The Innkeeper

The World Seed Lotus had undergone a subtle evolution. The evolution was not too drastic, as its species had not changed. It was still a World Seed Lotus, just that its minimum possible achievement had changed from a 5 star world to a 6 star world. It had gone up a level while still staying within the definition of World Seed Lotus.

Unfortunately for it, as a result of its upgrade, it would take it much longer to become a world now. Fortunately for it, it did not care. It had spent practically all its life on Lex's back in a semi-dormant state so that was really all it knew. Of course it had strong instincts, and helped Lex numerous times using its abilities, but that did not mean it had magically gained some other knowledge.

This worked heavily in Lex's favor, for the Lotus never realized that Lex was actually very weak. The Lotus never thought too deeply into it either. As far as it was concerned, other than the Sovereign turtle that had first awoken it, Lex was the closest person to it. Now that Lex had done it such a huge favor by giving it the crystal that allowed it to evolve, it felt even closer to him.

The question, then, would be why would it let Lex fall into a near death state if it felt so warmly about him? The answer was simple: it did not even realize anything was wrong. For anything unrelated to world building, or any other stuff where the Lotus' instincts would kick in, the Lotus knew nothing.

Suddenly, though, it was woken from its semi-dormant state. It was not Gerards smooth, velvety voice that woke it up. No, it was the energy strands the old man released into the Pod that went straight to Lex's back, rousing it.

When it heard Gerard's request, the Lotus felt ecstatic. The sheer warmth and affection it felt for Lex at the moment could not be described with simple words, and just the opportunity to do anything even remotely positive for Lex filled it with excitement.

But while it lacked knowledge about many things, and it was driven by strong emotions to help out Lex did not mean it would do things carelessly. The first thing the Lotus did was check the condition for Lex's body and see if it really did match what the old man had said.

The tattoo on Lex's back warmed up ever so slightly, and a stream of energy entered Lex's body, traveling along his blood stream. There did not seem to be any injuries, but the heartbeat was extremely slow and the body seemed… strained, like a fruit that had been squeezed of all its juice.

Any and all activity had been slowed down to the utmost, even the passive flow of spiritual energy within the body.

The Lotus could not conceive that the Innkeeper had suffered harm, so it came up with its own explanation for the situation.

Once before the Innkeeper had gone through a process during which Lex was remaking his body. Back then the Lotus had provided some help by helping the Innkeeper amalgamate all the precious materials on hand. Now it seemed to the Lotus that the Innkeeper had set a Foundation in its body, but was not satisfied by how sturdy it was and so weakened it thoroughly without actually destroying it, so that he could slowly strengthen the Foundation to the utmost.

In this case, it made sense that others might assume that the Innkeeper was napping. After all, how could they begin to understand the intricacies of the Innkeepers' plans?

The matter now was that the Innkeeper was required but it would take him a while to strengthen his Foundation at his own pace. In that case, the Lotus could speed things up.

After all, when he grew up the Lotus would set the Foundation for an entire planet. Compared to that, a small human body was nothing.

From within the tattoo an extremely miniscule stream of blue liquid was released and fused with Lex's blood. Through his blood the blue liquid circulated throughout Lex's body, slowly entering and nourishing each and every portion of it.

The liquid was called Hydratia Basal Detrium. It was found only in 6 star worlds, and even then it would be found in miniscule amounts. After all, any of that liquid that was discovered was leftover liquid from when the world was being created. It was not strictly used to build a Foundation for worlds, but instead strengthened the worlds ability to interact with universal laws.

It was only after the blue liquid completely merged with Lex that the Lotus started releasing a warm stream of energy into Lex's body to nourish it, flood it with vitality, and build a Foundation strong enough to rival a planet.

The sequence of events in this situation was very important, for now that Lex had absorbed Hydratia Basal Detrium, and strengthened his Foundation afterwards, the ability to interact with laws easily became a part of Lex's Foundation.

All this took a few minutes, during which Gerard was waiting with gritted teeth. He could not detect any difference in the Innkeeper, but Mary told him to wait patiently. He could not even tell if his attempt had even produced any effects, but until otherwise instructed, he could do nothing.

His nervousness was only exacerbated by his knowledge of everything that was happening outside. By now, things had escalated by another notch, and there was a group of people outright fighting the Inn's security team. Moreover, one by one, their numbers were ever increasing.

Full on panic had started to spread.

But while everyone at the Inn was living through an unreal nightmare, Lex was finally recovering. Previously, he had been in such a state that his mind was, for all intents and purposes, practically stopped working. Now at least it recovered to a level that Lex was able to feel soreness and discomfort throughout his body.

His mind, from being a complete blank, entered a state of deep sleep. Slowly he started to dream, but even in his dreams he saw odd shapes and colors. He felt the gaze of people that should not exist, and he became aware of events that were both happening and impossible at the same time.

His unconscious mind blankly accepted everything, and it was fortunate for him that he was asleep when this was happening, for his conscious mind would have tried to resist this knowledge. It would have been beyond the realms of his comprehension, and he would have tried to explain it using his paltry understanding of the universe at large.

Instead of understanding the universe for what it was, his mind would have forced him to try to project the knowledge through the lens of what he could understand, which would have distorted the information.

But while it seemed like eons passed in the dream, Lex was actually recovering very quickly. At first, his body was only passively taking in the energy that the Lotus provided. But after a few moments, when it regained even a semblance of strength, it began actively sucking in all the energy.

After all, why would it not? This was not spiritual energy that the Lotus was providing. Instead, it was the energy that turned barren meteoric rocks from space into the vibrant, fertile land that would eventually become a part of its world.

A few minutes later, color finally returned to Lex's pale face, and Gerard finally felt relief flood his fragile heart. If it was that simple, he did not know why Mary did not wake up the Innkeeper sooner. Perhaps there was some great secret, or perhaps a huge price to be paid.

What he did not know was that the reason no one asked him to do this earlier was because… Mary simply hadn't thought of it. It could be blamed both on her stressed out mental state, but on a deeper level it showed a lack of readiness by both Lex and herself.

If they had spent time discussing what to do in emergency situations, Lex would have definitely told her how useful the Lotus had been to him. But he was so used to taking care of things himself that it never occurred to him to rely on Mary for anything other than miscellaneous Inn related tasks.

Just as Gerard finally took a step back and sighed in relief, he heard a loud bang. His brow creased as he mentally contacted the Security team to find out what had happened. Unfortunately, the situation was too hectic, and no one was giving him a response.

No matter, a few minutes more and the Innkeeper would be awake and he would deal with whatever it was.

Gerard flicked his head towards the right as panic filled his eyes. He could sense, through his bloodline, a massive surge in energy. Before he could do anything, though, the wall of the room burst through as they were struck by a massive explosion!