Eternal Cultivation of Alchemy

Alex held Midnight in the open garden with his eyes closed as he concentrated on sending all of his Sword Intent into the sword. Midnight glowed brightly to signify the presence of the Sword Qi.

Alex added the next Intent into the sword and specks of Sword Qi started flowing out from it, quickly surrounding his immediate vicinity, creating Sword Aura.

As it happened, Alex continued pouring in more of his Intent, this time the Intent of him embracing his sword. This was the most important part.

He had to focus all of his mental energy on adding this Intent while already using the other 2 Intents, but he still forced it to happen and that created flashes of very thin light around him.

He tried to take notice of those sparks, those Sword Qi that were forming around him, but it was difficult. He could not take away his attention as well as he thought he could.

Thankfully, he didn't have to do it for too long. He stopped all of his focus and opened his eyes, looking around him. Sparks of sword Qi vanished, but as they vanished, he saw some of them.

Like hair-thin fractures in space, those sword Qi were nigh impossible to see with one's eyes unless you were looking for them in the first place.

All the Sword Qi winked out around him, and Alex sighed. "That was Sword Domain, wasn't it?" he asked.

Scarlet sat on a chair off to the side in the garden with Whisker on her lap, who she slowly pet.

"It… I want to say it is Sword Domain, but it feels to me like you are still not capable of fully creating it. Maybe you are not in there yet? I'm not very knowledgeable when it comes to weapons, so I can only tell you what I've seen," Scarlet said.

"People in your realm didn't have weapon domains a lot?" Alex asked.

"You might not have noticed but beasts usually don't use weapons," Scarlet said. "Especially ones with a strong bloodline. They have pride in their bloodline and refrain from using any sort of weapons."

"Pearl's father had a broken spear staff in his Soul Space. Did he not use a spear?" Alex asked.

Scarlet thought for a while. "Well, the ones that were chosen to come here weren't really that talented, so our elders didn't care much what we did. Maybe he decided to learn Spear here? I couldn't tell you. He never used it during the battle 5000 years ago, and we were never close enough that we could tell what the others used or did not."

Alex was slightly taken aback. "You guys weren't close before coming here?" he asked.

"We might have seen each other here and there during the thousands of years we were alive, but no, we did not know each other before we were chosen to come to this realm. It was only in the days leading to our departure that we even learned each other's name," Scarlet said.

"That… is wild to me. I don't know why I thought the four heavenly beasts were close like families," Alex said.

"No, we are not that close," Scarlet said. "The elders obviously are close with each other and know each other, but our palaces are on different sections of the realm, farther away than the entire length of this realm. So we don't really get to know each other a lot."

Alex was surprised. "I always imagined the four heavenly beasts living in a giant city, all in different mansions, but in the same area."

"You're just wrong in the scale of things is all," Scarlet said.

"I guess," Alex said. "Anyway, that was Sword Domain, or at least the beginning of it, right?"

"Yeah, we can call it the beginning. You're stepping into it. A bit more cultivation base, a bit more practice, and you should be able to do it," Scarlet said.

Alex nodded with a bright smile. "I will have to try my hardest then," he said.

"Okay," Scarlet said. "You didn't bring me here to let me see your Sword skills certainly. Why am I here?"

"I did call you to help me understand if it is Sword Domain that I was using," Alex said. "I didn't want to have to go to Brother Shen for something so simple. But, I suppose I have something more to ask of you."

Alex brought out a bunch of stuff and started showing it to Scarlet. The items floated in the air around Scarlet, and she looked at each of them with her bright red eyes.

"We got these from the Azure Dragon's Soul Space. What is good and what is not?" Alex asked.

Scarlet looked at the pills first. "Those are just some healing pills. You can give me those," she said and took the pills.

"What? You should ask Pearl for it. It belonged to his father," Alex said.

"Oh… right," Scarlet said and put the two Immortal pills back where she took them from. She looked at the broken bits of green metal.

"Is this the spear you were talking about?" she asked. "Not a bad metal. I wonder how much it cost him to buy this."

"These two are escape treasures," Scarlet said as she took two circular treasures made up of metal. They were what Alex noticed to have an aura of Teleportation around them.

"Escape treasures? So they are for teleporting away?" Alex asked.

"Yes," Scarlet said. "But not just any type of escape though. This is not like those talismans you can get. These treasures, you can set a location you want to teleport to, and when you use it, you will be teleported there."

Alex thought for a bit. "Wait, so they are escape treasures, but you choose where you escape to?" he asked.

"Yes," Scarlet said.

Alex was surprised. "That's… that's incredible," he said.

"Not really," Scarlet said and then made a thinking face. "Actually, it is quite good for humans, I suppose. These treasures are made using Dragon scales and the Azure Dragons use their Space and Teleportation Dao to make these, so they are quite freely available for anyone who can afford it in the Land of the Blessed Sun."

"And this?" Alex asked, pointing to a ring to the side.

Scarlet looked at the ring for a bit. "This…" she thought for a bit and poured some Qi into it. "I see. As I thought, this is a ring where you can store a single attack and can use it without any delay."

"Just like the Mirror," Alex said excitedly. "And the attack can be from anyone?"

"Yes," Scarlet said.

Alex got happy. "Will you store one of your attacks in it for me?" he asked.

Scarlet looked at him in the eye and shook her head.

Alex was taken aback. "Why not?" he asked.

"What if you accidentally kill someone?" she asked. "I would die."

"Oh… right. You should be worried about that," he said. "Alright, no worries. I will save one myself then."

He looked at the other things that floated around and grabbed the box with the talisman inside that he couldn't read.

"This is the one I wanted to ask you about," he said. "What is this?"