The glass bottle that Lex took out was only a very mundane glass bottle. It was not made from any spiritual material, nor did it have any mystical abilities. The reason Lex took this out first was because he wanted to get an idea for how quickly the liquid worked, and if it worked on ordinary materials as well, or was it restricted to living beings.
In scientific terms, if Lex were conducting an experiment, then the glass bottle would be the control. Once he had an understanding of how the liquid, which Lex had started to call Holy water temporarily, behaved, then he could find a suitable container for it..
Using his spirit sense, he grabbed the bottle and lifted it into the air. Slowly, so as to not cause a splash, he dipped the bottle into the Holy water and filled it to the brim. Then he lifted the bottle up in the air, holding it directly above the pool in case the bottle also dissolved.
But Lex did not even have time to properly get in position. Even just as he was about to begin waiting, the glass cracked, and then shattered. The pieces fell into the pool alongside the extracted liquid and quickly settled to the bottom. Suffice to say, the Holy water was not harmless.
Next, he took out a jade bottle. It had some medicine Lex had stored for emergency situations, in case encountered someone who was hurt, and removed it. Even as far as special containers went, this jade bottle was still not the best, but it contained a trace of a spiritual attribute, used to retain the medicinal potency of whatever it held. It was also sturdier than glass, and not as easily broken.
He repeated the process, but did not get much better results. Although the jade did not immediately shatter the way the glass bottle did, it was immediately covered in small cracks, which eventually grew until the jade broke apart.
Next, Lex took out something he hadn't used in a long time: a bottle of Botlam Dew! It was not the dew Lex was after, but rather the bottle it came in. Regardless of all its shortcomings, the one thing Lex could never accuse the system of was giving him low quality items.
If this bottle didn't work, then Lex would officially run out of containers. It wasn't as if he went around with his spatial bangle full of bottles to use for various situations.
Once again, he repeated the process, but although the bottle resisted for a little longer, it too eventually broke.
By now, all the shards of glass and jade that had fallen into the Holy water previously had disappeared, and Lex detected the slightest increase in the size of the pool. The increase was so small he would not have noticed it if he weren't looking for it.
Lex paused for a moment and considered the situation. Although he planned on conducting a few more tests, it seemed fairly certain that anything he would use to try to contain the liquid would dissolve. That was an issue, for if he wanted to submit the liquid into the Gift shop so that he could discover what it was, he would need to at least contain it for a few minutes. After all, returning to the Inn from the Crystal realm took quite a bit longer than normal.
If he had to go on by what Toro said, the only thing that could contain the liquid were his tenets, but that was only because they interacted with laws.
Based on that, he could think of two ways to contain the liquid. Either he could use arrays, or he could try his own spirit energy since he had suspicions that it had something to do with laws.
But it was best to be sure first, so he continued his tests of trying to contain the liquid. Since he had run out of containers, he tried other things. He tried soaking the liquid up in some cloth. He tried storing it in the curves of some metallic armor. He tried freezing it so that it would become solid. Nothing seemed to work, as any material it interacted with would dissolve, and temperature seemed to have no effect on it.
In the end, Lex became too impatient and began to devise a way to trap the liquid using an array. His plan was simple: he would store a single drop of liquid trapped inside an array which kept it floating in the middle so the liquid would never actually come in contact with the array. The array itself would then be fit inside a container so that Lex could move it around.
He would make the array so that it would last for at least 30 minutes, which would give him plenty of time to send it to the gift shop and read its description.
Coming up with the relevant array was pretty easy. Lex had long divised his own way to create arrays by implementing structures similar to functions in programming languages. Of course, this was only true for simpler arrays; if the array had to perform complex actions, or bring about extremely powerful reactions, he would still need to spend more time working on them.
A minute later, he finalized the array and activated it. At first, it seemed to work. The drop of liquid was suspended in the air, kept there by a gentle yet constant push generated by the array. Even Toro, who was watching from afar, seemed surprisingly hopeful.
But then something happened that Lex had not foreseen. The array ran out of power all too quickly! According to Lex's design, the array should have lasted for 30 minutes, yet it had not even lasted for 3 seconds! What's more, as the drop fell back to the pool, it turned into two drops right before Lex's eyes!
