Eternal Cultivation of Alchemy

Tan Yang, one of the remaining 9 council elders of the Southern Continent died from a sword slash to the back while he was overwhelmed from two other sides.

Alex saw it happen with his peripheral vision and saw the moment of death through his spiritual senses. The moment the elder died, Alex felt something else break inside of his heart.

First, it had been Yao Ning, and now Tan Yang.

He looked to the side and saw Gong Liuxian struggling with another battalion leader who was empowered by a strong array behind her.

Far away, Lei Zhong was being beaten badly, unable to muster enough strength to keep protecting himself.

Alex looked for more, but someone attacked him at that very moment, forcing him to focus his attention back on the battle.

The man before him fought with no weapon but just an artifact that carried an open flame. The flame burned hot, but merely hot enough to be trouble for a regular cultivator.

To Alex, it was no different from ordinary flames.

Still, the flames carried with them the power of a cultivator that was beyond Saint Transformation 9th realm at the moment.

Alex was strong too, thanks to the array, but he had unfortunately come to find out that he could only be so strong beyond a certain level. It was almost as if there was some sort of bottleneck on how strong one could get in the world with borrowed powers.

Beyond the 9th realm, the improvement diminished rapidly such that it mattered little.

Alex could see nearly 400 strong Saints powering this one person. Had this person been capable of handling more power, they might have given him more, but perhaps that might have been useless to begin with.

There were very few people as strong as him on the battlefield, and they were focused on the four strongest people fighting on behalf of the Southern Continent's armies.

The four being Alex, Hannah, Zhou Linfan, and Yan Yating.

Alex didn't know where the other three were yet. He could search, but that would take away from his focus.

A blazing ball of yellow flame released from the man's hands, flying toward Alex while leaving behind trails of swirling hot air that twisted the world seen through it.

Alex immediately employed his True Fire Dao and caught onto the fireball before it even got too close. Using the Dao, he had more authority toward fire and could steal control of the ball from the other person.

Alex would have to fight his opponent mentally to do so, but in a battle of Intent, he doubted he could lose.

As Alex thought that, his eyes narrowed slightly when he felt the tremendous Intent behind the attack. He tried to wretch away the fire, but he came empty-handed and with a slight headache.

He looked toward the opponent and found him not even breaking a sweat at all.

Alex could not believe that there was someone with such a stronger Intent than him. However, when he really thought about it, that seemed a bit impossible.

Even if the man did have a stronger Intent, he would not be standing so freely. Which meant, that the Intent wasn't coming from that man at all.

It belonged to the flat chalice-like artifact where the yellow flame perpetually burned.

Looking at the treasure, Alex could tell that it was the treasure that gave away the Intent. Was it an Immortal treasure?

Alex let go of the struggle and simply struck the ball of fire with his sword, destroying it. He was pushed back with a significant force but jumped right back into battle.

He fought against the man, dodging and preparing at every instance for what may be his final attack. Meanwhile, the man seemed to tease Alex into using his strongest technique to defend against potential Immortal Qi attacks, which he used very sparingly.

Taking too long here would lead to Alex's loss and subsequently his death. So, Alex decided to fight harder without caring for his spare QI at all.

The man fighting Alex was strong, but he was also nothing more than a person with a single trick. All he could do in the battle was use his artifact, which was clearly very strong but pretty much useless against Alex once he knew what to do with it.

Alex dashed forward as assuredly as he possibly could and swung his sword through the midsection of the man's torso.

The man created a barrier of flames using Immortal Qi, just as Alex had hoped.

Alex teleported, but that was old news to these people by now.

The man located him nearly instantaneously, using the Immortal Qi in his body to empower the artifact once again and shoot out massive flames at Alex.

Alex teleported at the last second again, saving himself from the attack.

The blast of yellow fire caught empty air and the man felt an attack from behind him. Without even turning around, he sent a flame attack toward Alex, only to be shot at by one at the same time.

The two balls of fire exploded into a large array of colors, sending the man back in a disorientation. When he tried to orient himself, he realized that it had been too late.

Alex swung just once and the man's body was cleaved in half completely, the artifact that burned with the yellow fire being destroyed with it.

Alex rejoiced in the death of his opponent for a split second before it was time for him to fall back and see how he could help. Any person he could help was a person he could save.

He moved back from the battlefield of the war and took a good look at the situation and who he could help.

He saw Hannah and Zhou Linfan who weren't having as much trouble as he was worried for them. They were much stronger in general than everyone else, so they had survived easily.

Alex was about to look for others when Liang Shufen walked past him with an arm that was cut off and a leg that was as though it had been crushed completely.

"Elder Liang, are you alright?" Alex asked.

"I'm… I'll be fine once I go to the ship," she said and sighed as she turned around. "We can't do this alone. Even with all those that had been added, we're still getting overwhelmed."

Alex nodded. "As we increase in number, the enemy increases too," he said. "I will help who I can see, not that I can see many people from here."

"Brother Kang is dead," Liang Shufen said. "I saw him get punctured with many roots at once. He had very dead."

Alex remained silent, although his face trembled with emotions as memories passed him.

"Elder Tan is dead as well. I saw him get cut down by her," Alex said, pointing to a woman who had started attacking the weaker people on the battlefield.

Alex intended to go for her, but Huang Chen made it there first. Alex, instead, focused on finding everyone important to him.

As he did, he realized something troubling.

Graham was missing from the battlefield entirely.