Chapter 749 Silent Wanderer
"Mr. Lex, you have made me wait," Powell complained, though the massive smile on his face did not belie any dissatisfaction.
"I've been too busy lately," Lex said with an exasperated sigh as he approached the familiar counter and leaned on it. Even as he was there now, his projection was at the Inn, having meetings with countless devils who wished to meet him.
Many of the meetings were actually fruitful, as they were about small or targeted events the devils wished to host. Some of them were just about the devils wishing to make themselves known to the Innkeeper and try and expand their connections.
One of them was a wedding proposal by a very beautiful devil, yet Lex had to calmly reject her, stating that he did not wish to distract himself from his work. There were many more useless or actually even infuriating meetings where they tried to scam him or make use of the Inn for malicious purposes, but they were still in the minority.
"Your package arrived long ago. Here you are, a single freshly mined Durril ore straight from Frigra. I can guarantee that it has spent no more than a few days away from that planet, and those days are entirely attributed to your own tardiness."
"Yes, yes, no need for the sales pitch, this suits my needs just fine," said Lex as he took the briefcase Powell handed him and opened it to look at the bright pink ore, only partially revealing itself from the piece of stone it was within.
This ore was extremely valuable across the entire realm, mostly because there were very few mines for them at all. But that's not the reason why Lex had ordered this particular ore. No, he just needed something from the planet Frigra that still contained an aura of the planet. With that, Lex could use the item as a guide to purchase a ticket from the system that targeted that planet specifically.
Like this, he would be able to teleport there with the intention of linking it to the Inn. But Lex did not truly care much for linking the planet as much as he cared about treasure hunting. After all, that planet was a part of the 89 rogue planets that formed the only known 'belt' of rogue planets within the Suera galaxy.
It was only once he had already reached there that he would consider how exactly he was going to determine if his location was correct. If it wasn't… he really had no idea how he was going to look for the relevant place. He was already late as it was.
"Powell, what about my second request?" Lex asked, once he closed the briefcase. As a rich and powerful Innkeeper, it was about time he got himself a respectable interstellar spaceship!
"Haha, of course it is ready. After all, you gave us so much time to prepare. If we weren't able to provide you with a satisfying result, the emporium would lose face!"
With that said, Powell ducked behind the counter, and brought up another briefcase. Within it was a single spatial item fashioned into a necklace. Unlike other spatial equipment, this was a very special one since it was prepared specifically for just one item: the Silent Wanderer!
The Silent Wanderer was a ship produced by Havalier Industries, the same company that made the Silent Night which had triggered Lex's deep desire for a personal spaceship!
The Silent Night was a collectors class ship, and never produced again, but the Silent Wanderer was not bad either. Although it did not boast the same capabilities as its Night variant, it nevertheless qualified as one of the foremost coveted ships in the entire Origin realm!
Lex had to place an order long in advance with the emporium who went through an unknown number of hurdles to have it produced.
"Follow me," Powell said as he led Lex to a hanger, where he activated the spatial necklace and brought out the ship.
The Silent Wanderer was metallic silver in color, yet when flying through space it appeared invisible as it would perfectly blend in with darkness and light alike. It had an incredibly sleek body, and could only support a crew of thirty humans at most!
Yet where it suffered in lack of space, it more than made up for in its speed, armor, fire power and state of the art navigation systems. Although it lacked the complete self navigation system, which would require the addition of an A.I., it was the best one could get besides that.
Inside the ship were four small yet cozy bedrooms, each with its own tiny bath, a kitchen, a large storage room, a main hall and a cockpit. It was fueled by an extremely powerful battery that generated energy by consuming a highly radioactive ore. The battery was so dangerous that there were over 100 fail safes built into it, not to mention an emergency ejection system for the battery in case those fail. The ship could also be piloted using alternative fuels such as spirit stones, but that would limit the ship to less than 1% of its original capabilities.
"If only you accepted MP for payment," Lex softly mumbled as he rubbed his hands against the Silent Wanderers body. This ship was an absolute beauty, but it also came with a hefty price tag.
To pay for it, Lex had to liquidate nearly 39 billion MP via the guild by purchasing the highest quality of spirit stones that the empire would sell to him. Naturally, due to the rush he was in, he suffered a great loss in the conversion rate from MP to actual physical goods, but it was what it was.
One could not fret too much about the details when one was purchasing a spaceship that could travel the distance between Earth and Mars in a few hours.
"This is excellent Powell. Pack it up, and don't forget to throw in the manual. I can't wait to drive this thing!"
