The Innkeeper

Lex was hesitant. The last thing he wanted was to accidentally activate the belt or something. To be specific, it wasn't that Lex did not want a galaxy on hand to harvest its wealth. He just knew that he would not be able to hold on to such a valuable item with his meager strength.

It had absolutely nothing to do with the chastity aspect of the belt. No, this was totally about having realistic expectations about whether or not he could keep the belt longterm.

He had already taken this into account over the past few days, so he summoned a chain and swung it towards the belt, sealing it once it had wrapped around the length of it. Then he pulled.

To Lex's immense and genuine surprise, the belt lifted pretty easily, without giving him any kind of trouble. No enemy popped up to attack him either, though Lex did not lower his guard as he swam out. He even aimed to exit at the opposite end from where he fought the commander just to avoid a trap waiting for him when he exited.

Although his spirit sense did not detect any enemies, Lex stuck out his head just enough to see everything happening outside so that his left eye could see through any potential traps. How could there be nothing? Yet there really was nothing waiting for him.

So, carefully, Lex exited the lake and then once he made sure everything was fine, he began pulling on the chain. He recalled Eclipse saying that as long as he pulled out the belt, his obstacle course would be completed.

Just when it really seemed like there were no surprises waiting for him, Lex finally encountered the final obstacle, though it was not what he had expected.

The moment the slightest bit of the belt left the water, a part of its body exposed to the air, the aura of the belt exploded as if the only thing keeping it in check was the water.

Lex had been through a lot of pain in life, whether it was from fire, from ice, from attacks, and even from the auras of dragons. So when the aura of the belt smacked him across the face, launching his body through the air, it was not exactly something new… and yet, this had never happened to him before.

The only thing that stopped him from flying farther in the air was the chain wrapped around the belt, though the aura exuding from the belt constantly kept Lex pushed to the limits that the chain would allow.

The aura was so immense, and so powerful, that Lex could not resist it at all. But once he got over the shock of what had happened, he realized that maybe, even if he genuinely planned on taking the belt, he might not be able to. After all, an entire galaxy was packed into a belt. That belt probably had more mass packed into it than a black hole - or it was around the same.

In fact, he realized that without the support of the water which suppressed the belt's aura, he might not have been able to pull it out at all.

At least it was good to know that all those years ago, he hadn't made a mistake by not picking the Narn item. It might have killed him back then, which would have been an embarrassing way to die.

Lex landed back on land, turned around with the chain going over his shoulder, and forced himself to march.

The final obstacle was both difficult yet simple. The more that the belt was drawn out of the water, the more its aura was unleashed, making it even harder for Lex to continue. Yet all he needed to do was to force himself to push through.

It was tough, it was painful, but considering that Lex seemed to be suffering no real harm for some reason, he just grit his teeth and endured the pain. What Lex didn't know was that the reason he wasn't getting hurt was because the effect of the water was still active, healing him before he even had a chance to get hurt. That was a small, silent reward from Eclipse for anyone who made it this far. After all, even tolerating the aura of the treasures she might leave in the lake was a big deal for mere immortals, especially non-Primordials.

Eventually, Lex managed to pull the entire belt out, collapsing as soon as the entire belt emerged. Yet Lex discovered that as he fell to the ground, he was no longer in front of the lake. Instead, he had fallen to the ground in front of Eclipse, a poodle, and a massive dragon, all staring at him with various emotions in their eyes.

"Not bad at all, young man," Eclipse said, clapping Lex on his back. "Although what you did back in Sin City was a little cheeky, I don't blame you. It was kind of funny too, and the new mayor, Goloo-Goloo is a lot more entrepreneurial. I'm looking forward to seeing how he develops that place."

"Thank you for that opportunity, senior-"

"Call me Eclipse," she interrupted. "What are you worrying about? If I've found you interesting enough to chat with, then there's no need for any unnecessary formalities between us. You won't even affect your karma too much by talking to me in the garden for certain reasons. I'd tell you, but it wouldn't be nice to have you fainting too often."

"Thank you for your consideration," Lex said, doing his best not to reveal an awkward smile.

"Now, have you thought of what reward you want? If you're interested, I can give you a few recommendations. I'll have you know, now that you've completed the obstacle course, old Ventura will be having his elders try and go through it as well. I won't make any changes - I'm quite curious to see how good or bad you are compared to these so-called elders."