Eternal Cultivation of Alchemy

"You've come," the Emperor looked at Alex as he walked in.

"Yes," Alex said. "I was just about to leave to roam the city when your message got to me. Have you finally decided what to give me?"

"Yes," the Dragon Emperor said and handed over something to Alex

Alex took the object and saw that it was a medallion made up of some sort of strong metal that looked a lot like silver. On the medallion was the emblem of the Azure Imperium, a single sword with the azure dragon coiling around it.

Alex poured some Qi into it, but nothing seemed to happen to it. "What is this?" he asked curiously.

"It's a Dragon Medallion," the Emperor said. "It gives you the highest authority in the continent aside from the Emperor and the Crown Prince, making you effectively the 3rd most important person."

Alex was a little surprised. "And you're giving this to me? In exchange for the pill?" he asked.

"Yes," the Emperor said. "On the condition that only you can use this. No one else."

Alex looked at the medallion for a bit. "Can I deploy your military with this?" he asked.

"Do you want to?" the Emperor asked.

"I'm just asking," Alex said with a bit of a chuckle.

"Yes, you can," the Emperor said. "You can deploy troops, change kings, and do whatever else you want in the continent. As I said, you have the third highest authority."

"Even above the other princes?" Alex couldn't help but ask.

"Even above both of my other sons, yes," the Emperor said. "But of course, you should know its not as free as you might be thinking to yourself. In the first place, you can't perform a lot of significant actions because they will be reported back to me or my son, and we will have complete control over if we accept that choice of yours or not."

"That makes sense," Alex said. "And what about the other kings? Can I make decisions for them as well?"

"Those kings can report back to us as well, so I don't really see the point of trying," the Emperor said.

"Then what exactly is the point of this thing?" Alex asked.

"It gives you freedom in all of the empire. To go anywhere you want without restriction, to do whatever you want as long as it doesn't conflict our rule," the Emperor said. "There are much more uses that I'm sure you can find out on your own."

"I can," Alex said, looking at the medallion with a curious look. This was definitely worth it for the 100 pill recipes according to the Emperor, but Alex wasn't sure if that was true or not.

"You also don't have to pay to enter a lot of different places that you otherwise might have to," the Emperor said.

"Alright, I will accept it," Alex said and pulled out the 100 talismans that he handed over to the emperor.

The oath buzzed between the two of them as it was partially fulfilled.

The Emperor sighed in relief. "Alright, I will now go into closed cultivation to learn more. If you need anything, which you shouldn't thanks to that medallion, talk with my son."

"Okay," Alex said. "Good luck on forming a pill cloud. I'll return when I have another thing to trade."

He walked away from the room, leaving the emperor to himself. With the Emperor going into closed cultivation to train his alchemy skill, Alex wondered how many years it would be before he saw the man again.

2 years? 5 years?

He would certainly use that time to explore the land.

He left the palace afterward, going out into the city. He wanted to visit the various schools, but he left that for the middle of the day. For now, he was going to visit the rest of the city and see how it differed in the Eastern Continent.

For one, it actually looked like the Dragon Capital had some city planning done with how it was set up and not just based on how people set up in the early days. That way, the city looked wide and open while also having enough space to take in everything.

Most the buildings still followed the same traditional pattern with the red tiled roofs that curved outwards onto a tip with its pagoda like features. There were various trees planted along the side of the road, each of which was there to improve the city's overall quality.

The city was prosperous, with regular stores and shops selling whatever a cultivator needed. It almost seemed like there were no mortals in the city.

Alex went through a few shops, seeing the quality of the items that were sold and was quite genuinely shocked.

Perhaps it was it was the capital of the entire continent, the items sold here were of generally extremely good quality. He had went through a few alchemy shops to find that most of the regular ingredients sold were capable of reaching more than 80% harmony with a good recipe.

In most other places, one would have to go to auctions and similar places to acquire such good ingredients.

Alex didn't have many things he wanted to buy, so he just window shopped for the day. After going around, looking at what sort of activities one could do in the city, he didn't find any that particularly interested him.

There were some recreational facilities and even some gambling houses, but Alex didn't find any interest in those.

So, he decided to finally visit one of the schools for the day. His choice of school to visit was the Poison school for the day.

He wanted to see how they dealt with the problem he had thought of.

The poison school was similar to the alchemy school in how it functioned. The school had levels to the teaching that was done there, each including requirements before every level.

The headmaster of that school, a middle-aged man with streaks of gray hair told Alex about everything that went on in the school, clearing up his confusion.

The poison arts required one to have a intensive knowledge about the poisons and how they interacted with each other. The poisons didn't simply belong to plants and animals, but also anything that could be synthetically created from other materials that were naturally found or made by the poison masters.

They were mostly taught to make 3 types of poisons. One that needed ingesting, one that needed breathing, and finally one that simply needed contact.

There were also some weirder poisons in how they needed to be applied, but those were the main there. And they were taught to each person that wanted to learn.

"How do you make sure what you're teaching isn't being used by the wrong person in the wrong place?" Alex asked the headmaster.

"Before each level, our students are made to swear an oath that they will not use what is taught here on anyone unless the order came from the royal family, or their life is in danger," the man said. "That way, we can stop our students from exploiting what they have learned here."

"I see," Alex said, nodding to himself as the words made sense. "Do you think I can test my poison knowledge to see what level I can reach?"