The Innkeeper

Chapter 2340: Treasures of the Gilded Hollow

Lex had to admit, besides just protection from the retribution, and curiosity about the only city in Gilded Hollow, he had another reason for wanting to find the stronghold. If he could find higher quality resources, that would be ideal. Specifically, he was searching for something unique or significantly powerful.

Lex didn’t believe that a place as rich and vast as the Hollow lacked resources that were uniquely valuable even in the context of everything else they were offering. Information and leads on things like that would be easier to find in a city, not to mention that the city had gateways that accessed different areas of the Gilded Hollow.

Despite anticipating that Mithon’s karma with the Fortune Lord was strong, he did not actually plan on probing, or even properly examining that. It went without saying that the Fortune Lord was most likely a Dao Lord, and Lex was not dumb enough to invite death upon himself by touching the karma of a Dao Lord.

Examining Mithon’s karma should give him some options, though, and he could search for the stronghold based on that. Yet when he used the Karmic Bead to examine Mithon, he was only one thread of karma - his own!

Mithos had not a single other thread connected to him, as if he’d never done anything else in his entire life, nor had he met anyone else. Lex was stunned, and tried to guess what this meant. Was everything he heard from Mithon a lie? Or had he imagined everything?

That didn’t seem possible.

He thought back to when Mithon said that to survive, he needed to have no existence at all. Had staying still in one place without doing anything erased all his karmic ties? That seemed quite unbelievable. So then was it something about the Gilded Hollow that erased her karma?

Lex narrowed his eyes as he caught onto something. To Mithon, the changing of laws was a natural and regular occurrence. Lex couldn’t quite understand why such a thing happened just yet, but it was possible that every time the laws changed, they erased the karma on her as well?

But Lex had doubts. Based on everything he knew, it shouldn’t be possible to live within an entirely different set of laws, even if they were immortals. After all, their very bodies, souls, and even immortality itself came from the laws of the universe they were in.

Maybe it had something to do with the Fortune Lord. He might know of a way to survive such a thing.

"It’s no use. Your karma has been completely erased, I can’t track your waygate or the stronghold through you," Lex said as he put away the Karmic bead.

Mithon looked at the human full of awe. She had no idea what karma was or why it could be used to track things, but it sounded powerful.

"Well, if that doesn’t work we can search for Truth Crystals, or Memory Sphere," Mithon said excitedly. "Either of them should be able to help our search."

Lex raised an eyebrow.

"What’s a Truth Crystal? Or a Memory Sphere?" he asked.

Mithon, as if anticipating such a question, answered eagerly.

"They’re both items that are born from the laws of the Hollow. Memory Spheres are somewhat easier to find, and are less rare. They grow on regular fruit trees, but when the laws of the Hollow dominate, the trees grow those crystals instead of fruit. Of course, not all fruit trees grow them all the time. Even of the ones that grow, more than half are destroyed once the laws switch. So they’re still kind of rare.

"A Truth Crystal is much rarer, but if we can find it, we’re basically guaranteed to find the stronghold. A Truth Crystal can answer any question truthfully, depending on the durability of the crystal. If it is extremely durable, then it can even answer some long forgotten secrets, which is why it is always in demand. However, getting an answer to a simple question like the location of the nearest waygate should be simple enough for even the weakest Truth Crystals to answer."

Lex raised not just one eyebrow, but both. This Truth Crystal sounded like it was extremely useful.

"The Truth Crystals grow in the dark, and shatter if they’re exposed to any kind of light at all, so they’re most commonly found in deep caves and caverns, or underground. Unlike the Memory Sphere’s, there is no fixed condition required for their creation, so you just have to search for them at random."

Lex looked at Mithon for a moment, and then could not help but ask a question that popped up in his head.

"If that’s the case, can’t you use a Truth Crystal to search for the location of other, more durable Truth Crystals if you want to learn the details of a particularly difficult question?"

Mithon nodded readily, almost like an excited puppy.

"Yes, exactly! That’s what many people do, which is why Truth Crystals are so scarce across the Gilded Hollow. There aren’t many reserves of them left, at least in the more commonly explored parts of the Hollow, which is why everyone waits for a new cycle of transition of laws to go search for newly made ones. Unfortunately, newly formed Truth Crystals which have only experienced a single cycle of transition of laws aren’t usually very durable."

Lex nodded.

"Alright, let’s move. We can talk while we travel," said Lex as he lifted Mithon and began traveling across the land, once more devouring any and all resources that came his way.

Watching such an unrepentant display of avarice frightened Mithon still. Her philosophy her whole life had been to be practically invisible, and to leave no traces behind. Her strength today was as a result of accumulation over time, and not through any shortcuts or resources, even when they were extremely abundant.

This was the mindset common amongst all who lived in the Hollow. The resources, while valuable, meant nothing if they would get them killed.

But now it was too late for her. Even if she told the senior human to stop - which she didn’t dare to do - it would not change the fact that she had been present when something like this had happened. She could not avoid detection - at least unless she spent countless years inside the stronghold, waiting for the traces to wear off.

"Tell me more about the Hollow. How do you survive when the laws change? Does anything special happen? Are there any more unique or valuable treasures in the Hollow that you know about?" Lex asked one question after another.

Mithon, despite being a Heaven Immortal, was somewhat simple minded - at least in Lex’s opinion. Maybe it had something to do with her life experiences where she had few interactions with others, and spent most of her time in hibernation. Thus, he had to be very specific in the questions he wanted to ask her.

"Surviving the change of laws is pretty easy - anyone can do it. There’s a technique called Good Fortunes Shine through Darkness taught in the stronghold, though we just call it the Good Fortune technique. When you sense that the laws are about to change, you simply have to use the technique and you’ll survive the transition.

"Although, on second thought, I’m not so sure if it’ll work for you. The technique might need the blessing of the Fortune Lord. I can teach it to you anyway in case you’re curious. Whether it works or not is something you’ll have to check on your own.

"As for whether anything special happens... I’m not sure what you would qualify as special, but a lot of things definitely happen. Everything works in a different way, and it can be confusing at first, but you get used to it pretty quick.

"To answer your question about treasures, I can easily say that there are definitely quite a lot. But if you ask me what they are, I cannot tell you. There is no systematic education system inside the stronghold beyond what the Fortune Lord wishes to teach, and most people keep anything they learn to themselves.

"The things I can tell you are either all generic treasures that everyone knows about, or a couple of really famous stories shared through the ages. For example, one of the most famous stories is of a Redwinged Bull from over a billion transition cycles ago. It is said that he discovered a treasure so powerful that he swore that upon attaining it, he’d become a lord himself!

"He gathered a team to be able to reach the treasure, and in the end his team even managed to finally catch sight of it. Yet what did they get after crossing the frozen wasteland where the treasure was found? As soon as the Redwinged Bull touched the black flower, his body froze and then shattered, even though he was a peak Celestial Immortal.

"It scared everyone quite a lot, especially when the black flower was stained by the blood of the full. It was quite a gruesome si-"

Lex froze, and then turned to look towards Mithon, his mind racing. He raised his hand and conjured up a certain picture.

"Do you happen to know... if that flower looked like this?"