeeper. "You should be able to reach out to me using that business card. I would give you a key to the Inn, but our teleportation is offline these days."

Romulus let out a deep sigh and then pulled out a crystal and placed it on the table in front of him.

"I think that is for the best, Innkeeper. I wish we could have met under better circumstances, but I’m sure we’ll have an opportunity to meet again in the future. For now... I have some business to take care of. Please pass this crystal along to Lex - it’s a little something he forgot inside the Gilded Hollow, as well as news on some of the friends he made while in there."

The Innkeeper looked at the crystal and nodded before the qilin disappeared. The scale that summoned him was also used up, leaving behind nothing at all.

Lex walked up to the crystal and channeled his spirit sense inside of it. Within was news about everyone he had met inside the Hollow... and it seemed like the update was accidentally written in a crystal Romulus was already using for notetaking. Within it was information that Romulus had learned reading the fortune of the universe, using it to determine what was going to happen in the future.

Lex paused, turned around and took a seat on his chair. This was going to take him a moment to get through. The first thing, though, was news about the new type of realm he heard about in the Tea Party.

Once the universe matured, a new type of realm called the Dao realm would be created. Dao realms would appear and disappear, as far as Romulus could tell, and would be lethal to anyone below the Dao cultivation realm. But, to make up for it, the entire realm would be filled with countless, valuable, never before seen Dao materials!

That was interesting, as far as he could tell. But until he was able to handle dao radiation without getting hurt, it had nothing to do with Lex or the Midnight Inn.

The next part was interesting, though. Ever since returning to Vael?n, Romulus discovered that the fortunes of almost all races he encountered were... strangled almost. They were heavily regulated, to the point where the fortune of one person was linked to the fortune of his entire race.

Stuff like this was not easy to see through. If Romulus wasn’t as strong as he was, even if he understood the Dao of Fortune, he never would have been able to see through it. After a little bit of investigation, he discovered the cause.

It was the Cosmic Ascendance Spectrum. The spectrum wasn’t something that made a list of all races and then ranked them. It was... doing something to their fortunes. It was not harvesting the fortunes, but it also wasn’t letting them flow freely either.

That discovery had stunned Romulus, because something like that wasn’t easy to hide. For what reason was the fortune of all existing races being used up? The problem was... Romulus could only see fortunes. As far as he could tell, it could also be affecting their fates, their karma, their destinies... everything!

The reason why certain races were stronger than others wasn’t because the race itself was stronger. Instead, Romulus had two theories. Either the spectrum artificially fed the fortunes of higher listed races, making them stronger. Or perhaps it constrained the stronger races a whole lot less, allowing them to use their natural strengths while everyone else was constricted.

Lex’s eyes narrowed, and he suddenly remembered something. The Celestial race... was not an Elder race despite being so strong. The Dragons were not Sages, despite being universally recognized as extremely strong. Neither were the Henali...

What the hell was the Cosmic Ascendance Spectrum actually doing?

*****

Romulus wore an extremely grave expression - one that was far worse than what he had shown the Innkeeper. Around him, the Dao Lords that had exited the Gilded Hollow alongside him waited. Not a single one of them spoke.

In front of Romulus lay the corpse of a Weaver Dao Lord. Ever since the fall of Destiny, this once mighty race had suffered tremendously. Some even said that they had lost their position as a Sage race. Romulus cared for none of that right now.

"It’s been more or less confirmed - someone is hunting us. I doubt any simple Dao Lord can fool my senses so easily, so it’s either one of the top races... or one of the unnatural Archons," Romulus said, his voice deep and grave, filled with a killing intent so thick that it could harm the fortunes of some weaker Dao Lords simply by exposure.

"For now, we can’t do anything about that, but neither can they properly hunt us. We need to find a Major realm and take control of it, and we only have a few years to do it. Every one of you... start searching. We need a new realm as our home base, and if it’s not a Major realm, we’re done for."

None of the other Dao Lords spoke, because they were having trouble coming to terms with reality. The universe had changed too much while they were inside the Hollow.