An Alchemist's Path to Eternity

A story woven from both truth and falsehood was often the easiest kind to believe, but in the end, whether someone accepted it depended on whether they were willing to believe it at all. Clearly, neither Golden Plume nor Divine Fire had ever trusted Luo Chen in the slightest. Since that was the case, there was little point in continuing to reason with them. And if words could not convince them, then strength would do it instead.

Without warning, aura began spreading from Luo Chen. Deep as an abyss and oppressive as a prison, it swept through the hall with an utterly domineering force.

Behind him, Sima Huiniang and Gu Caiyi looked shaken as their long hair fluttered around them. For an instant, it felt as though a volcano had risen directly before them and was moments away from erupting. Even though Luo Chen’s pressure was not directed at them, the residual force alone made it hard for them to breathe.

Realizing this, Luo Chen immediately drew his power away from the two women. Only after the suffocating weight disappeared did Sima Huiniang and Gu Caiyi exchange shaken glances. If merely standing behind him had been enough to leave them breathless, what kind of pressure were those directly facing him enduring?

All at once, the Sages in the hall realized what Luo Chen had unleashed—a Nascent Soul Domain—and turned their attention to the two Divine Sect representatives.

Luo Chen had already made his challenge clear, and someone had to answer it. Since he was a newly advanced Sage, Divine Fire would normally have been the clear pick. Yet before Divine Fire could move, a cold snort rang through the hall, and Golden Plume stepped forward. ”Hmph! Perfect! Let’s see what you’re truly capable of!”

Before the words had even faded, an imposing presence no weaker than Luo Chen’s burst out. At the same time, the ambient spirit energy rushed toward him from every direction, gathering above his head and condensing into a brilliant pillar of golden light.

The moment Fairy Windflower sensed that power, her expression changed slightly.

A clash of Domains was one of the purest and most direct contests between Sages. There were no spells or divine abilities to hide behind, and neither could either side rely on their treasures. It was a direct contest of mana power, second only to a head-on clash of divine consciousness.

Had Divine Fire been the one to accept Luo Chen’s challenge, Fairy Windflower would not have been particularly worried. After watching Luo Chen overwhelm Old Ghost Skyscraper at Skypiercing Pass, she knew that the average early-stage Sage posed little threat to him.

But no one had expected Golden Plume to step forward instead. As the foremost of the Five Peak Elders of the Divine Sect, his cultivation was the highest, at the fifth stage; in terms of overall strength, he was second only to the sect’s supreme elder. Apart from Ye Lingtian, almost no one here could say with confidence that they would defeat him. Even Fairy Windflower and Primal Sovereign Nine Spirits were only at the same stage, while the master of the Thousand Sword Pavilion, despite his formidable combat strength, fell slightly short in cultivation.

With no late-stage Sage present, Golden Plume was one of the strongest people in the hall. How could a newly advanced Sage like Luo Chen possibly compare with someone like him?

”Fellow Daoist, don’t you think you’re taking this a little too far?” Fairy Windflower said coldly.

Beside her, Idle Crane was equally unhappy. ”Is everyone from the Divine Sect this bossy? From the way you’re acting, anyone would think you’re some kind of Holy Land!”

Even as he spoke, however, Idle Crane quietly glanced toward Ye Lingtian, who was still sitting at the head of the hall. The latter remained perfectly composed and watched the two men with interest, showing no intention of intervening. And if he had chosen not to step in, it meant he was tacitly allowing this.

Clearly, Golden Plume also reached the same conclusion. He bared his teeth in a cold smile. ”You said you stand here as one of us? Then let’s see if you’ve really got what it takes to call yourself our equal!”

At his command, the golden light above him began pressing forward.

It was also then that Luo Chen realized that this clash of Domains was unlike any he had experienced before. Normally, when two Domains collided, both cultivators would expand them as far as possible, competing for control over the ambient spirit energy. Each side would devour the other’s territory bit by bit until one finally overwhelmed the other’s influence over the world.