Chapter 750 Frigra
Powell looked a little reluctant to part with such a magnificent spaceship. The Silent Wanderer was a corvette class ship, meaning it was light and fast, but had enough of an armor and attack capability to survive if it got in a scuffle.
If they ran into pirates or faced aggression from a random group, unless they had armored ships, the Wanderer would come out on top due to how high class it was. Of course, a lot also depended on the pilot. Even the best ship would not bring any decent results if piloted by an amateur.
Powell, as a ship enthusiast, was also a pilot and longed to get his hands on something like the Silent Wanderer, but it was not meant to be. Perhaps in the future such a day would come, but it had not come yet.
Suppressing his sigh, he put the ship back in its spatial equipment. This necklace was especially made on order at Lex's request. After all, he was going to be teleporting to places often, so if he could not carry the ship with him when he did so, it would be pointless. But the ship required a space large and stable enough so that it wouldn't get damaged, as some of its more sensitive equipment could not handle the duress of typical spatial equipment. The battery was especially a point of concern in this regard.
Therefore, the specially designed spatial equipment was an absolute must. If he lost it one day, he would not be able to put the ship in any other random spatial equipment even if it had the capacity for the ship.
Once withdrawn, Lex put the necklace on. He was not one for jewelry, so it was fortunate that the necklace only consisted of a thin silver chain with a flat, rod centerpiece at one end with an engraving of the Silent Wanderer on it. The whole thing was simple enough that Lex could wear it without feeling embarrassed.
He bid Powell farewell and quickly returned to the Inn. He first looked at the manual for the Silent Wanderer - it was equivalent to a 36,000 page PDF. Lex blinked to make sure he saw correctly, and when he received the confirmation, he made a copy and forwarded it to Cirk - the captain of the giant spaceship inside the Inn.
Lex would learn to pilot his own ship, of course, but it wasn't like he could pick it up in a day. It was moments like this that having the endless resources of the Inn on hand came in handy. Although it would still take Cirk some time to learn, he expected it would be alot faster than Lex.
He then took out the Durril ore, and after a very long time, bought a ticket. Only this time he wasn't buying one of the random planet search tickets, but rather a focused ticket using the ore to lock onto the planet's aura.
Fortunately, despite Lex's delay in collecting the ore, due to the fact that it was sealed in a perfect container, it retained the aura of the planet. When the silver colored ticket appeared in Lex's hand, he mentally reviewed everything he knew about the planet.
The planet was the only one in the belt that had life on it, though the local dominant species were not humans. In fact, there were no humans on the entire planet. Actual on ground information on the planet was limited because it was the territory of a dragon, but the one thing that was certain was that it exported Durril ore in limited quantities.
The planet had no tourism, and only very limited trade ties. Once Lex approached there, he would stand out significantly, so he would have to be discreet and stealthy. He also needed a way to confirm that he was in the correct location, but that would come later.
He tore the ticket and a very familiar interface appeared in front of him.
Planets Available:
Planet: Frigra
Planet Rating: 3 Star
Planet Distance: 384 Sectors 𝑙𝘪𝒷𝘳𝑒𝘢𝑑.𝒸𝑜𝑚
Planet Environment: Frigid cold, perpetual darkness, multiple underground steam vents
'How delightful,' Lex thought to himself before confirming the only planet in the selection, and disappearing.
A moment later, he found himself standing in what looked like a vacant street. For once, it seemed like he had teleported not in the wilderness, but near or in an inhabited area.
There was complete darkness all around him, with the distant stars in the sky as the only source of light. He had to rely on his spirit sense mostly to get an idea of where he was, though admittedly his eyes were well adapted to the darkness as well - not to mention the Fancy Contact lenses.
He was studying his surroundings, and trying to understand where exactly he had teleported to, when he picked up on something. To be specific, it was not his eyes, contact lenses or even spirit sense that detected the change, but his soul sense!
There was originally no one around him, but then he detected a soul pass by. It seemed like the 'soul' detected him at the same time as he felt the presence of the soul, and changed its direction to approach him.
Lex did not reveal that he had already detected the incoming being, and observed to see how the situation progressed. It was approaching him from behind, and even as it came within a few dozen feet of him, Lex could not actually see or hear the approaching entity. 'Was this what others experienced when Fenrir used its stealth?' Lex wondered as the being came even closer, practically only a couple of feet away from him.
Were it not for his soul sense, he would have had no way of knowing there was someone standing right behind him. But then, the being attacked viciously, and when it finally made contact, the being was revealed to Lex's senses.
It seemed Lex needed to be touching it to perceive it.
