Eternal Cultivation of Alchemy

Before the tournament battles started, Mao Yingtai had something else to do. She had to reveal the amount of points everyone had received in the secret realm, especially the ones that were to be seeded in the competition.

There were going to be 16 seeds in total, who wouldn't have to fight until the Top 16 were decided from the remaining. Adding the seeded, there would be another round to finalize the real top 16.

When the points were revealed for everyone to see, gasps of shock ran through everyone in the room, and most definitely through everyone in the stands outside.

Alex stood at the top of the list with nearly 80 thousand points. The closest to him was Sarah with only 29 thousand points. After that surprisingly the leader of the group of 5 tried to attack Alex while he was breaking through.

That man had a total of 21 thousand points.

Alex looked through the list and frowned at the lack of Zhou Boqin in the list. Had they removed him because he had died? Were they trying to hide his death?

Whatever the case, Alex saw no reason to worry.

A simple explanation of Alex not taking part in the tournament was made and the remaining top 16 were given the seed. 

Alex remembered most of the names on that list. Every single one of them was someone he had fought. Many of them had even taken his pills while he trained his sword. 

After that, they went through a few statistics of the various points based on age, cultivation base, and kingdom.

Surprisingly, the highest number of points gathered in total was by the Ebony kingdom. No one could tell if it was a coincidence, or if it had something to do with the fact that the Ebony kingdom was the largest in size of all the other kingdoms, with few places that weren't inhabited.

After that information was given, the Silver Queen had no reason to remain on the stage anymore and arrived at the stands with all the others.

After a quick greeting, Mao Yingtai slumped on her chair, almost disregarding the Empress and the Crown Prince around her, not to mention everyone else.

"I hate how much work that was," she said in a deep sigh. "At least I'm done with it now." 

A few people around her gave her some words of comfort and then focused on the matches that were going to start soon.

The Continental Tournament was going to have over 8 thousand participants from what Alex had gathered, and that was going to take a long time to get through. Perhaps for as long as it would take.

Multiple stages were prepared for the starting battles, and soon they were underway. 

Inside the shades stands where Alex and the rest lay, multiple screens had appeared, each focusing on one stage or another. People could only watch the matches through this as all Spiritual senses were blocked from entering the stage.

Battles started and ended, one after another. Many people that Alex did not recognize fought each other, oftentimes one easily coming out in front of the other with ease.

There were a few times when the fighting got tense, and those were the fun ones to watch, but this early on there weren't as many of such fights.

It took nearly 10 days for the first round of battles to end and the 2nd round to start. At that time, Alex saw the few people he cared about watching in the tournament.

Shan Wangjiu, Talia, Fang Yimu, and Mao Yingkong had to fight normally to get through the competition, but it wasn't that difficult for them. After this fight, he knew when they would show up in a fight next.

He left the stands once nearly 14 days into the competition and returned 2 days later. He had made excuses to have to go cultivate, and that was what the people thought he was making. Excuses.

Alas, he truly had to go cultivate. Going for 2 weeks was difficult without dealing with the Yin that gathered in his body. If he didn't do something about it, it would affect his cultivation base.

Not that he could tell anyone about it. It was a somewhat annoying situation in moments like these when people were gathered and could stay there for months without having to do anything.

He couldn't wait until his Qi was strong enough to not get affected by the Yin again.

Shan Wangjiu had a somewhat difficult battle against his next opponent, a man who used a giant war axe as a weapon. Their cultivation base was similar, so it took him a while to defeat the man. There were so many weaker opponents still around, so it was quite unlucky for both of them.

The rest had uneventful matches.

The 2nd round of battle ended faster than last time, in just 6 days. And then the third round began.

Shan Wangjiu had an easy time this time around with his opponent being someone weaker than him. He also seemed to have broken through to Saint Soul 3rd realm after the last battle, so he was doing better.

Talia had a rather difficult battle in the 3rd round. With cultivation in the Saint Core realm, she should have still been considered to be one of the stronger individuals in the competition. However, she ended up coming across someone just slightly stronger than her and ended up losing.

The rest managed to win through easily.

The next few rounds went faster and faster, and after a month with some setup of the hosts, only 256 people remained. 

The Top 256 fought, and Shan Wangjiu sadly lost his battle. There were too many stronger individuals around and he couldn't make it past that.

Fang Yimu nearly lost as well, but she managed to make it through with the skin of her teeth.

Mao Yingkong had a much easier time than the rest thanks to not having to fight someone very strong.

Top 128 and Top 64 went by, and on Top 32, Fang Yimu lost against someone with a cultivation base of Saint Soul 8th realm. 

Mao Yingkong managed to make it through, but when the true Top 32 was created by adding the 16 seeded individuals, he immediately lost to Ren Wujin, who had become his opponent.

On the final top 16, Alex recognized everyone and had no one he truly rooted for. If he had to name someone, it would be Sarah, but it was easy to see that she would most definitely be the person to win here.

Ren Wujin managed to pass the Top 16 and lost in the Top 8.

Teng Xuegang also lost in Top 8.

The Azure Prince lost in the Top 4.

The finale was between Sarah and the leader of the group that had attacked Alex.

After a fearsome battle that seemed to shake the world itself, Sarah managed to emerge victorious thanks to her quick wits and fast attacks.

Sounds of cheers and noise erupted at her victory, with fireworks and paper lanterns completely lighting up the night.

2 months passed since the beginning of the tournament and finally, it was completed with Sarah's victory.