The Innkeeper
chapter-1165

"I need to go to this planet," Lex said to Powell, showing him a zoomed in projection of the galaxy, displaying the planet as well as its nearby star systems.

Powell, who was smiling, looked at the projection with a frozen expression, and then at Lex. Then back at the projection. Then at Lex.

"You know we're a store, right? Not a teleportation facility," Powell said as he rubbed the bridge of his nose. Lex shrugged.

"Do you at least know the name of the planet?"

Lex shrugged again. Powell sighed, and then walked to the back room. Lex was certain he'd be able to do it, and he wasn't wrong. Soon enough he found himself once again teleporting through a number of teleportation facilities, since there was no direct teleportation available.

Powell also included a VIP security check free access for Lex, so that he could avoid problems with the TSA. He was hoping that this time Lex would not cause an intergalactic incident, though he didn't say that out loud. Lex was too good of a customer to annoy over something as trivial as disrupting the flow of goods and people across an entire galaxy. There may or may not have been hints of sarcasm mixed in when Powell had that thought.

Either way, soon Lex found himself teleported to a planet suffering from an artificial ice age.

The dominant race of the planet were called the Yeti, and preferred lower temperatures, and so had a deal with an environment conditioning agency that ensured long periods of ice ages on the planet.

Though, for the health of the planet, every so often the ice ages would need to end, but that was not coming up any time soon.

The Yeti were tourist friendly and ran various ice and snow based resorts for visitors from around the neighboring star systems. At least, that's what the pamphlet he was reading said.

After taking note of all the local customs and major attraction points, as well as safety notices which warned which areas of the planet were off limits for tourists, Lex turned to look north.

That was the direction he sensed his blood connection, and that was one of the off limit zones. Sneaking around on this planet was not as easy as it had been on Pangaea since, to be fair, on Pangaea they had not had time to set up all their defenses yet. This place was different.

Not only were there countless Earth Immortals patrolling the place, there were formations and various other defenses in place as well. It was such tight security, in fact, that it actually prompted to change into his stealth suit.

Getting Lex to don a different suit specifically for the purpose of stealth was a very big. But on a serious note, Lex would not be able to teleport around the planet as his spatial ripples would easily be detected, so he had to do this the old fashioned way - walking.

As Lex blended in with the environment, pulling in all his auras and disappearing from detection even through spirit sense, before walking at the speed of hundreds of miles a step, he began to imagine his reunion with Liz.

Compared to Belle, who he had planned out his reunion with in great detail, he had not much considered how he would meet Liz. Her somewhat introverted personality made it so that it was tough to plan things for her. Maybe he should crack a joke about arranged marriages.

No, no that was too insensitive - which meant he should definitely do it.

Due to his slow pace, it took him several hours to reach deep into the restricted portion of the planet. The deeper he went, the more somber his mood became. Although there was no proof that the person he was looking to find was one of siblings, the deep connection he felt meant that the connection had to be someone close to him.

His parents were nowhere to be found so he thought it was unlikely it would be them. So what were either Belle or Liz doing this deep into this planet? The level of security, by now, was something Lex could no longer joke about.

Even with his stealth suit, and his many means, not to mention his instincts guiding him, he was nearly caught multiple times.

Eventually he reached a mountain, covered in snow with the black stone underneath visible in certain areas where the snow had slipped. His connection was coming from within the mountain. Either there was a very convincing illusion formation, or there was a base inside the mountain.

He entered his soul state and slowly approached the mountain and carefully went through it. The fact that he was repelled meant that it wasn't a formation.

Carefully, so as to not let his building anxiety rush him, Lex entered the mountain, passing through layers and layers of rock until he eventually reached some kind of hidden facility. Lex had kept his spirit sense contained so that it was not detected, which is why he was not prepared for what he saw when he entered.

"Master," Pel, who had been Lex's silent companion for quite some time finally spoke. "The sword in your eye is returning."

But Lex did not care, because it was not the sword hiding in his soul that was causing his anger to bubble.

It was the sight of dozens of glass containers in front of him, each carrying an unconscious, naked clone of Moon, floating in some kind of liquid, that was causing the bubbling anger.

"Master, do not act rashly," said the former dragon trapped in the ring. "These clones can be beneficial for your sister. She can absorb them to regain strength."

But Lex could not hear Pel's words. His gaze was locked onto a particular yeti who was standing in front of one of the glass containers, taking voice notes about the growth of the clones, talking about them like he was talking about cattle.