The Innkeeper

Though the distortions in space stopped as soon as the energy vanished, the effects that they already had were far from over. The movement path of an estimated 1 billion galaxies was severely compromised, and even more were suffering from mild deviations. The few strands of energy that escaped the attack dispersed into the universe and gave birth to a phenomenon of a bountiful harvest. Planets quickly started rising in their star ranks, though quick was only a relative term, and treasures that were so rare they had no names began to form.

A time of rapid growth suddenly overcame the few galaxies that had been the closest in contact with the energy, but while that growth brought with it prosperity, it also brought greed and war. For better or worse, the trajectory of the Origin realm had changed.

A thing to note, however, was that none of the galaxies affected were actually a part of the galaxies that had directly interacted with the Inn so far. For example, these galaxies were so far from the Jotun Empire that, besides their strongest immortals, none of them even felt the energy surge that enveloped the whole realm.

Of course, the Henali were the quickest to understand what happened, and quickly even summarized accurately what had happened.

In the Henali assembly, there was an awkward silence as the Daolords had been stopped midconversation for an announcement. They had no idea what had just occurred because the location of the assembly was special and cut off from the rest of the realm, but they were about to find out.

"There was a clash amongst lords," said the Henali convening the assembly. "We do not know the background of the issue, but it seems that God Ra provoked the new lord known as The Innkeeper. As a result, The Innkeeper retaliated, and Ra\'s religion had ceased to exist in the realm, and Ra has escaped, hiding his trail."

No more was said, but excitement filled the room. Amana especially was thrilled, and a little flushed. She was extremely grateful to the mysterious Innkeeper and, strangely, feeling a little attracted to him. Daolords almost never clashed, for it was not easy for any of them to get an advantage over another, yet the Innkeeper had reduced Ra to hiding in a single clash.

The Innkeeper must be incredibly powerful, which meant... he would also make a good father. Her blush grew as her thoughts started to race.

Very few Daolords were able to keep their composure, but Ballom was one of them. After all, the Devil\'s background was not as shallow as everyone else\'s. Still, it seemed like the Innkeeper was worthy of cooperating with. Since his Inn catered to the whole universe, perhaps he should also invite him to Garvitz, one of the main realms of the Devils.

A few other Daolords also developed an interest in the Midnight Inn. After all, now that the Innkeeper had shown his hand, there was no doubt he was worthy of sending a team to the Henali Champions tourney. It seemed that things would be very interesting this time around.

*****

At the Midnight Inn, all was still. The sky itself had been ripped asunder by the Innkeepers attack, allowing them to glimpse the havoc it wrought onto the universe. Of course, since the system had failed to protect the guests from the aura of the attack, most of them had fainted outright - including the workers.

Mary especially was disoriented, for the System itself had suffered from the attack. A countless barrage of notifications flooded Lex, but unfortunately, he was asleep. This time, though, he would wake up soon as he had already informed the Lotus of the kind of aid he wanted - though Lex himself was disoriented when he gave the instructions, so it was unknown what his exact purpose was.

Still, a few managed to stay awake, and as soon as the rip in the sky healed and the dark clouds over the Inn dispersed, they began working. After all, they had already suffered a huge blow to their credibility. It would be a massive shame if the remaining guests woke up and found themselves on the floor.

Anita summoned an army of undead, still looking beautiful and magnificent instead of ugly and decaying, and had them start working. As the workers began waking up, they helped as well.

Moreover, while the guests who had been here for the chaos had been affected, as the Inn had over time developed some prestige, more and more guests came every few minutes. Soon, the Inn seemed to be returning towards operating normally. Lex hadn\'t had time to clean up the Inn but the workers quickly began getting to it.

When Mary finally recovered, she breathed a sigh of relief and was just about to begin passing out orders to return things to normal, when a golden beam of light shot through the air right from the grounds where Lex killed all the miscreants.

Mary was too sensitive right now due to everything they had faced, and immediately turned all her attention to the light, ready for another battle. But it was not new enemies that appeared from the beam of light. No, instead a hearth was formed right in the open.

A golden flame lit up in the heart, and began producing a crackling sound, as if logs were being burnt. On the stone, writing started to appear alongside a countdown that was ticking each second.

After ensuring it was nothing bad, Mary scanned the heart. Even though she had no physical body, she shuddered mentally as she read the words and looked on in horror.

It read: here lie the souls of those who deigned to become enemies of the Midnight Inn, serving as timber until their time is up.

The countdown was only about 100 days, but in a way, it was longer than eternity. When one focused on the flames, amidst the burning the flames\', faces appeared from time to time. If one focused on the hearth with their spirit sense, the wails and screams of countless souls could be heard, even if ever so slightly.

The souls trapped here were only those that Lex had trapped in the formation, and not all the ones from the entire universe, but even then the number went into the tens of thousands. Moreover, trapping souls was not an easy task. Taking it a step further and trapping thousands of souls, and then torturing them made the formation increasingly expensive.

A majority of Lex\'s MP went into purchasing the soul trapping formation, and the rest went into maximizing the number of days they could be trapped.

Perhaps it would be a waste of MP to do such a thing, for it had taken a long time for Lex to accumulate so much. But maybe, it would serve him in another way, and the price would end up being worth it.

As it happened, a guest teleported to the Inn, and they appeared right in front of the hearth. Ragnar stepped out of the golden light with a creased brow, clearly under great stress. Things had not been going well for Jotun on the battlefront, but then again, when were things ever simple?

He had come to the Inn to find out if the Innkeeper had returned, as well make a few updates on his assigned guild task. He still did not know that it had been accepted already by someone, and was already in the process of being completed.

As the golden light disappeared and Ragnar got ready to move on, he suddenly noticed that something was unusual about the Inn. He did not need to sweep his spirit sense as just his eyesight was enough to see the damage it had suffered, and the numerous unconscious people on the ground.

Before he could even begin to speculate, however, his attention turned towards the hearth. He was stunned as numerous thoughts ran through his mind, but first he kept checking the hearth. This was because, within the souls trapped in there, he recognized a few. In fact, he did not even need to search for them, as the hearth had some kind of mystical ability to let him know exactly who he knew that had been trapped inside.

He could not believe that soldiers from his regiment would be stupid enough to attack the Inn. It went against common sense. In fact, they should not be participating in any conflict that he did not assign, it was a clear dereliction of duty and betrayal!

He froze, and tasted the word on his lips. Betrayal. Suddenly a few things made sense to him.