The Innkeeper

Chapter 1421  Inter-realm travel

Since neither Lex nor the others had ever been to the Versalis Bank before, within the Origin realm or anywhere else, they could not directly go there from the Inn, nor did Ripley expect them to.

Instead, they first all went to Dunya. This was not a problem since during this long period, Lex had gone to Dunya and connected it to the Inn, finally. As one of the planets with an incredibly high star rating in the realm, it was a central hub, and thus an important point for the Inn to be connected to. Also, Lex had planned the workers compensation vacation here, so it needed to be connected anyway.

Even though that vacation didn't end up happening, since most workers didn't want to go, he still had to put in sufficient work in case someone wanted to go. He also finally completed the quest that told him to connect the planet to the Inn, but since it took him over a decade to complete the quest, his quest rating was pathetically low and he didn't get a reward worth mentioning.

The reason they had to reach Dunya first was that since it was a central hub, it could act as a relay teleportation point for them. Ripley himself could travel to and from the Origin realm from any location.

He had a permit from the Henali, and the Bank could be accessed by him from anywhere. But if he wanted to bring guests, he would need to go through a more formal route.

"From Dunya, we're going to Pansolis. The Henali headquarter, where the heads and Dao Lords of the Henali reside, is actually off limits to anyone and everyone who is not Henali. Even with all the permits I have, I have never been there. Yet around their headquarters, a number of star systems have been artificially built so that they are in close proximity to it.

"Pansolis is one such planet that has been built not by any other force, but by Henali itself, and is open to the public. Of course, public in this instance is a relative term. It is mostly a place where Celestial Immortals of the Origin realm, as well as the elite, who wish to be close to the Henali come.

"Like Dunya, it is a 5 star world, although I have heard rumors of it being upgraded to a 6 star world through some treasure in the near future. The reason we are going is because that is where an inter-realm teleportation facility has been set up by the Henali.

"Let me ask you three a question. Have you guys ever been to different realms? I mean proper realms, not pocket spaces and minor realms."

"Including the Midnight realm and Origin realm, I've been to 3 realms," Lex said.

"I've only been to the Origin realm and Midnight realm," answered Velma, and Gerard indicated that he was the same.

"Well in that case, how do you travel between realms? And how do you think other people travel between realms?" Ripley asked. Of course he could have just given them the answer without questioning them, but since the whole point of this trip was to increase the exposure of the workers, Ripley wanted to test the limits of their knowledge, as well as make them realize what the generic experiences of the rest of the universe were.

"In our case, the Inn just handles the teleportation," said Lex. "It is quite seamless. It is difficult to tell the difference between ordinary teleportation, and teleportation between realms."

"A testament to the Innkeeper's amazing power," Ripley said in a matter-of-fact way. "But not everyone is backed by a Dao Lord, and not every Dao Lord excels in cross realm teleportation. There are actually two main ways to travel between realms, depending on your background.

"The first, more common way, is to travel by a Void ship. The Void is limitless in size, and touches upon all of space. The Void is connected to every single realm in existence, though the exact nature of that connection is difficult to explain.

"A simplified, and even then partially incorrect explanation is that one can imagine that the Void is a large ocean, and that all the realms are small islands with it. That means all realms connect to the same Void. As such, a Void ship which can tolerate the pressure of the Void is one of the most common modes of transport between realms.

"However, the Void is never ending and directionless. Without specific tools that specifically guide the ship towards other realms, it is impossible to find another realm. There are no road signs or landmarks in the Void to help you find your way. Sometimes, the Void even exists within the boundary of a realm, and other times it leads to areas so dangerous that even Dao Lords would not be able to survive.

"This is not even mentioning the fact that Void Beasts, which are so unimaginably ferocious within the Void, will attack any non-Void living thing on sight, so one has to hide from them as well. All of this means that, generally speaking, travel from one realm to another is almost non-existent due to how dangerous and expensive it is.

"Even for those who can afford it, reaching the destination is not assured, and there is no one who can say with confidence and surety that they can travel through the Void. That leads us to the second method of travel between realms, which is inter-realm teleportation.

"Despite being much safer and much more convenient, this form of travel between realms is actually more rare," Ripley said, as he led the way. "This is because for such a thing, very powerful and very expensive formations need to be set up between both realms that only ever point to one another. That means one must set up a formation in one realm, and then travel to the other realm and set up the second one, or have someone in the other realm set it up for you.

"After that, you can use it. But despite the formations that literally point to one another between realms, teleportation is so expensive that only very powerful Dao level organizations can do it. Not even the generic Dao Lords can afford it on a regular basis. Or, at the very least, individual Dao Lords would not spend their money to send low level people like us through the teleportation formation, and would rather just use it for themselves. It is a testament to the incredible resources and power of the Versalis Bank that they can allow us to use a teleportation formation so easily.

"Of course, these are only two of the more common and generic methods to travel between realms. There are, no doubt, many other ways in which people can travel between realms. Certain powerful beings, such as the Innkeeper, can facilitate teleportation easily and seemingly without worry for the immense resources it ordinarily requires. That is because, naturally, it is expensive to use a formation but a Dao Lords own power does not consume any resources.

"Then, there are also some… anomalies that defy the common rules of realm travel. The Devils, from the Humanoid alliance, are one such example. Their realm, Garvitz, can be accessed by any Devil from anywhere in the universe. Simultaneously, others can summon Devils from Garvitz to their realm for a relatively low price.

"For this unique trait of their realm alone, the Devils have suffered immense pressure throughout the years in terms of attacks and conspiracies. But the fact that they have managed to retain complete control of that realm for so long is a testament to their incredible power.

"There are also certain Heavens which boast the ability of inter-realm teleportation, but that is usually reserved for very specific beings, and is not available for everyone to use."

"I have a question," Lex said, when Ripley finally paused during his speech. "If the Void is so dangerous, seemingly even to Dao Lords, how do people discover new realms? Like, is it possible that there are countless major realms in existence that we don't even know about and that no one has discovered?"

Ripley smirked. This was exactly the kind of question that would have Lex identified as what many powerful beings would refer to as a 'country bumpkin'. But he was glad that Lex asked this question, for Ripley wanted the Inn workers to gain more exposure. Only then could they live up to the standards, and quite frankly the minimum basic expectations of a being such as the Innkeeper.

"Such things may be hidden from individual Dao Lords, and Dao level organizations. But like I said earlier, even among Dao level organizations, there are differences. These secrets are not really secrets in front of the more powerful level organizations, races and alliance blocks of the universe.

"For example, even if we don't necessarily have the means to get there, the Versalis Bank knows the exact number of major realms in the universe. For the number of developing and small realms, though the bank does not have an exact number, they have a very close estimate.

"In this universe, it is not exactly easy to keep a secret. But the very fact that it's so hard to keep a secret is the exact reason why the bank pays such close attention to the Innkeeper, whose existence was a complete secret until he himself chose to reveal himself. One could say, someone like the Innkeeper is even more rare in the universe than Major realms."