Chapter 2521: A quick nap for 20 billion years

Lex could not help but smile as he read the description, for more than one reason. The fusion was done, and they would soon discover if that meant that Lotus could hide them from the universe.

That was only part of it. The realm gaining three confirmed unique abilities was something to look forward to. The crazy thing was that even the system could not confirm what would happen once all three layers were completed, only theorizing that the realm would gain another unique trait.

But was that all it took to get Lex excited? Not even close!

Lex was bonded with Lotus, and that bond now extended to the Midnight Realm! He could now feel a connection to the realm in such an innate way that it was hard to describe. He could not yet do anything with that connection save for feeling its existence, but that very existence at all promised so much more potential!

Moreover, Lex and Lotus often gave each other feedback when they grew stronger. In fact, that feedback was one of the main sources of Lex’s immense and unreasonable physical strength. Now that the Midnight realm had grown so much, not to mention its fusion with Lotus was perfected, that feedback began with immediate and immense effect!

But even that was not the whole of it. When Lex looked at the prices inside the Midnight Realm Management Panel, he could not help but grin widely. The prices for almost all upgrades had dropped.

Voidwoven, an ability that made his realm undetectable to Dao Lords and allowed his realm to move across the Void itself, was once priced so high that Lex could not see it. Then he unlocked ME, which was equal to one trillion MT, or one trillion trillion MP. The price of Voidwoven changed to 999,999,999,999 ME! That was 1 ME short of a trillion ME!

To give some context of what the value of such a price was, Lex sold 1 piece of Dao material to the Inn and in exchange received 13 ME.

Well, after the upgrade the price had dropped to 450,000,000,000 ME. While that was still unaffordable, that was basically a 50% discount on the original price. Many other upgrades also became available since their prices were also reduced drastically.

But that piece of good news was accompanied by a restriction. The Midnight Realm Management Panel had a new restriction: he could only implement 24 realm changes moving forward! That was basically one for each petal.

Fortunately, previous upgrades did not count in this. Lex wasn’t entirely sure why this new restriction had appeared, but his understanding of how realms worked was still quite basic.

"How do you feel?" Lex asked as he felt Lotus’ changes with his own bond.

"Tired, strained, sleepy," responded Lotus in an exhausted voice. "The feedback from the realm has given me the energy to remain awake, otherwise I would immediately enter a state of dormancy. Once I sleep properly and recover completely, I should be able to gain complete control over the realm. However, by human standards, a proper rest for me might last anywhere between ten to twenty billion years."

Lex’s smile froze. To be fair, it made sense. Lotus was a baby, and its biology and physiology was suited for existence over extremely vast periods of time. Considering the lifecycles of realms as compared to planets, merely twenty billion years was probably just a short nap for Lotus and still not a proper rest.

"I’ll find a way to help you get better quality sleep and recover quicker," said Lex seriously, addressing the lotus’ concern. "But before you go to sleep, tell me, has the Regal Embrace given you a way to hide from the universe? The technique is geared for total and complete defense, and being undiscoverable is also a component of defense."

Actually, that was not strictly true, but it also wasn’t technically wrong, and that was good enough. The Regal Embrace made it absolutely ridiculously easy to learn any kind of defensive technique, to the point where a mere glance was enough to learn a technique. However, it was equally bad at anything and everything unrelated to defense.

"Yes, actually, I have already learned that," responded Lotus. "There is a hidden danger in the Void that is triggering my defensive instincts. The extent of that danger is extreme, making me feel like the moment it’s unleashed, no realm can survive destruction. Regal Embrace responded to that danger and concluded that... even becoming a Mature realm is not enough to protect me from that danger, and so the best form of defense is to be undetectable. I should be able to use the technique soon, I just need to gather some energy."

This time, when Lex’s smile froze, it was not nearly as simple a matter. A hidden danger that not even Mature realms could avoid? What the hell was going on?

He wanted to know, and at the same time was afraid to learn more. He knew that at higher levels, knowledge carried a cost, and secrets of this level were beyond him currently.

He was sure that this danger was not the same as the universe wanting to devour realms because according to Lotus, even a Mature realm strengthened by Regal Embrace would not be enough to resist that danger.

Lex took a deep breath in and teleported to his office with a terrible, terrible decision in front of him - one that would forever alter the direction of his life. Should he ignore this knowledge, or should he write a letter as the Innkeeper and send it to the Henali or even Eclipse?

If this was common knowledge among higher level Dao Lords, revealing it might also reveal that his identity as the Innkeeper was a facade. But if this information was not known...

Logic dictated that there was no way something like this was a secret. They had to have known about it. The question was... could Lex risk not telling them on the minute chance they didn’t know about it? After all, Regal Embrace was far from simple, and neither was Lotus at this point.

If telling the only beings possibly powerful enough to address this concern might prevent a terrible danger in the future, was he morally obligated to share this information? More important than morals was a concern for his own protection. Revealing a possible flaw in his identity would put him at risk, and ignoring such a strange danger also put him at risk. The question was, which of those risks was greater?