But the space in the hall was nowhere near enough for such a contest. Instead, Golden Plume had compressed his entire Domain into the smallest possible area, concentrating its power to the extreme before sending it directly toward Luo Chen. They would be testing the finest aspects of their cultivation against one another within that confined space: control over their own mana, the depth of that mana, and how much ambient spirit energy they could seize and command.

As Luo Chen watched the savage confidence on Golden Plume’s face, a passage from the Luo Tian Society Memoranda suddenly surfaced in his mind.

Duan Feng and his wife were both very good at identifying ores. When the fighting reached the Two Poles Tin Forest in the Limitless Domain, Sage Golden Plume sent them there as reinforcements. Neither survived, and they left no children behind.

His eyes turned cold. ”I haven’t even looked for you to ask for an explanation about my people, yet you’ve come straight to me instead. Fine, then!”

The next moment, he fully activated his own Domain and sent it directly toward Golden Plume’s.

Crimson clouds collided with golden light, and a violent storm of spirit energy erupted inside the hall. The music had fallen silent long ago; only the harsh rattling of tables and chairs continued, accompanied by the groaning of beams and pillars as the entire hall quaked under the pressure of the two Domains.

Soon enough, the disturbance was becoming too great to ignore. Seeing this, Ye Lingtian prepared to intervene and protect the hall. After all, this was Luo Chen’s Nascent Soul Formation Ceremony; although he was curious to see exactly what Luo Chen had relied upon to overwhelm his peers inside the pocket world, he did not want the ceremony to fall into chaos or let Luo Chen lose face in front of so many guests if things went badly.

Just as he was about to act, however, his gaze suddenly sharpened, and he looked toward the tall ceiling of the Luo Tian Hall. After sensing for a moment, his expression gradually turned thoughtful.

Something’s protecting the hall... A treasure? A formation? This fellow is far more capable than he lets on. Just how much is he still hiding?

Sure enough, although the clash between the two Domains grew increasingly violent, the hall itself continued to hold.

Meanwhile, Golden Plume’s expression had begun to darken. His cultivation was clearly higher than Luo Chen’s, yet he discovered that his opponent’s mana was astonishingly abundant, and the amount of spirit energy Luo Chen drew from the ambient was no less than his own. Even after several breaths, he still could not gain the upper hand. At last, he gritted his teeth and poured more mana into the Domain. At the same time, he slowly rose from the ground and sat cross-legged in midair.

”Your cultivation is still ultimately lower!”

The moment those words left his mouth, the golden Domain swelled violently. With his Nascent Soul now directly supporting it, the golden light blazed with such intensity that it became almost impossible to look at.

Across him, Luo Chen’s white-and-golden robe snapped wildly in the turbulent currents of spirit energy, while his bound black hair whipped behind him. Crimson light flared around his body until it seemed as though he might burst into flame at any time.

Before his eyes, his Domain was being forced back bit by bit. Yet instead of showing concern, he grinned. His lower cultivation was not the main reason he was losing ground. In terms of sheer mana reserves, Luo Chen was actually stronger than Golden Plume. The real problem was that he had yet to fully stabilize his cultivation, and his control over that enormous reserve of mana was still rough.

But that, too, was within his expectations. Without making any visible movement, he silently uttered a single word, ”Melt.”

The next moment, the crimson clouds that had been forced back suddenly reversed course and surged forward to wrap the golden light. Moreover, waves of domineering spirit energy began driving out the metal-attribute spirit energy Golden Plume had drawn into his Domain.

Then, from deep within the crimson clouds, a wisp of mysterious white flame appeared as though it had been hiding there all along. The pale flame immediately latched onto the mana Golden Plume had infused and eroded it strand by strand. Once those strands of mana were severed, the spirit energy they had been controlling lost its guidance and collapsed even faster. After all, fire countered metal naturally!

And that was not all. Void Melting came with an exceptionally powerful ability to reject and expel foreign forces. Thus, the moment Luo Chen revealed this trump card, the balance shifted almost instantly. The golden light shattered as the crimson clouds continued closing in, Golden Plume’s Domain was steadily compressed until, finally, it could no longer hold.

BBBOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMM!!!!

The golden light shattered.

Golden Plume dropped from midair and slammed into the floor. The force sent him staggering backward several steps before he finally managed to regain his footing.

Thud! Thud! Thud!

The moment he steadied himself, he snapped his head up angrily. ”That’s cheating! You’re relying on external power!”

The accusation only deepened the astonishment throughout the hall.

Golden Plume had clearly held the advantage just moments ago, yet in the blink of an eye, the entire situation had reversed, and he had been defeated outright. Lin Qingxuan, whose cultivation was only at the first stage, could not even tell what had happened, while Divine Fire stared at Luo Chen in complete shock.

Fairy Windflower looked equally incredulous. However, after replaying the clash in her mind, there was also a trace of contemplation in her eyes, as though she had caught a glimpse of the principle behind Luo Chen’s victory. When she glanced across the hall at Primal Sovereign Nine Spirits, she found him wearing much the same expression, with one hand stroking his chin as he silently considered everything that had just happened.

At the head of the hall, Ye Lingtian rested a finger against the rim of his wine cup and gave a slight nod. If that was Luo Chen’s power, then he truly was capable of overpowering newly advanced Sages from a Holy Land. Even compared with veteran experts from ordinary sects, he was not weaker in the slightest.

Meanwhile, the crimson clouds that had filled the hall gradually dispersed. Luo Chen remained seated exactly where he had been. His black hair had settled neatly against his back, the folds of his white-and-golden robes were perfectly smooth, and even the crimson-golden crown engraved with dragon patterns remained firmly in place. Compared with Golden Plume’s disheveled state, the contrast could not have been sharper.

Luo Chen looked down at him coldly. ”External power? What are you talking about?”

”That fire!” Golden Plume jabbed a finger toward him, his entire body trembling with humiliation and anger. Losing to Luo Chen in front of so many people had nearly driven him mad. ”You hid a mystical fire inside your Domain!”

The corner of Luo Chen’s mouth lifted as a wisp of eerie white flame appeared at his fingertip. ”You mean this?”

”Yes!”

Luo Chen laughed. ”This is my primordial true fire. Since when does that count as external power?”

Golden Plume froze.

The others, however, immediately became more interested.

Incorporating one’s primordial true fire directly into a Domain was certainly an interesting idea, but after thinking through the clash, none of them believed that little trick alone had decided the outcome.

It was obvious to them that the real reason Golden Plume had lost lay in the nature of Luo Chen’s Domain itself. It possessed an extraordinarily domineering ability to expel foreign spirit energy, and once that advantage was combined with fire’s natural suppression of metal, the balance had tilted in Luo Chen’s favor. More than that, Luo Chen’s mana reserves had proven far deeper than anyone would have expected from a newly advanced Sage. With these factors considered together, Golden Plume’s defeat was hardly unjustified.

As that conclusion settled over the hall, the gazes directed toward the latter gradually changed. Some held pity, others sympathy, while a few carried barely concealed amusement.

Golden Plume felt as though he might cough up blood on the spot. In the end, however, he forcibly swallowed the anger boiling inside him. ”That was just a little exchange. Next time, we’ll fight for real and see who’s actually stronger!”

With that, he turned and strode straight out of Luo Tian Hall.

Once he was gone, the attention of everyone present shifted toward the other representative of the Divine Sect: Divine Fire.

Strictly speaking, Luo Chen had only invited Divine Fire to the ceremony, and Golden Plume had come of his own accord. Now, under so many curious gazes, even Divine Fire found it hard to remain comfortably seated.

Luo Chen, however, did not want to embarrass him further. Instead, he smiled, raised his wine cup, and gestured toward the gathered guests. ”Continue with the music. Let’s keep drinking!”

At once, the zithers, reed pipes, and flutes began playing again, while wine once more flowed from cup to cup. On the surface, the banquet soon returned to exactly how it had been before. Yet everyone in the hall knew that many things had already changed.