All was peaceful at the Midnight Inn, which was the norm. Anakin Indiana McClane found it hard to relax completely after the chaos that the Inn had encountered last time. But, in his humble opinion, the Innkeeper was very clear about his displeasure by ripping the universe itself to attack every bad guy and their mother, not to mention damning the souls of the attackers to endless soul torture.
Now, Anakin wasn't a man who condones violence, no sir. But it made him feel somewhat special that the hotel owner would go as far as creating a mini-hell in the form of a hearth to dissuade anyone from attacking again. Honestly, Anakin even considered asking the man for an autograph.
Unfortunately, Anakin had been much too busy to waste time lately. The strange grandpa who visits him in his dreams had been very unhappy that Anakin hadn't been cultivating his special darkness affinity, so to appease the old man, he had been dutifully cultivating in the Meditation rooms.
As if that wasn't enough, his new scam- eh, his new business of taking advantage of Noman's ability to detect lies, had made him very popular. It wasn't anything official, but many women secretly brought their boyfriends to him without letting on what they were doing to test if the boys truly loved them. At first, Noman felt hesitant to use his ability like this, but all it took was the attention of one heartbroken girl to change Nomans mind. Teenagers really were easy to get along with.
Of course, he had found bigger clients too. Currently, opposite to Anakin sat his latest client, Souta. Their discussion had been conducted in the Chamber of Secrets, so he did not remember Soua's secret, but he knew for a fact that Souta needed someone to die. To be specific, a Mr. Suzuki had to die.
Now such a horrible, nefarious and insidious task was completely outside of Anakin's domain, for he had never killed a pet goldfish let alone a human, which is why opposite to him also sat Larry. They were just having a conversation about how Suzuki had been hired to kill Larry. What Larry did with that information was completely and totally up to him, as Anakin had in no way exaggerated Suzuki's motivations and dedication to completing the task.
Yes, it was a perfectly normal, calm and peaceful day within which Anakin was just having a normal conversation, with no otherwise strange occurrences at all. The wind was blowing, the birds were singing, the sun was shining- eh?
One moment, the group of Earthlings had been sitting out in the garden, sipping some piña coladas, the next, a massive shadow had appeared all around them. The change was too sudden for it to be a cloud, and the size of the shadow covered not only them, but a massive area!
The trio looked up to see… a massive spaceship! The metallic structure extended for hundreds of miles, yet it floated effortlessly in the air. In fact, the flying city above the village almost bumped into the massive ship, but quickly adjusted its path to dodge it.
Up in the air, the entity known as Abroar which had been relying on the spaceship to keep its body alive had finally arrived at the Inn. It needed to complete some final tasks before it made the transition to existing as a spirit.
Though Abroar was stuck inside the ship, it had access to all of the ship's sensors, and so could sense the entirety of the Inn. In fact, even the formation surrounding the greenhouse could not deter its vision, revealing everything to it.
At a glance, Abroar felt quite disappointed. The Inn was too small, and it detected few, if any, beings of considerable strength. But then, it began to notice a few minor details. Due to the realm it used to have, as well as the extremely advanced technology that made up its ship, its knowledge was far beyond ordinary cultivators. It immediately noticed multiple sources of divine energy, as well as the numerous signatures of extremely potent bloodlines, not to mention the destiny shield.
Abroar let out a mental sigh. To be honest, it did not matter whether this place was impressive or not, it was the only choice it had left. It had long noticed the small hologram of its original species that appeared in the ship's bridge, ready to provide information once Abroar was ready to interact.
The being strengthened its resolve and was about to ask the hologram about completing a few final requests before it took advantage of the Beyond the Grave function of the Inn, when its sensors detected a new being which had teleported near it.
Compared to the ship, the new being was small. That did not change the fact that the Mountain-man was over 20 miles tall. While the ship was technically longer than the Mountain-man, it was horizontal, and its length was parallel to the ground. The Mountain-man, instead, was standing vertically, and so its head went far beyond anything else in the Inn.
As if that sight was not enough, the Mountain-man had teleported while moving. It was already not used to its massive body, and the ground moving from right under its feet caused the creature to trip terribly, ultimately landing on the ship!
Anakin repeatedly rubbed his eyes and he tried to clear his vision, but no matter what he did, the image did not change.
"Guys, I think I had too much Saturn cake," Anakin said lightly. "I must be hallucinating or something. I swear I can see a giant man made out of rocks on a space- no, a giant rock man on a hoverboard that looks like a spaceship. My compliments to the chef who baked that cake."
"It's not the cake," said Larry, whose eyes were gleaming! He absorbed precious metals to grow stronger, and the 'hoverboard' in the air felt more precious to him than anything he had ever felt in his entire life!