Alex and the many alchemists stood in front of the Alchemy gate of the Realm of Trials. His 21 alchemists stood surrounding him, while the thousands and thousands of others were there as well.

And this was just for the alchemy trials.

Each of the 6 entryways was there for individual trials. Aside from alchemy trials, there were the Talisman trials, Formation trials, Artifact trials, Music trials, and Painting trials.

There were no cooking or poison trials as he would’ve expected the place to have, but it didn’t. As for Beast taming and Puppetry, Alex could understand why those weren’t there.

They didn’t fall under production at all, which these trials were set to test.

From what Alex had heard about the trials, there were multiple tests inside, not unlike the tests back in the Sundering Sanctum, but this time thousands could take the test at once.

If they passed, they moved on to the next test. If they failed, they would be sent outside, in which case they would have to wait for their turn to come again to get tested.

Given that there were tens of thousands of people waiting, one would have to wait a while for their turn to come.

Due to the nature of Alex’s status, his cultivators had been given double priority when it came to entering the trials. They would be the first ones to enter, and when they failed and left, they would get to enter again without having to wait in line. It would happen just twice, and after that they would have to wait as everyone else.

As for Alex himself, he had permanent priority. No matter how many times he failed, he would always get to enter when he wanted to.

There were soldiers all around the realm of trials that floated from the sky, looking down to make sure no one threatened or tried to overtake someone else’s turn. They were very serious about it all.

Alex looked around to check if he would notice any faces. There weren’t many that he recognized at all. There were Talia and Fang Yimu, who were standing with the rest of the alchemists from the Cloud Iron sect. 𝘯𝑜𝑣𝘦𝘭.𝘦𝑡

He had already met up with them and had spent some time yesterday. Today, they did not come to meet him and were instead focused on their own thing.

Aside from them, he noticed a few more people that he recognized but only by their faces. He had seen those people in passing in the Royal School of Alchemy a few times.

Most popular folks of the empire weren’t involved in production, so there weren’t many people here for him to meet. Not to mention, this section was just for the alchemy side of things. There were perhaps people with big names in one of the other 5 locations.

“Everyone has a decent amount of ingredients, right?” Alex asked his alchemists. “You will need to make pills inside, and you won’t get anything inside.”

“Yes, your majesty,” the alchemists answered in unison.

Alex nodded when he heard that and turned back toward the gate that would open at any minute now.

From what he had heard, no person controlled the entry to the hall. It was instead a spirit inside that did so, similar to the Sundering Sanctum, once again.

And it seemed the spirit was ready to take in guests as the Realm of Trials officially opened with a buzz that went through the entire area.

People could feel the trials opening up and then, the people were allowed in. From outside the walls, the soldiers placed the people into a line and sent them inside.

Alex and his group were the first ones. They walked inside the wall and went in a straight line until they arrived inside the building.

As they walked, Alex could feel spatial fluctuations around the door. His eyes narrowed a little. Something was off about this secret realm.

Spatial pockets gave spatial fluctuations as well, but this one was different from the others. It did not feel like he was walking into a secret realm.

Instead, it felt as if he was walking into the production room inside Senior Yang’s mansion.

‘This is no secret realm,’ he realized. ‘Its expanded space, made to work similar to a secret realm.’

In essence, the two did the same thing. Only one was natural and one was man-made.

Alex’s pupils glowed slightly purple as he looked at the aura around the area. A large formation was running in this place.

One by one, his alchemists started entering through the door. After they were all inside, Alex brought out Whisker and had him go through as well. He had wanted Whisker to take the trial as he was no weaker than any of them when it came to Alchemy.

Once Whisker walked through, he walked in as well, curious what it was all about.

As soon as Alex walked into the room, he arrived in an entirely dark room with no light whatsoever. Even when Alex tried to use some flames to light up the area, it was still dark. Not even his connection with Whisker remained other than just the normal connection through their bond.

He could see himself and the ground underneath his feet, but not his surroundings. He moved his hands around and felt some sort of barrier there.

‘I see,’ he thought. No wonder he couldn’t see anything. The same barrier had stopped his spiritual sense from entering as well.

He looked at the ground in front of him and saw a set of formations there for him to run himself. He had known about this before. This was here for him to use as a furnaces and would have to be run using his own spirit stones.

The first Azure Dragon that had prepared this place had not wanted to waste more energy than he had to. With everything including the space expansion running with the help of the formation, it would dry up the spirit vein underneath if they started allowing thousands of individuals to use up the Qi from the same locations every decade as well.

His eyes shifted as colors flooded his vision. Before the person in front of him had appeared, he had already looked up.

The man appeared, an illusory figure with a glowing body. At first, Alex noticed nothing wrong with the man, but when he focused on him, he started noticing discrepancies that made the man… less human.

Short illusory horns that branched into 3 segments on either side. Green hair that flowed behind his back, as if drifting in the wind. Slit eyes with green pupils.

Momentarily, Alex had a thought that came from something he had heard a long time ago through Bai Jingshen when he was still Shen Jing to Alex.

“They are just like humans. The only difference is that some of them have horns as well as colorful eyes and hair.”

Alex looked at the illusory figure that stood in front of him. Without even giving the figure a chance to say anything, he spoke out loud.

“Demon!”

The Illusory figure paused right as he was about to start. His eyes seemed to drift around before landing on Alex’s body.

He stared at Alex for a moment before Alex felt a spiritual sense land on him.

“I am no demon.”

Alex’s face changed immediately on two counts.

First, he was surprised that the spirit was not a demon at all. That made Alex curious as to what it was, but before even that, he was way too surprised because of the second reason.

The spirit had just communicated with him via his spiritual sense, which Alex didn’t know was possible at all. How could spirits use spiritual sense? How could they have spiritual energy?

That made no sense to Alex at all. He tried to understand just what was happening when he came upon a possibility that shocked him to his core.

His face shifted and he spoke in a low voice. “You’re not a spirit,” he said softly. “You’re a nascent soul.”

The man’s eyes changed imperceptibly and a small smile appeared on his face. “Interesting,” a voice flowed into Alex’s mind once again. “This is the first time anyone has recognized that I am not a spirit in a very long time. But, I must disappoint you as I am no mere Nascent Soul.”

“I am an Immortal Soul,” the man said. “I shall talk with you later. For now, my duty forces me.”

The man’s eyes looked around as if looking around a large audience. Alex looked at the black walls around him. He realized that there were other alchemists that were around him.

He simply couldn’t see them.

“My name is Qing Xiaolin,” the man spoke. “I am trial master of the Alchemy Trial. You shall go through various trials today, all prepared to test your knowledge and skills of Alchemy.”

The man explained things that most already knew about. He explained the purpose of this trial and how it was going to be held.

Alex wasn’t listening to any of it at all. Instead, he focused on the very first words the man spoke to everyone. His name.

Qing Xiaolin. Qing.

Alex’s eyes narrowed as he noticed something that he had ignored previously as he hadn’t known to look for it.

Scales. He saw scales on the man’s arm, that were somewhat hidden by his robes. After seeing the scales, the slit eyes and the forked horns started making sense.

This man was no demon after all.

He was the Immortal Soul of an Azure Dragon.