Eternal Cultivation of Alchemy
chapter-2003

There was a certain feeling Alex got from the monolith as it tested his talent. The pulsing energy had been getting progressively stronger, but his body was simply too strong to care about it during the earlier phase.

But now, as it got close to becoming blue, the energy was stronger and Alex felt the strain of it in his body.

Weirdly, while the strain did hurt Alex both physically and mentally, the attack itself didn't seem to be on either of those two. The attack, if there was one, was somewhere else, and the result only appeared as a strain on his body. Was it targeting his talent? Whatever the case, it was still at a level where Alex could handle it rather easily.

Alex waited as the monolith burned bright blue. The redness in the purple was all but gone now and only the blue remained.

When blue shined brightly, Alex could hear gasps from the group of elders who were until then talking among themselves.

"He really did it," one of them said.

"Divine grade talent. We had expected as much, but to see it be verified is still something."

"Wait, the color is still going."

'Divine grade talent?' Alex thought, staring at the color before him. Did blue light mean Divine grade talent?

Then, did purple mean Immortal and Red meant Saint? What did black mean? Was it a True grade or Common? Or did that just not matter because such talents were trash anyway?

Many thoughts went through Alex's mind, and even as that happened, the color kept changing.

The strain in his body was also great at this point, but it wasn't so great that Alex struggled in any way. It was more so uncomfortable, like prickly feelings all over his body, than any actual pain.

The blue in the light slowly faded as Alex stayed there, leaving behind what appeared to be nothing but white light. 'White… Does that mean Celestial grade talent then?' Alex wondered. 'Does God grade not exist?'

From what he remembered, God grade was the highest for talent, but that was created by the senior. Did that not exist? If it did what was the distinction between it and Celestial grade in this monolith?

The color progressively lightened and the strain improved as well. It was beginning to hurt now, still at a level where he could handle it, but if it continued increasing, he would have to stop very soon.

The light lost all of its color in the next few seconds, and it turned fully white. Alex bore the pain he felt and waited for it to get even stronger. However, the pulsing energy Alex felt from the monolith disappeared at once while the glow remained bright white.

All the strain Alex felt disappeared at once, the pain vanishing along with it. He was confused. 'What went wrong?' he thought. 'I can keep going.'

He hoped that the pulsing energy would return, but it didn't. Instead, the bright white light remained burning on the monolith even as he let go.

Alex took 2 steps back and looked at the brightly burning monolith, wondering if he had done something wrong. It had reached White, but that wasn't all there was, was it?

"White!" someone said in shock from behind, prompting Alex to turn around.

He finally saw the 13 elders that were standing just steps away from him, having come next to him at some point he hadn't realized. They were all staring at the monolith, each one of them ignoring him at the moment.

"The highest grade," one of the younger-looking women said.

"This is what I saw. I'm sure of it," the old woman with the frosty white hair said. "I told you I saw white. This is it."

"It must be," the old man with the mole on his cheeks said. It took a while for the elders to get over their shock and look at Alex.

Alex stared at them, surprised that he had only gotten to the Celestial realm. That was… quite low. 'But I could keep going,' he thought. "Is that enough, senior?" Alex asked the old man. "I hope you won't mind me going past the blue light that you requested."

"Huh? What?" the old man asked, having problems forming words thanks to his shock.

"Hah! You nearly let him walk away, sect master. Sister Frosteyes stopped you from making a grave mistake."

"That she did," the man said and turned to look at Alex. "Tell me, young man, are you truly someone with no background of any sort? You are not hiding it from us, are you?"

"I have no background that you would consider special, senior. I was born in a place where cultivators didn't even exist. I had to leave where I was to go and learn cultivation somewhere else," he answered.

"I… just can't believe it," the man said.

Alex was curious now. "Is this… rare?" he asked the man.

"Rare?" the man looked down at Alex in disbelief. The others gave him weird looks for asking the question as well.

"The last time a Celestial grade talent joined our sect was back when the war between humans and demons was still in full effect," Elder Shang said. "There have been quite a few that managed to do it, but those weren't trying to join the sect, but only utilize our resources to train themselves further and return where they came from. Only a single one ever joined."

"Who was it?" one of the other women asked. "Do you know?"

"It was brother Fengyu," the woman answered. "He had shocked many of the elders back then."

A few of the younger elders gasped in shock. "Senior Sixghost?" one of them asked.

Alex was surprised to hear that name as well. The last person before him to turn that monolith white was… Reverend Sixghost?

How talented was that man? And just how rare was a talent like his?

"Do Celestial grade talent not get born that often?" Alex asked curiously.

"No, they get born often enough. But to be born with such talent, you must either be extremely lucky or have your mother fed with pills and elixirs of all sorts while you are in the womb. Talents such as yours are born everywhere, but those are all members of great families and sects."

"On its own, it is just too difficult for a regular person to have talent like yours. That's why I asked if you had a background. I just don't see how else you could've received such a talent."

Alex nodded slowly as he came to an understanding. Celestial-grade talent was rare, but not as rare as he would've assumed it to be. If he wasn't wrong, the other Immortals realms would be teeming with them. He just had to search at the right place.

"You asked for me to light the monolith blue, but I lit it white. I hope you're not offended I did not follow what you said, senior," Alex said.

"Screw formality, young man. We're way past that point now," the old man, who was the sect master, said out of nowhere. "I want you to join our sect one way or another. Let us talk about how we can make that happen."