John, an old member of the Inn and the local assassin who had not gone assassinating for a very long time, finally reappeared at the Midnight Inn. After months, he had finally won his life or death duel, yet he did not look even remotely happy - but one would have to look past his bloody figure to notice his expression.
His right arm, which he had used to deliver his final blow, had been completely eviscerated, and ended in a stump right above his elbow. While he was missing no other limbs, that did not mean he was unhurt.
Typically, as an immortal, he would have a very strong healing ability, and would not have to go to a common place like the Recovery room, but that is exactly what he did. Or at least tried to do, for his feeble body was completely lacking the once devastating strength it had.
But all was not lost. A member of the security team suddenly appeared next to him, and teleported him right to the Recovery room without asking any questions.
As John's bleeding and battered body was carried in, there was only one injury John was worried about, and that was the injury to his system! He was not sure how it happened, or what his opponent had done, but his system had completely stopped working, and with it the cultivation it had granted John had vanished too. In John's eyes, there was only a hopeless desperation.
As unusual as it was, as one 'immortal' was being taken to the Recovery room, another one was walking out. Ragnar bore no sign of the devastating loss he had suffered, and had healed completely as one would actually expect of an immortal. But just as he was not frustrated or disappointed by his loss, he was not excited about his recovery.
With an even pace, he walked to the Chamber of Secrets, where Emperor Jotun was waiting for him.
"How is everything?" the emperor asked, his voice devoid of an urgency or concern as well.
"As you speculated, Warheil cursed my body. If it is not removed, I will likely turn into a zombie," Ragnar said as calmly as if he was speaking of the weather.
"I'm sorry you had to bear this loss," the emperor said with some genuine emotion in his voice, finally. "But this is much too important. With a curse directly from the source, and one powerful enough to affect an immortal, we can finally find a way to reverse it."
"Just don't fail… again" a third voice interrupted the two. They looked over to find a female zombie avidly reading a book. Gladius, the owner of the book club taking place at the Inn, had finally given her the correct book to read. Reading a novel really was more interesting than plumbing manuals.
She should have reached such a conclusion on her own, but such basic common sense sometimes eluded her now that she had become a zombie.
"Ragnar, I'd like you to meet my daughter, Clarissa Jotun. Like you, she too suffered from a curse that eventually turned her into a zombie. Yet her curse was not from the source, Warheil. So while studying it and attempting to reverse it allowed Clarissa to retain her soul and consciousness, it did not stop the transformation. But we learnt a lot during her transformation. I'm completely confident that now, with your help, and with the information we gathered from her, we will be able to finally find a cure."
"For the betterment of humanity, I do not mind bearing the humiliation of defeat and the threat of a curse. I look forward to ridding the universe of zombies once and for all."
For a moment, Clarissa paused, and looked up at Ragnar. She could not help but admire how good he looked… then she looked down again. Suppressing her urge to eat living cultivators was hard sometimes.
While externally he did not show it, internally, Jotun was quite pleased. While his intention to find a cure for the zombie curse was real, his main motive was to get Ragnar and Clarissa to spend more time together. This is what he called… a parents trap!
*****
Alexander had a grim look on his face as he stared directly at a number of his superiors, as well as the head of his team, Valkyrie. He was under a lot of pressure, but at the same time, he was completely relaxed for he knew what lines he would not cross.
In this interrogation, where he was the one being interrogated, he had been searched and deprived of all his golden keys as well as other treasures. It was so that he would not try and escape to the Inn or cause any problems. Yet they overlooked the fact that he was above level 2 Prestige membership at the Midnight Inn. That meant once every ten years, he could directly teleport to the Inn without the need for a key! To be clear, this was a separate privilege from the one he used to teleport to Vegus Minima, which was the perk he got for being at level 3.
"Like I said, I cannot, nor will I, reveal the identity of my agent. Yet I can guarantee that he was not the one who planted the hazardous material."
"According to the cover identity you created, your 'agent' is only in the Golden core realm? How can he possibly survive and even come back well enough to give a report when none of our agents have survived even coming close? It took immortal level involvement to deduce that there is some extremely hazardous material hidden at the designated site, and even then it was not a clear answer. How can a Golden Core cultivator survive where even an immortal did not succeed?"
Alexander sighed. He did not blame them for being suspicious, but by grilling him they were just wasting time. It would have been better spent trying to identify whatever that material really was. At the same time, a part of him really could not help but applaud Lex for surviving when literally everyone else who came close died. It was an incredible feat.