Eternal Cultivation of Alchemy

Chapter 2239  Poison Essence

The battle between the man and Pearl lasted nearly 10 minutes with both sides attacking each other, and both of them defending.

Whitestorm, the white-haired fox, sat in one of the seats alongside a few of his men and watched the battle on the stage.

"One side is good with defense," he said. "And the other one is still clearly hiding something. This battle might take much longer than this."

"Do you think he will win though, boss?" the man next to him asked. "There is a lot riding on him."

"He will win this one," the fox said. "I am certain of that much. But the issue comes later when his opponents get stronger. I cannot tell what else he could pull out to fight stronger fighters. I know nothing about him at all."

The people next to him nodded. "And our searches revealed nothing either," one of them said. "But I do still think he's one of the alchemists taking part in the tournament. I have recently seen many alchemists wearing those."

The fox nodded. "But an alchemist who can fight this well is certainly wasting his time with Alchemy. He can buy any pill he wants if he just focuses on cultivation."

The people said nothing.

Whitestorm wasn't so worried about Pearl winning or losing naturally. He was worried that Pearl was going to try and trick him in fact. He wasn't sure if Pearl knew it or not, but the time one earned the most was when the odds were against you.

If everyone bet against Pearl, and he suddenly brought out something no one had known he had before, then it would mean that all their understanding of him before that fight had been wrong, which also meant they had made their decision with the wrong data.

Pearl would be tricking them all into betting against him, and then reaping the benefits of that. The worst part of it all was that it was a common tactic among the fighters and perfectly legal.

If he tried to make Pearl intentionally fail, it would be against the terms of the arena. The staff had already come so close to banning him a few times in the past and had only not done so because he had never outright broken their clauses. He wanted it to remain that way for the foreseeable future.

Pearl's final attack in the fight was once again his claw slash that broke through the walls that the man had put up as defenses and cut the man behind the walls.

The man had chosen to give up at that point, seeing no future where he could win against Pearl.

"You are a strong, young man," the short man said as he walked away. "I wish you luck for the rest of your matches."

Pearl smiled and nodded toward the fighter before hearing the referee announce Pearl as the winner.

Pearl made his way out of the stage, now very used to the cheers from the crowd, most of which were women. He made his way up and saw Whitestorm on the way, who gave him a small smile and congratulated him.

"That was a well-deserved victory," he said. "I see now that you are quite strong."

Pearl nodded. "I am going to win more and more," he said. "I will go register once again."

"Please, go on ahead."

Pearl walked away, checking his medallion while he left. To his surprise, he had earned a whopping 2100 Immortal spirit stones from this fight alone.

'So many,' he thought. 'Did so many bid on the fight?' It seemed a little unrealistic unless people thought they understood him better. 'Or were the odds against me actually?'

Pearl started believing that was the reason. 'Then I should continue earning more,' he thought, looking forward to the next few fights.

Pearl made his way to the registration room on this floor and quickly registered once again. Once registered, he opened his medallion to look inside and sighed deeply.

His next fight was going to take place at least 6 hours later. It was so far away.

He couldn't even leave the arena as fighters who left the arena before their fights took place were considered to have forfeited the match.

Not to mention, it cost 100 Immortal spirit stones each time to come back, so it was incentivized for everyone to stay there for as long as they could to get the most out of their money.

So, Pearl had to stay as well.

* * * * * * *

Alex returned from the shop, still sensing Pearl far away. He wondered what sort of place he was in. He could go check once he returned from the valley.

He arrived back in the courtyard and saw Whisker and Momo still training. Last time she was training her Jade Skin technique, and this time, she was training her Flickering Shadows technique.

"Brother, did you find it?" Whisker asked.

"No, the shops don't have it, it seems," Alex said. "Understandable, I guess. Momo, come here. I have a few things I need you for."

Momo walked up, curious. "What is it master?" she asked.

Alex took out some things and handed it over to her.

Momo took both of the things, one a flower, the other a pill. She looked back up, confused. "What am I doing with these?"

"You will eat that flower," Alex told her. Momo was confused. "Eat… the flower?" she asked. "Who eats a flower?'

Whisker landed on her shoulders and looked down at the thin blue-petaled flower. He gasped a little in surprise. "Brother, that's the Toxic Bluebane. Why are you making her eat it?"

"Toxic?" Momo looked up quickly, scared. "Is this poisonous?"

Alex nodded. "That pill is an anti-poison pill. If this poison hurts you, that pill will heal you immediately."

"Huh?" Whisker was the one to make the confused sound. "What do you mean 'if', brother? Of course, the poison will hurt her. Won't it?"

Alex shook his head. "I wouldn't be so sure. I have consulted with the playground and we've come to the conclusion that Momo here has a unique physique that can consume poison to become poisonous itself."

"It's called the Poison Essence Constitution, and it's apparently a Divine ranking physique. If Momo consumes weak poisons and slowly makes her way to stronger ones, there will come a day when she has to fear no poison, and instead her entire body, Qi, and even spirit itself can be poisonous instead."

Momo gasped. "I… will become poisonous?" she asked. "What if I accidentally hurt others? I don't want that."

"You will be an alchemist. You can always make pills if you accidentally hurt others," Alex said. "Besides, by the time your physique is strong enough, you will be able to control what it does yourself. So unless you allow it, it won't poison another person."

Momo thought for a long moment and nodded. "This pill will save me if I am wrong, right master?" she asked. Alex nodded. "That is why I brought that pill over for you."

"If that is so then I will eat this flower," she said, taking a deep breath before chomping on the flower and swallowing it.