Thisโฆ he couldn't believe it. This time, he tried again, but with an array designed to last much longer. This time Lex spent well over 20 minutes to design the array, making sure there were no flaws and that it would last at least a couple of days.
He did not mind brute-forcing a solution, but the premise was that the consumption of the array's energy stayed constant to what Lex had already witnessed.
๐ก๐๐ซ๐๐๐๐ญ.๐ฌ๐๐ถ
He tried again, and once again a single drop was suspended into the air.
1โฆ 2โฆ. 3โฆ Lex counted in his mind. When he reached 10 seconds and saw that the array was not destabilizing, he felt himself relax. If the array lasted at least a few minutesโฆ
Before the thought was even complete, the array collapsed, and this time, the single drop turned into dozens of drops, causing a ripple in the puddle when they fell back.
"Don't do that again," warned Toro. "It's increasing the size of the pool too fast. The more the liquid accumulates, the stronger its effect becomes on the surrounding creatures."
Lex frowned.
The more troublesome this liquid was, the more he wanted to get his hands on it. But he was running out of ideas. The only thing left to do was try out his own spirit energy, or perhaps his own body.
There was a reason Lex hadn't tried directly using his spirit sense on the liquid. Since it could corrode even an immortal, chances were it would do the same to him, and he really didn't want to face the hassle of recovering from another injury.
He wasn't really concerned about any significant damage to himself, though. Although healing was very annoying for him, he had all the benefits of a body cultivator and more. That meant that, at this point, even if he lost a limb, with enough time and energy, he could grow it back.
With a sigh, Lex steadied his mental state. He assumed that, even if the liquid did not corrode him, once he touched it his desire to drink it would multiply. But until he verified what this liquid really was, and what it did, he could not take that risk.
He used the technique Impervious Hands and slowly dipped the tip of his finger in the liquid. As soon as he felt any harm he would immediately pull out, but he was not at all ready for what happened when he touched it.
The Lotus tattoo on his back stirred. The Lotus had fallen asleep after the immense effort it put into refining Lex's body when he was previously injured, but the moment Lex touched the liquid it began to wake up.
It wasn't that the Lotus was attracted to the liquid. No, instead, it felt great danger!
But even before the Lotus could fully wake up, and respond to the danger somehow, a stream of information rushed into Lex's head from a very familiar source.
Regal Embrace had identified the liquid, and immediately told Lex to drink it up! This was the kind of resources that he desperately needed to evolve his cultivation technique, but could never hope to actually encounter!
Lex had previously already given out a strict set of instructions to Mary and the various workers of the Inn to go by, not to mention the fact that every so often he would use his remote presence to drop in and monitor things.
Many important things were happening at the same time during this period. First, the festival at the Inn had entered the winter phase. The weather of the entire Inn had changed for the first time, blanketing it all in snow. The architecture of various buildings had changed to suit the new weather, and the kinds of services being offered had changed as well.
The golf carts had turned into snowmobiles, and hot springs had cropped up all around the Inn. Some specific regions even had extreme weather, dropping well below -100 celsius, though of course they were far away from the densely populated areas.
One Minor realm had been selected to be sold to the refugees, and the council had, under the supervision of Luthor, come up with a payment plan for it. Since a one time payment was incredibly difficult, the refugees would continue to pay installments for 50 years. Moreover, since this wasn't a transaction through official system channels, Lex had set up a few conditions.
The overall price of the Minor realm was set at 30 trillion MP. This was not a lot, considering the fact that the Minor realm not only had better spiritual energy than earth itself, but was full of various natural resources that would belong to the refugees to harvest.
A portion of that price would be paid in MP, but the larger portion would be directly transferred over to the Inn in physical form. That meant Lex would collect the payment in the form of valuable resources such as gold, spirit stones, metal ores, valuable medical herbs, secret treasures, unique spirit tech and more.
The first deposit of 300 million MP had come from the accumulated personal wealth of all the millions of refugees, as well as some of the council's reserves. Although the situation on earth had developed so that fewer and fewer refugees were coming through, the council still treated the Minor realm as their failsafe in case the war went poorly. In fact, some council members had already completely given up on earth and decided to focus on developing the Minor realm into their own personal kingdoms.
