Eternal Cultivation of Alchemy

Alex teleported far away to the right, his body sliding in half as both halves fell from the sky, slamming hard into the ground.

The half of Alex with his intact Dantian, the half where his soul was at the moment, started growing, using the Qi in his body.

Alex could experience everything through the soul, so he used what little blood his body still had to draw the Qi from it and use it to heal himself.

Even as he did, the Dragon Emperor landed by his side with a slam, sending dust everywhere.

He huffed loudly, his body moving lethargically. He had been affected extremely by how much Qi he had to expend for that last attack.

Fortunately, he had been successful with it.

"You're like a little worm," he said, watching Alex's slowly growing body. "No matter how much I kill you, your body still continues moving."

Midnight trembled a little on Alex's right hand as if wanting to move on its own. But there was nothing Alex could do at the moment.

The Dragon Emperor started chopping up his body as it healed, almost as a sport.

"You've cultivated your body to quite the extent," he said softly. "It is perhaps stronger than mine was before I ascended."

He chopped up more of Alex's body.

"Where is your ring?" the Dragon Emperor asked, looking at his hand. He cut away Alex's hand holding Midnight and looked at it.

"Hmm, must be on the other half of your body," he said and pulled the bloody body out of the rubble.

Alex's absolutely dead half came toward the Dragon Emperor, his eyes wide open and staring blankly outside.

He pulled the ring from his finger. "Finally, this is mine," he said. He didn't have the time to check whether everything he needed was there or not.

It would take him a lot of time to break through Alex's refining and gain full access to the ring.

"I have to be certain," the Dragon Emperor said and began searching for something.

Alex panicked very much. Whenever he tried to heal his body, the Dragon Emperor cut it away, wasting more of his Qi.

'I can't die like this,' Alex thought. 'This is not how I'm supposed to die.'

He thought of a way he could still survive. If someone could come and fight him, someone strong. Could Hannah help him?

Alex didn't know who could help him right now. Either way, he had to help himself first. He needed to get the Dragon Emperor away from himself.

'The Immortal Puppet?' Alex thought. He had 3 of them, and he had used two already. Could he use the last one?

He tried to pull the Immortal Puppet out, only to realize he no longer had a connection with his Soul Space.

'What?' Alex wondered. 'What is going on?'

The Soul Space was supposed to move along to his Soul once his body was dead, was it not? That was how it worked.

Only, was his body dead right now? His was an Undying body, that could truly never be dead. Could it be that perhaps the other half of his body, which had been cut away held the Soul space still?

The Soul Space was physically supposed to be near one's heart, and his heart was definitely on the other body right now.

If he used his spiritual sense to reach for it, he could do it. He would alert the Dragon Emperor to his Nascent Soul's survival, but that was a risk he was willing to take.

He had to. There was no other choice.

Just as Alex reached for his other body, the Dragon Emperor's senses reached into his dantian and found him.

A spear thrust into his body, tearing open his naval region so that the Dragon Emperor could reach into it and pull out Alex's Nascent soul.

Alex resisted the Dragon Emperor, trying to fight his grasp, but as a Nascent Soul, there was truly nothing he could do at the moment.

The Dragon Emperor roared with laughter at Alex's pathetic situation. "I told you that you would not win. You did not listen to me," he spoke toward Alex. "This is what comes of that."

Alex's soul heaved heavily as though taking in deep breaths.

"Don't fear," the Dragon Emperor said. "You won't die just yet. You still have many things to teach me. I will draw every single secret out of you, I will learn every technique, every skill, every knowledge that you have. And then I will become a strong Immortal, perhaps even as great as the Alchemy God. And only then will you have my permission to die."

The Dragon Emperor put Alex's Nascent Soul into his own storage ring. Once Alex's soul was gone, finally he let out a long sigh of relief.

It had been a long and arduous day, with the sun far down in the sky than it had been when he had left his palace today.

He picked up Alex's sword and looked at it. He could feel the intense weight and a small hint of resistance on the inside that could not resist him.

"Not a bad sword. I could make good use of you," the Dragon Emperor thought and put Midnight into his storage ring.

He looked toward Alex's corpse next and shook his head. There was nothing more there that he wanted to take away.

He took a deep breath and looked inside himself to see what his situation was. He was nearly dried up of all Immortal Qi.

This would not do. He had to leave this place now that he had received everything he had.

He spun quickly, his spear moving with him to strike back against an Immortal attack that came for him.

Hannah arrived next to him, her eyes red with fury. She looked at the ground next to the Dragon Emperor and her eyes flashed wide open in shock when she saw Alex's lifeless corpse.

She had kept hope that Alex wasn't dead. That he was only cut in half. He could recover from such damage easily. He had shown that he could do that quite a few times previously.

However, seeing his body like that, she could tell that not even his soul remained in that body. It was dead.

Shock filled her, but it was anger that moved her.

"I will kill you," Hannah said in a low voice, moving Starweaver around to attack the Dragon Emperor.

The Dragon Emperor fought back, knowing there wasn't much he needed to do to win this. She had already lost against him, he could do it once again.

Compared to Alex, Hannah was too straightforward to be of any trouble.

He charged his spear with the remaining bits of his Immortal Qi, ready to attack Hannah.

Just as he did, he felt his finger grow hot. He could not ignore what was happening and turned his head to look at his finger.

For some reason, his Storage ring which was usually supposed to be dark in color, was now glowing bright white with silver light for some reason.

Not only did it glow, but it also started trembling for some reason. The Dragon Emperor knew not what was happening to it.