The Innkeeper

Unable to retaliate or even avoid, the murderer disappeared once again. But the ruins had been completely destroyed by the blast, eliminating all hiding spots. The moment Lex climbed up onto the big rock, he could easily see the collapsed body of the murderer in the distance. Not interested in giving him any time to retaliate, Lex dashed towards him once again.

But the murderer had been pushed to the brink of desperation by Lex\'s relentless assault, and he began mindlessly using anything and everything in his arsenal. A blue bubble appeared around his body just in time to stop Lex, causing him to crash head first into it.

Unable to stop in time, Lex\'s body hit the bubble hard, and fell back with a strong rebound. His nose broke and started bleeding.

Even in his state of anger, a part of himself could not stop himself from commenting on the irony that the greatest wounds he\'d suffered so far were self-inflicted.

The murderer was not interested in Lex\'s self depreciation as he began to spend his Murder Points, or MP, to buy everything available to him. Mannequins started appearing out of thin air, all holding blades similar to the murderer, all looking at Lex with dark eyes.

When 109 such mannequins appeared, they attacked Lex in unison. Their coordination was immaculate, and it was as if a higher power was controlling each of their movements. Each of their attacks were smoother and deadlier than the murderers, though Lex could detect a hint of similarity in their attack patterns.

Still, none of it mattered. Something as simple and straightforward as physical attacks could not overwhelm Lex unless there was a massive difference in speed and strength, which there was not.

Guided by his instincts, Lex dodged so smoothly and seemingly effortlessly that were anyone to see it, it would seem that Lex and the mannequins were working together to purposefully avoid him. It was like he decided where he would move to dodge before they even decided to attack, and it was more or less exactly what was happening.

This was a result of a flaw due to how perfect their coordination was. That perfect coordination made it so that their next moves became predictable, even to the point where, in his overdrive state, Lex was able to determine what would happen four or five moves ahead.

Lex was moving as fast as he possibly could, but at the same time he was under no pressure. This allowed him to begin forming arrays to deal with the mannequins.

But the murderer was not done either, as he had killed enough people to accumulate quite a bit of MP.

A mannequin was hovering over him, healing his broken body while two, much more intimidating ones stood around him as guards. Moreover, armor filled with metal spikes slowly appeared around the murderer\'s body.

At a small distance, dirt from the ground was automatically piling up on itself, forming some kind of massive monster.

Up in the sky, the starlight was blocked by thunder clouds that were beginning to form.

All of this was taken in by Lex, even though he was busy dodging the mannequins. He did not know how the murderer was suddenly doing all these things but it was best to let him fully prepare.

His mind went through the various arrays he memorized, but none were suitable for the situation. He also didn\'t want to risk using Evisceration, as while he had increased his mastery over the technique, with the unusual coincidences happening, Lex didn\'t want to risk it. If the coincidence went from blocking the attack to somehow interrupting Lex\'s Evisceration, the result would be catastrophic.

He took a deep breath just as the arrays he was forming ended. The ground trembled and hundreds of sharp earthen spikes erupted from the ground, impaling most of the mannequins.

It was time to employ the rest of Lex\'s preparation with arrays. The conundrum of forming new arrays to match various situations was an extremely difficult one. If he had time it was not an issue, but in the heat of battle it was not possible.

So, Lex found a loophole using his knowledge of programming, and the unique connecting method employed in the Crystal realm for their arrays. It would somewhat diminish the power of the arrays, but it was good enough as it provided versatility.

Lex memorized over a hundred, extremely small arrays that performed very simple and basic tasks. He originally wanted to call them \'functions\' but ended up just calling them letters. The reason for this was because the concept he was working towards was combining the various small arrays in the way letters combine to form words, and then words combine to form sentences.

Combining the so-called \'letters\' was still not exactly straight forward, for even language has rules about how the alphabets behave let alone something as complex as arrays. Yet the concept of joining many small arrays to form one big array was too attractive to overlook, and much easier to design.

What he needed now was immense, concentrated fire power and so he began forming just such an array. At his current speed, within 1 second he could form up to 10 mini-arrays with the function of gathering heat. For the array he had planned he would need hundreds of such arrays, so he couldn\'t wait and began immediately.

A few seconds went by when the murderer realized that Lex was not attacking, as he usually did, and was instead preparing something.

"Attack!" he roared to his final two mannequins that acted as his bodyguards, as well as the arachnid shaped dirt monster. "Attack! Attack! ATTACK! KILL HIM FOR ME!"

A sharp, piercing pain stabbed him directly through the eyes and into his brain, but Lex did not even flinch in his overdrive state. Pain meant absolutely nothing to him right now.

The mannequins reached him in the blink of an eye, these ones armed with a sword and shield each. They were also much faster, and much stronger than the previous ones. Truly, they were formidable foes. Well, they were formidable if their opponent wasn\'t Lex.

With the forewarning from his instincts, Lex dodged each attack easily. In fact, Lex did not even look away from the murderer as he casually avoided each swing of the mannequin\'s sword.

The dirt monster, 12 feet (3.65 meters)tall, also arrived and started smashing at Lex with its numerous legs. It was not as fast as the other two, but it was much stronger. Dirt and rubble flew into the air under the explosion caused by its massive legs, yet Lex was as elusive as the wind.

A hint of fear crept into the murderer\'s mind as he observed Lex who never broke eye contact. But the fear was followed quickly by madness. He joined his hands together forming a strange symbol and began reciting some unusual prayer.

From the moment he uttered the first syllable, Lex felt the danger around him increase, and he knew he could waste no more time. Whatever he was doing had to be stopped! But his array was not ready either. It would take a few more seconds.

The duel suddenly turned into a lethal waiting game, and whoever struck first would gain the advantage. Normally Lex might have felt nervous under so much pressure, but his overdrive state allowed him maximum control of his every thought. Nervousness was not a useful emotion right now, so it would never be activated.

Of course, a part of his also had to do with the fact that Lex\'s mind had been flooded with pride and anger.

Just as 2 seconds were all that remained for Lex\'s array to be complete, he dodged his attackers and rushed towards the murderer. A monster that had previously not existed suddenly appeared in front of Lex, blocking him.

Unwilling to change his actions, Lex used Home Sweet Home and continued in a straight line. Either he would tear through the monster\'s body, or take him along with him.

But how could a monster formed from dirt be sturdy enough to block Lex.

Bursting right through the monster\'s chest, Lex appeared before the blue bubble that blocked the murderer and aimed his right palm at him. Even Lex was interested to see what kind of coincidence could block him now.