The Innkeeper

Once the small wedding was over, Lex returned to his room and went to his study. Although, according to Mary, not many big things happened at the Inn while he was asleep, there were many things for him to do.

First of all, the Midnight Games will come to a close tomorrow. Once they concluded, many of the benefits he had been retaining would come to a close. Lex needed to plan accordingly. His first priority was security, but Mary advised him to put that on hold till after the event. When he asked her why, she only stated that the system would prevent her from answering. Since her advice about the bodyguard had been so valuable, he decided to trust her once again on this.

The next item on Lex's list was the personal holographic assistant every guest received upon entering the Inn. Although those personal assistants could not do any actual work, they were great at answering questions and disseminating information. Unfortunately, while they were cheap to procure during an event, buying them permanently was extremely expensive. In the end, Lex decided to purchase holographic assistants with only very basic capabilities as a permanent addition to the Inn for 500,000 MP. These holograms would answer basic questions, but could not do all the additional tasks such as provide a place for a private conversation, like Lex had with Larry, or send messages to other guests.

The third concern Lex had was rooms. While he did not go and buy a few more skyscrapers, he started planning for them already. When the time came, he would be able to directly make the changes he'd planned and thus avoid doing things haphazardly.

To cater to his preliminary vision, the size of the Inn would also need to be expanded, but obviously that was expensive. He needed to divide his MP between expansion of the Inn and construction of properties, and would do so based on his requirements. So, he would build and expand in phases. This was especially important because while he was earning an average of 1 million MP a day, he expected to see that number fall once the games ended. This was because a majority of that income was from food and gambling.

Lex worked directly through the night as he compiled plans, not only for the Inn, but for himself. He made himself a priority list so that instead of doing things randomly, he could make a focused effort towards getting certain results.

The priority list was:

1. Security

2. Lex's own cultivation

3. More infrastructure to cater to guests

4. More managers so he could effectively divide tasks and not overburden his AI

5. Teachers, not for his guests but for his staff. Lex expected to be in a state of constant expansion for the foreseeable future, and the AI he hired only came with basic knowledge. He wanted teachers who could constantly raise the quality of his staff and services. The lack wasn't so evident now, but that was only because his services were limited.

6. Entertainment for his guests. Only after the basic and important requirements to host a guest were fulfilled could he start thinking of entertainment.

7. Expansion. Ideally, he would expand before a need for it arose, so that he was always one step ahead, but a lot of it would depend on his MP expenditure.

For now, this is all he had on the list. He might add more items to the list, or revise the order of things as he saw fit, but it would serve him well at the moment. It was important that he keep reminding himself of this because an unorganized way of doing things would be inefficient, and Lex did not want to slow down at all as he was now determined to raise his strength.

Another correction he decided to make was how he behaved while in the Innkeeper persona. Previously, he was obsessed with letting everyone think that he was incredibly powerful and mysterious. However, this was a knee-jerk reaction caused by his own insecurity at being so weak while being surrounded by those so strong. In his mind, when he envisioned an Innkeeper, the image he had in his head was someone very close to the ground level, and someone who had a good relationship with his guests and clients.

Though he could not suddenly change his persona, Lex planned to slowly become more approachable instead of enigmatic.

With all his planning for the Inn taken care of, there were still a few hours until the last match began. This gave Lex just enough time to do something he was very excited about: start cultivating!

From now on, his cultivation would no longer be in the hands of the system and would require him to make his own efforts. In a way, this was tougher. But Lex preferred not to be too dependent on the system for stuff like this.

He left his study and went to the place where he usually meditated and sat down, cross-legged. He closed his eyes and began meditating. This was not cultivation, but would help him hone his state of mind for when he did.

For this next part, he did not need any guidance from Mary, as the Regal Embrace had provided him with the relevant information on how to proceed.

The body tempering realm, for humans, was about tempering the body internally to make it capable of absorbing and storing spiritual energy. An increase in strength and stamina was only a side effect of such a process, and not the preliminary purpose. As a result of this, depending on how one cultivated, there were often mortal athletes who were stronger and more physically fit than Body tempering cultivators. This is why, on the first day Lex started his self-defense training, he felt like some of his peers lacked in the fitness department.

Lex, of course, was strengthened to the extreme due to the prowess of his cultivation technique.

It was important to note that this description was only fit for spiritual cultivation, as body cultivators obviously honed their bodies well. Furthermore, if one wanted to be a body cultivator, while the stages were the same, the effects were different. It was exactly for this reason why, if someone wanted to dual cultivate spirit and body, they had to start both together as the body would undergo various changes in each stage.

If, for example, someone reached the Golden Core in spiritual cultivation, then decided to start cultivating their body, not only would they be unable to do so, chances were high it would even negatively affect your spiritual cultivation.

There were, of course, exceptions to everything, and maybe there were ways in the universe that would allow a person to start body cultivating at a later stage. But, in general, that was the exception and not the rule. Encountering such a situation could only be based on luck.

Naturally, none of that mattered to someone like Lex who would, henceforth, cultivate his spirit, body and soul all at once.

The next stage of cultivation was called Qi training. It did not matter much, but Qi was just another name for spirit energy. To be more specific, a single strand of spiritual energy was called Qi. In the various worlds, spiritual energy took on various names, and thus the cultivation levels were often called differently as well. Fortunately for Lex, his universal translator would translate all the different terminology into the same few words.

The reason for the next stage being called Qi training was because, since the body had only just become capable of withstanding the presence of spiritual energy inside it, a cultivator would begin by only absorbing a single strand into their body at a time.

Even then, with having only absorbed a single strand, the cultivator had to be very careful. This was because the body maintained an internal pressure that prevented the spiritual energy flowing around it from entering inside. By absorbing a strand of spiritual energy, or Qi, the cultivator was actively pushing against this internal pressure. This was a delicate process, as cultivators would be required to constantly breakthrough the limits of their body by absorbing Qi, but at the same time if they were too rough, the increase in pressure could cause a meridian in the body to rupture, which would severely damage the body. In extreme cases, if too much Qi was absorbed, the body could even explode - the reason why Bluebird tested Lex's cultivation. Such a test did not eliminate the possibility of something like that happening, but at least a faulty cultivation technique would no longer be the cause for it.

Meridians were extremely important, as they were the vessels in the body that allowed Qi to flow through them, the way veins and arteries transported blood. Without meridians, or with damaged meridians, it was obvious that one would not be able to cultivate. In fact, the very reason Larry had been unable to cultivate was because he was born without meridians whatsoever - though people did not know that fact. They only knew he could not cultivate from birth.

What Lex needed to do to go from Body Tempering realm to the Qi training realm was simply to sense spiritual energy. That's right, he didn't even need to absorb it yet. As soon as he was able to sense the energy with his body, he would officially break through the realm and finally begin his cultivation journey.

The process for sensing spiritual energy was described clearly by Regal Embrace, and once he had calmed his mind and entered the most suitable state of mind, he began. Four minutes later, Lex, for the first time in his life, sensed spiritual energy and broke through to the Qi training realm.