Other than these, the Inns workers had also selected a Minor realm which would solely belong to them.
The Jotun empire had also by now begun to promote their private Minor realm to humans, attracting many to go and train at the pagoda. In fact, many were already in there, including a few prominent people such as Z, Gerard, Will Bentham and Noman Butt the human lie detector.
Oddly enough though, despite the many people entering, very few were able to make it as far as Lex and Alexander. It was only now that so many that were entering that the soldiers in charge of recording the pagoda information realized how remarkable their achievement was.
All in all, the scene at the Inn seemed peaceful and prosperous. In contrast, the seeds of war were beginning to bloom across the entire Origin realm. The change brought about by the energy released into the Origin realm by the Innkeeper was finally becoming noticeable. More and more powerful cultivators and unique beasts and creatures were beginning to appear, their strength increased by the sudden surplus of cultivation materials.
Previously, such growth would be slow and natural, meaning that the status quo would be undisturbed as everyone would naturally find their place within it. But with such a sudden surge in powerful beings, everyone believed themselves special, and wanted to resist the greater powers to have their own organizations and influence. Normally, such actions would have brought them a swift death, but the sheer scale of the event was actually bringing about great pressure on the pre-established powers.
Even the Jotun empire was showing signs of trouble, but it was fortunate that the three great noble families had suddenly become very active, and began suppressing dissidents. All of this was not even considering the sudden upsurge in Fuegan attacks.
This could no longer even be called the calm before the storm. The storm was already arriving, and chaos was brewing. Conspiracies thousands of years in the making were coming to fruition, empires seemingly indestructible were crumbling from within and races that had long been suppressed, and were waiting for an opportunity to revolt, were beginning to make their move.
Amidst all of this, numerous students of the acclaimed Ventura academy were once again returning to their respective powers - at least in the Origin realm. If they were coming to help their powers tide over difficult times, or if they had some secret agenda was still to be seen.
None of this should have had anything to do with Lex, but the Innkeeper and the Midnight Inn could not escape its influence. The Henali had given their response to the Innkeeper.
The Inn's battlefield was decided, and it was in a galaxy that had almost no human presence at all. Instead, it was a galaxy controlled by Elves called Suera. Coincidentally, or perhaps not so, that was the same galaxy the mysterious man had told Lex to visit to find an unknown valuable item.
But while the Henali had decided on the Inns battlefield, the order had not yet reached the Inn and thus Lex. Which was fortunate, because Lex was thoroughly preoccupied at the moment.
He stared at the shining liquid, which was anything but the Holy water Lex had originally decided to call it, an ominous look in his eyes.
His cultivation technique had given him a detailed description of the liquid which was known as Cosmic Erosion Elixir. This extremely rare liquid was produced in only two known circumstances: it could either be produced by a Daolord by using their power to slowly and carefully grind space out of existence, or during a relatively very brief period of time when a seemingly stable realm begins to destabilize, on the course for self-destruction!
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The circumstances required for the production of Cosmic Erosion Elixir were extremely stringent, even on a universal scale. In fact, even if many Minor realms or realms were destroyed, they might not produce this elixir.
The first most important requirement was that the realm needed to be extremely stable, and should otherwise appear completely inline with its normal lifecycle. The stability of the realm meant that the space it constituted would be extremely stable, and capable of healing normally and naturally should anything happen.
The second requirement was a significant and constant destabilizing factor. This factor should be strong enough to strain the laws of the realm constantly, but not strong enough to actually unravel the functionality of the realm or its laws.
The third requirement was that the realm should not be fully mature, and should still be in the growing phase of its lifecycle.
The fourth requirement was a sufficiently long enough duration of time to pass without any of the prior requirements changing.
The natural inclination of the realm to grow would increase the stress on the laws of the realm caused by the destabilizing factor, without unraveling them. The otherwise stability of the realm alongside the increased stress would, in random locations, cause space itself to begin to disintegrate.
