Eternal Cultivation of Alchemy

Alex knew he was headed in the right direction with his idea about expanding on the sound attribute of the Immortal Jadehorn Leaves. He had picked a few ingredients that would work well with it, but he still hadn't landed on a good pill recipe yet.

He needed to make sure the pill did something in the end, after all.

As he slowly approached some fruitful revelation, a loud sound took away his attention. Surprised, he looked up and saw the Alchemy God hover in the center of the stage.

"Your time is up," the Alchemy God said, his voice reaching them alone with no other sound to accompany it. "I quickly want to congratulate all 102 Alchemists that have passed the first phase of the test. Your second phase, the one-on-one battles, will now commence."

"We have already decided on the matchups, so here they are before you all."

The sky bloomed with a massive display that showed four different groups of brackets, each with expanding veins of names that were meant to fight each other.

Alex quickly tried to search for his name and see who he was up against. He found his name in the 2nd group around the middle area, but he was completely alone. He wasn't fighting anyone in the first round. He was going to be moved on to the round of 64 just as easily.

He tried searching for the rest of the names. And just like him, many others searched for their names as well.

Dusklily found herself in the 1st group, going up against Faithseeker at some point. She frowned a little because she understood how good he was. She had tried her best to come up with the first three recipes, using everything she had to do so, and even then, she had lost to him and Palesilver. But just because she was in the same group as him didn't mean she was going to give up so easily.

She was damn sure she would win. If she didn't, then she would make damn sure that he had the worst time of his life going up against her.

Leafheart looked at her name and saw that she was skipping the first round too. After that, she was going to fight against some other people that she didn't know much about. The only person she had any reason to worry about in her third group was Faithseeker, and given his performance earlier, she wasn't sure if she could beat him.

Truth was, she knew nothing about the man at all. Still, as someone hailed as the best alchemist of the younger generation of the Medicine World, he was bound to be very strong..

Aethersage looked at his own name in the 4th group and saw himself going up against someone else right away. Unlike others, he did not get a chance to skip the first round.

He couldn't help but put on a rueful smile. Had the competition taken place a century or two later, he would have likely reached the requirement to be rewarded with the valuable skill that helped with creating new recipes. Sadly, he was going to rely entirely on himself now.

It was a challenge, yes, but for the first time in a while, it was fun as well. It had been a while since Aethersage was completely left to his own devices. And now, it was time to prove that he was more than just the gifts he was born with.

His talent and hard work were things that were worth something. His struggle was worth something. Its value was something he would show the world with this competition.

Palesilver took one glance at the round matchups, noticed her placement in the 2nd group, and went back to focusing on a circular disc in her hand. She closed her eyes and connected her mind to this disc. Once it was connected, she continued finding the rest of the recipes she would need to pass through all of the competitions.

Faithseeker was happy to notice his name in the 3rd group. He looked at the other groups, quickly smiling at what he had observed.

He knew there was bias in the competition. No one was placed where they were randomly. Everything had been meticulously planned to prepare the competition to be the most entertaining out there.

There was a reason why the four Immunity Pin winners were all placed in the four different groups. There was a reason why he and Palesilver were in two different groups. If luck was on the side of those four, they wouldn't meet until the final four. If luck was on his side, he would most likely meet Palesilver in the finale of this competition.

He knew about Palesilver and her little device. It helped her conceptualize ingredient combinations much faster. He had a similar device too, but it was far worse than what she had. With that, she had likely made over six pill recipes by now and was most likely going to make even more by the time she had to go up against someone else.

At that point, all that would be left for her would be to refine the recipe and make the best pill possible.

And that was the reason Faithseeker was so confident that he would win in the end. Because no matter how good Palesilver was at making recipes, he was better than her at making pills. And in the end, that was what mattered. Stay connected through My Virtual Library Empire

He looked away from the brackets and was about to focus on the other recipes when the Alchemy God spoke once again.

"As you have noticed, some of you have opponents right away, and some don't. Twenty-six of you have had the chance to move on to the next round without having an opponent, while the remaining seventy-six will have to go up against someone else," the Alchemy God said, pointing to the bracket above him.

Everyone who looked at it had one of two thoughts. They were either happy that they had gotten the chance to skip the round or sad that they weren't the ones to do so.

Skipping meant having to work on one less recipe, so it was clearly unfair to the ones that just happened to be fast.

"We did not want to move twenty-six of you to the next round at once, but this is just the simplest way to deal with the lack of numbers necessary for the tournament."

He smiled suddenly. "I can already see the concerned looks on many of your faces. I know you want to scream that it is unfair, and so does the audience. And of course, we won't let it be so unfair."

"So, for those that have received the chance to move on to the next round without going up against any opponents, you will still have to deliver a recipe as well as a pill with over 80% harmony. Should you fail to do so, you will be disqualified as well."

"Now, continue and try to do better than your opponent."

Alex chuckled slightly, realizing that skipping the round wasn't really skipping anything. He was still going to have to work anyway. So, he focused back on the pill recipe he was working on and continued from there.