Chapter 751 Nonchalant
The creature was humanoid, though it did not resemble a human at all. In the darkness it was not possible to distinguish its color, but its back seemed to be covered in a thick and jagged carpiece while its front consisted of a very thick hide, making the creature extremely durable.
It did not seem to have eyes, though it most certainly had a mouth filled with extremely sharp teeth. Lex could see a few other features on its face, some of which could possibly serve the same purpose as a nose and ears, though what the rest were for was a mystery.
The creature seemed intelligent, as it was wearing some kind of clothes that augmented its stealth abilities, and Lex could faintly detect surprise from the creature using his sixth sense. In its right hand was a blade that seemed like it was made from a very sharp tooth, yet its usual lethality seemed to have failed the creature today.
He had tried to slice Lex's neck off in one swift motion, but his attempts were not even enough to give him a shave. The creature, instead of getting the satisfying feedback of a successful kill, was greeted with the shock of hitting an incredibly solid object.
The pushback from the force in his hand nearly caused a few tendons in his fingers to rip, though they had ultimately managed to hold on.
Lex only raised an eyebrow as he looked at the creature, while abject horror gripped the creature's three hearts. It tried to retreat as quickly as possible, but Lex was too fast for it.
He reached out and grabbed the creature's hand, restricting its retreat. He squeezed slightly, making sure not to break the hand. Despite his care, the grip was tight enough that the creature lost its grip on the knife and dropped it - although, it simultaneously won Lex's admiration for it had been able to suppress its scream. The creature was well trained.
"I don't think we have any animosity," said Lex calmly. "Why did you suddenly attack me?"
While waiting for an answer, Lex simultaneously read the information he was getting from his Fancy contact lenses.
The creature was known as a Frigal, and was a local variant of a species closely related to dragons. They formed societies and communities around dragons, and worshiped them. Each and every dragon usually had its own country of such followers, who also happened to be descendants of the very dragon they served.
As a virile species, dragons often mated with any suitable creature in their habitat, often giving birth to half-breeds and different variants of Frigal, who then ultimately spent their entire existence worshiping their dragon ancestor due to the heavy influence of their bloodline.
But it was not as if the dragons ever actually managed their subordinates, so such creatures often formed their own societies with independent cultures and ideas, not to mention intrigue and politics.
This particular Frigal, upon realizing it could not escape Lex's grip, very resolutely chopped off its own hand and retreated. But the creature had managed to take only a single step back before Lex grabbed its other hand.
"Will you chop this one off too? But you'd need a hand to do that. Will you bite it off?" he asked with seemingly genuine curiosity. But the more nonchalant he appeared, the more the Frigal felt afraid.
Gathering up its courage, the creature leaped forward and kneed Lex in the face. He moved extremely quickly and summoned all its strength, making it so that Lex was not able to react. When his knee made contact it felt elated, but then the feeling faded when it saw that Lex remained completely unaffected!
"I see you are not really in a cooperative mood," he remarked as he pondered what to do. Should he try some form of torture? How was he supposed to extract the information?
After a couple of moments of thinking, during which the Frigal had been relentlessly assaulting Lex, he decided to take a different approach. He only gently twisted his hand, and the creature's arm was dislocated. He took a single step forward, managing to perfectly dodge one of the creatures' attacks, and gently chopped at the Frigals' neck.
Well, it was gentle by Lex's standards, but to the creature it was completely fatal. With its neck broken, the creature collapsed on the ground, bleeding out from its severed hand.
Lex could not help but sniff the air. The smell of this creature's blood was unusually pungent, like rotten eggs, and would probably last for a long time. Lex made a mental note not to get any blood on himself, lest he be easy to track down if someone was searching for him.
Lex searched the creature, and besides the dagger it had used to attack him, found several darts and needles, all coated with poison.
Wherever this fellow was going, his motives were not pure.
He once again looked around, and upon ensuring that no one had seen what happened, quickly moved away. He changed into his stealth suit, so that it was easier to hide, though he did not know how effective the suit would be here. After all, he did not know what senses these creatures used. If it was the normal hearing, touch or spirit sense, Lex had his bases covered. But if it was some other unusual sense, well then Lex would find out how good his suit really was.
It only took a short while before Lex encountered other Frigals, but that made sense since he was in what appeared to be a town. Oddly enough, the mood across the whole town seemed to be extremely depressing, and filled with anxiety.
Lex situated himself behind a peculiar bush that seemed unaffected by the cold and the dark, and carefully extended his spirit sense to see if he could spy on the conversations the crowd was having. He was once again trying his hand at being a spy.
Only a few moments later, Lex raised an eyebrow. He just heard something interesting.