Eternal Cultivation of Alchemy

Somewhere about 10 to 15 kilometers away from the gates of the Ancient Battlefield, there lay a massive gorge on the ground, as if the ground had been split in two.

In fact, the ground had been split into two, and it had been done with none other than a sword.

For a sword cultivator, this place was one of the best places to cultivate in the entire Ancient Battlefield.

Alex arrived at this location not long after. He had learned about this place before even coming here and had planned on learning in this place.

But his plans were for him to come here many days later. However, learning about the aura and how useful it was forcing him to come here.

"The gorge is right in front of us?" Alex asked.

"Yes," Pearl answered.

"Describe it to me," Alex said.

Due to the self-imposed small range of his spiritual sense at the moment, Alex was incapable of seeing anything in there. However, even without it, he could feel the sword aura and could tell that whoever had fought here, had wanted to cut down everywhere.

"The ground looks like it has caved in, but at an angle," Pearl said. Towards us is the thin end of the gorge that was cut open, and it expands as it goes forward and only ends at the feet of a rather large hill," Pearl said.

"Is there any change in scenery?" he asked.

"No, it's the same barren land as we've been walking on for the past hours," he said. "There are also people here. Hundreds, actually."

Alex nodded. He wasn't very surprised. This was a famous place after all.

"How are they seated?" Alex asked.

Pearl looked around. "They're scattered, around the start of the tip of the gorge mostly, but there are some on either side as well," he said. " Although, most are quite far away from the gorge itself."

"I see. Let's go to a relatively open place then," Alex said. "We'll test ourselves against the intent and aura here. If we can withstand this, we can continue moving forward."

"This will help me hone my Sword Aura, and you should be able to look into the laws of the Dao of Cutting or Sharpness," Alex said.

Pearl took Alex to an empty location away from the start of the gorge and saw down.

Alex found himself capable of going even further with relative ease, but he still decided to stay back so that Pearl could take his time.

He sat around the hundreds of people who were all in deep cultivation, doing their best to look into the Intent and Aura that was used to split the earth in half in front of them.

Pearl concentrated on it as well, and so did Alex.

For a while, Alex could feel nothing much at all. So, he decided to sense more, deeper with his spiritual sense.

He sent his spiritual sense further towards the edge of the gorge. He needed to be careful here as the aura from the sword was still quite dangerous for him.

He continued increasing his range and soon entered an area where the sword aura and thereby intent were quite thick. As such, he started concentrating on it from far away.

It took him a while, but he was able to get lost in his own thoughts, as his mind was influenced by the aura and intent he was constantly experiencing.

Soon, he started seeing visions.

Alex saw a man in front of him with a single sword in his hand. Alex didn't know what the man looked like, how he talked, or how he dressed. He didn't even know if that was a man.

He couldn't see what the sword he held was like. Was it metal or wood? Was it a single-edged blade or double-edged? Alex couldn't even see if the man was holding a blade at all.

However, a man holding a sword was the impression he was getting for the moment. The man prepared his sword and swung.

The world lost its colors as light itself seemed to have been cut, and Alex came back to his senses a second later.

He fell into deep thought for a few minutes as to what he had seen before understanding what it was.

Intent. Alex had seen this man's intent. More specifically, he had seen this man's intent to cut everything in his path using his sword, even if the thing he was cutting was light itself.

'Such grand intentions,' Alex thought. He was shocked by exactly what the man thought he could accomplish with his sword skills.

'Are all immortals like this?' he wondered. It was hard for Alex to have such intentions. He didn't even know if it was possible to cut light or not. He had never heard of anyone doing anything like that in the first place to have intentions like this.

But, if that really was possible, then just what else was possible?

Alex began thinking. You could cut space, he knew that. Could you cut time? How would that work?

Could you cut reality? Was that even possible?

Could you cut a soul? A spirit? A mind?

Could you cut the heavens? Could you cut a dao, the very fundamental truths of the world?

If you could, just how strong could you be?

While Pearl focused on learning the truths behind the Dao of cutting hidden within the aura of the sword, Alex started unraveling the possibilities hidden in his future.

He understood that cutting everything was not what he wanted to do with a sword. A sword for him was a means of defense in most scenarios and only a means of hurting or even killing when absolutely needed.

He would rather de-escalate a situation than immediately fight the other person.

However, he was also willing to cut down anyone or anything who stood in front of him and his path forward.

Whether it be Immortals, Divinities, Celestials, or even Gods. Whether it was living or dead. Whether it was the earth, the moon, the sun, or even the stars.

Whether it was space, time, or fate, he would cut everything down and keep moving forward.

Alex felt a clear change in himself after the self-revelations. His mind felt improved for some reason, and it took a moment for him to figure out what had just happened.

'My sword Intent has improved… by quite a lot,' he thought. He could tell that it was now above the threshold of what was necessary for someone to have Sword Aura.

Now, the only thing that was lacking was for his Sword Qi to improve as well. For that, he needed to improve his way of handling the natural sword aura and make the sword Qi as dense as possible.

That was something he could either learn after a long training session or simply improve by understanding how someone else had done it through their sword aura.

With so much of sword aura in front of him, Alex was more than certain that he could gain an understanding of that here. If he was lucky, he would even learn his Sword Aura right here, in this very gorge.