The byproduct of this disintegration was the Cosmic Erosion Elixir, which was a physical manifestation of the various laws that used to occupy the space that had been destroyed. The reason why this liquid was so attractive to all living beings was because of those said laws, which could directly elevate them to a higher life form. Lex himself had undergone such evolutions through the natural sequence, which occurred every time he rose from one cultivation realm to another.
But if he followed this path, then his maximum ceiling for evolving higher was fixed to the number of cultivation realms he could cross. Items and treasures which could elevate the lifeform without going through the process of raising a cultivation realm were so rare that they were essentially never sold. There was no price for them in the market because it had never happened before.
Yet the reason no one could make use of this Cosmic Erosion Elixir was because it had to do with laws, and their bodies could not handle the strain on directly touching laws. The only reason Lex was not suffering a similar fate was because his body had literally used fragments of laws to upgrade itself.
If he used the elixir to reach a higher life form level than he was supposed to be at, he would begin to understand how important and valuable such a thing was. But it was not meant to be, for now at least. His cultivation technique had called first dibs, and informed him of how he could use this liquid to slowly augment the existing laws that made up his body as well as influence his affinity, so that slowly it would change in a direction which would allow him to enter the next realm.
Of course, the elixir alone was not enough to achieve such a thing, but it was a start.
๐๐๐๐๐๐๐ญ.๐๐๐
That gave Lex an amazing idea. Not only could he use this elixir, he could transport it to the Inn.
He would use however much of it was needed for his own upgrade and trade the rest to get other materials with similar effects so he could continue to upgrade himself. After all, although he knew he could fix his cultivation if he got an SSS+ rank on a quest, such a thing was easier said than done.
Every time he had completed a quest with such a high ranking, it had been completely based on luck, and was a result of the involvement of extremely high leveled cultivators.
A part of him wanted to keep the elixir forever, continuously feeding it items to allow it to grow, but such a thing was not possible. Apparently, the elixir would only exist for a very short time before the laws within it would naturally reorient themselves, causing the liquid to disappear.
If there was one fortunate thing, it was that he now knew how he could transport the liquid.
Since his body and spiritual energy would not be corroded by the elixir, he only needed to use them.
He used a curved Imperial shield, and scooped up all the elixir into it like a massive bowl. He would first take it back to the Midnight Inn before consuming it. He did not know what kind of reaction would occur once he did, and did not want to leave himself vulnerable to external influence.
"I'll be back," Lex told Toro, before eventually disappearing to the Inn.
He teleported to his personal meditation room before using his influence over the system to create an especially expensive and powerful basin for the liquid before pouring it in.
He did not know how long the liquid would continue to exist, he had to be quick.
The Lotus, which had finally woken up, was frightened silly when it sensed Lex drinking the elixir! That was not soup, but laws! Even it did not dare absorb such a thing for if he was not able to perfectly influence how those laws were absorbed, its body itself would instead be absorbed by the laws!
That was a fact that Lex's cultivation technique had already mentioned, but had already given a solution to. So, while Lex went ahead and augmented his cultivation, the incredibly powerful Lotus on his back was filled with reverence for the incredible Innkeeper. He was truly beyond common sense.
With that thought, the Lotus went back to sleep. Since Lex's body was a carrier for the Lotus, the stronger his body, the faster the Lotus would mature. With Lex doing something as daring as drinking the elixir, there was no doubt the Lotus' maturing speed would continue to increase.
It was fortunate that the Lotus had gone back to sleep, for the reverence it had built up might have been severely affected when it noticed that, instead of entering a state of cultivation upon drinking the elixir, Lex immediately teleported to the restroom!
The elixir had given him a bad case of diarrhea!
Regal Embrace had given Lex detailed instructions on what to do to absorb the elixir. He would first start using his cultivation technique, and only after he had used it for one complete cycle would he take a single sip from it, while continuing to run his technique.
As soon as he took the sip, his cultivation technique would stop absorbing spiritual energy from the air, and instead use the elixir to increase his cultivation. The actual process of what happened next was quite complicated, but all Lex needed to do was ensure he didn't stop cultivating.
