Rise of the Alchemy God

Chapter 158: Trouble Ahead

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Time passed, and the remaining three days flew by.

Finally, the long-awaited day arrived in the capital.

During this time, aside from cultivating, Ethan hadn't done much else.

He had been invited out by the first category disciples, but he refused.

He didn't know them and felt no need to get acquainted.

Right now, he wanted to make the most of his time, advancing his cultivation as much as possible.

Unlike ordinary people, Ethan didn't have a normal perception of time.

After all, he had a dimension where time flowed faster.

If he had gone out, he probably would have wasted 2-3 hours, which in the smaller dimension would amount to 12 days, a considerable amount of time for him.

As far as he was concerned, he wouldn't be interacting with these people after the tournament, since aside from Xiang Hua and him, no one else here belonged to his sect.

And lately, he had been leaving his residence less and less, cultivating whenever he could.

The amount of Qi needed for each level increased by 1 million each time.

By making an approximate estimate, he could tell it would take him three full years of refining pills for each million Qi gathered, producing perfect-grade level 3 pills.

From this, it could be deduced that the maximum time within which he could advance to the end of this stage wouldn't be a matter of years or even decades but could comfortably stretch to a century or two.

And this was considering only the quantity of Qi to gather, then refining it and feeding it to the sphere would require additional time.

In other words, he didn't have time to waste.

Now that he had recharged his brain with that free day spent wandering around with Bai Yu, he knew it was time to seriously focus on his cultivation again.

Infact, after the tournament, he was considering returning to the dimension and cultivating in seclusion.

There wasn't much else for him to do out here, so he might as well take another leave and lock himself up in his residence for a year or two.

While thinking about this, he had already left his room and was heading towards the atrium to join the rest of the group.

Once he arrived, Elder Shu checked that everyone was present, and they finally set off towards the tournament venue.

The capital was large and had various public buildings for all kinds of events.

At the moment, the building many people in the capital were heading to was a large coliseum, big enough to hold 100,000 spectators.

Once they arrived at the coliseum, two guards at the entrance approached to confirm their identities.

Elder Shu took care of this, and once their participation was confirmed, they entered.

As they entered, Ethan continued to examine the surroundings of the coliseum, trying to get a sense of the people who would be participating.

"Hmm, it seems there are quite a few powerful beings here," he thought, noticing several auras of potent figures scattered throughout the coliseum area.

Most of these were likely figures of a certain level, invited to oversee or monitor the situation at the coliseum.

Only a few of them were companions of participants or spectators.

While casually scanning everyone, he didn't worry about being noticed by anyone who could perceive his spiritual sense, mainly because he knew how to conceal it from anyone who wasn't at least a stage or two higher than him.

The number of things Ethan perfected during these 25 years of seclusion was quite significant.

Even regarding his rare flame, he had find various methods to use it to his advantage in combat and other things, including pill refining.

As he examined the various participants, he noticed something.

"Wait, this..." Ethan's calm expression shifted slightly as he sensed a strange but familiar aura.

"Could I have been mistaken?" he thought, noticing that the aura had vanished as soon as he detected it.

It was as if it had disappeared into thin air the moment he sensed it.

What he had perceived was none other than demonic Qi.

Ethan knew he hadn't made a mistake, so he tried expanding his search range further and once again noticed that aura.

But this time, it wasn't alone.

He detected at least three more spread throughout the area.

Ethan wondered why beings tainted with that energy had suddenly appeared in this place, but then, recalling the incident a couple of months ago, he remembered the cultivator had said something about the organization behind him, claiming they would overthrow the current Long Empire.

"Could it be that they've moved to attack the capital during this event?" he wondered, thinking he might be overthinking it.

But then again, he couldn't just ignore them.

After all, it was demonic energy, and regardless of the situation, it would inevitably lead to some kind of catastrophe.

Perhaps they wouldn't attack the empire so soon, but if these figures with that aura had appeared here, it meant something unpleasant was going to happen at the tournament.

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"What do you think of this situation?" he asked as he continued walking with the others.

Bai Yu, who was hidden in his sleeve, had also sensed those auras and could tell they were users of demonic energy.

"Given the concentration of demonic Qi in them, we can say they aren't part of the demonic race but are merely infected by it.

It's likely they've come to sabotage the alchemy tournament, but as for why they're doing it, I'm not sure.

That said, leaving them unchecked isn't an option for us," she said as Ethan's sleeve moved slightly, then stopped.

Although nothing was seen, Bai Yu had just exited the sleeve and blended into the crowd.

"You continue with the tournament while I try to follow them and see what they're up to," she said.

"Be careful not to get caught," he replied, knowing there wasn't much need to worry.

Bai Yu was currently assuming a reduced form of her draconic form.

Essentially, she was a small white snake coiled around his arm under his robe.

Ethan silently prayed for the unfortunate one among the four who would become her target.

She might not show it, but that dragon woman could be quite aggressive at times.

He still remembered some training sessions with her when he reached the fifth stage and thought he could hold his own against her in combat, but instead he ended up being beaten by her.

It was clear he still lacked a lot of combat experience.

He snapped out of his thoughts when the group arrived at a small room dedicated to them.

This was where they would participate in the various competitions.

In other words, it was their temporary lodging.