Eternal Cultivation Of Alchemy

Alex stood before Blazelight, watching her. The woman had vanished for some time, but it seemed she had returned now.

”Did you know I was sitting there, senior? Was that why you chose that seat?” Alex asked.

The woman shrugged. ”I don’t know what you’re talking about. I merely saw an open seat and chose to sit down. Are you going to ask me to leave?”

”No. I was merely curious,” Alex said. ”There are plenty of other seats, after all.”

He sat down in one of the seats next to her and began to rest.

”I saw your fight. Bravo,” she said while gesturing a soundless clap. ”That was quite the victory.”

Alex smiled. ”Thank you for your kind words, Fire Sage.”

The woman crossed her arms and leaned backward. ”Why didn’t you choose the Dao battles?” she asked. ”As an apparent Fire God, I don’t see why you wouldn’t want to see how strong you are there.”

”First of all, I’m the Sun God. Not the Fire God,” Alex said. ”And secondly, I do not need to explain why I am doing what I’m doing to you, senior. You can simply keep an eye on me so I don’t leave this realm and keep yourself out of it all.”

The woman let out a small chuckle. ”You do realize it’s nearly impossible for me to stay out of everything, don’t you? Given the fact that we will soon be dueling each other.”

”I’m dueling your God, not you,” Alex said.

”Do you think you’ll get to go for our lord right away?” she asked, a look of disdain forming on her face. ”You will need to go through me and a few others. If you can’t even defeat a Fire Sage, you could never defeat a Fire God, after all.”

Alex looked toward her, realizing at that moment that she may have been right. Her job there was more than just to keep an eye on him.

In that case, he had done the right thing by joining the weapons tournament. This way, he wouldn’t really be revealing anything at all.

There was a possibility that he may have shown his Dao Sword there, but considering that he was still incapable of fully merging the Dao with his sword, he would’ve been disqualified right away.

So he had long since made the plan not to even try that during this tournament.

”The choice of whether I duel you or not is mine,” Alex said. ”I don’t need to defeat any of you. Just your God. It’s better for me to put my effort there from the start anyway.”

The woman chuckled slightly. ”An audience full of Gods and Sages will be waiting to watch a duel where you prove that you are the one who should be the pinnacle of Fire and Yang, and you will choose to shy away from contending against Sages and Reverends? Go right ahead. Watch how much confidence that instills in everyone regarding your stance.”

Alex’s eyes narrowed instantly.

He chose to remain silent, but that alone had already told the woman that her words had won right there.

Alex hated what she had just said, but he could not deny that it was the truth.

Becoming a Half God meant proving to people that you were indeed the best at the element, better than anyone else. If he chose not to battle the Sages and went directly for the God, it would tell the others that he had no confidence in his victory at all.

It would tell the others that he was only there to get things over with.

The moment all of those Gods, Sages, and Reverends stopped thinking of him as a God of Fire and Yang, he would immediately lose his status. ℯℯ𝘭.

He would have lost before he even fought the Fire God.

That was not what he wanted at all.

He had no expectations of winning against the Fire God, but he was going there with every intention of trying. Whether he won or not would be something that would be decided afterward, but he would give them no chance to make that decision before the duel even started.

After a long moment of silence, Alex nodded to himself.

”Fine,” he said. ”I will fight you too. I’ll fight your God and anyone else he brings for me to fight.”

The woman smiled faintly. ”I’m glad I didn’t have to waste my breath explaining any more. Though, I would love to see just how strong you are right away.”

Alex turned toward her before letting out a scoff. ”I believe I am free to refuse as much as I want right now, aren’t I?”

”I don’t know,” she said with a grin. ”Why don’t we ask the referee?”

Alex was taken aback. ”Ask who?”

The referee spoke up right away.

”And for our final battle from Group 38, give a round of applause for our finalists. Dawnblade...”

The crowd went into an uproar at his name.

”And Blazelight.”

Alex tuned out the crowd for a moment as he slowly turned toward the woman next to him. He saw her grin and understood in that moment that this was what she had planned from the start.

Half the group had battled in another arena, and Alex hadn’t really given much thought to what sort of fighters there had been all this time.

Looking at it now, it seemed she had been one of the fighters in that group and had won all the way to the finals.

’No wonder she went missing all this time,’ Alex thought. ’I thought she would have forfeited every other battle, but it seems her plan from the start had been to do just this.’

Alex stood from his seat and looked toward the woman.

”How much of this was a coincidence? How much of it was planned?”

”Partly,” she answered truthfully as she stood up. ”I saw you register for the weapons battle, so I chose to join the fight too. I am not as skilled with a weapon, but I’m not bad myself. As such, I bribed the people to place me in the same group as you. If you had lost before this, it would’ve been awkward, but I trusted you wouldn’t disappoint me at all.”