By the time Lex exited his retreat, only seven months remained to complete his quest. Considering that he had narrowed down a list of items that could possibly help the system and all he needed to do was go find them, that was both a very long and very short time. It was long because teleportation would cut his travel time down by a lot. At the same time, it was short because there was no guarantee that they would help the system.
In the back of his mind, he had come up with a contingency plan, which is something he would only use in the worst case scenario. It required the help of the Rhinocentaurs who had access to the groupchat. But, he didn't want to wait until the last possible minute to look for them.
