Eternal Cultivation of Alchemy
chapter-2039

Alex looked at the three men in front of him, quickly analyzing which ones he could fight. Two of them were in the Immortal Ascendant 7th realm, while the final one was in the 9th realm. Even if he had a Battle Power of 2, he would be difficult for Alex to fight against.

If all 3 fought him together, it would be impossible for him to win.

Pearl was even worse off, as even the weaker two were trouble for him. Unless he used that mark that appeared on his forehead, it would be a loss.

'Should I let him join the fight?' Alex thought. Considering that the two sabers were right there, this was a situation that demanded them to use what they could. Even if the two of them had to give everything they had and get thrown out of the secret realm in the process, they had to use it in order to achieve those sabers.

Alex pulled out Midnight, staring at the men who were staring at each other and at Alex and Pearl.

"Brother…" Pearl called through their bond. "What do we do?"

Alex got ready to fight but didn't start the fight himself. His eyes glowed purple as he turned to look at the Sabers. He needed to make sure that the Sabers were—

The man sent an attack flying at Pearl, who was simply too close to dodge. Alex swung his sword at the same time, destroying the fiery attack.

The other two men moved at the same time, coming for Alex. Alex turned and grabbed Pearl, before sending him into his Soul Space.

At the same time, he swung Midnight, striking the incoming sword slashes, throwing the two men back. They struck the wall at the back, but the wall took no visible damage at all.

Alex ran backward, creating some distance between him at the three men. He was at the edge of the long pathway, right next to the turn. He couldn't take the turn.

The moment he walked past that point and these people somehow left, the section would change. Whatever happened next, he had to sit and watch.

The men looked at Alex and were about to attack him too, but before they could do that, the strongest of them turned around and made a run for the sabers.

Whoever got the saber first would be its owner, so the man wanted to get to it before the other two. There was no sharing of these sabers so there were no multiple winners in this race.

The two realized the situation as well and ran behind the man.

Alex watched the three, unmoving. His purple eyes glowed, watching the colorful area around the sabers, the mass of light that should not exist there unless…

The air rippled when the man got to it. As soon as he arrived, he realized what had happened.

Illusion.

The sabers were an illusion, and these illusions were meant to draw him up to that spot.

Something struck the man at his chest, like a whip of air. Immediately, a teleportation aura surrounded him and he was taken away.

The other two men were too late to stop as well. They were struck the same way, immediately being forced to teleport out of the secret realm.

The colors in the air morphed for Alex as the whip came for him too, despite the great distance he was in. Without a moment's hesitation, Alex teleported to the side, beyond the turn of the place.

He only heard the crack of the whip behind him, hitting the wall. When he turned to look at the section, he saw nothing different there at all. He quickly walked back into the pathway, cautious the entire time, and saw a dead end where there was previously the illusion of the sabers.

He took a deep breath as he realized how close he was to being killed should he have stayed there for a moment longer.

Pearl came out, concerned. "Brother, are you—" he paused and looked around. "Where are they? Where are the sabers?"

"A trap," Alex said. "Illusions, meant to draw us there so we can be attacked. That must have been what happened to those girls too."

Pearl was confused. "So those Sabers weren't real?" he asked.

"No," Alex replied. "I can't even be sure the Sabers are real anymore."

There was also that technique Godslayer told him about that belonged to the Saber god, the one that allowed someone to replicate their weapons. He had been on the lookout for them as well, but a bunch of text was a much more difficult item to find than sabers. Texts could be written anywhere, and he wouldn't know.

If the treasure was not the sabers but rather the texts, was there a chance that he could find it within this maze? The main problem Alex had about the entire situation was that he wasn't sure if the treasures hadn't been taken away yet. The Elders on the outside were confident it wasn't taken away, but what if someone had?

"What do we do now?" Pearl asked. Alex stopped thinking needlessly about the treasures that could be there and focused on the treasures that were there. "Let's see what comes up next here."

After going back and forth through the section for a while, the path turned to a Dead End again, and Alex left to find other regions.

Days passed, and then weeks. Alex and Pearl roamed the maze, trying to find interesting locations hidden within it. The best thing they had yet found was a mound of dirt with a thick Earth aura that seemed to contain more than just the basic Earth Dao.

If Alex was not wrong, the thing he had found there was a mound of dirt that had been filled with an aura of True Earth Dao.

Pearl didn't have any Earth spiritual root, so Alex and Whisker were the only ones who could benefit from it. They sat around the mound for days, learning what they could from it.

Alex gained a much deeper understanding of the Earth Dao and also gained some insight into the other daos such as the Dao of Crystal and Dao of Hardness.

He couldn't take the mound away, and he couldn't waste all of this time there either, so reluctantly, Alex left the place and went to find other locations.

Weeks started passing as Alex and Pearl went around the maze, finding somewhat useful things, but none nearly as important as they could be. Most of the important locations were also filled with people who were hostile enough to fight anyone who wanted to come close to them.

"I don't think we'll find anything else here," Alex said to Pearl. "Nearly two months have passed already since we entered the maze and we found neither the sabers nor the technique."

Pearl nodded. "The secret realm is more than just the maze. There are other things out there."

Alex nodded back. "We have yet to see what the places are like, see if we can find some sort of clue to the treasures."

"I agree," Pearl said. "Let's leave."

And so, the two of them retraced their steps back to the entrance of the maze and walked out.