As soon as he took the sip, and his cultivation technique began using the elixir to affect his body and infinity, Lex was hit with a sensation he hadn't experienced in quite a while. He needed to use the restroom, and he needed to use it now!
The urgency of the situation nearly interrupted his cultivation, so he immediately entered the Flow state to ensure he did not mess things up. This way, he teleported to the restroom while still running his cultivation technique.
What happened next wasโฆ disastrous. There was no mexican food on earth mexican enough, nor spice strong enough to devastate Lex's stomach the way it was now. If Lex was not in his Flow state he definitely would not have been able to continue cultivating.
The gurgles in his stomach were like rolls of thunder. If Lex were not at the Inn, and had been elsewhere, earthquakes would have rocked the area around him.
Although the method wasโฆ unconventional, Regal Embrace was using the laws in the elixir to perfectly stabilize his body, so that the laws he contained would be in perfect equilibrium instead of being a random hodgepodge. Moreover, although laws were incredibly powerful and definitely beyond Lex's level, thus increasing his strength drastically, not all laws were suitable for him.
Due to his breakthrough while the Inn was undergoing a star level increase, a random assortment of laws had been absorbed into his body. While he had survived the experience, it did not mean that those laws were actually helping him. In fact, many of the laws that made up his body were going against the natural foundation he had built up since he started cultivating.
It was the difference between randomly getting a power up through the use of treasures beyond one's level, and a conscientious effort using the most optimal resources to systematically increase your power. While both would give you a power up, one would leave you unable to grow further, while the other would not only give you a higher power ceiling you could achieve within the same realm, but also make your final destination much higher than before.
In a way, Lex was already on the path to transcending the original description of the Regal Embrace. That did not mean his defense would be even higher than it should have been. No, the cultivation technique had already aimed for the highest possible achievable defense right from the get go. Instead, besides the ridiculous defense, Lex would also gain other incredible attributes.
For example, besides Lex's abnormal affinity for defensive techniques, he may gain an affinity for other types of techniques as well. Since he could learn defensive techniques at a glance, and even upgrade them, imagine if he could do the same for movement techniques? Or offensive techniques? Techniques based on the applications of space?
Lex could only use such thoughts to distract himself as his cultivation technique slowly and effectively removed the unnecessary, or even obstructive laws that his body had. In their place, the laws within the elixir were being used.
Although he was once again undergoing a fundamental change in his body's make up, he was more embarrassed than in pain. No, he couldn't continue to dwell on the matter or even his state of flow would be broken.
He turned his thoughts to something else that had occurred to him when he found out about the elixir, but didn't have time to contemplate on. The elixir was formed when there was an instability affecting the realm.
It was not a big jump to assume that whatever anomaly he was supposed to be investigating was the very same instability that had put the Crystal realm on the path for destruction. He did not know how much the local powerhouses of the Crystal knew about the anomaly, but he was fairly certain they didn't know that the realm was on the path to destruction.
According to his original guess, they were using the anomaly and the Kraven to fulfill some grand plan, or perhaps they were farming some extremely rare resources. All in all, there was some secret plan they were exploiting the Kraven for. But if they knew that their continued exploitation had likely put their realm on the path to destruction, he doubted they would behave so audaciously.
๐๐ฒ๐๐ง๐ฎ๐๐ .๐ฌ๐ค๐ถ
This piece of information was more than sufficient for him to venture towards Valesco and meet that Crystal race elder. In the meantime, there was also the chance that he could learn more from the Noel and Phillips family.
Lex could feel that he was incredibly close to solving this mystery.
While Lex was busy thinking every possible random thought he could to distract himself, there was a certain area of the Inn he had purposefully blocked off all news from to himself. No matter what happened there, for now, Lex would not know.
There was a simple reason for that. The Midnight Inn was a closed system, meaning that everything that happened there, stayed within.
The remnants of the laws that were beingโฆ released from Lex's body were not mysteriously vanishing. No, they were being recycled, and then transported to the special area that Lex had blocked all news from: the greenhouse!
"Oh dear, such potent fertilizer," commented the turtle as bags of fresh fertilizer were being teleported to the greenhouse. These would be extremely useful in helping the vine growing beside the Fire Temple.