The Innkeeper

While spirit sense was mostly illusory, it could also be used to interact with physical objects. It was not a replacement for physical strength, usually, but still the ability to pick up or somehow manipulate items far away was very useful.

The process of interacting with physical items was broken down into a few simple steps so that beginners could focus on each individual step while they learned. First was, naturally, wrapping the intended item with his spirit sense. Then Lex would channel some spirit energy into his spirit sense, giving it the strength to harden temporarily at certain points, allowing it to touch physical items. Then, based on his control of his spirit sense, he could use the hardened portion of his sense to grab onto and manipulate the item as needed.

There were countless techniques that allowed cultivators to use spirit sense to gain greater strength than their physical bodies, attack the mind, control weapons, and more. From the Golden core onwards, cultivation became infinitely more complicated because there was so much more that a cultivator could do.

But all of that began with training the spiritual sense itself. Much like hand eye coordination needed to be trained, and to some extent was being trained from birth, so too did the spiritual sense need to be trained.

The first step of training spiritual sense in many videos began the same way, which was to first get an easily available spiritual treasure which was specifically designed to aid in learning how to control spiritual sense. It was just that… the tutorial with the most views and the one that Lex was watching started with not one treasure but two. More specifically, it started with procuring a pair of chopsticks which were also spiritual treasures.

Varying from normal treasures, which to cultivators usually either meant natural resources which could aid in some facet of cultivation, or manmade items which could facilitate the use of spiritual energy, often even enhancing it, spiritual treasures were designed specifically to be used with spiritual sense.

Lex watched the entire tutorial and thoroughly understood the requirements of each step in the training before exiting the portal. One issue with using the Henali portal at the Inn, rather than on a planet that had been connected through the proper procedure, was the lack of a delivery service. No matter how affordable the treasure was, it could not be delivered to the Inn. One reason was that the delivery service probably wouldn't have golden keys to enter the Inn, but even in a situation where the Midnight Inn became so popular that everyone had golden keys, using the portal at the Inn disabled location and tracking. It was literally impossible to enter his location as the Midnight Inn while using the portal.

But all was not lost. One of the features of the ongoing festival were stalls that had been setup, allowing guests to sell items and trinkets from their locale. He would first check that market to see if a spiritual treasure matching his requirements was available. If it wasn't then he would place a request at the Guild room.

At the same time…

Lex pulled out his personal hologram which he, as a 'guest' would have had and said, "can you please forward a message from me to the guest Larry, he's an old friend of mine. Tell him I'll be at the local markets."

The hologram nodded and disappeared. The personal holograms could fulfill many of the guests' simple requests such as this, and weren't just limited to answering questions. It was not a commonly known feature, but with time it was slowly catching on.

More importantly, and more relevant than the additional features of the hologram, by inviting Larry to come to him instead of approaching him while he was at his new group, Lex would avoid any suspicion that he was approaching them for a hidden reason. Not that anyone would have any reason to suspect him to begin with, since there was nothing wrong with two friends meeting, Lex was becoming used to thinking about every situation in layers. By doing this, he eliminated even the possibility that someone would suspect him of his real agenda, which was to scope out the system wielder. After all, Lex only invited Larry. They would not have had any idea that he already knew that they would likely follow him.

Lex hailed a golf cart and made his way to the village where the local market had been set up and began to peruse. He could, of course, find out if what he wanted was available if he scanned the system, but he was also using this opportunity to study his eyesight and try to ascertain the limits of what it could show him.

A short while later, his hologram appeared once again, informing him that Larry was on his way to meet him. Lex smirked. Everything was going according to plan.

Well, at least it was, until Larry and his group closed in, and Lex's intuition immediately started acting, warning him that there was immense danger!

Lex was genuinely alarmed, for he couldn't understand who or what could threaten him while he was at the Inn. But it was not a mortal danger that he faced. Lex was still not experienced enough with his intuition to understand what it was trying to tell him.

Unfortunately he was not able to identify the kind of danger, but he at least narrowed it down to who it was coming from. It was one unassuming member of Larry's group. Lex scanned him to discover his name was Noman Butt, but the system gave him no other important information.

His left eye, however, picked up on something. There were strange, invisible waves coming out of and entering his body, mixing in with the environment around him.

"Lex, you sly fellow, where do you disappear to?" Larry yelled loudly over the noise of the crowd as he closed in, his usual stupid smile painting his face. He was still as excitable and jolly as ever.

Lex was about to give a casual reply, stating that he wasn't busy with anything important, before passing a remark about Larry's own busy schedule. He was about to, but before the words left his mouth, his intuition acted up.

This time, he understood the feeling well. No matter what, he must not lie!

"I've been traveling a lot," Lex said with a smile as he greeted his old friend. Yet behind his bright smile and eager eyes, his mind was already compiling a list of everything he could and couldn't say, if he was unable to lie. After all, he was a man with many secrets.