The Innkeeper
chapter-97

Lex was dumbfounded by the crying whale. He looked towards Mary for some advice, but the hologram looked confused and defeated as well. Lex tried multiple times to console or question the baby whale, but it would only cry without saying anything. He checked its status to see if he could discover some details that would help him.

Name: -

Age: <1 year

Sex: Male

Cultivation Details: Mortal

Species: Whale

Midnight Inn Prestige Level: 1

Bloodline: Ordinary

Remarks: The whale suffers from a broken heart

Lex learned that the whale was less than a year old and had no cultivation at all, but that did not help him much. For once, the remarks were not snarky and only said that the whale had a broken heart, but Lex did not know what to do about that.

But Lex did not need to do anything as very soon the Galactic Sovereign turtle appeared on the scene, softly saying "oh dear" repeatedly.

It grew out a vine from the ground that softly wrapped itself around the whale and brought it down. The turtle made a hand out of grass and used it to softly caress the crying whale as he whispered things to it. The whale seemed immediately fond of the turtle, and continued to whimper as it listened to the turtle. Eventually, the turtle led the whale towards the forest, pulling its giant body with the vine.

Lex watched the two leave in silence, relieved that the situation was handled yet strangely concerned about the whale as well. He decided to check up on the whale in a little while to see what had happened.

For now, he turned his attention to the Inn. The Midnight Games were about to begin and while he had his preparations done, he was concerned about his two non-A.I. employees. Harry did not seem at all disturbed by the lack of guests lately and could always be found practicing his sorcery in his barber shop. Lex had handed him a new cultivators guide that he downloaded directly from the Bluebird online platform. The young barber had already registered himself as a 'cultivator' back on Earth and had attained a legal status. In fact, he had also joined a rather loose organization of beauticians who happened to be cultivators. They were all low level, with the highest in the organization being peak Qi training realm, but the focus of all the cultivators in that group was fashion and style. Or at least that's what Lex understood they did, he did not look too deeply into it.

Lex had also used his identity as Leo to get some information out of the young barber about sorcery. Unlike cultivators who grew stronger using spirit energy, sorcers channeled their abilities using the strength of their soul, as well as external artifacts. Cultivators grew stronger inherently, which then raised the level of their souls. Sorcerers directly strengthened their souls, which then reflected in the growth of their strength. Harry did not explain in too much detail, but Lex understood that a simplified explanation for one of the main ways to grow stronger in sorcery was to constantly practice and use your abilities.

A result of his constant practice was that he would not completely exhaust himself after giving a single haircut using his abilities, like before, although his stamina had not increased by much.

Something interesting that Lex also learned was that Harry also received mini-quests of his own from the system that he fulfilled back on Earth which helped him raise his strength. It seemed like the system was grooming his employees well.

Lex turned his attention to John, and found him once again in the Gamer's Den. This time he was not playing games, but watching anime with Z. Lex did not know how to feel about John. He would never practice or meditate or do anything productive. He would always only be found in the Gamer's Den. Using his Leo identity, Lex had asked him some details as well. It seemed like the only thing John was interested in was going into the Mystery Trial, yet since he had had no customers, John had no MP to go to the trial.

This intrigued Lex. Apparently John had gone into the Mystery Trial, but did not gain anything. He did not learn any new skills or discover any flaws in his existing ones. He was only beaten up, and that too quite terribly. That was unusual as the Trial was supposed to be very helpful, but if it was John was not willing to mention it. Lex decided that once he was done with the Midnight Games he would try the trials as well. For now he didn't want to distract himself.

Speaking of distraction, a couple days ago Lex had wasted the whole day because he was slightly careless. His latest quest reward was an item called Elegant Top hat. As is usual, Lex had forgotten about it when he completed the quest and only looked at it much later. It had a very useful ability. While wearing it, it could enhance the capability of his brain by upto a hundred times, depending on how one used it.

Lex put it on to try it out. He only elevated his ability by five, and at first he felt no difference. He thought he would be smarter or more enlightened or something. It turned out the wording was not clear about what the ability of the hat was. It sped up his thoughts, so that anything that was happening in front of him seemed to be happening in slow motion. The event wasn't actually slowed down, just his perception of it had increased so much that it appeared to be happening incredibly slowly.

Lex played around with the hat a lot, but a side effect of using it was that it would drain you mentally. Lex quickly discovered that after using it for only a short amount of time, he was so mentally drained that he slept for 18 hours afterwards. Suffice to say he got no actual work done that day.

Lex continued to check up on all aspects of the Inn. Marlo was still in the meditation room, with no indication of when he would come out. His A.I. staff had mostly entered the Body Tempering realm, which Lex was happy about. Everything was as it should be.

Finally, Lex went to the turtle to inquire about the whale. What he did not expect at all was that when he arrived at the forest, the whale's status had changed from a Pro Bono guest to the turtle's pet!

HOW HAD THE TURTLE TAKEN ONE OF HIS GUESTS AS A PET?! Not only had the system recognized the whale as a pet, its name had been changed to Little Blue! Lex cursed a hundred times in his head! Why didn't the system care when he was naming the turtle Little Black? Whose system was this anyway?

"What's going on?" he finally managed to ask, looking grim. All jokes aside, he couldn't allow his guests to be scammed. He needed to learn the details, or otherwise wouldn't his reputation be ruined in the universe.

"Little Blue's family was hunted down and killed by fishermen," answered the gardener, who looked at the whale with pity. The turtle and the whale were practically stuck together right now, and although the whale did not look sad at the moment the turtle was not taking any risks.

Lex silently listened to the gardener explain what it had learnt. The whale was not from any other planet, it was from Earth! It was completely ordinary and had no cultivation whatsoever, and neither did any of the whales it grew up with. His family had been hunted by fishermen and Little Blue had either escaped or was let go for being too young - that point was a little unclear.

Lex grimaced as he heard the story, then let out a sorrowful sigh. The whale's story was tragic, but he understood the perpetrators probably weren't evil. Although whaling had been reduced in recent years, it was not completely banned and some countries still partook in it.

Suddenly Lex had a bitter taste in his mouth. He was reminded of Nibiru, where humans were the ones who were at the bottom of the food chain. In either case, could the perpetrators be called evil? It was just how the natural food chain set them up.

For the first time in his life, he understood the saying he commonly read in novels. Weakness is the original sin. No one was inherently evil, usually, but it often happened that one person's interests harmed another.

Lex's mood started fluctuating so he quickly retreated back to his residence and started meditating. He was probably going to see a lot more situations like this across the universe. He needed to get used to it, or figure out how he was going to deal with it.