Eternal Cultivation of Alchemy

2202  Hardrock City

A year before the tournament's determined date, the Alchemy God's people, the ones managing the tournament had released a set of rules for all the participants to follow.

There were about 25 different rules, some obvious ones, and some interesting ones.

The main ones that mattered to Alex were 3 different ones.

First, one could not get any aid from any outsider during any part of the competitions, which included their family, masters, and friends obviously, but they were allowed to rely on their bonded beasts.

Alex was surprised when he first read those rules since it was easy for someone to temporarily bond with Divine beasts for the period of the competition, but Silvermist had said that it was not possible.

If there were a Divine beast, then they would instead be the master in the bonded relationship, and by technicality alone, they would not count as they would be a master.

The second rule was that one had to register all artifacts they were going to use during the competition. Any usage of unregistered artifacts could be considered in violation of the tournament and was grounds for their disqualification. 

To make things stricter, the competition holders held the right to decide if an artifact was allowed or not for the competition. One could register an artifact at any period during the tournament, so there was no worry about accidentally missing out on an artifact.

Alex was initially worried that some of his cauldrons would be rejected, but Silvermist assured him that this rule was to weed out any who wanted to make it far up in the tournament with borrowed strength.

That was what they intended to stop.

Finally, the last important rule made them aware that for a significant portion of the tournament, neither they nor their bonded beasts were allowed to use their Soul Space.

That was quite the odd requirement that was put onto them that Alex couldn't make sense of. Silvermists had ideas about why that rule was put into place, but he too wasn't entirely certain. It appeared this rule came out of a meeting he wasn't present for.

The best guess either of them could come up with was that the rule was put there to make the battlefield more leveled for the Saints as they would have to be competing against Immortals.

These three and the other rules had been around for a year at this point, so everyone was aware of it and accepting of it already. So, by the time they arrived in God's Domain, everyone was more or less prepared for everything they would have to follow.

The ban on travel for foreigners had been lifted at this point, so with every teleportation thousands of individuals arrived in God's Domain.

Alex and the rest walked out of the building into a busy street, filled to the brim with many that were foreign to this continent. While many had come to participate, most had come only to spectate.

Since the events of the competition could only be seen directly by the individuals on the continent itself, everyone had already arrived on the continent and filled up the cities there.

Thankfully, for anyone registering for the tournament, a different section had already been separated out for them in a faraway city.

Alex and the group quickly made their way to a city in the east called Hardrock. It was one of the lesser cities in the continent with a low population. But that made it perfect for a place where the tournament could be held.

With thousands and thousands of participants, they needed to start somewhere.

Alex hadn't been to this continent before, so he enjoyed the view along the way as they flew over to Hardrock City. The land of God's Domain was mostly rolling hills, broken irregularly by rivers or large spans of plains.

The city where the Alchemy God stayed, Whitesong City, lied further south from where they had arrived in the continent. Alex wouldn't get to see the city before the tournament's end, it seemed.

Alex took note of the places they passed through as they flew, but even with his master's ship that was so incredibly fast, it took them nearly half a day to reach the city in the east.

God's Domain was quite the lengthy continent after all.

Even before they arrived at the city, Alex could already see a plethora of people making their way to the city. Most of them were participants, but surely a lot of them were audiences as well.

It was announced that no person unaffiliated with any participants was allowed to come to this city, and yet people still did anyway. They did remain on the outskirts of the city, however, not entering it entirely.

They were teetering on breaking the law but didn't break it.

Alex finally saw the city by itself, a massive spread of houses and open lands across more rolling hills, this time surrounded by a large river on all sides.

Giant rocks protruded from the grounds all around them, ones that were particularly strong. The outskirts of these locations had long since been used as a quarry for these rocks as they were great in construction materials. Their hardness made them great materials.

Silvermist put the ship away and landed outside of the city. There was a long line of people who were waiting to register and be verified to go into the city.

Instead of staying in that line, however, Silvermist walked right past everyone. Alex followed his master without question, but as heads began turning toward them, he did wonder if they were cutting in line.

Surely his master wasn't going to use his status to ignore the queue, right? While might was right in the cultivation world, it still did not make it any less shitty to do these things.

There were several outbursts from the waiting people upon seeing Silvermist's group move forward. A few even moved out of the line to confront them. However, each and every single one of them shrunk back in fear when Grimsight stepped forward, standing between them and Silvermist.

Not a single one said another thing once they could feel the dread they got once they saw Grimsight. Their survival instincts kicked in immediately.

Silvermist laughed the entire way through, mocking the ones that called him out. He dared them to try and do the same as him while walking straight to the front.

No one accepted his dare. They instead looked forward to watching him get humiliated when he was forced to be sent all the way back.

One of the guards registering the participants quickly noticed Silvermist and was about to say something when Silvermist handed him a talisman with the Alchemy God's insignia —a leaf etched on a scroll— on it.

The man quickly read through the talisman and realized not only who the man before him was, but also that he was one of the people given priority to registration.

Once the next participants moved into the city, Silvermist and Alex moved there next, as those next in line were made to wait while Alex and Silvermist registered for the tournament.